Rating: 
Summary: A new angle
Review: A hilarious take on parenthood. Very Clever!
Rating: 
Summary: Even good moms get the blues!
Review: Betsy Howie hooks the reader with the $$ gimmick but goes beyond the gimmick and straight to the heart of first time motherhood. This isn't really about the money at all, unless it's to say that babies are worth their weight in gold -- and then some! Any reader who thinks that raising kids is all sticky sweetness and sentiment should probably spend their money on a Thomas Kinkaid calendar instead of this book. But for those who appreciate unflinching honesty, don't take themselves too seriously, and are willing to acknowledge the whole range of mom-emotions, look no further. Like Anne Lamott's Operating Instructions, this book affirms the exhilaration of new motherhood while acknowledging that occassional bouts of the baby blues are perfectly normal. Add to that the fun that the author has at the expense of our acquisitive culture. Very funny -- and heartwarming too.
Rating:
Summary: Great book for a soon-to-be first time mom!
Review: Come on Jessica from Michigan, lighten up! You didn't "get" this book at all, did you even read it? She's not actually charging her daughter anything, just trying to figure out what it really costs financially, and even more so the huge life changes involved in having a child. And her eventual point is that we ALL owe each other... in ways that you can't ever really count, and it doesn't matter because you can't count what you get in return either. I certainly owe my mother more than I could ever pay her, for the financial, physical, and emotional sacrifices she's made. I expect that it will be the same way when I have a daughter... in fact, my having a daughter is one way of trying to repay my mother. That's just how it goes. This book made me think, more than anything else I've read, about what my mother's done for me, and the changes that I'll go through when my baby is born. I laughed, I cried, and I have a whole new appreciation for my mom, and for what I'm getting ready to do. I plan to buy it for the next friend who gets pregnant!
Rating:
Summary: Great book for a soon-to-be first time mom!
Review: Come on Jessica from Michigan, lighten up! You didn't "get" this book at all, did you even read it? She's not actually charging her daughter anything, just trying to figure out what it really costs financially, and even more so the huge life changes involved in having a child. And her eventual point is that we ALL owe each other... in ways that you can't ever really count, and it doesn't matter because you can't count what you get in return either. I certainly owe my mother more than I could ever pay her, for the financial, physical, and emotional sacrifices she's made. I expect that it will be the same way when I have a daughter... in fact, my having a daughter is one way of trying to repay my mother. That's just how it goes. This book made me think, more than anything else I've read, about what my mother's done for me, and the changes that I'll go through when my baby is born. I laughed, I cried, and I have a whole new appreciation for my mom, and for what I'm getting ready to do. I plan to buy it for the next friend who gets pregnant!
Rating:
Summary: Great book for a soon-to-be first time mom!
Review: Come on Jessica from Michigan, lighten up! You didn't "get" this book at all, did you even read it? She's not actually charging her daughter anything, just trying to figure out what it really costs financially, and even more so the huge life changes involved in having a child. And her eventual point is that we ALL owe each other... in ways that you can't ever really count, and it doesn't matter because you can't count what you get in return either. I certainly owe my mother more than I could ever pay her, for the financial, physical, and emotional sacrifices she's made. I expect that it will be the same way when I have a daughter... in fact, my having a daughter is one way of trying to repay my mother. That's just how it goes. This book made me think, more than anything else I've read, about what my mother's done for me, and the changes that I'll go through when my baby is born. I laughed, I cried, and I have a whole new appreciation for my mom, and for what I'm getting ready to do. I plan to buy it for the next friend who gets pregnant!
Rating: 
Summary: This book left me bitter towards the woman who wrote it.
Review: First of all, this woman has "unprotected sex for several weeks" and now she has the nerve to bill her first born for all the expenses. If she made the choice to to put herself in that situation then she should have been responsible for the outcome. Her daughter Callie was in no way indebted to her mother for her mother's actions. This book was dreadful and I can't imagine any mother indebting her own unborn child.
Take responsibility for your own actions, your child owes you nothing. So I guess Callie will be billing her mother for all Callie's psychologist appointments when she is older.
Rating:
Summary: This book left me bitter towards the woman who wrote it.
Review: First of all, this woman has "unprotected sex for several weeks" and now she has the nerve to bill her first born for all the expenses. If she made the choice to to put herself in that situation then she should have been responsible for the outcome. Her daughter Callie was in no way indebted to her mother for her mother's actions. This book was dreadful and I can't imagine any mother indebting her own unborn child.
Take responsibility for your own actions, your child owes you nothing. So I guess Callie will be billing her mother for all Callie's psychologist appointments when she is older.
Rating:
Summary: Poor Callie!
Review: I found the book mean-spirited and not at all funny. This was $[money] that would have been better spent on my unborn child.
Rating:
Summary: A non-mom reviewer
Review: I loved this book!!! As I contemplate future parenthood, this book hit just the right chord. It was funny, irreverent, sincere, and an honest look at being a new mom without sugar coating a thing! It's similiar to the Shopaholic series (which I also loved), but perfect for the next phase in one's life. If you want a laugh out loud book, this is it.
Rating:
Summary: I laughed, I cried - truly a great book!
Review: I read this book in a single sitting. Incredibly funny and fast reading, with the individual vignettes, it was impossible to put down. As the mother of five grown children, and the grandmother of 8, I found this book to be most entertaining and enlightening! How many of us have NOT wondered about the actual costs involved in bringing our kids into this world? It was refreshing to be able to look at Callie's "list" and know that those years are well behind me, thank goodness! Ah........ but I definitely could still relate. Betsy Howie has a special knack of making the reader feel a part of the unfolding drama of expecting and raising Callie through her first year. The book certainly brought back memories of my child-rearing years, and I once again found myself trying to find ways to "cut corners" with those expenses. :-) I found myself looking forward to the next party, the next "event", the next receipt... Another plus was Ms. Howie's reporting of the actual feelings she experienced with raising her daughter. Life isn't always a bed of roses when it comes to kids, and Ms. Howie honestly expressed her frustrations, her fears, her delights and her pride in her daughter. Such candor can often be lacking in works of non-fiction. And all of this is written with an underlying message that the dollars are not to be taken too seriously, that the expense is "worth it", and that in the end you get more than what you pay for. This is a definite "must have" for parents-to-be as well as grandparents, when the cycle actually begins anew. Which makes me wonder when "Bob" will publish HER accounting of grandmahood! It would be interesting to see which list tallies higher (been there, done that!).
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