What Makes A Baby

Super brilliant book for parents who are grappling how to explain it right!! Loved it! Everyone should read it for info!

Great book to extend knowledge for our children ages 7 and 9. Goes into a little more detail without too much.

Libro facile, colorato e molto carino. Ho spiegato a mia figlia (7 anni) dopo svariate domande come si fanno i bambini, con un linguaggio semplice senza raccontare fandonie e senza creare traumi. Top. È in inglese ma veramente easy.

I got this book for my 2 year old. There is no mention of gender in this entire book. The book does not show genitals or sex in any way. It says "some bodies have sperm in them, and some do not." With a picture of a completely androgynous person, with a little picture of a sperm close to where the sperm would really be in their body. I recommend this book for every kid in the world and stress that there is no such thing as being too young for this book. Older kids may like it as well, it isnt cheesy and uses real words. The only mention of genitals in this is the word "vagina" but it does not show one. It only talks about the fact that "some babies are born by coming out of a part of the body most people call the vagina" and it shows a picture of a midwife taking a baby out of the vagina in a birds eye view, so that we dont see the vagina. The opposite page shows a c section and explains that the doctor makes a hole, takes the baby out, and closes the hole. The picture is not scary and shows zero blood or gore, but is realistic and easy to see what is happening. There is a picture of the baby upside down inside of a person's body with the umbilical cord. They show a picture of a uterus and explain that some bodies have uteruses and some do not, and that babies grow inside the uterus. There is a picture with lots of people, and some of those people have a uterus and some do not in the picture. Again I stress that there is no gender in this book which is fantastic. The pictures are very colorful and fun, yet informative. The single only complaint I have is that it doesnt talk about the sperm going into the egg, but just the sperm dancing with the egg. After we read the words on that page I just always add "and then the sperm goes in the egg." I think thats all that's really needed. This book started a really nice conversation between my little one and I and now if I ask, my two year old can tell me which parent had an egg, and which parent had a sperm to make my little one and who had a uterus where my little one grew and got bigger and bigger (the book shows pictures of the stages of development) and then came out and how. This book also does not talk about "mommies and daddies" which is great since we have a Daddy and Shoey in our house, and no Mommy. I would recommend this book for families who adopted or had a surrogate, etc. It just talks about a sperm and an egg, but doesnt say anything about what kind of people "should" have a sperm or an egg or a uterus. There is no mention of male or female or intersex or man or woman, etc. It also shows a lot of different families, family members, and babies, but they are very diverse and a lot of them are very androgynous. I haven't looked too much but there may or may not be obviously gay couples, nonbinary couples, and families with 3 or more parents. Super duper inclusive. I love this book. It is absolutely perfect for our family. Perfect for your queer kids and gaybies too. xD

This book is perfectly inclusive and just exactly what I was looking for to complement the more mainstream "Amazing You" book by Dr. Gail Saltz. Amazing You!: Getting Smart About Your Private Parts In an extremely inclusive way, it guides children through a basic, colourful, non-gender-conforming understanding of the elements required to create a baby, without even ONCE making reference to a pronoun. I didn't know how they'd do that, but the end result is amazing. I would wholeheartedly recommend this book to anyone seeking an honest, accurate no-fuss description of the components required to make a baby. It gets the child to ask themselves who in their lives were waiting for their arrival - a great chance to discuss with ALL children the different ways of being born - from full-term with a biological parent, to adoption, to surrogacy, to surgical deliveries - its a well thought out beginning to many, many doscussions. My son is 4, and I can see that we can go back to this book for several years and just add on different layers as he's ready for them. I am *so* glad I saw this book on an online list, because I knew I wanted nothing religious, nothing that minces words, all while being aware of - and open to things other than - gender-normative terms. As a Birth Doula I especially appreciated the time to mention both vaginal and surgical deliveries. It was a nice touch. Overall this is a great starting point for discussions with a young child, even though my family's CIS-ness made other similar books "accessible". I wanted to do better than that.

I bought this book to help me explain to my egg-donor daughter about the origins of life as simply, broadly and as inclusively as I could. I was blown away by how well the author Cory has achieved this. Cory doesn't mention gender, instead differentiating those who have and don't have sperm, eggs or a uterus. Neither is the sexual act mentioned, just what is required, essentially the egg, sperm and uterus, as well as it being something the parents decide to do, and the illustration suggest conception as a happy event. The illustration are also non-gender specific, alloiwng for the explaination that not all men have sperm, and not all women may have eggs or a uterus. Personally the inclusion of the uterus alongside the egg and sperm really validated for me, my part in my daughters journey, so often in birth books it is just veiwed as a container, but Corys' line; ' How a baby grows depends on the stories that the egg and sperm share, and on the uteus the baby is growing inside of.' brought me close to tears, and was hugely validating. Of course conception does not always result in a live birth and the fact that the 'brand new thing' created by the joining of egg and sperm does not always grow also allows parents who have had previous failed treatments or miscairrages to sensitively explain this to their child, if they so wish. There is so much room for parents to weave in their own childs individual and unique journey from conception to birth, allowing for all the possible combinations and variations in fertility treatments, and surgical as well as natural birth that I really can't think of any situation there this book would not apply, including of course stright forward natural conception and birth.