Given what I do for a living, I’m shown products that just make me think, “that would have been nice to have when my (baby/toddler/preschooler/fill-in-the-blank) was younger.”  By The Book Fill in manual for taking care of your kids is one more of these products.

It is both a guide for new parents to navigating the both the safety and transition elements of having caregivers other than Mom and Dad in the house.  While there are many “Nanny Logs” out there, this product goes much deeper than the ones I have seen.

Karmel Publishing’s “By The Book – Kids” binder has everything that a modern family needs to think about in terms of safety and convenience gathered together into one binder.  Not only are there basic logs about when little Johnny slept and ate but there are sections for parents to fill out about, “What do my kids like to eat or hate to eat (for breakfast/lunch/dinner/snacks),” “What do my kids like to play,” and “What are possible discipline methods for my kids.” The brilliant thing is that there are different pages for each kid so it is super easy to specify that Johnny hates peanut butter while Jason insists on it everyday. Also great with discipline methods since what you might specify for your 18 month old is not what you would tolerate with your 4 year old.

As the mother of kids of 3 very different ages, I also love the section on extra curricular activities, what they are, when they are, how to get your child there.  Each time I go away I find myself drawing up elaborate schedules for my husband, any participating grandparents, our nanny about who needs to be driven where, when and by whom.  Who is getting picked up by carpool and at what time – you get the drift.  What I love about this binder is that there is an easy referral mechanism so you don’t need to recreate the wheel if someone new needs to step in.  Plus – since it is a binder, when the schedule changes, you can easily rip out that page and just insert a new one.

What about refills?  There are two options, you can pay and get a .pdf version that you can reprint from you computer anytime you want – or you can just copy pages before you use the last one and always keep an extra.  Either way it’s easy to update this binder as your schedule and kids grow and change.

As I mentioned, this book goes a step deeper than everything I have seen.  In addition to the basic emergency contacts/allergies/etc it also has space and directions for taking care of more complex emergency needs including alarm instructions, where you keep emergency equipment (with a list of what you should have), authorization to treat a minor that parents can pre-sign and even a space to fingerprint your children and write down all children identifying details should you (I hope never) ever need that.  I am so impressed with the complete thoughtfulness and details of this book.  Plus at $19.95, you don’t have to make a huge investment for this type of convenience.

One last rave – for new parents, there are excellent information sections of how to hire a nanny or babysitter, questions to ask, even a Nanny application you can use to screen applicants.  It is really a complete go to guide that will live on parents kitchen counters for years to come – changing like the seasons and growing alongside your family.

Now the fun stuff!

Karmel Publishing is offering Strolling-Along readers a 25% discount when purchasing this guide.  Just use coupon code: BTBK7757 (case sensitive) when ordering.

Also for one lucky blog reader – you can score your own beautiful copy which we are giving away!

TO ENTER THIS GIVEAWAY: 

1)   Subscribe to this blog, Strolling-Along either via email or RSS reader and post a comment below letting us know you subscribed.

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