Family Restaurant celebrates young children with gay or lesbian parents. It's a magical world filled with cute characters who reflect their family lives. Set in a family restaurant, it features talking ketchup and mustard bottles among the colorful diner residents, as well as real children with gay or lesbian parents.

James serves on the Board of Directors of the Outfest LGBT film festival, and notes on her Kickstarter page, "there are very few family-friendly films where these kids can enjoy a fun story that reflects their own lives."

Lynn Sherr wrote about Bates in the January 4 New York Times, where she also explains why many of Bates' beliefs stand opposed to those of Romney. It's a good read.

Despite the flippant title of this post, it may be ahistorical to call Bates and Coman lesbians in a modern sense, but at the very least, they seem to be spiritual lesbian foremothers. (Read my earlier post on Bates for a snippet of poetry she wrote upon Coman's death. Theirs was no ordinary friendship.)

(For more on Bates, see also Judd Proctor and Brian Burns' post from last Gay History Month.)

What? You're not? Well, you should be.

Go check out A.K. Summers' new comic/graphic tale, "Pregnant Butch" over at comic collective site Act-i-vate. It's a funny, insightful, semi-autobiographical look at "a butch dyke enduring that most deeply feminizing of processes--pregnancy." She'll be serializing the 100-page comic at the rate of several pages per week, and hopes someday to find a print publisher. (Note: This is a comic of the grown-up variety, not a kiddie book.)

I had the pleasure of interviewing A.K. for my upcoming Mombian newspaper column, which should be appearing in select papers over the next week or so. (Here it is in Bay Windows.) One highlight: "There is so much said and written about the importance of pregnancy and your transformation into a parent and a birthgiver," Summers explained. Pregnant Butch, she said, "is about my attempts to hold on to my butch self and also to allow myself to be transformed by the process [of pregnancy], and where that could occur and be positive."

Comics clearly aren't just for superheroes anymore. Either that, or LGBT parents are superheroes.

The groups say the project was created in response to the lack of representation of LGBT people in school curricula as well as "disproportionate incidents of bullying and violence against LGBT youth."

The project contains audio interviews (and transcripts) of nine people who "helped shape LGBT history," along with discussion questions, suggested activities, and historical background for each interview. There are also lesson plans on broad topics such as invisibility, name-calling, the exclusion of LGBT people from societal institutions, the right to marry, and understanding gender identity.

Interviewees include Phyllis Lyon, one of the founders of Daughters of Bilitis, the first lesbian rights group; David Wilson, one of the plaintiffs in the case that won marriage equality in Massachusetts; transgender activist Jamison Green; and James Dale, plaintiff in the U.S. Supreme Court case challenging the Boy Scouts of America's ban on gay scouts. GLSEN says they will add more stories and voices in the coming months.

Worth a listen/read for your own edification even if you don't have kids in the target age range. (They're mp3's, so - if you're like me - you can download them to the device of your choice and listen while you're commuting, folding laundry, washing dishes, or raking the yard.)

[Michele] is supposed to be on set with her cast, but insists that the little girl with two fathers wait for her outside the auditorium. Once there, Michele wraps her delicate arms around the girl and asks her about the experience. "How do you feel in school? What did you tell them?" she asks, visibly touched by her character's impact. "You're cool now; you're like Rachel Berry," she says to the nodding fan, adding, "I'm so proud of you."

[Quote from page 6; first page of story is here.]

But as a chronicler of things related to lesbian moms, I now feel obligated to note that Carol Ann Duffy, Britain's Poet Laureate, will be writing a poem for Prince William and Kate Middleton's wedding. Duffy is a lesbian and a mother, although a few years ago, she told Jeanette Winterson (another great, out British writer), "I'm not a lesbian poet, whatever that is. If I am a lesbian icon and a role model, that's great, but if it is a word that is used to reduce me, then you have to ask why someone would want to reduce me? I never think about it. I don't care about it. I define myself as a poet and as a mother--that's all."

Part of the Poet Laureate's job is to compose poems for royal occasions, but Duffy told the BBC Woman's Hour in 2009 that she would only write for the occasions that inspired her, saying, "If I felt, in the event of a royal wedding, inspired to write about people coming together in marriage or civil partnership, I would just be grateful to have an idea for the poem. And if I didn't, I'd ignore it."

It's worth a read, and if you're like me, your blood boils regularly this time of year as you fill out your tax forms and think about the financial inequities we face. I'll note, though, that unlike the couple in the example, some couples (my spouse and I, in fact) would have actually paid more in taxes this year if the federal government recognized our marriage.

That doesn't mean we're against marriage equality, of course. With rights come responsibility, and we'd be more than willing to pay up if we also gained access to all of the other benefits (financial and otherwise) of legal recognition.

Almost Perfect is the story of a boy in a small-town high school who falls for the new girl in town, only to discover she was born a biological male.

The ALA also announced four "honor books" in addition to the main award winner. They are: Will Grayson, Will Grayson, by John Green and David Levithan; Love Drugged, by James Klise; Freaks and Revelations, by Davida Willis Hurwin; and The Boy in the Dress, by David Walliams.

Kudos to all of the winners and to the ALA for instituting the award. Positive images for and about LGBTQ youth and the children of LGBTQ parents are sorely needed, and such recognition can only help.

And he issued a less flippant but more direct statement Wednesday in response to those who fear the "radical homosexual agenda." That agenda, said Frank, is "to be protected against violent crimes driven by bigotry, it's to be able to get married, it's to be able to get a job, and it's to be able to fight for our country. For those who are worried about the radical homosexual agenda, let me put them on notice. Two down, two to go."

Love them fightin' words--but he forgot one big item: to be able to become parents and protect our children.

What makes this more than just another article on personal finance, however, is that the couple profiled consists of lesbian moms Liz Page and Marianne Stravinskas.  The fact that they are a same-sex couple is incidental to the main thrust of the piece, which is not about "gay" finance per se.

I am not myself religious, and would not ever say that religion is the best or only answer to bullying. I do know, however, that messages of hate disguised as religion help no one, and can do great damage to LGBTQ youth. On the positive side, religions have the power to offer great comfort and assistance to those within their communities of belief. Some might say they have a God-given duty to do so.

McGillis, who came out last year, has two children from a previous relationship.

The couple's ceremony garnered coverage by the New York Times; After Ellen has more on the couple and on McGillis' upcoming vampire film, Stake Land. No, McGillis' character is not a lesbian, as far as I can tell. But she is a nun who "faces a crisis of faith." Make of that what you will.

That's the belief of "a majority of Americans," who now include the above in their definition of family according to a study by Brian Powell, a sociology professor at Indiana University, Bloomington.

The New York Times has a piece this morning about the study and Powell's new book, Counted Out: Same-sex Relations and Americans' Definitions of Family. The book's conclusion, as stated by the NYT, is that "framing the equality of same-sex couples in terms of 'the best interests of the child' might prove to be a more successful political argument than others." I've long argued the same.

Then, people both inside and outside the LGBT community assumed that "you gave up the ability to have children" if you came out, said Academy Award-winning filmmaker Debra Chasnoff. In her 1985 documentary, Choosing Children, however, she profiled six pioneering lesbian families who were defying this assumption.

The film, made with her then-partner Kim Klausner, helped inspire many lesbians to become parents. Now, years after the film's negative was lost, Choosing Children is being restored, and Chasnoff hopes it will inspire the next generation of LGBT parents--as well as teach people about a key part of LGBT history.