Our Family Thankgiving Trip 2008

Every year we travel to my (Steven’s) home town of Massena, NY to visit my family for Thankgiving. Ever since my mother died over nine years ago the festivities have been held at the home of one of my sisters. It’s a pretty small house, and we have a pretty big family. This year my sister’s daughter and son in-law hosted dinner since they purchased a rather large older home. My family has always welcomed Brian, and now Darius as members of the family. We don’t get the same reception with Brian’s parents, but that’s another story for another post if he wants to tell it.

Here are some photos from our trip. I’m really bad with remembering to bring a real camera anymore, all these shots were taken with my Iphone.

Wordless Wednesday: Thanksgivings Past

Spread the Cheer Challenge: Donate to the Family Equality Council

Earlier this month, we blogged about the aftermath of the 2008 election – viewed by many as a step forward for America, yet in many ways a step backward for gay families.  We’ve also shared the thoughts of our friend Vince, and similar responses from around the web in our Friday Family Roundup.  It’s clear that throughout the gay community – and the gay parenting community – many of us are unsettled if not outright incensed at the recent turn of events.

So what’s to be done about it?  Here’s one way to take action.  The Family Equality Council is currently holding their Spread the Cheer Challenge.  If 100 people contribute donations of any amount, a group of Family Equality Council donors will pledge $5,000 to continue their important work that supports our families.  If 200 people contribute donations of any amount, that same group of donors will pledge $10,000.  And if 300 people contribute donations of any amount, the donation will increase to $25,000.  Consider giving any amount that you can; tax-deductible donations of $10, $25, $50 or more will all help reach the total number of donations.  Family Equality Council is primary voice advocating for GLBT families at the national level, and they are helping support our families and taking the fight to our enemies.

We’re proud to be members and to support their efforts, and we hope you’ll join us in helping make the Spread the Cheer Challenge a success by clicking to donate now on the link below.

Four Things

by Steven

I self tagged myself for this meme at Worducopia, I’m having trouble coming up with something to write about and Brian is too busy to write.

Four Jobs I’ve Had:

• Pizza delivery (in college)
• Letter Carrier (during a several year break in college)
• High School Biology Teacher (right after college, big mistake)
• Scientist, Clinical Lab QC (current)

Four Movies I Can Watch Many Times:

• Dune
• The Lord of the Rings
• Star Trek IV
• Rent (just to throw anyone off from figuring me out)

Four Places I’ve Lived:

• Massena, NY
• Plattsburgh, NY
• Hempstead, NY
• Albany, NY (all pretty boring huh?)

Four TV Shows I Love(d):

• Babylon 5
• Battlestar Galactica
• Stargate
• American Idol (see above reference to the movie Rent)

Four Places I’ve Vacationed:

• San Francisco
• Key West
• Provincetown
• Orlando (again, I don’t want anyone to think I can’t branch out a little)

Four Novels (or series) I have enjoyed rereading:

• Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone
• Dune
• The Hobbit
• I rarely reread a book so I’m having trouble with this one.

Four Websites I Visit Often:

• Daily Kos
• Zen Habits
• Iphone Alley
• Wadsworth Center (work)

Four Places I’d Like to Be Right Now:

• Provincetown for Family Week
• On another cruise (we went on an Rfamily cruise, February 2007)
• Back in Disney World (we had so much fun)
• On a day off with absolutely nothing planned

The idea now is to tag four blog friends to do the meme and link back here. I tag:

1. Preston at Me and the Blue Skies
2. GDad at Cranial Hyperossification
3. Joe at bored beyond belief
4. If anyone else is interested, comment here and I’ll add you.

Vince’s View: No Rest For The Queery

Our good friend Vince writes a monthly article called Vince’s View that is posted on the Pride and Joy Families website.  This months article is called No Rest For The Queery, where Vince discusses his thoughts on the recent election and ballot measures.  Here is an excerpt from the article:

Burnout is one way that I can describe my post-election funk. I no longer curl up three inches away from the television with the volume down low, so as not to wake Mona or Jack, surfing between CNN and MSNBC, occasionally even clicking onto FOX when my blood pressure was able to handle it. And my heart rhythm is much more stable without the constant defibrillation of polls.

Read the rest of the article here.

Wordless Wednesday: Kindergarten 2008

Sunday Outing with Lambda Family Circle

Today we went on a little outing to the New York State Museum with Lambda Family Circle.  Lambda Family Circle is our local GLBT parents group and the museum trip today was part of a series of monthly play groups.  We only met one other family there, a woman and her son.

We quickly moved through the Adirondacks exhibit because D could see a Mammoth all the way across the length of the museum and we just had to go there.  From there we moved to an exhibit on “invasive species”, this was a new exhibit and of particular interest to me.  In college I took many ecology, wildlife biology and environmental courses.  It was once a dream of mine to work in wildlife biology, but I was sidetracked by the idea of teaching school only to discover after awhile that I did not have the temperament for teaching.  From there I somehow ended up working in a clinical laboratory.  The exhibit showed a large number of non-native species that have invaded various habitats in New York State, I was not even aware that many of the organisms shown there were not native species. There was a special area where the kids could view small things like seeds and zebra mussels through a digital microscope.  This was a big hit with D.

After this area we made it to the New York City exhibit which takes up nearly half of the museum.  The picture of D is from the inside of an actual 1950’s era subway car.  The straps became an impromptu playground for a few minutes.  The museum now contains an extensive exhibit on 9/11, including pictures and video of the World Trade Center towers crumbling down and the planes crashing into the toweres.  Of course this became the source of a stream of questions from a certain 5 year old.  “Why did the planes crash into the towers?” “How come the towers fell down?” “What happened to the people in the towers?” and “Why would someone crash planes into towers?”  All very troubling and difficult questions to answer and they somehow caught me off guard.  I’ve had an easier time telling him where babies come from.  From here we decided it was time to go home.

Friday Family Roundup (11/14/08)

Here is some GLBT family news I’ve gathered from around the web this week:

1. Visit the Family Equality Council Website and Declare Your Family Equal. Check out this video made by the Family Equality Council. Have You Declared Your Family Equal?

2. Tomorrow, November 15, 2008 is a National Day of Protest.  Join The Impact - Protest Prop 8 is organizing action all across the country.  Check out the website to find a protest near you.

3. Here is a bit of local news for us here in New York from the Albany Times Union about gay couples traveling to Canada and elsewhere to get married.  The story highlights Nora Yates and her partner Erika Lewis who traveled to Niagara Falls, Canada to get married.  Nora is the Executive Director of the Capital District Gay and Lesbian Communilty Council.

4. Check out Atticus Circle a group of straight American who are fighting for gay rights and marriage equality.

5. Another group, Mormons Stole Our Rights is looking the strip the Mormon Church of it’s tax exempt status for using it’s money to influence the Prop 8 ballot measure in California.

6. In a post titled Somethings Afoot at Daddy, Papa and Me, Trey discusses a sense that something has changed in the response of the gay community to the recent ballot losses. Is there a new activism emerging in the gay community?

This one seems different, more intense, deeper and broader. People I know who have never been ‘activists’ are now, people I know who have been ‘activists’ (from people like me who have been episodic, sometimes accidental activists to full-time activists) seem to have a deeper resolve. It’s only been just over a week, but somethings changed.

7. Guy Dads discuss their reactions to the recent elections, both the good and the bad.

8. Steve at The Hygiene Chronicles expresses his own reactions to the election with a letter to President-Elect Obama and includes a very cute video of his son.

9. Here are some more reactions to the elections; a post titled The Things We Tell Our Children from The Daddy Diaries, Days of the Dragon gives us Post Election Redux, a response to Prop 8 from Family of Choice, and Dana over at Mombian writes about LGBT Parents: The Forgotten Voices of Prop 8.

10. And finally, here is a look back to our own reaction to the elections here at Green Dads, America, Get Over Yourself.

Wordless Wednesday: Helping Hand

Want One or Both of These Humorous Books?

We’re having a contest to giveaway 5 copies of these two books courtesy of the Hachette Book Group at our other site, Book Dads.  Read a description of the books and the contest rules here.

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