On the face of it, "Yummy Mummy" is a loathsome term. Popularized by the British press in reference to the slim, chic, youthful business-magnate mother of Prince William's girlfriend Kate Middleton, it soon gained broader currency, becoming yet one more way for today's mothers to feel guilty about not doing it all.

Anna Johnson, a veteran freelance writer for InStyle, Vogue, Elle and any number of magazines that feed that guilt, says she wanted to reclaim the term -- for herself, and for mothers; hence her new book, "The Yummy Mummy Manifesto: Baby, Beauty, Balance, and Bliss" (Ballantine Books).

In it, she reveals how expectant and new mothers can raise good children without silencing "one's sense of self" -- indeed, how to keep themselves "vivid and delicious with children."

Ms. Johnson's vision of a Yummy Mummy doesn't come from the overloaded parenting shelves or magazine racks at Barnes & Noble but, rather, from the artist, the eccentric and "from women who never had children at all."

"I love to imagine how Frida Kahlo would have painted her nursery or to picture Katharine Hepburn teaching toddlers how to yell at the ocean," she writes -- a bit fancifully, perhaps, but she's on to something.

The organizing principle behind "The Yummy Mummy Manifesto" is: relax. Don't feel you need to meet some impossible standard. You don't have to have a perfect body. You don't even need to exercise to get the baby weight off -- just move a lot, eat food you enjoy and wear clothes you like.

There's lots of sound advice, from how to breast-feed to throwing a birthday party to choosing the right crib. There are links to all kinds of helpful resources for working moms and stay-at-home moms.

"My definition of 'Yummy Mummy' is not this high-maintenance, impossibly thin person," said Ms. Johnson, 42, in a phone interview from her home in Brooklyn, where she lives with her husband and 3-year-old son. "I believe you live with your children, not in spite of them, and you need to let them inspire you. I don't believe in maternal guilt or competitive mothering. Each woman is different and has to find ways to do things in her own way. This book is not going to boss you around."

But mostly, Ms. Johnson has a way with words. She's funny, outrageous, irreverent in that way British journalists are and, ultimately, quite sensible.

In a chapter called "Outrageous Simplicity," she recalls an encounter outside a New York toy store with a mom and child in a stroller that had been outfitted with a stereo in the headboard, educational bells, buttons and whistles on a plastic tray in front, bowls of cereal and raisins on either side and a beverage holder with enough room for three cappuccinos. Oh, and a fully outfitted diaper bag, a shopping net and two side-buckled saddlebags.

"Where did we get the habit to load up our babies for the apocalypse for every outing?" she wonders, noting that "the impulse to confuse organization with hoarding, and intrepid creativity with mad consumerism, is driven by yet another strain of mother guilt: the good camel complex," where diaper bags weigh more than the kids, and the kids soon learn to want more.

Make them do with less, she counsels. Don't load up with each and every beverage or favorite toy under the sun each time you go to the playground; don't build a free-for-all nursery in the back seat of the car. Just keep it simple. While he may become a rabid consumer later on, at least you will have had a few years of living simply.

Of course, her reader demographic will probably be the same women of child-bearing age who flocked to see the "Sex and the City" movie this summer. In one chapter, "The Goddess Expecting," there's "Morning Sick in Manolos: Finding Your Feet and Holding Your Ground."

Hmmm, you think, remembering that one pair of Manolos can cost as much as a new refrigerator. Who is she writing for? But really, Ms. Johnson's point is simple: If you work in an office, you will be subject to all sorts of snap judgments about how to dress in the corporate world, which rewards women for "carrying small, carrying neat and, implicitly, performing with the same vigor as nonpregnant co-workers. Never mind that we might want to slam the door shut and lie down on the floor, or wear desert boots instead of pumps that pinch a swollen foot."

So, dress comfortably but also in clothes that you like, even if you're huge: "Competence comes with confidence, so planning a strong work wardrobe for your entire term is not a matter of whim. On really tough days, you might just need the armor of a little black dress that is not so little."

"The Yummy Mummy Manifesto" is intelligent, sensible and YET stylish and self-indulgent -- a real departure from the scads of ever-so-earnest "advice books" out there for new mothers.

My only question: Where was she when we ever-so-serious, our-new-baby-is-our-new-project baby boomers needed her?

Check out Anna Johnson's Web site at www.yummymummymanifesto.com.