What are your favorite animal-friendly, beautifully-illustrated kid’s books?
My kids, nearly two and four, love to be read to and I love to read to them as long as the books are lyrically written and creatively illustrated — and they don’t encourage harming animals (original Curious George, anyone?), or feature name-calling or cranky parents (too many to list).
“Do you want him to be gay?” Musings on gender roles, assumptions, and raising self-aware kids
We spend a lot of time talking about empowering girls to break gender barriers. Which is important — we should. And there is plenty more work to do in that arena. But now I have a boy to raise. And if he wants to play dress-up instead of hockey, or wear his hair long or short, or become a fashion designer or watch HGTV instead of judge shows (fingers crossed), or if he likes girls or boys or nobody at all, I want him to know that it’s OK.
How do I ask the person hosting my baby shower to make the party gender-neutral?
My fiance and I aren’t having a baby yet, but we’re trying to conceive and have already decided that we don’t want to find out the sex of the child until delivery. I have a lot of family and friends who will likely want host a baby shower for me, but I’m not sure how to convey the idea of gender-neutrality to them.
My son found my Barbie, said she was pretty, and turned her into a space explorer
I don’t want my son to find a Barbie doll pretty. I want him to understand, even at three, that she is not an accurate representation of a woman’s body. This is ridiculous, I know, but it’s not stopping from getting all excited about this teachable moment we’re having.
Finding out the sex of your baby: pros and cons
Finding out the sex is one of those favourite sources of conversation for pregnant women and all who know them long into early parenthood: “Will you find out/have you found out/did you find out the sex?” It’s the earliest indication of the significance society places upon the gender distinction.
My son the cross-dresser
My son is big into tractors. He loves Lego. He builds skyscrapers out of wooden blocks, and then goes all Godzilla on them. He plays in the mud, and looks for bugs, and has a thing for dinosaurs. And on the first day of gan (preschool) last week, my son told me he wanted to wear a dress.
Queer Parenting for Heteros (and anyone else who wants to teach kids that being queer is awesome)
Well, a lot has been said and written about queer parenting in recent years, but most of this commentary ignores the opportunity to actually engage queer theory and instead simply equates queer parenting with LGBT people raising children. But what happens when we attempt to apply the insights of queer theory to our relationships with children?
Mommy, why do the girl superhero costumes have skirts?
Avital, author of the blog The Mamafesto (among many other things!), had a conversation with her five-year-old son yesterday without even meaning to. They had just arrived back home after a family trip and had a stack of Halloween costume catalogs waiting for them. Her son started flipping through the pages and then made a surprising discovery that he had a lot of questions about.