Books About Babies

I may still be in the early part of my pregnancy, but my children are very excited about the pregnancy and they are anxiously awaiting the arrival of their new sibling.  They are constantly asking when the baby will be born and what the baby will be able to do when he or she is born.

My sister sent the perfect book to address a lot of those questions.

There's Going to Be a Baby by John Burningham and Helen Oxenbury follows the swirl of questions in the mind of a young child anticipating a baby sibling with excitement, curiosity, and just a bit of trepidation.  The book begins with a mother telling her young son that there is going to be a baby.  This statement is followed by the boy's questions and the mother's answers over the entire pregnancy.  He asks questions like, "When is the baby coming?" , "What will we call it?", "What will the baby do?", and even says, "We don't really need the baby, do we?".  The mother's answers are perfect; I am keeping them in the back of my head!  At the end of the book, the young boy is on his way to meet his new sibling with his grandfather.  We aren't reading too many books about babies at this point, but this is the perfect book to read from the time of the announcement to the time of the birth.

Of course, when you tell a young child that there is going to be a new baby in the family, one of the inevitable questions is, "Where do babies come from?".

How You Were Born by Joanna Cole is a Reading Rainbow Book that uses photographs, diagrams, and straightforward text to answer that question and all related questions.  The book explains that a sperm and an egg join together without giving too much information about exactly how that happens.  It's enough for my children to know that it takes a man and a woman.  The book goes on to explain what is happening to the baby inside the uterus and finally how the baby is born.  You don't have to be expecting a baby to read this book with your children.  We have read it many times over the past year, and it is a great book to help your child understand how he or she came to be.

I'm sure we will be reading many books about babies as the due date gets closer.  Do you have a favorite book for a child expecting a new sibling?

I am linking this to What My Child is Reading at Mouse Grows, Mouse Learns.