The results are in. Ten parent bloggers reviewed Ready for the Day and Ready for Bed. The consensus can be summed up in two words, “overwhelming success.”
Both books, written by Stacey Kaye and illustrated by Elizabeth O. Dulemba, claim to help parents as well as children navigate through the daily morning/night routines with less stress while building the child’s emotional intelligence.
“On the surface it seems like the books might be geared toward helping kids learn how to transition through routines like breakfast or bedtime without sass or stress,” observes one reviewer. While the book does help children (ages three to six) learn how to power up (or 
power down) for the day, “the goal is provide more effective communication alternatives to the bribing, timeouts, and other means to an end that parents use either as their modus operandi, or simply when they’re pushed to a breaking point by their kid’s behavior.”
One such effective communication alternative? Learning to fine tune our language — to speak one of positive parenting. But sometimes that’s easier written than practiced. Thankfully, the adults in both books model this type of behavior.
“As the story unfolds for each book, different parenting phrases are highlighted to show examples of the parent validating feelings, offering choices, and giving encouragement,” writes one reviewer. “In Ready for the Day!, the child whines about wanting to stay home with her dad instead of going to school. Her dad follows up on the whining with, ‘I know just how you feel. I wish we could spend the day together too.’ He doesn’t say what might be the first reaction for many of us, ‘Stop whining’.”
Along with touting the potential of positive parenting language, there’s also a few more fuss fighting tactics mentioned – like giving kids choices and talking through a child’s feelings. Readers appreciated these aspects.
“I enjoy seeing real world examples that remind me how I can personally follow this approach in real life,” notes a reviewer. “That’s exactly what both of these books do. For example when Marco doesn’t want to get ready for bed, his mother offers him a choice between swimming like a fish or flying like an airplane to get to bed. Similarly the dad offers Maya the choice of a shirt and shorts or a daisy dress when she doesn’t want to get dressed.”
This same blogger eagerly adds, “In addition to providing me with new ways to present choices and new ideas for what choices I may offer, the books helped me focus on realistic parental responses that validate a child’s feelings. There aren’t any fairies or cuddly bunnies in these books. Instead, each book has a parent and a child interacting to go through a couple of daily rituals.” Another blogger wholeheartedly concurs, sharing her thoughts on the subject: “It’s important for our children to know that we were kids once, too, and that we know how they feel. This encourages cooperation and children become more calm and less likely to start a screaming tantrum.”
Overall, these readers took the messages of both books, which are published by Free Spirit, to heart.
“Ready for the Day and Ready for Bed reminds both me and my husband as well as our daughter about compromise and making correct decisions to cut down on the amount of drama in our lives,” writes on apt reviewer. A second blogger adds, “I will say that the Ready books also were effective in validating my feelings. It might take a little more work and an adjustment in perspective and communication style to start talking the positive parenting talk, but the fact of the matter is that the techniques do work.”
While many of the children were delighted by the vibrant illustrations and entertained by the storylines, we wondered if reviewers saw changes within themselves and their children once they began reading the books together. Indeed they did.
“After a week of reading the stories, I noticed more cooperation on Dawson’s part. But even more amazing was that I noticed I was willing to be more patient with my son,” marvels one blogger. Another one chimes in with her experience: “After just one reading of Ready for Bed, for instance, Chicky was much more willing to ‘take turns’ brushing her teeth. Which really amounts to her asserting her independence enough to make her happy and me being able to brush dinner from between her tiny teeth. A win/win situation, if you ask me.”
Ready for the Day and Ready for Bed also be found on Amazon.
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