Filed under: In the news, Weird but true

Parents are well aware that kitchens are not the safest of places for kids. However, when you think of danger, sharp knives and hot stoves are what come to mind. The only harm a counter top poses a child is if they happen to if catch their head on a sharp edge or corner.

But an odd thing has been discovered in some kitchens: certain granite countertops have been emitting dangerous levels of radon and radioation. "It's not that all granite is dangerous," said Stanley Liebert, the quality assurance director at CMT Laboratories in Clifton Park, N.Y. "But I've seen a few that might heat up your Cheerios a little."

Radon is the silver medalist behind smoking as a leading cause of lung cancer and is most dangerous to smokers who already have compromised lungs. Cancer-causing radation has the most profound effects on developing fetuses and children. Neither is what anyone wants in the room families spend the most time in.

Continue reading Granite countertops - Hazardous to your health?!

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Filed under: Newborns, Pregnancy & birth, Money & work, Bump watch, Life & style, Celeb parenting, Rumors, Media, That's entertainment

Actor Mark Wahlberg has vowed not to sell the baby pictures of his new child-to-be. Marky Mark is putting a stop to any offers from magazines before they even get started, insisting he will not be selling his baby photos like so many other celebrity parents have of late.

The actor is expecting his third child with girlfriend (and perhaps soon to be wife) Rhea Durham, who is due in September. He is already father to two other children with Durham, Ella, who is four and Michael, who is two. I don't recall Mark pimping out pictures of either of them to the tabloids either!

Wahlberg wants to keep the birth and his family private, which is a welcome refreshment to the baby picture overload we've been experiencing lately, our fascination with which is borderline disgusting! Rumor also had it that new mom Nicole Kidman and her husband Keith Urban would not be selling pictures of their new daughter, Sunday Rose. Perhaps there is a new celebrity parenting trend afoot?

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Filed under: Newborns, Pregnancy & birth, Weird but true

While Michelle Duggar is only just working on number eighteen, a woman in British Columbia, Canada has already dropped her eighteenth kid. The forty-four-year-old Romanian immigrant gave birth to daughter Abigail, weighing a healthy seven pounds, twelve ounces. She joins her nine sisters and eight brothers ranging in age from twenty months to twenty-three years.

Livia Ionce and her husband Alexandru emigrated from Romania in 1990 and now live in the Western Canadian province. "We never planned how many children to have. We just let God guide our lives, you know, because we strongly believe life comes from God and that's the reason we did not stop the life," said Alexandru.

Apparently, this latest addition to the team makes Mrs. Ionce the most prolific mother in British Columbia in the last twenty years. And, she's got the Duggars beat -- that's certainly an accomplishment.

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Filed under: Image of the Day

Is she pondering jumping in? Watching the waves? If that was my little one, he'd be mid-flight right into the water. Thanks to NovaScotaGrl for this cute capture.

If you'd like your own picture featured here, simply upload photos into our group Flickr Pool - We'll highlight an image every day. Remember: we're on the lookout for shots with interesting backgrounds, cool angles, or original composition. Be sure to read the intro on our main Flickr page for more information and limit your uploading to 5 photos per day.

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Filed under: Kids 5-7, Siblings, Weird but true

It's unusual enough to be identical twins, but for a pair of such twins to meet another pair of identical twins and fall in love? That's gotta be pretty rare. But then, for one of those couples to give birth to identical twins, that's even more of a rarity. But even the rarest of events can still occur. And so we have the case of Diane and Darlene Nettemeier and Craig and Mark Sanders.

The two sets of identicals met at the Twin Day festival in -- where else? -- Twinsburg, Ohio back in 1998. They ended up going on a double date to Las Vegas where they won a whole mess of money playing poker. Sensing they were on a roll, they got engaged the same day. After getting married, they built a pair of homes right next door to each other.

As if all that weren't enough, Craig and Diane went on to have a pair of identical twins of their own, seven-year-old Colby and Brady. And now, ten years after their first meeting in Twinsburg, they're returning to show off their own set of double trouble. I have to say, that's pretty cool. Double cool, even.

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Filed under: Eating & nutrition, Playground bureau, Mealtime

Our school lunch menu goes like this: Monday -- pizza and french fries. Tuesday -- hot dog and french fries. Wednesday -- sloppy joe and french fries. To say that I was disappointed to discover this is putting it mildly. Though schools across the nation are slowly starting to offer students more nutritional meals that are far lower in fat and salt content than those listed above, it's a huge system that will take time to overhaul.

The obvious solution is to pack a lunch instead, and many parents have turned to the kid-friendly idea of bento boxes. Bento, which originated in Japan, is a single portion meal consisting of rice, fish or meat, and vegetables, packed in a box in an often visually appealing manner. Though parents can choose foods their kids like to put into their own bento boxes, the idea is to make food fun, finger-friendly, and nutritious.

Continue reading Bento boxes - Make healthy lunch more appealing

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Filed under: Fun & activities

Welcome to the dog days of summer! For many parents, the family vacation is but a distant memory, the kids' swimming lessons over and summer camp is done, yet there are still MANY, MANY days before the blissful sound of that morning bell at school!

How about whiling away an afternoon with the kids in the shade of a tree (or even better, a makeshift shelter created from a clothesline and old sheets or blankets!) creating crafts out of ordinary household items, MacGuyver style? It's inexpensive, easy, and best of all- children of nearly all ages and skill levels can participate.

Continue reading Childhood Unplugged: Making crafts out of nothing at all

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Filed under: Toddlers, Development

Our household is actively involved with potty training right now, a milestone that I had vaguely hoped would be maybe a 24-hour preoccupation but has regrettably turned out to be a ongoing effort. I suppose some kids gaily toss their diapers aside, shout NE'ER MORE!, and that's that -- not a drop spilled after the great change has been made, a well-worn, self-motivated path instantly created between child and potty chair.

We, however, are firmly mired in the Land of Endless Reminders: do you have to go potty? Do you have to go potty? Do you have to go potty? I feel like a demented parrot, hovering in front of my child and squawking the same phrase over and over all day long, but we've learned that reminders are not only useful, they're downright necessary.

In many ways it's actually more challenging to have a small child who's not in diapers. Leaving the house requires more strategizing than before, and once you're out and about -- well, there's no longer a safe haven of Huggies between your child's rear end and the shopping cart, you know? Plus, new issues are at hand: he prefers to pee standing up while I prefer not having to use an entire roll of Bounty Select-a-Size paper towels after each bathroom visit; potty reward stickers are now affixed to approximately eight thousand surfaces of my house, including, as I discovered the other morning, the bottom of my 6-month-old's left foot.

Despite the difficulties, though, it's an exciting time. Sure, it's a little moist, there are occasional setbacks, and frankly there's a lot more nakedness than I had expected, but we are on our way to leaving diapers behind (one kid down, one to go!). As my son loudly informed the bemused Fred Meyer clerk this week, "I've got THOMAS underwear on because I'm a REALLY REALLY BIG BOY and I go POOP in the POTTY!" He then went on to disclose some disturbing information about hot dogs, but thankfully we were well on our way out the door at that point.

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Filed under: Newborns, Just for moms, Babies, Pregnancy & birth, Health & safety, In the news

Smoking is a hard habit to break, there's no doubt about it. In fact, according to USA Today, only 10 to 20% of people who try quitting succeed. But expectant mothers have a reason to quit smoking that goes beyond their own health -- smoking during pregnancy is linked to ectopic pregnancies, placental problems, and low birth weight. And according to the American Cancer Society, those potential health issues are reason enough for many pregnant women to kick the habit, even if only temporarily.

Up to 45% of expectant moms who smoke quit cold turkey, especially notable since nicotine products like patches and gum aren't recommended for pregnant women. That's the good news. The bad news is that the stress of new motherhood often causes those same women to return to their smoking habit after their baby is born -- up to 80% of moms start smoking again within a year of giving birth. Post-partum depression, stress, weight loss, and partners who smoke are often named as reasons women return to the habit.

Continue reading Moms quit smoking during pregnancy only to start again

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Filed under: Pregnancy & birth, Bump watch

In an almost cyclical pattern, just as the furor of one celebrity couple having twin babies, another announces they are expecting a double dose of joy.

This time the superstar parents are Rebecca Romijn of Victoria Secret and Sports Illustrated modeling fame and current regular on Ugly Betty, and Jerry O'Connell, swooned over by many since his Stand By Me days and more recently, his parody of Tom Cruise.

The expectant parents were married a year ago in a quiet ceremony in Los Angeles. This will be the first children for either of them, but if they have any questions about the care and raising of twins, they could ask :

• Geena Davis
• Marcia Gay Harden
• Julia Roberts
• Patrick Dempsey
• Jennifer Lopez and Marc Anthony
• Nancy Grace
• Marcia Cross
• Dennis Quaid
• Al Pacino
• Cheryl Tiegs
• Denzel Washington
• Patricia Richardson
• Chuck Norris
• Cybil Shepherd
• Donald Sutherland
• Jane Seymour
• Ray Romano
• Mel Gibson
• Corbin Bernsen
• Michael J. Fox
• Ron Howard
• Ingrid Bergman
• Lance Armstrong
• Brad Pitt or Angelina Jolie

Apparently there is something going on with that Hollywood water!

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