Before You Were Big

It's a subject kids love to hear about-what was I like when I was little? It's also a subject parents can discuss to help prepare a preschooler for a new sibling-this is what the baby will be doing when he or she comes home from the hospital. With an instinctive sense of what matters to kids and the grown-ups who read to them, Jennifer Davis and Laura Cornell celebrate the extraordinary milestones of a child's first year. Before You Were Big is an irresistible, lift-the-flap follow-up to Before You Were Born, a spirited, kid-friendly, ingenious (Boston Globe) story of pregnancy with 122,000 copies in print. Each spread tells, foremost, the story of what happens month by month, from minutes after birth to baby's first birthday. Then, under the flaps, young brothers and sisters see how far they've come since. So when the main image is about a floppy two-month-old being bathed in the sink, under the flap it's: Now you've mastered the art of bubbly disguises,/So tub time is filled with jokes and surprises. A third layer gives facts about development, for example, how babies begin to prop themselves up in a catlike position by five months. Kids learn about soft spots and swaddling, first steps and parallel play. Jennifer Davis writes in whimsical, rhyming verse, while Laura Cornell-who is also the illustrator of Jamie Lee Curtis's bestselling children's books, with over 2.3 million copies in print-brings it all to life with her fun, bouncy, brightly colored art.