Toddler: Real-Life Stories of Those Fickle, Irrational, Urgent, Tiny People We Love [Paperback]

Jennifer Margulis (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 2, 2003

These tales capture all the hilarity, magic, and chaos of raising the complex little people we call toddlers. Poised between the baby’s and the child’s world, toddlers teach us to take joy in the roundness and the texture of a ball, in the comfort of a blanket, in the beauty of a spider web. They help us see the world differently with their wacky interpretations of everyday objects. They exasperate, defy, and devastate us, yet they fill us with a profound sense of awe. Readers share in the joy a father feels when his daughter looks at him and exclaims “dada!” (and the disappointment that follows when she addresses her sippy cup by the same name); in the struggle of a blind mother in keeping track of her very mobile two-year-old; in the frustration a mother—a family doctor—feels when the potty-training advice she routinely gives to worried parents doesn’t work with her four-year-old triplets; and in the hilarious resignation of a father who comes to realize that even his bathroom time is now a family event. Toddler mirrors the commonality of raising toddlers and reflects the joy and wonder that define this vital time in a child and parent’s life.

Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Seal Press (October 2, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 158005093X
• ISBN-13: 978-1580050937
• Product Dimensions: 7.5 x 5.6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (32 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,176,259 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Got Toddlers?, August 18, 2005

By 

Jen Singer "Author, You're a Good Mom (and Yo... (Kinnelon, NJ USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Toddler: Real-Life Stories of Those Fickle, Irrational, Urgent, Tiny People We Love (Paperback)

If you're living with those little irrational creatures who can switch on and off temper tantrums like a Rockin' Elmo doll, this book is for you. Frequently funny, at-times irreverent and always painfully true-to-life, "Toddler" is a classic that every parent of 1-3 year-olds should read... just as soon as the temper tantrum ends.

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Balanced and Dead On, May 11, 2005

By 

Marni Frankel (Silver Spring, Maryland) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Toddler: Real-Life Stories of Those Fickle, Irrational, Urgent, Tiny People We Love (Paperback)

At that certain time of night -- usually on a Sunday -- when everyone's tired and one or the other of my children is crumbling and crumbling loudly, I pull out this book. The essays are concise and well written and often out-and-out hilarious. At those moments when you feel that you must be the only person (OK, mother) in the world feeling what you feel, this book can be a lifesaver. And it does this without playing the political/gender role card. Kudos!

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A wonderful book, October 16, 2003

By 

Andrea Buchanan (Philadelphia, PA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Toddler: Real-Life Stories of Those Fickle, Irrational, Urgent, Tiny People We Love (Paperback)

TODDLER is a must-read for any parent of a child who has suddenly shape-shifted from a sweet, content, cooing infant to a suprisingly strong-willed 3-foot-tall drill seargant. Often, we mothers and fathers of toddlers keep our war stories to ourselves, trying in vain to sustain the illusion that we do, in fact, wear the pants in our house. But anyone who's actually been the caretaker of a stubborn developing human whose pointed goal of complete independence is continually thwarted by stature, social constraints, and parental interference knows who the boss really is. TODDLER is a kind of parenting tell-all, a first-person, behind-the-scenes glimpse of the toughest reality show there is: raising a child. Parents will be comforted to discover that their kid isn't the only one with inexplicable demands and intense preferences, and it will come as a relief to know that parents have plenty of company in the challenging experience of shepherding their charges through the hard-going terrain of two-year-old life. And yet the book is not all horror stories and I-can't-believe-she-said-that-in-front-of-the-neighbors incidents: while there is none of the treacly "but it's all worth it" sentiment that often pervades writing about life with young children, the book does feature sweet moments reminding us why it is we love our irascible, demanding, incredible toddlers as much as we do. TODDLER is a unique and wonderful book -- and a must-have addition to any mother or father's parenting library.

by Andrea Buchanan
Author of _Mother Shock: Loving Every (Other) Minute of It_(Seal Press)