Market Failure

We got a bunch of baby clothes at X's second shower last weekend.  In fact, we've totally avoided buying clothes, since we knew people would buy them for him, and we're saving our money for things that people won't think of.  (Although now Kate's aunt and uncle are buying us a breast pump.  Who knew people were that awesome?)

There have been several failures in this process.

The first is that we've gotten a lot of clothes that scream OH HAI I'M A BOY.  Now, that we got a lot of blue is not a problem.  Frankly, we would have picked out a lot of blue clothes ourselves.  Puppies?  Totally fine.  Trucks?  Um.  OK.  He can like trucks if he wants.  Athletics?  They do realize that he's more likely to be a ballet dancer than a football player, given his family conditioning, right?  A full-scale cowboy outfit, complete with matching hat and boots?

Well, OK.  That one's a little awesome.

In any case, we got clothes that came from the boy side of the store.  Now, I object pretty much on principle to having a boy side of the store, and to the assumptions made in how clothes get assigned to that side.  But, we'll live.  

But there's another thing.

X has a onesie that says "Mommy loves me."  Actually, I think he has two.  And he's got a third that says "Favorite things: Mommy.  Hugs.  Kisses."  They are tremendously cute.  I love them.

Of course I do.  I'm Mommy.  

In most families, these outfits are countered with "My dad is my hero."  (Yes, I saw that one at Babies R Us today.  Seriously.)  "I love my daddy."  "Daddy's little man."  (I may be making that one up.)  But we don't have a Daddy. We have a Mommy and a Mama and an Uncle, and only one of us is getting served by the onesie industry here.

I almost want to write on the "Mommy loves me" onesie with a Sharpie: "Mama, on the other hand, is a little sick of me by this point."  

Uncle's vote is that we're shopping at mainstream/white stores; white people say Mommy, while black and Latino people say Mama, so if we headed out of the mainstream and into stores particularly targeting communities of color, we might be able to find Mama-themed attire.  Or, at least, Mamá.  He might be right; I'll start digging.

But, in a quest to fix things, I went on makeaonesie.com today and ordered these:

(Extra points if you get why the butterflies on the Uncle one are funny.)

I know there are much bigger lacks we'll be experiencing as queer parents.  But this is the sort of silly little area where accommodation of different family styles could be useful.  Not all mothers are Mommy.  And if someone wrote that on a fucking onesie, I'd buy it.

A Trip to the Beach

This weekend, X went to the beach.




His family can be pretty boring at the beach. Especially when they have the new issue of Buffy Season 8. (Best. Comic. EVAR.)



Mama got a new bikini for the occasion. (Mommy thinks she married a hottie.)


X got to swim in a pool for the first time! He really liked it.




Then he went to his first funeral: his moms and uncle buried their kitty, Vodka, who died a year ago.



Then he came home. He likes the beach. He's going back next weekend.

He can dance if he wants to.

It's official. Willa's a he.



And he likes kicking himself in the head. My mother suggested the Simpson Gene. Our donor had hair, though.

At 22 weeks, he weighed 1 pound, 2 ounces. And his legs were measuring two weeks ahead of date. Ha!

While we could keep calling him Willa, we've started calling him by his outside name, and it would be nice to be consistent. So, for Intarwebs purposes, he'll be called X.

No, we won't tell you what it stands for. But, well, you know us. Guess.

Things We Have Done in the Past Month

• Told Kate's grandparents. Upon hearing one of our girl names--which happens to be the name she and Kate's mom share--she said that's what we were calling the baby. Regardless of sex. OK, Nana.
• Told my great-aunt. She thinks we're awfully young to be having children. And it's too close to the wedding. But she's happy. (I love my great-aunt.)
  
• Told the first of our friends. They're all freaking out appropriately, given that we're one of first among our friends to have kids. (The other kid came eight years ago, right out of high school.)
  
• Heard Willa's little heartbeat for the first time. She sounds like a horsey. We heard it for the second time today.
• Willa has become visible to the outside world.
  

• Kate felt the first kick. Last night, when she woke up at 3:30 AM. And a bunch more today. We have bought her soccer shoes already.
• Kate's also had gas so bad she's thrown up. Twice.
  
• Incidentally, I've been writing like a demon. I'm about 7 pages from being done my last semester of coursework, and being able to start in on my dissertation. Whoo-hoo!
• We've been on the road more than we've been off it. Visits to our families, going to a conference and staying with family while there. Thursday we leave for Kate's five-year college reunion. I'm considering making her a t-shirt that says "Yep, it's a bump."
• And I really cannot tell you how many times I've watched this. Or this. Or this.
  

More detailed posts to come. But we wanted to touch base.

Hello there, Teh Intarwebs!

Hi, everybody. My name is Willa.

This photo was taken when I was 11 weeks and 3 days old. My mama went for an Ultrascreen test at the hospital where I'm going to be born (with my mommy for moral support). From what they say, we all went into a little room, and Mama lay down on the table. The nice technician had really good aim, so that the moment she put the sonogram wand on Mama's belly I popped right into view. Mommy immediately started crying. (She's like that. Funny, she's not even pregnant.) I put on a nice show for them all, kicking my long legs, patting my face, and jumping up and down. Actually I put on such a nice show that I gave myself the hiccups.

After a little while, Mama and Mommy got annoyed, because the technician said I wasn't in the right position. I got called recalcitrant, and ordered to move in the right position. Then Mama coughed a lot, which was really annoying, and so I stayed because they were annoying. So Mama and Mommy went for a walk, and Mama even jumped up and down, which was fun. Apparently the tech liked where I was this time, so they were able to get the photo for the test.

Mama and Mommy have been running around being silly since they got the pictures. They keep calling me by my outside-world name, and crying, and emailing these pictures to my grandparents. They even have photos on their cell phones. Silly moms.

Anyway. They just wanted me to say hi. So hi!

William The Transsexual Parakeet: A Story (With An Important Payoff)

Kate and I do this thing. She makes me tell her stories for her. Not just things that happened that we both know about: she makes me tell her childhood stories, her college stories, all of them. I'm the storyteller, which is hilarious if you consider that she's the one who wants us to blog every damn thing. Wants me to blog every damn thing, more like.

But anyway, today I'm the storyteller. And this is her story, but I'm telling it for my own purposes. So make of that what you want.

Anyway, when Kate was seven or so, a shed got delivered to her house. And in that shed was a tiny little parakeet. She and her mother and her little brother (who was about four) spent a good deal of time trying to catch that parakeet. Actually, Kate's mom did most of the work, aided by the ever-well-behaved Kate, and disturbed by the less-well-behaved brother, who desperately wanted to pet the pretty birdy. But, in the end, the bird was captured and brought inside. Kate's mom refused to let the kids name the bird for about six months or so, until she had exhausted every possible avenue for finding its original home. After all hope was lost, the kids named him William.

Several years down the road, William became sick. So he was taken to the vet, for the first time ever. At the vet, it was revealed that William was, in Kate's words, Williamette: they had a lady bird on their hands. William/ette's condition did not improve substantially, and about six months later s/he Flew To The Great Shed In The Sky, so to speak.

So, it is in honor of this bird, who managed to live for a time in both genders, who appeared without warning and shocked everyone by sticking around, that we christen the Non-Hysteri-Keet.

Blogosphere, meet Willa. Willa, meet Blogosphere.

Why Willa, and not William? Well, because we've basically decided that it's too hard to play the gender-neutral pronoun game all the time, and that our personal default pronoun is female, so she should have a vaguely female name. However, we picked Willa in part because it references the chromozonal question mark: Willa might be William might be Williamette, and all is well. We'll know when we know, or we won't, and it's fine.

(Oh, and alternative sources for the name include this and this. Look, the one walked the line between genders and wrote one of my favorite novels, and the other is a mysterious production of parents who shouldn't have been able to procreate AND had magical powers as an infant. Either way, it's good.)

What, you want a real story of yesterday morning's positive? Well, maybe I'll tell you. But not today. Willa's mama is demanding dinner, and her mom has some Guy Debord to read. The world continues turning, but it's one Keet heavier round these parts.