“She Got Me Pregnant:” Episode 86

Helen and I discuss the perfect baby present for Mary Cheney and Heather Poe’s second child. We then show off Helen’s Halloween fabric engineering skills, proving that with lesbians, it’s sometimes hard to tell who’s the more domestic one. On another seasonal note, we take a retro look at It’s the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown and connect it to a real-life case of horrible injustice for a lesbian-headed family. Turning to happier matters, we share highlights from our family trip to a local science museum last weekend.

(If the embedded video above doesn’t work for you, try it at Dailymotion.)

Brought to you in partnership with After Ellen.

LGBT Parenting Roundup

I’ve already written about the great news from Montana this week. Here’s what else is happening. (There’s not a whole lot, but since my last roundup was rather massive, I thought I’d keep this one light).

Parenting Advice

• New England LGBT newspaper Bay Windows (for which I am a contributing writer) just published its Fall Family Guide. Lots of good stuff, including two useful pieces by the Family Equality Council on how to talk to children of different ages about different family structures and ways to be active and visible each week of the year. Lawyer Joyce Kaufmann also advises couples to do a second-parent adoption, even in states like Massachusetts, because other states might not otherwise recognize the non-bio parent’s rights. My own contribution to the guide is a list of fun fall family activities to get you out and about—it’s very Massachusetts-specific, though, so I won’t crosspost it here. Go read if you’re in the area.

Personal Stories

• Dorothy Snarker notes the very tomboyish aesthetic of Shiloh Jolie-Pitt, versus the more feminine appearance of her sister Zahara. While we of course can’t look into the mind of Angelina and know whether this is her idea or Shiloh’s, I tend to agree with Dorothy’s assessment: “It’s not some different-to-be-different look her parents have chosen for her. If so, then they’d dress 4-year-old Zahara the same way.” And not that I in any way condone violence, but as a former fencer, I have to say it’s cool to see little girls carrying toy swords. Read the rest of this post »

Montana Supreme Court Rules for Lesbian Mom

Too good to wait for the weekly roundup:

The Montana Supreme Court affirmed a trial court decision granting a “parental interest” to Michelle Kulstad, a lesbian mom who had been co-parenting two children legally adopted only by her ex-partner, Barbara Maniaci. Under state law, the women could not jointly adopt. Maniaci is now married to a man and says she is no longer a lesbian. (Yes, there seems to be an unfortunate trend of that in custody battles.) She was represented by the Alliance Defense Fund, who are sort of the anti-Lambda Legal.

I mentioned the case back in April when it went to the state Supreme Court; I will defer to lawyer Nancy Polikoff for her comments on yesterday’s ruling:

The Montana Supreme Court credited the trial court’s findings: that Barbara had acted inconsistently with the position that she was the only one with a child-parent relationship; that Michelle did have a child-parent relationship with the children; that, as the mental health experts testified, it was in the children’s best interests to continue their child-parent relationship with Michelle.

Polikoff notes that only one justice dissented. One of the seven who concurred, James C. Nelson, also wrote “a separate opinion championing the rights of lesbians and gay men to form families and raise children.”

It is an amazing piece, and worth reading in full (PDF; Nelson’s piece starts on p. 37). Polikoff calls it “some of the strongest and most passionate language I have ever read in a court opinion”—and she has read a lot of court opinions. Here is an extract: Read the rest of this post »

Cat Cora On How to Get Kids to Eat Well

Karman at After Ellen has just published a long interview with Iron Chef and lesbian mom Cat Cora. Cora has just launched a new restaurant, Kouzzina, at Disney World in Florida, and is about to start another season of Iron Chef America. Karman asks her the obvious question: “How are you juggling having two new babies [and two other young children] in the house, competing on Iron Chef, and launching a very high profile new restaurant?”

Go read the interview for her answer. I will, however, quote her response to Karman’s question about how to teach kids good eating habits:

My theory is that you have to start with the parents and kids TOGETHER. The parents are the ones who shop for food, cook the food and feed the kids. They are the ones who decide whether or not to drive through that drive thru for fast food. So, educating them along with teaching the kids is key.

Hear, hear.

We’ve been blessed with a non-picky eater, but I admit it’s hard at times, especially when traveling, to stick with healthy food. I commend any restaurant that takes the audacious step of putting vegetables on a kids’ menu. And don’t even get me started on our local school cafeteria. Endless cycles of chicken nuggets, hamburgers, and Domino’s pizza, with an occasional “breakfast for lunch” of French toast. Our son gets lunch there once in a while, but I usually pack his food. (Not that we don’t have some of the above at home every so often, too; we just don’t do perpetual loops of it.)

Where/when do you find it hardest to eat healthy with your kids?

Now It’s My Turn, Again: Mary Cheney Pregnant with Second Child

Mary Cheney, daughter of Dick Cheney, is pregnant with her second child. She and partner Heather Poe are expecting their new addition in November, according to True/Slant.

Mary has hardly been a beacon of the LGBT movement, even donating to anti-LGBT political candidates, but she is one of the country’s most recognizable lesbian moms. This means, as I’ve said before, that despite her lackluster record, she may in fact be the kind of bridge we need to win over more people in support of our cause. The fact is that we’re not going to gain equality by turning everyone into liberals (much as I might like that). We’re going to win equality by convincing centrists and conservatives (though perhaps not ultra-conservatives) to join liberals in supporting our rights. Read the rest of this post »

New Lesbian Mom TV Script Written By Lesbian Mom (Sperm Not Included)

From StuntDouble at After Ellen comes news that CBS has ordered a lesbian-centric sitcom script from writer-comedian and lesbian mom Carol Leifer (The Ellen Show; Seinfeld). She quotes the Hollywood Reporter:

Inspired in part by Leifer’s real-life situation of being in a long-term, same-sex relationship and having a child with her partner, the CBS show, tentatively titled You and Me and He, centers on a recently divorced woman who enters a gay relationship only to find out that she is pregnant with her ex-husband’s baby.

This doesn’t mean the show will air, only that CBS is considering it. With that in mind: Read the rest of this post »

LGBT Parenting Roundup

It’s a big roundup this week, so grab some coffee:

Personal Stories

• The U.K.’s Mirror brings us the story of Emma and Laura Flanagan, who used the same known donor to get pregnant five months apart, and plan for their children to know the man as their father, though not a legal one. It’s pretty well done, although the paper gives some sense that their situation is rarer than it probably is. “This is their unique family,” it says. Here’s my previous post on simultaneous pregnancies among lesbian couples, proving that it certainly isn’t unique—and I know there are many of you out there with involved known donors, so that isn’t unique, either. Still, it’s a sweet story, and I wish the couple my best.
• Margaret Daros, the mother of a gay son, gives us a moving, multi-generational look at her family, including her in-laws (through her son’s partner), as an argument for upholding marriage equality in Maine.
• A couple of weeks ago, I posted the touching video of Chelsea Montgomery-Duban speaking at her dads’ wedding. Mississipi’s Sun Herald has an article about the video, Montgomery-Duban’s YouTube fame, and her thoughts on her family and marriage equality. Florida’s St. Petersburg Times also has a piece about the video.
• This one could have gone under the Politics heading as well: Indy Week profiles Julia Boseman, North Carolina’s only out state senator and a mom who recently won a custody battle with her ex-partner over rights to see her seven-year-old son. She and her new spouse, Chrystal Medlin, are expecting a baby boy in January. In the article, Boseman talks both about her personal life and about measures like the anti-bullying bill she helped institute.
• Nevada’s domestic partnerships went into effect last week, and while that’s not parenting-specific, it did give the Las Vegas Sun a reason to publish a profile of Carline Banegas and Jodie Dearborn and their three teen children, who will be one of the first couples to register. They are field trip chaperones and enjoy trips to Disneyland, making them a pretty typical family of any sort—but they met during a softball game and moved in after just a few weeks, making them pretty typical lesbians.
• Canadian lesbian site The Pink Elephant brings us the reminiscences of a teen daughter of a lesbian mom, who tells us when she first started thinking of her mom as a person, not just a parent—and it wasn’t the day her mom came out to her.
• Paige at Bilerico shares the very funny story of her son asking about his body parts (his word mix-up almost made me spill my coffee), and discusses her difficult search for children’s books that talk about bodies and sexuality in an age-appropriate, feminist, queer-affirming, sex-positive way. Read the rest of this post »

Halloween Songs from Erin Lee and Marci

Children’s musicians Erin Lee and Marci bring us the next of their regular posts with thematic recommendations for kid-friendly music, plus activities to make the songs an interactive experience for the whole family.

Look for Erin Lee and Marci here on the first Monday of each month, or visit their homepage, www.gottaplay.org.

I’ve created links to Amazon for the full albums (click the album image or name), plus links to Amazon MP3 downloads, when available, for those who want only the singles. (Click the song name.) I also have a widget after the jump that will let you preview most of the songs without leaving Mombian.

It’s Halloween…our favorite time of the year! Creepy costumes, spooky stories, lots of candy…and, oh no! Another party has ground to a halt because somebody put dance music on and the only creepy dance music on hand was The Monster Mash! Brilliant, we love it, but all too frequently overused. Don’t let that happen at your party! There’s lots of monster music out there that’s perfect for dancing, stomping and sneaking. Here are two of our favorite not-too-terrifying tunes: Read the rest of this post »