I have a new post on her.meneutics about the near-destruction of our family's summer cottages during Hurricane Irene. It begins:

For New York City, Hurricane Irene was largely a non-event, an unnecessary nuisance with unprecedented action. For me and my extended family, Hurricane ...

I didn't really want kids for a long time. That's a story for another day, but I might as well admit it. I thought they would slow me down. I worried that I wouldn't be able to achieve my own goals. I thought I might not know what I was doing as a parent. And I was ...

I have written before about the concept of a "wrongful" birth–the legal term used when a mother sues doctors after her child has been born with a disability that wasn't discovered in utero. The idea is that the mother would have aborted, given the proper medical information. ...

As a writer and former English major, I know that language matters. The way we talk about our world informs the way we experience our world. Language shapes reality. And so we are teaching our kids, for example, not to say "I hate that" (they learned hate from Cinderella, of ...

I have a new post on Bloom–Parenting Kids with Disabilities, "Friends in Need, Friends Indeed."

It begins:

I have 300 new friends. Well, not really. But last week, a woman who knows I write about having a child with Down syndrome sent me a Facebook message and a friend request. ...

I received a very kind comment over the weekend. In response to my recent post, "Penny's First Day of Kindergarten," she wrote,

Wow, did she really tell you all about the funny man up on the stage? What did she say? Do people understand her when she speaks and does she really ...

A lot of my friends describe themselves as "spiritual but not religious." I think I know what they mean. I think they don't want some of the restrictions that come with religiosity–the rules that mandate saying certain prayers or feeling lots of guilt. They don't want to find ...

Sharon Hodde Miller was kind enough to promote my book on her blog, sheworships.com. For those of you who would like another preview of A Good and Perfect Gift, you can read Part One here and Part Two here.

Also, A Good and Perfect Gift is now available on Kindle. Click here ...

Are you in a Book Club? (This is besides the point of this blogpost, but as a personal aside–if so, what have been your top three books in the past year?)

Just wanted to let you and your book club know that there are now Questions for Discussion available on my website about ...

Three articles I recommend for your reading this weekend:

First, a New York Times piece about the impact of artificial insemination as more and more children discover their "half-siblings." When one man "fathers" 150 children, the chances of those siblings accidentally meeting ...

I have a new post on her.meneutics, MIA: Men Who Don't Use Pornography. It begins:

I don't remember much about sex education in 10th grade, other than anxiety about what topics I might have to discuss with peers. But I do remember a woman who came to our private, secular school ...

A few weeks ago, I had the chance to talk with Diane Markins of Words in High Def about A Good and Perfect Gift and having a child with Down syndrome. You can listen to the interview by visiting her website and listening to the MP3.

While you're there, you'll find a guest post ...

William and I were watching Bambi together last week. Penny was already asleep. Near the end, when spring comes, all the little animals fall in love. Owl calls them "twitterpated." William was very confused.

"Well, it's kind of like they become super-great friends. Like your ...

Penny's first words when I picked her up from her first day of kindergarten: "I didn't miss you, Mom!"

That probably says it all.

I missed her. William missed her–he spent the morning asking when she would get home from school. But she was ready. She marched right into that big ...

I have a brief interview with author Rachel Simon in this month's Books and Culture magazine: "Two Minutes With Rachel Simon." She wrote Riding the Bus With my Sister and The Story of Beautiful Girl. You need to subscribe to Books and Culture to read the whole thing (and I highly ...