Sarah Brannen, author of Uncle Bobby’s Wedding (about which see my Saturday post, if you haven’t been following the story), was kind enough to let me share this e-mail message she sent me:

I read the book to a group of young children at a school book fair yesterday. They had a lot of questions:

How long did it take you to write the book?
How did you draw them so cute?
Is the little white mouse a baby?
Is the white one at the wedding a boy?
How did you make their clothes?
Were you ever a flower girl in a wedding?

And that was it.

Happy Mother’s Day to all of you who call yourselves mothers. We may come by the title in different ways, but the one thing we all share is a love of our children.

I found it interesting that two lesbian-mom authors this week wrote of the difficulty of sharing Mother’s Day with another mother. Harlyn Aizley at the Beacon Broadside says: Read more »

Sometimes, I hate being right. It wasn’t a stretch of the imagination to foresee that the new storybook Uncle Bobby’s Wedding, by Sarah Brannen, would be a target for the right.

I didn’t imagine they’d quote me while doing so, however. The conservative publication Town Hall just published the article “Librarians Against Censorship,” by Brent Bozell III. Bozell says:

Already we can predict how the ALA next year will complain about any objection to a book called “Uncle Bobby’s Wedding,” the story of a young guinea pig who worries that her Uncle Bobby won’t play with her anymore after he “marries” his boyfriend Jamie. The book ends at the “wedding,” with Chloe as the enthusiastic flower girl.

In my March 18 review of the book at Bay Windows (and published in a longer form at After Elton), I say:

It tells the sweet story of Chloe, an anthropomorphic young guinea pig who worries that Uncle Bobby won’t keep having fun with her after he marries his boyfriend Jamie. Uncle Bobby explains that their special times together will not end; Chloe will not be losing an uncle, but gaining one. The book ends at the wedding, with Chloe as the enthusiastic flower girl.

Hmm. See any resemblance? Well, if Bozell is going to take my words, I’m not going to provide a live link to his article. You can view it at:

www.townhall.com/Columnists/BrentBozellIII/2008/05/09/librarians_against_censorship

if you want to see it. He also rails against And Tango Makes Three and the American Library Association’s Rainbow List of LGBT-inclusive children’s and young adult books. (For an alternate perspective, see my interview with the chair of the Rainbow List project, Nel Ward.) Read more »

• Congressman Joe Sestak, the highest-ranking veteran in Congress, called for a repeal of the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy. Admiral Mike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told graduating West Point cadets that Congress, and not the military, is responsible for “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”
• Some say transgender rights could be the next big civil rights battle of our time, and the Nashua Telegraph has a good overview of where some of these rights stand around the country.

Read more »

Having preschool teachers who make sure your son brings home two handmade flowerpots for Mother’s Day?

Priceless.

Having a party? Doing a quiet gift exchange? Waiting to see what your kids will spring on you? Ignoring it altogether? How are you and your family celebrating this family holiday?

Helen and I are keeping it pretty casual (unless there’s something she’s not telling me), but as with most holidays at our house, there’s likely to be a cake involved. How about you?

Helen and I do a special Mother’s Day vlog in response to a viewer request about our decision to become parents. What made me finally break down and decide to have a child? Why did we choose the method we did? Was our cat really involved in the selection of our sperm donor? And what was that about dating Ellen DeGeneres and Sharon Stone?

In many ways, this vlog is a precursor to the post I did about the medical and legal details of creating our family. Now you’ll know the whole story.

We also invite all bloggers and vloggers to post on June 2 in celebration of the third annual Blogging for LGBT Families Day. (Yes, videos and photos are welcome, too. Put them on your favorite image-sharing site, make sure they’re public, and send me the link.)

Online Videos by Veoh.com

If the Veoh video above isn’t working (sometimes their server can be flaky), you can try it at Daily Motion.

Brought to you in partnership with After Ellen.

Somebody bring me some water . . . in a sippy cup.*

MomLogic (part of the AOL Living network) just published the article “Melissa Etheridge: Superstar Mama.” The lesbian icon talks about having twins, explaining her cancer to her children, celebrating Mother’s Day, celebrity babies, the most important lesson to teach your children, and her new tour. She also offers this advice to other “non-traditional” families:

I would tell them they have all the power. That feeling inside, that desire, follow that, that’s what life is all about it. Just put it out of their mind that there is some sort of normal out there because there’s not. They may portray it on the television like Leave it to Beaver that there’s a perfect thing, but that does not exist, everyone’s doing the best they can to raise families, and find happiness, and find many ways to love, and there are many ways.

Bravo, Melissa! Bravo to MomLogic, too, for not just sticking to “traditional” families during this period of pre-Mother’s Day maternal celebration. Not all mainstream parenting channels are so bold.

*If you’re not an ME fan, that reference will be lost on you.

For the second year in a row, the children’s book And Tango Makes Three, about two male penguins who care for an egg and raise a chick together, tops the list of the American Library Association’s (ALA) 10 Most Challenged Books.

Personally, I think the guinea pigs will give them a run for their money in 2008 (not that I wish censorship on this or any book). Herewith, my full review of Uncle Bobby’s Wedding, a new LGBT-inclusive children’s book that I’ve mentioned in a few previous posts. I also speak with author Sarah Brannen and her editor, who discuss, among other things, the reaction to the book so far and their feelings about potential censorship.

Fur Better or Worse: Gay Guinea Pigs Wed in New Children’s Book
(Originally published at After Elton, March 25, 2008)

Uncle Bobby’s Wedding, by Massachusetts author and illustrator Sarah Brannen, is more than just a good LGBT-inclusive children’s book; it is a good children’s book, period. Like 2005’s And Tango Makes Three, about two male penguins who hatch an egg together, it is likely to garner critical praise as well as ultra-right censorship.

Uncle Bobby moves us from feathers to fur, however, and tells the sweet story of Chloe, an anthropomorphic young guinea pig who worries that Uncle Bobby won’t keep having fun with her after he marries his boyfriend Jamie. Uncle Bobby explains that their special times together will not end; Chloe will not be losing an uncle, but gaining one. The book ends at the wedding, with Chloe as the enthusiastic flower girl. Read more »

Writing about the right always makes me grumpy. To cheer up myself and maybe some of you, here’s a roundup of some happy articles about LGBT families:

• “Mother’s Day Special: A Tale of Two Moms” in the Windy City Times is the first of a two-part series about a couple of lesbian moms in Chicago. They conceived their family the way Helen and I did, using one partner as the egg donor for the other.
• “Surrogate mothers fulfilling gay men’s parenthood dreams” from AFP talks about the increasing number of gay men using surrogates, and the extraordinary expense of the process (over $100,000).
• “Diane Amos Headlines Funny Girlz” in the San Francisco Bay Times would be just another article about a local stand-up comedy event, except that it profiles comedian Diane Amos, the daughter of two moms, one black and one Jewish. She uses tales from her childhood in her routines, and says:
  

  Gay audiences love it because there’s so much funny stuff. Then I found a way to take it to straight audiences just by really telling the truth and telling some of the stuff around our household they’d never experienced. It’s just funny.

  Amos is also the face and voice of Pine-Sol cleaner. (And hey, you’d think a household cleaning product fronted by the daughter of two moms, and whose parent company has a perfect Corporate Equality Index rating, would be interested in advertising to lesbian moms, no? My own selfish interest in that aside, it does indicate that some marketing teams just aren’t thinking creatively enough when it comes to potential audiences. All they’d have to do is rearrange the bottles in the picture so they form a rainbow.)