How to make a baby: sperm donors, IVF, and mad science experiments
Choosing a sperm donor is a little bit like setting up an Xbox avatar. You begin by deciding on the ethnicity, hair color, and eye color of the fellow whose sperm you’d like to combine with your egg to make your baby. Then you enter that criteria into a sperm-bank search engine, which returns a list of matching anonymous males who passed rigorous genetic tests and filled out detailed questionnaires. Finally, you pore through each donor profile, considering things like his height, weight, build, SAT scores, family medical history, sexual orientation, whether or not he has moles, the shape of his nose and mouth, and in some cases, his baby photo or voice sample.
My wife and I didn’t pick names for our son to call us — and now I’m “Other Mommy”
After hearing his whole life us saying versions of, “This mommy is cooking — ask other mommy to put your shoes on,” or, “This mommy will read you one more book, and then your other mommy will take you upstairs for bed,” he now calls us — quite sensibly — “This Mommy” and “Other Mommy.”
Two mamas, a baby on the way, and abundant sunshine
Y’all, I am swooning over Jill and Erica’s maternity session by Amy Ann Photography! The session took place in Columbus, Ohio, and the group visited the wonderful So-Hud tree mural, the Buggy Works complex in the Arena District, North Bank Park, and ended the photos at the Book Loft in the German Village (locals shout out!).
Queer families traveling or living in countries that aren’t LGBT-friendly: what is it like?
My beautiful partner and I love adventuring. We go away several times a year, often to places that are quite gay unfriendly and we deal with it. We’re now planning a family and have been talking a lot about adventuring with kids. We’ve really valued the posts on Offbeat Families about travelling with kids and have felt inspired to keep an open but optimistic mind about going abroad with our future family.
Dykes and Tikes on bikes: celebrating Pride with my family
We celebrated Pride weekend in August this year, and it was a hot one. Saturday was the Dyke March, which we tapped into later in the day. I had zero intention of braving a crowd of 650,000 people with a fiercely teething and mobile infant and his fearless three-year-old sister and decided to lay low. Back in my twenties, Pride was about volume. Do more, see more, flirt more, be more queer.
Eye Candy round-up: let’s all get our ogle on
It’s Eye Candy time! Wanna get in on the love? Drop a photo and a few sentences into our Flickr pool or send it to us.
Renee and Lois are having a baby and they’re so EXCITED!
Nothing says home like your actual home, and nothing says “We’re so happy we’re having a baby!” like huge smiles plastered on your faces. Lois and Renee are definitely stoked about their impending arrival of their firstborn!
Adopting the son I helped to conceive: how second-parent adoption reframes parenthood
The second-parent adoption has been an ongoing reminder that I need to reframe my ideas of motherhood for myself. Through this entire journey of conception to adoption I have been tested on my ability to bring myself out of melancholy thoughts and into recognition of everything I have to be grateful for. Just because I have always identified as a mother in one way, doesn’t mean I cannot be as much of a mother in different way.