“With all due respect Ms. Colvin, it’s time to put the guitar down. The baby’s head is beginning to crown.” “Shut up you jackass! I’m one track away from completing the recording of my Giving Birth album.”

What’s it going to take to get this folk iron woman to take it easy? She was plump with child when she joined the Lilith Fair caravan on several stops this past summer, and her latest release, Holiday Songs and Lullabies, was recorded while 8 ½ months pregnant.

This collection of sweet ballads was inspired by Lullabies and Night Songs, a book illustrated by Maurice Sendak, which Colvin loved as a child. Sendak allowed Colvin to use his illustrations on her CD. Included in the artwork is a darling illustration of a small dreamy-eyed, sleep-walking child suffocating himself with a pillow. Too cute.

Colvin and producer Doug Petty have released a wonderful blend of 14 holiday classics and lullabies just in time for Christmas. If this reviewer had any foresight at all and didn’t suffer from chronic procrastination, you would have enjoyed this warm array of melodies while sitting around the fire Christmas morning, pealing open your hickory sausages. But no, you’ll buy Holiday Songs and Lullabies just in time for what? Martin Luther King Day? How’s that for marketing.

Some of the album’s brightest moments include “In The Bleak Midwinter,” “Love Came Down At Christmas,” “All Through the Night,” “Silent Night” and “Little Road to Bethlehem.” Gentle violins and cellos accompany Colvin’s angelic voice on many songs, but her trademark mid-western acoustic twang can be found on a few songs, including “Little Road To Bethlehem.”

So go on shoppers, Holiday Songs and Lullabies would make an ideal stocking stuffer for a mother-to-be. Hurry now, Martin Luther King Day is just around the corner.