Rating: 
Summary: Life Saver!
Review: Please believe all the great reviews of this book! They are nothing but the truth. Ms. Ford saved my sanity as a part-time single Mom (My husband is in the Army). I tried the Sears method and it left me with cracked bleeding nipples from feeding on demand. I tried the Babywise book but found that 2 men writing a book on infant care tended to leave out a lot of details. This book helped me in that I am overseas and don't have the help and advice of family and just nailed down every little detail of our daughter's day. I can't stress enough how great this book is. Thank you Ms. Ford!
Rating:
Summary: Excellent book for open-minded readers
Review: I think this book is a wonderful alternative to the hundreds of "how to" parenting books out there. Trends today focus on "feeding on demand" and allowing the child to take the lead when it comes to sleeping, eating, etc. I believe there are benefits to this line of thinking, but I also feel that infants and toddlers can thrive in a structured environment. While you may not agree with all of the recommendations in this book, it certainly gives you something to think about. Pick and choose what works for you.
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Summary: Baby Bible !!!!
Review: As you can tell from previous reviews of this book, you either love it or hate it. If you feel confident that you understand what your childs needs are from the word go then you probably dont need advice - especially books telling you what to do. How ever, if you are like my wife and I, with little support from family due to our work location and this is your first baby this book is a life saver. It was recommended to us by several couples who have had a fantastic experience with the book - I therefore feel obliged to pass on this good review (the first I have written for Amazon) since we have found bringing up a baby for the first time a pleasure. The idea is that the baby is happy, smiling and sleeps well regularly. Everyone has different opinions on how this should be accomplished, but if your baby is having problems sleeping through the night or you feel you need some pointers...its simple...buy this book...its great.
Rating: 
Summary: Truly Sad...
Review: I am the happy mother of a happy, sleeping-through-the-night from 8 pm to 7:30 am 15 month old. He slept in his parent's bed (until he was 1 year old), breastfed on demand (he weaned himself at 13 months) and was tended to when he cried (his only form of telling us he needed us). I followed my instincts as a mother, not acted like a machine. I treat my dog better than this woman treats babies. This book sets parenting back to the dark ages.
Rating:
Summary: If I could give it zero stars I would
Review: What is so wrong with holding and soothing a baby? Why must we feed them when it is good for us? Who am I to say what a baby, or anyone else for that matter, really needs? There is much more that can go wrong with a baby than the "hungry,burp,poop" idea. Don't you ever want to just be held for "no good reason"? It is so important to just be there. This is just what society needs... another book to tell us what is good for someone else and neglect the truth that we are social beings who need to be loved and understood! It is what we need as adults, so do we feel it neccessary to abandon that need in infants who only expect to be loved and nothing else? She might have ideas about how to get babies to conform, but I would love to see her babies all grown up feeling unloved, with food issues, and every thing else that goes along with institutionalized way of living. So sad :(
Rating:
Summary: Best Book Ever!!!
Review: What a great book! You can read and understand the concept in a couple of hours. Children need a sleeping and eating schedule. The problem is that most pediatricians only tell you to feed on demand. As a new mother I was totally overwhelmed and didn't know what was good for my baby. Now I have the confidence to put her down so that she can sleep. If she cries for a few minutes I don't mind because I know that she is tired and that I am doing the right thing. Gina Ford has worked with hundreds of children: why not benefit from her vast experience!?
Rating:
Summary: A Life Saver!!!!
Review: Having initially read the Contented Little Baby book, I thought that I could do it better myself and I listened to my Health Visitors etc who said just to let my baby find his own pattern. What a big mistake! Eventually at the end of my tether, when my son was 11 months old I got the book out again and started to try to set up a routine. I actually rang Gina Ford and had telephone consultations, as I was so exhausted I was on the verge of post natal depression. Gina was my one sane lifeline and taught me from scratch how to feed my baby properly. Jack was eating jars of baby food (all organic) but they were not satisfying him due to a lack of protein and I ended up getting up 6 times a night to breastfeed him. With Gina's help he was down to 1 feed at night within a very short space of time and the next thing we had to crack was the sleep training, which we did with Gina's help and encouragement. It took 3 nights to get Jack to sleep and it was dreadfully hard listening to him crying for 40 minutes at a time, but had I followed the book properly from the start I would have been able to look back on Jack's babyhood with fond memories and not in a horrible blur. Jack now sleeps from 6.30pm till 7.30am!!!!! Exhaustion is the most dreadful thing and people are conditioned that it is part of the territory of being a parent, well thanks to Gina Ford and her marvellous book, that does not have to be the case. We now enjoy our little boy and he is far less ill and is in great humour most of the time. Babies need sleep and they need routine and adults need the same thing to be able to cope with babies! I get so irked when I hear a poor review of Gina's book as I feel the time has come for baby books to get back to basics, the modern way of parenting without routine leads to frazzled parents and eventually naughty children who are desperate for some consistency in their lives. I know - I was one!!!! Every friend of mine who has just had a baby gets Gina's book from me as a gift and everyone swears by it! I can thoroughly recommend this book and can't wait more books by Gina Ford.
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Summary: A Must-Have for Every New Mother
Review: Gina Ford's "Contented Little Baby Book" is a must-have for all new mothers. It was the best gift my mother gave me. The book is an invaluable source of information - from telling us what to buy for the new addition to the family, to the establishment of routines to ensure that you have a contented, well-fed and well-rested little baby (and mother!). Miss Ford tells you what is a necessity and what are unnecessary luxuries when preparing a nursery, etc. Gina Ford's routines really work! My husband and I can vouch for that. I came home from hospital with my two-day-old daughter and went straight into the first stage of the routine. The book was superglued to us for the first few weeks. It is amazing - it instructs new parent on all we need to know, from when to change nappies to how much milk to express, etc. By following the routines I can honestly say that we only had six disturbed nights with our daughter in the first four months, and from then on she has slept from 7pm to 7am every night. I am sure that the book played a crucial role in achieving a contented little baby - I might add that she is now 16 months old and I still follow Gina's routines. The book is simple to follow and full of common sense. I personally think that all new mothers should be given it free!
Rating:
Summary: Fantastic
Review: As first time parents with absolutely zero knowledge of babies, Gina's book has become our greatest aid. We indeed have a Contended Little Baby (now aged 6 months) who has slept from 7pm-7am every single night since 5 months and who is a happy, happy little girl. We follow Gina's book pretty much to the letter, with a few exceptions and our baby loves the schedule. Buy it, read it from cover to cover and be strong to stick with her schedules for a few days and watch your baby become lovely and content! Gina can be a little strict, so you do need to use your own intuition - but trust her, she knows what she's talking about. All in all, we LOVE this book and recommend it to all parents who enjoy some sort of order in their lives.
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Summary: This book is flying off the shelves in the UK
Review: Thank God this book is now available in the US - I've spent a fortune mailing copies to all my friends in the States! Over hear in the UK its reached something of a cult status as people have found it mostly through word of mouth. If you want to put your baby on a schedule you MUST read this book. If you thought you didn't need a schedule and are now walking around with huge bags under your eyes, wondering if you'll ever be awake enough to enjoy your baby, buy this book and you won't believe your luck! Ford realizes that we parents love and adore our children and would throw ourselves off a cliff for them so she leaves the mushy stuff to us and concentrates on the nuts and bolts of the operation. Frankly this approach is a breath of fresh air! There seems to be a huge gap in the market - all these self-help parenting guides espouse on theories from afar of how we should bring up our child but before Ford nobody seemed to have the guts to get down to the nitty gritty and guide us through a typical day hour by hour. Her routines change along with the baby as he grows and we have the benefit of her foresight as she introduces practices that avoid possible pitfalls further down the road. Quite simply her methods work. I bought the book when my baby was 5 weeks and he was sleeping an eight-hour stretch in the evening before the week was up. At 4 months he was sleeping a twelve-hour stretch. At 7pm I put my baby in his crib awake, he usually blows raspberries and smiles, I give him a kiss turn out the lights and that's it! Not another peep until 7am when I go in and wake him myself. And no he was not naturally an easy baby - I couldn't have done it without this book. The schedule also structures the baby's daytime sleep so that as he grows he'll be left with one nap that is cleverly positioned to offer the best possible rest for parent and child while avoiding overtired hyperactive toddler syndrome! But it's not just a book about sleep; it shows you how to wean the baby so that the transition from 7 bottle feeds to 3 square meals a day is a seamless one. I can't believe I have a baby who loves vegetables as much as, if not more than, fruit! I found the advice on breastfeeding excellent, by following the expressing schedule I was able to keep my milk supply up enough to reach my goal of breastfeeding my very large baby for the first six months of his life. There's also a chapter on what to buy for the nursery, which my husband is forever grateful for because it helped me avoid my usual practice of ending up with a closet full of 'things' which are of no use. This book is simply packed with valuable practical information and manages to look after both the child AND parent. Ford is one of the few childcare experts today who seems to really understand that the parent and child are interdependent on each other - if the baby isn't happy we aren't happy and vice versa. So with her book everyone wins - the child has all the sleep and food he needs to get the best possible start in life and the parent is well rested enough to enjoy the child and give him the love and attention he deserves and also have some quiet time alone with their partner to boot! And for all us 'Gina Junkies' she's come up with a follow-on book to help see us through the terrible twos. My friends are going to have to wait until that one is published in the US.
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