@Home For The Holidays By Meredith Efken ‘Tis The Season To Be Jolly? Sitting by the fireside, humming carols and knitting mittens…not! For these stay-at-home moms, the weeks before Christmas are anything but mellow. How can you balance housework, home crises and the husband without losing your mind? Plug in your laptop! Meet Dulcie, Zelia, Jocelyn, Rosalyn, Veronica and the rest of the women of SAHM I Am. An e-mail loop of stay-at-home moms, they’ve seen each other through months of domestic drama: babies who won’t come, bills that won’t leave, kids who won’t listen and spouses who won’t talk. Now, as the yuletide approaches, the SAHMs are on hand once again, bearing gifts of sisterhood, sanity, and the real Christmas spirit. Get your own copy of @Home For The Holidays An Excerpt from @Home for the Holidays  *Read Here* Interview with Rosalyn and Veronica from @Home for the Holidays  *Read Here* Deleted Scenes from @Home for the Holidays  *Read Here* “War” On Christmas?????  The last couple of years, we’ve heard a lot of hullabaloo in America about a so-called “war” on Christmas... Read the rest of the story Solution To Jocelyn’s Holiday Game To Happy Holid—uh, I mean…rather, Merry Christmas. Hope you enjoyed playing Jocelyn’s game with all the SAHM I Am girls. If you’re still stumped about why singing “Silent Night” would earn you a mistletoe smooch, but belting out “God Rest Ye Merry Gentleman” will get you nothing but a lump of coal, hover over the section below with your cursor: So, Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukah, Happy Kwanzaa…and any other holiday you happen to be blessed enough to celebrate with friends and family! Publishers Weekly (August 2006) *click here to read full review  “Efken nails the characters' various voices and keeps the pacing brisk, lacing some uproariously funny moments amid the ladies' virtual sturm und drang.” –Publishers Weekly Discussion Questions for @Home: Rosalyn spends a lot of time with her Save Christmas boycotting campaign. What do you think is her motivation for being involved with this? What does she really want to achieve? Is this the same motivation behind the real-life “Merry Christmas” campaigns? Why does using the word “Christmas” or not using it become such a controversy? Do you think it matters? Veronica and Rosalyn constantly take cheap shots at each other. How do you think they really feel about each other? Do you think there is hope for their relationship? Marianne suffers from postpartum depression. Have you or anyone you’ve known struggled with depression? What helped in that situation? How well do you think Marianne’s friends handled her depression? What would you have done the same or differently? Compare the three ways of building a family presented in this story: pregnancy, IVF/embryo adoption, and adoption. Were any of these options new or uncomfortable to you? What would be some of the advantages and disadvantages of each? Do you know people who have built their families in these ways? Brenna has relatives who disapprove of the embryo adoption. They believe it’s silly to adopt an embryo because it’s “not a real person.” Do you agree or disagree, and why? What would be some of the reasons people might choose embryo adoption over embryo donation? How would you have responded to those relatives if you were Brenna? Zelia also faces disapproval from her relatives regarding their choice to adopt from Ethiopia. The concern stemmed from racial issues. Were the concerns valid? Why or why not? Do you think that multi-racial couples and families are well-accepted in your community, or is there still needed improvement in that area? The loss of a job is always difficult for a family. How would you have responded if you were in Dulcie’s position? Was her anger and fear justified? How has outsourcing to foreign countries hurt the job market in your community? When Dulcie takes a job and Tom stays home, it’s quite a role reversal. How is Tom’s challenge of being a SAHD different from the challenge of being a SAHM? How is it the same? Do you think this can be a positive role reversal for a family? What factors would need to be in place to make it a success? What did you think about the initial lack of support from her friends for Dulcie’s decision to keep her job? Why were her friends so unsupportive? Did this make you more aware of how you respond to your friends’ surprising news or decisions? What was the answer to Jocelyn’s ongoing Christmas riddle on the loop? Were you able to figure it out? How did knowing or not knowing make you feel? What is it about human nature that makes exclusive or secret knowledge so attractive and desirable?