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Star Wars Costumes (126 Days Until Halloween)

Last week, BuyStarWarsCostumes.com contacted me and asked if I would be interested in reviewing a couple of their costumes. If you're thinking that I would be stupid to turn down such an offer, you are correct. I chose the Toddler Princess Leia costume for Claire and the Darth Vader Dog costume for Comang. The costumes arrived over the weekend and now, for the first time in years, I am looking forward to Halloween! I had chosen the Princess Leia costume in the toddler size, thinking that Claire might be too big for the infant size once October 31st rolls around. However, the toddler size is huge! I think that a 2 or even a 3 year old would fit comfortably in it. After looking over...

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My Mother’s Birth Story, Abridged

It is no secret that my father loves his two daughters and openly tells people over and over again how having two girls has taught him to be more sensitive, more responsible, and a better man in general. And as it was with Claire, it was he who was the happiest to hear the news that we are expecting another girl. However, I know that this was not always the case. I know that having lived most of his life in Korea — formerly a strongly patriarchal society — he must have had bouts of disappointment at not having sired a boy. (Surveys now show that for the first time in Korean society, parents prefer to have girls over boys. This is a...

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Laughing at Mommy Already

Sometimes I can't decide if Claire is incredibly lazy, extremely stubborn, exceptionally clever, or all of the above. Case in point: she never rolls anymore. I know that she is physically capable of doing it, because I have seen her purposely roll both ways several times. But I also know that she does not enjoy it. Hence, whenever she is in a horizontal position — whether on her back or stomach — she will only withstand it for however long she pleases...

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How Many Households Are Like Yours?

Over the weekend, the NYTimes ran an article titled "Baby Makes Four, and Complications" which tells the story of a woman, her son, her sperm donor and his lover, citing them as an example of the changing face of the American family. This was no big news to me. After all, the idea of the traditional nuclear family is being questioned every day, and for the first time ever, the percentage of households headed by married couples has dropped below 50 percent (according to 2010 U.S. Census figures). What particularly caught my eye about the article was its accompanying interactive webpage, "How Many Households Are Like Yours?" Upon entering the page, the visitor is prompted to choose the primary residents of his/her household, to...

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