A toddler kept tapping a woman's arm on a plane. Her response holds a lesson for us all.

"These are the types of people we need on airplanes."

Being locked in a metal box with 150 random people all hurtling through the air at 30,000 feet is quite the social experiment, but one many of us do willingly in this age of air travel. One of the most notable parts of that experiment is that you never know who's going to sit near you on an airplane. Will you get the quiet reader? The Chatty Cathy? The cougher who doesn't cover their mouth? The sweet-but-over-perfumed old lady? The parent with a baby who screams from takeoff to landing?

Flying can feel like a game of roulette, especially when you find yourself sitting near one of the most unpredictable forces on Earth—a toddler. Tiny tots might can for the most delightful trip ever or the most annoying one, but as one couple demonstrates, the difference sometimes comes down to our own attitude.

Kids don't listen? Expert says stop constantly saying 'no' and try this approach instead.

"Your kids will never know what you want them to do if you only ever tell them what not to do."

There isn’t a parent alive who doesn’t get tired of constantly correcting their child’s behavior by saying, “Don’t do this” or “Stop doing that.” What makes things even worse is that it can feel like no matter how many times we tell our kids to “stop standing on the couch” or “don’t slam the door,” they never seem to listen.

Jenna Mazzillo says that kids may not be responding to our “stop no don’ts” because they aren’t sure what they should be doing instead. Mazzillo shared her thoughts in a recent Instagram reel that was a big help to many frustrated parents. Mazzillo is a board-certified behavior analyst and special education teacher with 13 years of experience who goes by @abanaturally on Instagram.

She was 15 when men threw acid in her face. They told her she’d be ashamed forever.

ReSurge International helped Muskan Khatun reconstruct her body, and now she’s using her voice to advocate for burn and gender-based violence survivors.

When Muskan was 15 years old, a group of young men started teasing her on her way to school in Nepal. She found it disturbing and uncomfortable, but they wouldn’t stop. “Then, one day, when I was heading to school, I saw them again. This time, they had a jug of acid. They tried to make me drink it, but I refused. In anger, they threw the acid on my face, hands, and chest.” 

With a conservative estimate of 10,000 acid attacks each year, the surgical needs just for intentional burn victims is significant. ReSurge’s team in Nepal has treated 141 intentional burn attacks like Muskan’s over the last seven years.

Interested in helping more people like Muskan receive a second chance at life? This giving season, ReSurge is matching every gift for twice the impact. 

Have you noticed Christmas decorations going up even earlier this year? Here's why.

Christmas Creep has been around forever, but this year is different.

Poor Thanksgiving. The phenomenon known as "Christmas Creep" — where early Christmas decorations infringe further and further into Thanksgiving's usual November jurisdiction — has been around for decades, if not centuries. It's not a new idea, with plenty of people entrenched on both sides of the ensuing debate.

But this year is undeniably different. The creep has hit new levels. In my own neighborhood, I noticed more and more people going straight from Halloween decor right into Christmas without even a single buffer day in between. Turns out, a giant Jack Skellington decoration is the perfect bridge between these two holidays!