Let Us Wait for Baby No. 13

A western Michigan couple with 12 sons is looking forward to baby No. 13, and even though they're insisting their tradition of not finding out in advance whether they're having a boy or girl, they said they'd be shocked if their streak is broken.

Choose the right way to lose weight

Some women will try anything to squeeze into those skinny jeans, but the latest extreme slimming trend has nothing to do with cutting carbs or exercise, but rather, simply taking a step back in time and strapping on a corset.

Rumors about iPhone 7

Although the iPhone 6 just came out, rumors about iPhone 7 have already started pouring in. Fans are guessing about the release date and features for the iPhone 7.

Which One You Prefer, iPhone 6 Plus and Samsung's Galaxy Note 4?

The world's two biggest smartphone manufacturers each has a premium flagship phablet, Apple's iPhone 6 Plus and Samsung's Galaxy Note 4, vying for your attention. But which one you will choose?

The History of Halloween

Straddling the line between fall and winter, plenty and paucity, life and death, Halloween is a time of celebration and superstition. It is thought to have originated with the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain, when people would light bonfires and wear costumes to ward off roaming ghosts. In the eighth century, Pope Gregory III designated November 1 as a time to honor all saints and martyrs; the holiday, All Saints’ Day, incorporated some of the traditions of Samhain. The evening before was known as All Hallows’ Eve and later Halloween. Over time, Halloween evolved into a secular, community-based event characterized by child-friendly activities such as trick-or-treating. In a number of countries around the world, as the days grow shorter and the nights get colder, people continue to usher in the winter season with gatherings, costumes and sweet treats.

To Save Money on Halloween Treats

We're only a week away from Halloween and while everyone is crazy about the costumes and decorations, I'm crazy about the treats. That's right, I get more excited about the approaching candy rush than what I'm going to wear around the neighborhood. No Halloween is complete without some spooky treats that adults and kids can enjoy together at festive Halloween gatherings.

There is no need to rely on standard store-bought treats from the candy aisle. Those can be expensive and, let's face it, a little boring. I have some more creative ideas for you, and the good news is that they're also affordable. Scary Chattering Teeth: You only need three ingredients, which are red apples, peanut butter and marshmallows. Cut the red apples into slices. Slather on some peanut butter on top of a slice of apple and top it with marshmallows lined up to look like teeth.

Top it with another slice of apple to make it look like chattering teeth. Clementine Celery Pumpkins: I love healthy treats that look cute because you know the kids will eat them. I found these clementine celery pumpkins on Spaceshipsandlaserbeams.com. Not only are they super healthy, but they take absolutely no time to make. All you need are clementines or oranges and celery stalks. You can peel the fruit and then just add one inch pieces of celery to the top -- simple as that.

To Wash Your Towels More Often Than You Think

We took a deep dive into the particulars of towel cleaning: how often should you wash the various kinds of towels used on a daily basis? It turns out you should wash all your towels more often than you probably think. For bath towels, the experts we spoke with recommend washing after about three uses to remove millions (yes, tens of millions) of dead skin cells and avoid that musty scent.

A Deceptively Simple Plate Designed To Control Your Daily Diet

Counting calories can involve a tedious process of weighing food, doing conversions, and logging every meal, or buying an expensive gadget like this device that shoots a laser at your lunch. But then there's this low-tech alternative: A plate that shows, in a simple graphic, how to eat a balanced meal.

Dutch designer Annet Bruil saw a need for people to eat healthier, and through design research found that one of the main problems people struggle with is portion control. People find it difficult to estimate how many vegetables they should eat. And even if they know it should be 200 grams a day, but what does that look like on a plate?

Get Ready for Halloween with Your Personalized Hoodies

Like many high school students, Jhaney Hamlett prefers wearing a hoodie instead of a coat during the winter months. But instead of complaining about the cold or suffering in silence, Hamlett has turned her preference into a business plan.

Friendship Necklaces for You

Sure, you have a best friend today, but back in ’90s and early 2000s, best friends were a lifestyle. When you weren’t busy having weird secret sexual feelings for Disney Channel actors or carefully writing Blink-182 lyrics on your backpack in Whiteout pen, you were hanging out with your BFF: making up dance routines, pledging eternal devotion to each other, and coating any item within grabbing distance with glitter glue. It was, in a word, “fetch.”

Teddy bear parade keeps Railroad Festival on track

Children walked along cuddling their teddy bears and rode along in wagons with their favorite stuffed animals through afternoon drizzle in downtown Appomattox Sunday. The music, car show, and fireman’s competition at the 42nd annual Appomattox Railroad Festival were canceled because of inclement weather, but the teddy bear parade marched on.

Make Your Own Bookmarks

A folded corner. A spare receipt. An optimistic belief that we can totally remember the page number. We all have our ways of marking our place in a book before closing it for the time being -- but far too often that method is unreliable or unattractive.

Will iOS 8.1 Finally Bring Some of the iOS 8 Features?

were not part of Apple’s initial software release. Ars Technica has listed the main features coming in iOS 8.1, which is expected to be made available to users later this month, likely following Apple’s iPad and Mac event.

Will iOS 8.1 Finally Bring Some of the iOS 8 Features?

Apple already released the second beta version of iOS 8.1, its first major update for iOS 8 that’s expected to bring various important features advertised for iOS 8, but which were not part of Apple’s initial software release. Ars Technica has listed the main features coming in iOS 8.1, which is expected to be made available to users later this month, likely following Apple’s iPad and Mac event.

Some of the things iOS 8.1 will be device-specific, such as the Apple Pay support for iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus, and likely for the iPad Air 2, as well as the Touch ID support for the upcoming tablet. Others will be more generic and will reach all iOS 8-compatible devices, including Handoff features, iCloud Drive and bug fixes.

Apple Pay will be available to previous iOS devices including iPhone 5s, iPhone 5c and iPhone 5, but only once the Apple Watch is released, as these devices will have to be connected to a Watch to make contactless payments.

Most Handoff (continuity) features already work on iOS 8 and Macs running a Yosemite beta version (which is also nearing its official launch,) except for SMS messages. Once iOS 8.1 and Yosemite are released, users will be able to deal with incoming and outgoing SMS messages directly from a Mac that’s in proximity of an iPhone on top of iMessages.

As with any other iOS x.1 update, iOS 8.1 should bring plenty of stability and bug fixes, which may be more important than ever this year for Apple. iOS 8 adoption has stagnated following the many issues that surrounded the iOS 8 launch and subsequent minor updates, and Apple is expected to further patch things in iOS 8.1 to convince more people to jump on iOS 8. One important category of users that might be worried about upgrading to iOS 8 is made of iPhone 4s and/or iPad 2 owners who’re dealing with various iOS 8 performance problems. The company is also expected to release iOS 8.2 and iOS 8.3 in the future.

If you are interested in custom iPhone 6 cases, come to SNAPMADE. Design them by yourselves.

Buy a New iPhone or Not

The new Apple iPhone 6, which has a 4.7-inch screen and is about a finger-width taller than the older iPhone 5S, is a good choice for business users. The bigger iPhone 6 Plus is a bit more of an "entertainment" phone, with a 5.5-inch screen that's more ideal for watching movies (it tends to last longer due to a bigger battery). Yet both phones are facing even stiffer competition than the iPhone 5S did a year ago. It's more important than ever to know what you are missing for business features on Android and Windows smartphones like the Samsung Galaxy Alpha and the Nokia Lumia 635.

Keeping Kids Involved in Sports

In an effort to benefit millions of youth athletes, parents and coaches, this article is among a series created exclusively for partners in the Liberty Mutual Insurance Play Positive? program, powered by Positive Coaching Alliance.

The lifelong friends you’ve made. The coaches you will never forget. The fun you had with the teammates who taught you there is more to sports than wins and losses. These are just a few of the reasons why you wouldn’t trade your youth sports experiences for anything in the world. But will your children enjoy similar experiences?

Unfortunately, many children aren’t building memories such as these. Why?

Maybe the “win-at-all-costs” mentality that has become part of all levels of youth sports has taken much of the fun out of the game. Maybe the relentless pull of new technology creates fonder memories than they’re getting from fields of play. Whatever the reasons, we hope parents and continue to encourage their kids to continue their youth sports experiences.

Keeping kids involved in sports ensures that they at least have a chance to create those special sports memories and also contributes to their continued physical activity and all the benefits that come with it.

To help get you thinking about the ways to frame and discuss the many rewards of participating in sports to your kids, Liberty Mutual Insurance and Positive Coaching Alliance have outlined four of the central benefits of youth sports participation:

Fitness – Youth sports provide fun reasons for your kids to get off of the couch and get active.
Friendships – Teammates often become life-long best friends.
Wisdom – From learning how to overcome individual challenges to how to succeed on a team, youth sports is the platform from which many of life’s most valuable lessons are learned.
Focus – The mental preparation that it takes to succeed in youth sports provides the groundwork for success both in school and later in life.

At Liberty Mutual Insurance, we constantly look for ways to celebrate the countless acts of sportsmanship and integrity shown by people every day. We created Play Positive?, powered by Positive Coaching Alliance, as part of this belief to help ensure that our kids experience the best that sports have to offer in environments that promote and display good sportsmanship. We believe kids can learn valuable life lessons when coaches and parents come together to support winning on and off the field.

Are you interested in designing custom t-shirts for you kids or your friednds? Come to Snapmade, create and buy what you want.

UC Irvine Students Smash the Guinness World Record for the World's Largest Pillow Fight

Welcome week in the fall is the time of year when most new college students actively avoid getting hit in the face with objects of whatever variety to obviate the voltage for a moniker that will stay with them throughout their college career. This yr, however, students who had been accepted to the University of California, Irvine, said, "Bring it on."

As division of the university's welcome week activities, UC Irvine students, mostly freshman and transfers, joined together yesterday to attempt to smash the Guinness World Record for the world's largest pillow fight. An amazing 4,200 (sober?) students succeeded in snapping off the previous record — 3,813 people — held by Swedish DJ duo Dada Life, who instigated the pillow fight at a concert in Chicago.

Although just one specific rule had to be observed in order to clear the record — the battle had to remain for at least 60 seconds — apparently a portion goes into forming a world-record-breaking pillow fight. Granting to the Orange County Register, "It requires at least 100 volunteers and several turnstiles to count participants and an official Guinness adjudicator. Not to mention [portable restrooms], water, spare food, and a disc jockey to keep everyone jazzed while folks file in." During the event, the students wielding the bed linens against one another were serenaded by Ariana Grande singing.

UC Irvine currently holds the records for the world's largest water-pistol fight and largest dodge-ball game, which were both lay out during past welcome-week festivities. A fifth-year college student who had taken part in the event described how it felt to break the world pillow-fighting record with one word: "Awesome." The Irvine Anteaters, as they are recognized, officially start class today, and we hope all their seams are prepared. If you are interested in the custom t-shirts they wore, come to SNAPMADE.