Family: When parents happen to be same-sex

“It’s all good in the Braswell ’hood.” — Family saying

Leah and Erica Braswell joke that they had a 13-year engagement, writes Cheree Franco in Family. In their minds, they became a couple during the ice storm of 2000, but under Vermont law, they became a couple last September.

“We had a florist … and after the ceremony in the church, the photographer took us around to different places and we took pictures,” Erica says.

Their children Ross, 7, and Reid Braswell, 5, attended the wedding. It would take nearly another year for Leah to obtain full parental rights, despite the fact that she witnessed their births, cheers at their soccer games and answers to “Mama.”

The Braswells are as nuclear as families come. They live in Roland, in a sprawling ranch house at the end of a gravel road. There’s plenty of space for four-wheelers, water balloons, baseball games and roaming rescued dogs. The boys spend summers shuttling between Vacation Bible School, swimming lessons and grandparents’ houses, while falls are consumed with sports and school.

See Wednesday’s Arkansas Democrat-Gazette for Franco’s story on families where the parents happen to be of the same sex.

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