The week before something big
SoftSteps writes gentle, personalized stories that help your child understand what's about to happen — so the new baby, the new house, or the first day at school arrives as something they've already walked through once.
This is the real text of a story your account includes free — not a mock-up.
Maya and the New Baby
Something exciting is happening at Maya's house — a new baby is coming soon!
Eight pages in the full story. Add a photo and your child is illustrated in it.
Read the opening pages free. Full stories from $5.99 — no subscription.
First name and age. A photo too, if you'd like them illustrated in it.
One of the nine ready-made moments, or describe anything else in a sentence.
Eight short pages, written to be read out loud at bedtime.
Most children's books about a new sibling are stories with a moral. SoftSteps stories do something narrower and more useful: they describe, in short concrete sentences and in order, exactly what is going to happen — and they say plainly that whatever your child feels about it is allowed.
That shape isn't ours. It's the social story format, developed by Carol Gray in 1991 to prepare autistic children for unfamiliar situations, and now widely used for any child walking into something new. Every story here follows it.
Your child is the one in the story, along with any detail you add — a sibling's name, a pet, a specific worry.
You set the age; the sentences and vocabulary are written to match it.
English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, German, Italian, and Dutch — every story, in whichever you choose.
Swim lessons, a thunderstorm, a new baby cousin. Describe it in a sentence and you get a story about it.
Adding a photo is optional — the stories work without one. If you do add it, it's used for one thing: illustrating your child as the character in their own stories.
Read the full privacy policy for the detail.
Ready-made
$5.99 per story
Nine stories covering the moments most families hit — a new sibling, moving house, starting daycare or school, learning the potty, a doctor's visit, a hospital stay, a death in the family, parents living apart. Written and edited by hand, personalized with your child's name. Read the opening pages free first.
Anything else
$8.99 per story
Describe any situation and get a story written for it. Read the opening pages first, then decide. One-off payment — there's no subscription and nothing to cancel.
The apps are on their way. In the meantime SoftSteps works in your phone's browser — open it, add it to your home screen, and read tonight.
You can read the opening pages of any story free, with no card, before deciding. Unlocking a full story costs $5.99 for one of the ready-made ones — or $8.99 for a custom story written for any situation you describe.
The ready-made stories are written and edited by hand — not generated. Custom stories are written by AI to a fixed structure. Either way you read the opening pages before paying, so you never buy something sight unseen.
It's optional, and only used to illustrate your child as the character in their stories. You can remove it at any time, and you can delete your account and everything in it yourself from inside the app — you don't have to email anyone.
Roughly two to eight. You set your child's age and the vocabulary is written to match it.
Seven: English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, German, Italian, and Dutch. That covers the app, the ready-made stories, and custom ones.
No. Stories are one-off purchases — $5.99 for a ready-made one, $8.99 for a custom one. Nothing recurring, nothing to cancel.
No. These stories are for comfort and connection, and they're not a replacement for guidance from a doctor, therapist, or other qualified professional — particularly for a child with a diagnosed condition.
Write the first one in about three minutes, and read it together tonight.