A Journal for Baby's First Year by Eric Carle
48 pages	Chronicle	August 2006	Paperback

Anyone even remotely familiar with Eric Carle’s classic story about the very hungry caterpillar will derive great pleasure from the newest addition to Carle’s commercial line. In A Journal for Baby’s First Year, he has created a wonderful book with empty pages, to be filled with the stories and memories from your baby’s first year of life.

I have actually invested a great deal of time into trying to uncover the perfect home for the memories of a baby’s first significant moments. Most books I have come across either do not ask for enough information or, worse, ask for too much detailed information about memories I know I will never remember to (or have time to) capture. Many other available keepsake books include a religious theme, which makes the gift less universally appealing for parents of different denominations. A Journal for Baby’s First Year is a welcome and much-needed option that offers the perfect balance between all of my desires, and the fact that the pages are scattered with pictures immediately recognizable as related to Eric Carle’s classics is a wonderful bonus.

The book includes pages to be filled with basic information on the family tree of the mother and father as well as how they first met. It provides room to include handprints, footprints, and how the baby’s name was finally selected. There are pages for many “firsts” including first tooth, foods, crawl, and steps, as well as baby’s first Halloween. Some pages allow for flexibility and creativity with such broad categories as special moments and special celebrations. I appreciate the book’s appeal to a wide audience in asking for items related to a baby’s first holiday without specifying exactly what holiday should be included.

The book is a charming one that will fit right alongside the many others in a child’s library. I like the idea that it is the same size as any other book that your child may declare as their own, making it more likely that this collection of special moments will be treasured for years to come. The book also has an incredibly durable presentation with a brightly illustrated cover in a smooth and resilient surface, presumably to be passed around and admired by a wide range of guests interested in seeing the chronicle of your child’s journey to the very important age of one.