Party Princess [Hardcover]

Great Book!! Madison and her friends are back in Party Princess, the second book of the nine book series written by Dr. Vanita Braver, a child and adolescent psychiatrist and mother of three daughters. She blended her psychiatric knowledge with common events to build her story about inner beauty. Madison her main character wants to look extra pretty on her birthday. She wears her pretty pink velvet dress. She remembers how pretty she looked when she dressed up as a princess on Halloween and decides to help herself to Mom's makeup. After applying a little bright pink lipstick that missed her lips, some blush and eye shadow, Madison spied the glittery red nail polish. Madison thought how wonderful she would look with sparkling red nails, so she opened it up and painted her pinky. Poor Madison, a glob of sticky red polish dripped on her beautiful pink dress. She tries to rub it off with no success. She is so upset, the bottle tips over and red glittery nail polish spilled everywhere. Madison tries to clean up the mess, but she couldn't get the nail polish off. Mom comes in to find Madison and the mess. She doesn't yell, but Madison can feel her disappointment. Mom helps Madison clean up her face and change her dress before the party goers arrive.

Madison is feeling pretty low and is down in the dumps about wrecking her beautiful pink velvet dress. Madison's best friend Emily tells her she will feel better when she opens her gift, but Madison is not sure. Emily hands her the box and inside is the most wonderful doll. She knows Emily has wanted this doll for a long time, so she tells Emily they can share the doll. Wisdom the Owl and her Mom give her a nod of approval. That is when Madison realizes how pretty she feels on the inside.

Not only does Party Princess help children understand that true beauty comes from the inside, but it also, helps parents learn how to interact with their children when things don't go as planned. Parents can see how to respond in a calm and compassionate way. With all the images of perfection that bombard our children everyday, they can develop self-image problems at earlier and earlier ages. This is the perfect book to help combat these images before they become a problem.

Party Princess and the Teach Your Children Well Series is published by the Child & Family Press, an imprint of the Child Welfare League of America. They dedicate all the proceeds of their books to support CWLA programs for children and families.

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Sure to be one of those 'Read it again, Mommy!' favorites, this enchanting tale of a special day gone awry is sure to delight children and parents with its sunny humor and tender realism. Without heavy-handed moralizing, 'Party Princess', the second book in Dr. Braver's 'Teach Your Children Well' series delivers a gentle message for everyone: that sharing and forgiving are more beautiful than outward glamour, and that relationships with people are more meaningful than things..... The 'Teach Your Children Well' series by Child Psychiatrist, Vanita Braver, M.D. entertains and reassures children that they are loved and supported as they undergo impish real-life crises, and in addition--no small feat in itself--helps parents model their own mature responses to their children's mischief. The stories are sweetly amusing as adventures, but educational too as illustrations of the dilemmas and temptations that are part of every child's day. What is especially wise and consoling is the author's emphasis that moral trouble and moral redemption are not abstract commandments but aspects of living, intimate relationships. By placing human devotion at the center of ethical dramas, this series helps readers open their hearts to greater communication and trust between parent and child. Elizabeth Berger, M.D. Author, Raising Children with Character

Dr. Vanita Braver knows that it is difficult to teach our children well.

For starters, she's a child psychiatrist who is the psychiatric medical director of the residential treatment center Bonnie Brae. She's also a mother.

She took much of what she learned in both roles to create her series Teach Your Children Well. The second book in that series, Party Princess, released in April 2005, is a book that features 6-year-old Madison and the lessons she is learning about morals.

Party Princess opens with Madison getting ready for a big day. She's put on a lovely pink dress and is thrilled with how beautiful she feels. As she welcomes her best friend Emily as the first guest at her birthday party, she decides that some of her mom's makeup would make her look even more the role of a party princess. Only like most 6-year-olds, she isn't quite coordinated enough to put on make-up without making a huge mess-including spilling sparkly red nail polish all over the bathroom counter and her dress.

At this point in the story, many parents are nodding their hands and ready to jump up and tell their stories about times that they as a child or their own children have done something similar. It is this familiarity that Braver strives for-putting her protagonist into realistic situations that both parents and children can relate to.

What might be less common is the response of the mother. While she is obviously frustrated and shares her disappointment with Madison, she doesn't yell, she doesn't punish, and she doesn't make Madison feel worse than she already does. Instead, she just sends her to change out of the beloved party dress into something less desirable, but not smattered with nail polish.

Throughout much of the rest of the party, Madison sulks. While her mother may not have yelled at her, Madison feels her disappointment pretty keenly and feels guilty about her misbehavior and unhappy with the consequence of not getting to wear the pretty clothes that she had so carefully dressed herself in.

Her mood is only restored after opening a present and getting the opportunity to make Emily feel good-an opportunity that she takes advantage of to the approval of her mother and the delight of her friend. At bedtime that night, she and her mom talk about the makeup incident and her mom reminds her that she is never to touch the makeup without permission. She also reinforces that Madison is pretty without makeup-that she is beautiful because of the spirit within her. Madison reflects on the day and said that she felt far better about sharing with Emily than she did about wearing her party dress.

As a woman who dislikes the pervasiveness of makeup and the message from the beauty industry and media that we must change ourselves in order to be beautiful, I found a lot of appeal in this short picture book. Madison discovers on her own that she feels a lot better from being a beautiful person than she feels from simply looking beautiful. She also discovers that efforts to beautify oneself physically can backfire and leave one looking ridiculous, wiping out all the time invested.

A device that Braver uses in both books are the appearance of Madison's stuffed animals. Wisdom the Owl, Honesty the Bear, Hope the Bluebird, and Courage the Lion all are good friends to Madison the way stuffed animals are to children. For the adult reader, their presence can seem a bit of overkill. However, our children are less jaded and the target audience of four to eight-year-olds will appreciate the presence of listening companions who seemingly whisper in Madison's ear as she drifts off to sleep, helping her to process the day's events and what's she learned from them.

Cary Pillo is the illustrator and she uses bright happy colors throughout the books. She does an excellent job of painting pictures that seem alive with both motion and emotions. She paints some of the most infectious smiles I've seen in picture books.

The book is published by the Child & Family Press, an imprint of the Child Welfare League of America. They are a publishing house who dedicate all of the proceeds from sale of their books to supporting CWLA's programs for children and families.

I always approach morality stories for children with a bit of trepidation. They too often fall into the category of being too didactic or absent of any sort of dramatic conflict whatsoever. Thankfully, Braver manages to avoid these traps. Party Princess is successful on two levels. First, it has a charming story for children that addresses the importance of self-esteem and developing an inner beauty. Second, it provides a good model for parents on how to respond to those frustrating situations-including a model on when to step back and let the child work out the problem.

Party Princess is the second book in the series. The first one is Pinky Promise. The third one is due out in April 2006.

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