With a curious eye for quirky ways to engage with her baby, Bianca Ebeling was recently featured in the October 2015 issue of MY CHILD for her brilliant idea of self publishing a developmental black and white board book for newborns and babies aged till six months. Bianca talks to Baby Peppers about the influence of black and white colours in an infant’s life and the conception of ‘Let’s Go Outside’.
Like all mothers, Bianca noticed that her newborn was drawn to only specific items around the house while other items, noticeably bigger, were completely oblivious to her baby boy. “My newborn was incredibly drawn to a specific light fitting, a painting, and my pyjamas”. The reasons for this only became apparent after Bianca attended a mother’s group session at her local library in Geelong. Apart from highlighting the importance of reading to babies from a very young age, the librarian also stressed the importance of a baby’s developing eye sight and how parents could help with the development. “Up until the age of six months, babies can only see in black and white and are drawn to high contrast objects.” says Bianca, who was initially surprised at this information.
The session provided new insight for Bianca and it all started making sense when Bianca realised the colours of the light fitting, the painting and her pyjamas – the three things that her newborn was so drawn to. They were all black and white.
“My little one simply hated tummy time and after the library session, I placed a black and white book in front of him and it was as if a magic switch had been flicked. He was lasting so much longer on his tummy than ever before, and actually enjoying it”.
With this new epiphany, Bianca set about finding black and white board books for her newborn at her local stores but to her dismay and frustration found none. “This is how my new venture came about and ‘Let’s Go outside’ was created to provide parents an opportunity to help with their newborn’s developmental skills. While there were other high contrast board books in the market, there were hardly any black and white ones, let alone ones that especially encouraged imagination and creativity” shares Bianca. In Let’s Go Outside, parents can create and read a new story everyday to their little one based on the black and white images beautifully illustrated by Polish artist Jacek Cieslinski.
“A newborn’s vision begins very poor and blurry. The best way to stimulate a newborn’s vision is by using high contrast pictures. In your baby’s early months try to resist the pale blue and pink toys and go for the black, white and red one,” advises Bianca.
Although ‘Let’s Go Outside’ was created with infants in mind, it has had much success appealing to toddlers. Toddlers have the opportunity to sit with their parents, grandparents or other family members and share a story they have created based on the illustrations. It provides a great bonding time and the book can be cherished for years to come based on the unique and creative stories shared within each family.
‘Let’s Go Outside’ is now included in every baby pack given to new parents who have their baby at the Bendigo Health. This new initiative which began since September 2015 is funded by the Bendigo Health Foundation in partnership with Communities for Children and is such a beautiful gesture to encourage reading and developmental skills right from the birth.
Let’s Go Outside can be purchased at www.mylittlebookywooky.com