If you could recommend one book to a first time mum...

[bumperlicious]

Due in about 5 weeks or so and I have read a few comments on MN about people who wished they had read a little bit past all the pg and labour stuff to the bit at the back of the books that tells you what they hell you do with the baby when you get home!

In light of this was having a look at some parenting books e.g. Contended little baby, the Sears Baby book and a miriam stoppard one and was wondering which to get. Don't want to spend loads at this stage so was just wondering if you could recommend one book to a first time mum what would it be?

Dr Sears and Penelope Leach. Go with the floooooowwww... babies find their own routine and have been for millennia.

Hi Bumperlicious, I'll be delighted to pass on Three in a Bed and the No-Cry book - will e-mail you with their combined weight and a suggested amount for postage.

Fan of baby whisperer too - particularly for help with sleeping probs - found it to be helpful for getting a very "loose" routine, but not prescriptive about schedules which suited me because I do like a bit of routine but want it to be flexible around a bit of spontaneity in life and around the personality of individual babies (if that makes any sense at all)

Can't remember which books had good bfing advice tbh although I did like the Baby Whisperers "dream feeds" - they worked for me.

imo, What to expect the first Year - i found it conscisce, helpful, not too preachy, easy to flick through, good all round book deals with most crisis/queries

what to expect the first year

oo forgot to i hated baby whisperer dont want to be libelous so will leave it at that

MUMSNET BOOK IS FAB

ooo interesting did not know there was one

I bought 'what to expect - the first year' ina charity shop and it was so bad I ahd to put it out for recycling as i couldn't bear to think of another mother being taken in by its twaddle

'drink a pint of milk a day or else the qaultiy of your breatsmilk will suffer' indeed

The only baby books you will like will be the ones that confirm the way that - in your heart - you REALLY want to parent.

Personally though I'd recommend a nice novel instead.

agree with morningpaper of course there is no definitive book its ur baby u will instinctively develop a style that suits them and u

Agree yes get yourself a bloody good novel and some DVD too

The Best Friend's Guide to Motherhood by Vicky Iovine - its so chilled out and really made me feel better about myself!

Contented Baby book by Gina Ford. I'd cellotape a small sachet containing a pinch of salt to the inside cover and put a bookmarker on the pages about day time sleep routines.

Can I recommend NOT going into bookstores with small plastic bags full of pinches of salt BTW

penelope leach - your baby and child

is it true that you can now get a haynes manual for babies?or was somebody winding me up?

'yes,i'd like the haynes manual for the 2003 hyperactive blonde male please'

OK, maybe you'd need something larger than a pinch of salt with some of it, but honest, i found it really useful.

Maybe you need two books at extreme ends of the spectrum so you can get to grips with the opposite ideas and then find your own middle way??

Well, ScottishMummy, DH and I referred lovingly to a certain large manual that YOU loved (the pg one and it's sequels) as "the paranoia guide to pg"

To be fair it did cover everything anyone in the whole wide world could ever want to know about everything that could go right and and could go wrong during pg and early parenthood.

Im currently reading this Child of our Time

worth a look as it covers birth to 5 years

Oooh Yurtgirl I would love to read that - love the tv show too.

LOL - i am that paranoid 1st timer

eg shade a babe to go 2meters across street
Huge changing bag with every item
other just in case items too
factor 750 even when cloudy...

i could go on ..but i get embarrassed

Probably The Art Of War by Machiavelli

LOL ScottishMummy (I think the word PARANOID is a synonym for FIRST TIME MUM - you are not alone!)

LOL oh so funny how a wee thing can reduce u to gibbering paranoid fretful wreckc - and thats just planning to go out