It’s Earth Day. My son’s preschool had a series of related activities and discussions all last week, and he’s had the Earth on his mind.

After going through several pieces of toilet paper during a pit stop the other day, he held up the final one and asked “Mommy, if it’s clean, can I leave it on the counter for the next person?”

I explained about germs, but was impressed by his commitment to reducing consumption.

Please share some of the things you do to protect the environment and save energy. How do you teach your children to do so? Where do you compromise for convenience?

Cynthia Nixon, best known for her role in Sex and the City (less known for her inclusion in Mombian’s “Most Powerful Lesbian Moms” list), has become an ambassador for breast-cancer organization Susan G. Komen for the Cure. Nixon is a breast-cancer survivor herself, and the daughter of a two-time survivor.

She spoke with Good Morning America’s Cynthia McFadden this week about her own battle with cancer, how she explained it to her children, and what she thought of the Sex and the City breast-cancer storyline, which aired before her diagnosis. She also answered the ever-popular question of what the kids call her and her partner.

ABC News has video of the segment. (There’s a 30-second commercial beforehand.)

This week’s poll is in honor of season three of Work Out, which provides just enough women’s-sports coverage (and lesbian visibility) to get us through the gap between the end of March Madness and the start of the WNBA season. (Then it’s on to Wimbledon, the Olympics, and the U.S. Open here in the Mombian household.)

I know, Work Out isn’t really about sports; it’s about relationships. That and Jackie Warner’s abs.

While we’re on the subject of sports, though, Feministing brings us the happy news that girls are participating in sports in record numbers.

I’m all for breastfeeding. My partner breastfed our son. While its health benefits may still be argued by some, I take the general approach that natural is usually best. At the same time, I fiercely defend a woman’s right to make the decision about whether to breastfeed and for how long. The question has too many variables for there to be a single answer that works for all mothers. (See, for example, the story of Alex Elliot, whose breast-reduction surgery made it impossible to breastfeed.)

The Chicago Sun-Times recently questioned whether the breastfeeding advocacy group La Leche League goes too far in pressuring women to breastfeed. I’ll leave that an open question; I think much depends on the specific local La Leche group. What was more eyebrow-raising to me, however, was the article’s note that one of La Leche League’s 10 basic principles is:

Breastfeeding is enhanced and the nursing couple sustained by the loving support, help, and companionship of the baby’s father. A father’s unique relationship with his baby is an important element in the child’s development from early infancy.

This may be true for partnered, straight women, but leaves no room for the experiences of either partnered lesbians or single moms of any orientation. I haven’t had any direct experience with La Leche myself, so I thought I’d ask you, dear readers: Have you used the services of a local La Leche group, or are you a La Leche Leader yourself? Have they been supportive of you and other non-traditional families? If so, is there an opportunity to ask the organization to reword their principle to fit their clientèle? If not, is breastfeeding support and information yet another area where lesbians and single moms are left without equal resources? What’s been your experience?

We’ve been beset with colds here at the House of Mombian, thanks to the petri dish that is our son’s preschool class. Whenever he comes home with a sniffle, I start popping the vitamin C in the vain hope it will slow the oncoming train bearing down on my sinuses.

Enough strained metaphors; it’s time for this week’s poll:

Today is the 35th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, and also Blog for Choice Day. The organizers of the blogging event have asked us to explain why we believe it’s important to vote pro-choice. I tackle this topic with the acknowledgment that some readers may not, in fact, be pro-choice—though I think it’s safe to assume most are. Happy to entertain discussion in the comments, but please keep it civil.

Reproductive rights were an early political passion of mine, when I was a budding feminist but before I came out and became involved with LGBT rights. Coming out, far from reducing my concern with matters of male-female reproduction, only increased it. Being a lesbian is no guarantee against rape, or, more positively, the occasional consensual fling with a man. Even if lesbians were immune from such worries, however, I would be pro-choice because I think it boils down exactly that—choice.

No, sexual orientation is not a choice. We do choose, however, whether to live openly and honestly about our orientations. It’s a very fine line between limiting people’s choices about what they can do with their bodies reproductively and what they can do with them sexually. I can’t support choice in one without the other. Read more »

Today marks the start of No Name-Calling Week, “an annual week of educational activities aimed at ending name-calling of all kinds and providing schools with the tools and inspiration to launch an on-going dialogue about ways to eliminate bullying in their communities.” The event was created four years ago by GLSEN (Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network) and Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing. It targets grades five through eight, “years when the problem of name-calling is particularly acute, but the concept can be easily adapted by students and educators at other grade levels.”

Name-calling can have tragic consequences, as when a 14-year-old girl in the U.K. hanged herself, allegedly because classmates taunted her for over a year about her fashion sense and supposed lesbianism. Even when its effect is not as dire, there is no excuse for it. It’s all about basic manners. No, we can’t expect children not to tease each other to some extent. We can, however, teach them to recognize when the line is crossed between lighthearted banter where the subject truly doesn’t mind, and harmful insults whose hurt goes deep.

GLSEN has a number of lesson plans, activities, and other resources available for download. If you’re a teacher or want to become involved in creating a more tolerant, accepting, and safer environment in your children’s schools, take a look.

If you’re feeling a bit Grinch-like this holiday season, you’re not alone. More lesbian adults (80%) than straight women (64%) say they feel stressed around the holidays, according to a new survey (PDF link) by Harris Interactive and Witeck-Combs. Half (51%) of the lesbians surveyed said they tend to feel depressed around the holidays, versus 36% of their straight peers.

Dr. Linda Spooner, Chair of The Mautner Project’s Board of Directors, offers some reasons for this: “Estrangement from family, marginalization within and isolation from society, separation from children (sometimes due to custody battles), and inadequate access to culturally sensitive health care practitioners are all factors that can adversely affect mood during a season so identified with ‘family’ activities and ‘belonging.’” Stress and depression, she says, can also affect not only quality of life and workplace productivity [as well as interactions with our children], but can also impact hypertension and other diseases. Spooner and The Mautner Project are “once again calling on mental health and medical researchers to do more to include lesbians in their studies so that our community as well as lesbians individually can understand how to do more to take care of themselves and prevent disease.”

A worthy endeavor. On a personal level, though: Do you indeed find the holidays more stressful than other times of year? If so, does this stem from the tension of a “family” holiday in a world not always fair to our families, or is it the practicalities like gift buying and arranging childcare for when school vacations and employer vacations don’t overlap? Either way, what are some of your strategies for coping?

It’s World AIDS Day. AVERT, an international HIV and AIDS charity based in the UK, gives us the following statistics:

According to UNAIDS estimates, there are now 33.2 million people living with HIV, including 2.5 million children [and 15.4 million women]. During 2007 some 2.5 million people became newly infected with the virus. Around half of all people who become infected with HIV do so before they are 25 and are killed by AIDS before they are 35.

Around 95% of people with HIV/AIDS live in developing nations. But HIV today is a threat to men, women and children on all continents around the world.

Because this is a parenting blog, I’ll also note that an estimated 420,000 children became infected with HIV in 2007, and 330,000 died from AIDS. Only 9% of HIV-positive pregnant women in the developing world have the drugs needed to prevent the virus being transmitted to their babies. People under 25 years old account for half of all new HIV infections worldwide. Africa has 12 million AIDS orphans.

Finding a cure is more than just red ribbons and feel-good walks, however. The Think Before You Pink site by the group Breast Cancer Action, takes a cautionary approach to supporting products and companies that claim to help fight the disease. I think much the same applies to HIV/AIDS. Give money, but choose your recipients with care.

Also of note is the site AIDSVote, a new site where three of the U.S.’s largest HIV/AIDS-care groups have compiled information about the leading presidential candidates’ stances on AIDS-related issues. (Thanks, 365gay.com.)

Let’s not lose the personal in the political, however. Take a moment today to remember those living with AIDS, those who have died from it, and those affected by it because of someone close to them.

Living near the capitol of Red Sox Nation, it’s hard not to get caught up in the collective euphoria over our sweep of the Colorado Rockies in the 2007 World Series (and yes, for true fans, the first-person plural is warranted).

Sunday’s victory had another meaning for me as well. The winning pitcher was Jon Lester, who in 2006 was treated for lymphoma, a form of blood cancer. My father is also a two-time lymphoma survivor, and got out of the hospital the second time only two days before my son, his first and only grandchild, was born. The tie with Lester’s illness would be enough to give me pause this week. The Red Sox have also, however, been long-time supporters of the Jimmy Fund, the fundraising organization behind Boston’s Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, where my dad went for care. In fact, according to their Web site, “The relationship that the Red Sox and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute share is the longest standing, most extensive, and significant team-charity relationship in all of professional sports.” The two organizations have worked together for 54 years. (It’s also worth noting that third baseman Mike Lowell is a testicular cancer survivor, and both pitcher Curt Schilling’s wife, Shonda and Dustin Pedroia’s wife, Kelli are melanoma survivors. The Schillings founded the SHADE Foundation in 2002 to to educate people about melanoma prevention and detection.)

Despite my allegiance to the BoSox, I’ve never owned any team paraphernalia. (I’m also one of three lesbians in the U.S. who has never played softball.) I cheer for them, but prefer to spend my money supporting women’s pro sports teams, which need it more. (I can’t wait until the new women’s professional soccer league launches next year, with a franchise in Boston.) Still, I can see one of these 2007 World Champion holiday ornaments from the Jimmy Fund making its way to our house this year. (Heck, maybe I’ll even celebrate both our heritages and order eight of them.)

The World Series may be “just a game” to some, or a celebration of athletic prowess and community spirit, or a ridiculous display of overpaid egotists, but if it can bring more money and awareness to the Jimmy Fund and some of the other charities supported by the Sox and their players, then it’s served more than its purpose.