Monday, September 13th at 7 PM at The Pump Station Westlake 2879 Agoura Rd. Westlake Village, CA 91361

Wednesday, September 15th at 7 PM at The Little Seed 219 N. Larchmont Blvd. LA 90004

Thursday, September 16th at 7 PM at The Pump Station Santa Monica 2415 Wilshire Blvd. Santa Monica, CA 90403

You don’t have to be a celebrity to get an amazing swag bag! On September 13^th, 15^th and 16^th I will be giving away incredible gift bags at the Los Angeles book signing for my new book SuperBaby: 12 Ways to Give Your Child a Head Start in the First 3 Years. The first 50 people to buy two or more books at each of the signings will get a gift bag. These bags are filled with my favorite products, most of which I recommend in SuperBaby: 12 Ways to Give Your Child a Head Start in the First 3 Years. Each gift bag is valued at approximately $200 and has merch from the following companies:

Signing Time! ● Hanna Andersson ● Baby Legs ● Seventh Generation ● Uncle Goose ● Putumayo ● Parents Magazine ● EcoSystems ● Zoli Baby ● Born Free ● Naturepedic ● Burt’s Bees ● Cleanwell ● SuperGoop ● Retail Therapy ● Gdiapers ● Eat Cleaner ● Farm Fresh to You ● Earth Mama, Angel Baby ● Happy Baby Foods ● BabyGroup ● Homemade Harvey ● Herban Essentials ● Nature’s Paradise ● Baggu Bags ● EIO Cups ● Sensible Foods ● The Pump Station ● Healthy Child Healthy World ● The Environmental Working Group ● PETA ● and many more…

For the most up to date info on the events, the book, the swag bags and upcoming event raffles follow me on Twitter and Facebook. To preorder books and qualify for the swag bag go to Rare Bird and make an advance purchase. Keep in mind, you still must show up to the event to collect your bag.

To RSVP to the events email SuperBaby@SterlingPublishing.com and indicate which signings you will attending.

Do your best to include him. Teach him how to do the baby related tasks so that he feels confident. If he doesn’t do it exactly the same way you do it, let it go unless he is doing something dangerous. Help him build on his growing strengths as a father.

Holding and rocking a baby is very instinctual and any parent knows it feels wonderful. But did you know that it is also advantageous to your child’s development? Here are a few reasons why:

1. It helps digestion. According the Ashley Montagu, author of the book Touching: The Human Significance of Skin, rocking assists the movement of the intestine like a pendulum and thus serves to improve digestion and absorption.

2. It calms the baby. Researchers have found that we naturally rock our babies at the same 60-70 cycles per minute pace that they experience in utero. Also, the synchrony that tends to result in the parent and infants heart rate recreates the familiar environment that was so soothing in utero.

3. It helps the inner ear. Part of the calming effect comes from the inner ear, which maintains equilibrium. Rocking helps infants to find their place in space and ultimately to keep their heads up in a neutral position.

4. It helps promote healthy weight gain. A study of twins, where one twin was rocked thirty minutes twice a day and the other was not rocked at all, found that the rocked infant gained weight faster than the non-rocked twin in every single instance.

5. Rocked infants are better able to track visual and auditory stimuli. Professor Mary Neal’s study of rocked infants found that, not only were rocked infants better able to follow visual and auditory stimuli but, they also gained more weight than non-rocked infants in a control group.

6. It helps circulation. According to Montagu, “Rocking, in both babies and adults, increases cardiac output and is helpful to circulation; it promotes respiration and discourages lung congestion; [and] it stimulates muscle tone….”