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What Kind Of News Station Assassinates The Character Of A 4-Year-Old?
Misleading editing either incredibly racist or...nah, it's just incredibly racist.
03.05.13
The amazing bond between dads and daughters.
I have plenty of space.
This article originally appeared on 04.09.16
Being a dad is an amazing job no matter the gender of the tiny humans we're raising. But there's something unique about the bond between fathers and daughters.
Most dads know what it's like to struggle with braiding hair, but we also know that bonding time provides immense value to our daughters. In fact, studies have shown that women with actively involved fathers are more confident and more successful in school and business.
A 37-year-old Ukrainian artist affectionately known as Soosh, recently created some ridiculously heartwarming illustrations of the bond between a dad and his daughter, and put them on her Instagram feed. Sadly, her father wasn't involved in her life when she was a kid. But she wants to be sure her 9-year-old son doesn't follow in those footsteps.
"Part of the education for my kiddo who I want to grow up to be a good man is to understand what it's like to be one," Soosh told Upworthy.
There are so many different ways that fathers demonstrate their love for their little girls, and Soosh pretty much nails all of them.
Get ready to run the full gamut of the feels.
I’ve got this.
All illustrations are provided by Soosh and used with permission.
Sharing life strategy.
All illustrations are provided by Soosh and used with permission.
Tight fitting hula-hoop.
All illustrations are provided by Soosh and used with permission.
Dad makes time.
All illustrations are provided by Soosh and used with permission.
Let’s play.
All illustrations are provided by Soosh and used with permission.
Good shoulders.
All illustrations are provided by Soosh and used with permission.
More dad time please.
All illustrations are provided by Soosh and used with permission.
Always the protector.
All illustrations are provided by Soosh and used with permission.
Dad is superman.
All illustrations are provided by Soosh and used with permission.
Never a big enough bed.
All illustrations are provided by Soosh and used with permission.
Hearing Kondo say, 'My home is messy,' is sparking joy for moms everywhere.
Marie Kondo playing with her daughters.
Marie Kondo's book, "The Life-Changing Art of Tidying Up," has repeatedly made huge waves around the world since it came out in 2010. From eliminating anything that didn't "spark joy" from your house to folding clothes into tiny rectangles and storing them vertically, the KonMari method of maintaining an organized home hit the mark for millions of people. The success of her book even led to two Netflix series.
It also sparked backlash from parents who insisted that keeping a tidy home with children was not so simple. It's one thing to get rid of an old sweater that no longer brings you joy. It's entirely another to toss an old, empty cereal box that sparks zero joy for you, but that your 2-year-old is inexplicably attached to.
To be fair, Kondo never forced her way into anyone's home and made them organize it her way. But also to be fair, she didn't have kids when she wrote her best-selling book on keeping a tidy home. The reality is that keeping a home organized and tidy with children living in it is a whole other ballgame, as Kondo has discovered now that she has three kids of her own.
"My home is messy," she admitted in a recent webinar, according to The Washington Post, "but the way I am spending my time is the right way for me at this time at this stage of my life.”
Despite the Schadenfreude many parents may feel at Kondo's confession that kids change things, her reasoning for letting things go is actually right in line with her philosophy of embracing joy.
“Up until now, I was a professional tidier, so I did my best to keep my home tidy at all times,” she said. “I have kind of given up on that in a good way for me. Now I realize what is important to me is enjoying spending time with my children at home.”
Kondo has offered tips for tidying with kids at home since she became a mom, and they're pretty solid. But as any parent can attest, some children are naturally neater than others, and how many kids you have makes a big difference as well.
Kondo gave birth to her third child in 2021, so she's currently in the adorable hell that is toddlerland. Research has also found that parents of three kids are the most stressed, so if Kondo has found a way to enjoy time with her kids and create more balance in her life by letting go of her tidiness standards, more power to her.
Her new book, "Marie Kondo’s Kurashi at Home: How to Organize Your Space and Achieve Your Ideal Life," focuses on designing your living space so it works for you. "Kurashi" loosely translates to "way of life" or "the ideal way of spending our time," and Kondo says it's about seeing the world through the lens of what matters most.
“I believe that when we consciously cherish something precious, we deepen our relationship with it,” she shares on her website. “This, in turn, deepens our bonds with other things in our lives, bringing out the best in them and in ourselves.”
Applying that philosophy to family, Kondo's "giving up" on tidying all the time makes perfect sense. If spending quality time with your children sparks more joy than keeping your belongings organized just so, then that's what you should do.
Kudos to Kondo for publicly acknowledging that having kids has altered how her home looks and for validating what so many parents have felt in the face of unrealistic expectations of tidiness. She could have kept up a front of always being on top of organization and having a perpetually tidy home, but she didn't. Here's to her willingness to share the reality, here's to embracing joy in the fleeting time we have with our children, and here's to letting go of the rules that might interfere with that, even if it means humbly admitting defeat in the face of our kids' messes.
They are using their unique family arrangement to help people better understand polyamory.
The Hartless and Rodgers families post together
Polyamory, a lifestyle where people have multiple romantic or sexual partners, is more prevalent in America than most people think. According to a study published in Frontiers in Psychology, one in nine Americans have been in a polyamorous relationship, and one in six say they would like to try one.
However popular the idea is, polyamory is misunderstood by a large swath of the public and is often seen as deviant. However, those who practice it view polyamory as a healthy lifestyle with several benefits.
Taya Hartless, 28, and Alysia Rogers, 34, along with their husbands Sean, 46, and Tyler, 35, are in a polyamorous relationship and have no problem sharing their lifestyle with the public on social media. Even though they risk stigmatization for being open about their non-traditional relationships, they are sharing it with the world to make it a safer place for “poly” folks like themselves.
It all began in 2019 when the Oregon couples met in an attempt to add some spice to their sex lives. "None of us had been polyamorous before, but we all just met and fell in love,” Taya said, according to the Mirror. "We didn't even know what polyamory was, until we started getting feelings for each other," Alysia told Today.
"From the first night we met, we all wanted to just see more of each other. It wasn't easy—there was a lot of hesitations around having feelings,” Taya said. "Sean was the first to point it out—he said 'we can't deny this is happening'. We agreed to talk it out to see what the future would look like.
The couple lived two hours from each other, so in February 2020, right before the whole world changed, they moved in together along with Tyler And Alysia’s two children, 7 and 8. “The Quad” as they call themselves came together to create what they call a “polyfamory.”
Although neither Sean and Tyler nor Alysia and Taya are dating one another, they see each other as close partners. The women have their own rooms which the men rotate in and out of each night.
The couples had a direct way of explaining their relationship to their kids. "We told them: 'You know mom has a boyfriend and dad had a girlfriend and we're going to move in together, and we're all going to be a big family and they're going to help parent you, so we're going to need you to treat them like you treat us— like parents,’” Tyler explained.
Since moving in together, both women have had a baby but no one knows for sure who the fathers are. "We did not regulate the biology,” Alysia said. But it doesn’t matter because all four adults share parenting responsibilities.
"At the end of the day, we're just like any other monogamous family—there's just four of us," Tyler says. "Being a parent is so much more than just biology, and that's what we're about."
Taya agrees and says that those who focus on the intimate details of their relationship miss the bigger picture.
"People get so focused on who the biological father of each child is that they don’t consider the benefits of having more loving adults in the child’s life to guide and nurture them," she told Upworthy. "People imagine all the crazy sex we might be having and forget that we’re just people like anyone else. We are a lot more like 'traditional' families than we are different. There’s just more of us."
Taya believes that other poly families who feel stigmatized shouldn't let it get to them.
"My advice would be to live as authentically as they are able and to remember that the opinions of others often have more to do with that person than with you," she told Upworthy.
"Hopefully, somebody watches this and thinks, ‘Well, OK, maybe I’m not doing so bad.’”
Julia Fox taking viewers on a tour of her apartment in New York.
To live in a perfectly curated, always tidy, Marie Kondo-worthy home might be a lovely fantasy. But for many, dare I say most of us, that is simply not a reality. There just aren’t enough hours in the day or helpful hands in the house to keep it from getting messy multiple times a week. Square that by a million if the home has small kiddos in it. And if there’s only one parent to clean up after those small kiddos? Forget about it.
That’s why people are letting out a huge sigh of relief after getting a video tour of Julia Fox’s New York apartment in all its glorious disarray.
The actress and model is often seen wearing bold, high-end fashion pieces at glamorous events like the Met Gala,but her home is anything but glamorous.
In a three-minute clip posted to her TikTok, Fox first shows off the completely unmade bed in her bedroom, which is technically the living room.
Fox, a single mom, explains that her actual bedroom was converted into a playroom for her son Valentino. The makeshift playroom is filled with a flurry of toys, plus a rogue clothing rack that Fox knows she “really needs to get rid of.”
Stars…they really are just like us.
@juliafox Come with me on a very underwhelming apartment tour! also to clarify I have only ONE mouse and he’s cute 🥰
♬ original sound - Julia fox
Fox then takes us down a long and very cluttered hallway, through the kitchen filled with shoeboxes (a common sight in New York apartments, apparently), and into Valentino’s actual room, which is by far the cleanest room in the house. Of course, that’s only because Valentino is almost never in there and wants to hang out in mom’s room.
And that’s it. That’s the entire apartment. No frills. Just a small apartment with the charming chaos of parenthood.
“For me personally, I just don’t like excessive displays of wealth, [it] makes me feel icky. Especially people that have really big houses. It’s just really wasteful when there are so many homeless people in this country, and I’m not really like that,” Fox says in her video. “I know I’m gonna get roasted, but hopefully, somebody watches this and thinks, ‘Well, OK, maybe I’m not doing so bad.’”
Clearly, people did watch. The TikTok has racked up 8 million views in only two days, with thousands of viewers sharing how the “underwhelming apartment tour” was a breath of fresh air.
“I am legit flabbergasted that Julia Fox lives just like me. It doesn’t seem right,” commented one person.
“Me and Julia Fox both have wood platform beds with no headboard,” added another.
While Fox was met with some criticism, the overwhelming consensus was praise for both her transparency and down-to-earth parenting style.
“Love how much of your space is dedicated to your son,” applauded one commenter.
Another wrote, “You're a mother that obviously prioritizes your child & it is a beautiful apartment. Love you are showing that success looks different for every person.”
Life can be messy sometimes. That remains true whether you’re a privileged celebrity or just an average person trying to get by. So maybe we can all cut ourselves some slack for letting things pile up from time to time. Odds are, there's still plenty about a home to appreciate, even when it does look like a hurricane ran through it.
How do blind people cook? This "Masterchef" winner leans into her senses.
Christine Ha competes on "Masterchef."
This article originally appeared on 05.26.17
But it's got nothing to do with being a "Masterchef" champion, New York Times bestselling author, and acclaimed TV host and cooking instructor.
The question: "How do you cook while blind?"
Ha compares her vision loss to "looking at a very foggy mirror after a hot shower." After her diagnosis, she worried she'd have to give up cooking. It was an interest she was just beginning to explore and one she had a serious talent and passion for. Instead of shying away from the kitchen, Ha decided to learn to navigate her new reality.
"It's like any other challenge in life; you just face it head on and hope for the best," she said in one of her recent videos.
Ha started losing her vision in 2004.
Image pulled from YouTube video.
In a video for her YouTube channel, Ha wears a GoPro camera while expertly preparing a mouthwatering meal of steamed whole snapper with black bean sauce and blistered green beans. She describes it as a "typical weeknight meal," the very thought of which separates home cooks from Masterchefs.
Watch Christine Ha make a delicious dinner ... just maybe not while you're hungry.
Ha is patient, taking her time to feel, smell, prep, and cut ingredients.
She sometimes uses adaptive tools, but much of her cooking is done by touch. She deftly guides her knife to accomplish intricate cuts.
Just like a sous chef in a professional kitchen, sometimes Ha's partner lends a quick hand.
Preparing and sharing meals is a great way to unite people and celebrate what makes each of us unique. Plus, you get to eat tasty food with your favorite people. And if it's Gordon Ramsay approved, it's that much sweeter.
Watch and learn a little more about Christine Ha in the video below:
Gordon Ramsay at play... work.
This article originally appeared on 04.22.15
On his competition show "Hell's Kitchen," he belittles cooks who can't keep up. If people come to him with their problems, he berates them. If someone is struggling to get something right in the kitchen, he curses them out.
Ramsay went on Reddit and allowed users to ask him any question they wanted.
So when a fellow cook asked him a sincere, deeply personal question about what to do when you've hit a roadblock in your career, you could probably guess what was coming.
How do you deal with it Ramsay?
"My hopes and dreams are nowhere to be found as I scale and portion salmon after salmon, shelling pods after pods of broad beans.
...
Sometimes I look out the tiny window and I can see people walking around the streets, enjoying the sunlight, while I'm here, questioning my dedication to this art as I rotate stock in the cool room, getting frost bitten, but the fear of the chef stops me from stepping outside to warm up.
...
The closest thing to feeling any kind of joy I get is those rare moments when I walk through the dining room near the end of service to get some coffee for everyone, and there will be a few diners left, idly sampling those little petite fours that we've painstakingly ensured are all perfectly round, identical, and just plain delicious. Then, one of them will stop the conversation they're having with their company, look up from their food and say, 'Thank you, chef. This is delicious,' and making the previous 14-hours of sweat and tears kind of worthwhile.
My question is, how did you deal with it? How the fuck did you deal with all the bullshit, Gordon?”
That’s an amazing question.
He's sympathetic to the guy. Not just because he's a good person. But because he's been there.
Working in restaurants is a tough, tough business. As of 2012, the average salary for cooks was less than $23,000/year. And those who are just starting out often have to work unglamorous, tedious jobs that no one else wants to do. Ramsay didn't have fancy culinary school training. He rose up through the ranks putting in long hours for low pay in kitchens all over the world. That's why he gets it.
Which brings up another point.
(Does this salad dressing have black pepper in it?? No tip for you!)
Diet Dieting GIF by Bobbi DeCarlo - from GIPHY.
When we go out to eat, we, as a culture, tend to behave ... how should I put this?
Let's go with "not like perfect angels."
Of course, no one likes getting the wrong order. Or waiting a really long time for a meal. Or eating something that doesn't taste the way you expect it to.
But it's important to remember that the people behind the food, like Ramsay's anonymous letter-writer, might be working 14-hour days. Or might be a recent immigrant who speaks limited English, trying to support a family thousands of miles away. And possibly making very little money. And sure, they screw up sometimes. But we all screw up at our jobs sometimes.
Because they, like the rest of us, are human beings.
Which is why saying...
Could mean everything to someone.