CHICAGO — Amanda Williams has been coloring the Chicago-area landscape for years. She’s painted condemned homes in areas long disinvested in, in hues that resonate with Black culture (like the bluish-green of Johnson Products’ Ultra Sheen conditioner and a prussian blue of George Washington Carver’s 1927 patent). Williams’ public ...Read more

Dear Kid Whisperer,

What are your thoughts on the "kid leashes" (the small backpack with a strap that the parent holds on to) I've seen people using out in public? I have three kids under the age of 7, and I've considered using one on my toddler when we are out in crowded places like amusement parks or airports. I have mixed feelings about them...Read more

Q: I told my ex's new wife that I was saving up to take my daughter to a concert that I knew she wanted to go to. The tickets were very expensive, but I had been saving for six months because I wanted to surprise her. Yesterday was my daughter's birthday. She came home from her dad's house with a ticket to the concert. Evidently, her dad and his...Read more

George Washington is literally in the “pages of history.” A book on the coffee table has money hanging out of it — not play money, real money, as in a $1 bill.

I know in an instant the book belongs to a 12-year-old granddaughter.

The girl is an avid reader. She won the “Reader Award” in her class three times last year which ...Read more

I am not a good enough athlete to have my own baseball card, and I am not animated enough to have my own Pokemon card, but I am a man of culture, which I get from yogurt, so I could have my own trading card.

That was the estimation of a friendly and knowledgeable guy named Daniel, who works at the card store where I went with one of my sons-in-...Read more

LOS ANGELES — Lynn Nguyen had just begun working at the Chinatown Branch Library in 2019, when she learned that Ai Hoa and G&G markets were shuttering. As the last two full-service grocery stores in Chinatown, these closures left a gap in food access in the neighborhood, where one in four residents are above the age of 65 and 30% of households...Read more

PHILADELPHIA — Villanova astrophysicist Becka Phillipson wondered what a black hole might sound like.

She found an answer by translating X-ray data from a black hole system into musical notes.

The first time she listened to the audio, the cacophony reminded her of someone pressing every key on an organ at once.

After roughly 30 seconds of ...Read more

LOS ANGELES — The Trump administration has quietly let lapse a program for young leaders at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, The Times has learned. In its place, California will launch its own council for young people looking to get involved with environmental issues at the state level.

The California EPA’s Environmental Youth ...Read more

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. — One day before the Illinois State Fair was scheduled to get underway, Gov. JB Pritzker and other state officials on Wednesday unveiled the 2026 Butter Cow sculpture, celebrating the 100th anniversary of Route 66 and highlighting the historic Mother Road.

This year’s Butter Cow, sculpted out of hundreds of pounds of ...Read more

Harvard University’s policy capping A grades among undergraduates doesn’t officially start for another year, but students heading back to school this fall are already fretting over the changes.

After Harvard’s Dean of Undergraduate Education urged faculty to start implementing the policy as soon as the coming semester, students who’d ...Read more

Many of you are familiar with the term "surprise lilies." This name is mostly attributed to members of the Lycoris genus. In the South the red Lycoris radiata and yellow Lycoris aurea are two of the most treasured surprise lilies. We are approaching their season of bloom.

If you aren’t familiar with the term surprise lily, here's why they ...Read more

UNDERWOOD, Minn. - Do you remember your first camping trip?

Mine was when I was 15. We camped on a spit of land along the St. Croix River and I didn’t bring enough to drink. Nearly 40 years later, I still remember the intense thirst.

A handful of St. Cloud, Minnesota, kids had their first camping experience this summer. Along with parents, ...Read more

Dear Anna,

I (31F) called off my engagement about a year ago and moved to a new city. A few months later I matched with a guy (26M) on an app — the second person I dated post-breakup. We hit it off immediately, but I wrote him off as relationship material: He’s five years younger, still finishing grad school, and had never had a serious ...Read more

It was 2015 and Pastor Rob Dyer was working on the sermon he would deliver that Sunday to his congregation at First United Presbyterian Church in Belleville, a suburb of St. Louis on the Illinois side of the state line.

The message was about taking care of one another — a seed Dyer has worked hard to plant and grow since leaving his ...Read more

ORLANDO, Fla. — The Center for Health & Wellness in Winter Park, Florida, was crowded on the morning of July 25. It went beyond the normal traffic, folks hitting the gym or heading in for the center’s other offerings — classes on everything from nutrition and meditation to medicine, both Eastern and Western.

Today, there are teams in ...Read more

For years, I’ve worked with clients who come to me saying the same thing: “I just can’t find the right person.” When I dig a little deeper, a common theme appears — they’re clinging to a very specific idea of who their “type” is. (It often starts with a physical attribute, but it goes beyond that.) Here’s the kicker: That type ...Read more

BALTIMORE -- Jessica Schatz audibly choked up when she tried to articulate what Patterson Park Academy of Music has meant to her family.

“My grandfather was a music teacher, and eight years ago I inherited his piano,” she told attendees at a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the newly rehabilitated building that will become the Academy’s first ...Read more

Our nightly dinner routine goes like this: I cook dinner and the husband sets the table. Last night we had Panera napkins, the night before we had Subway napkins. We have a drawer full of cloth napkins, but he prefers to save those until we’ve used all the extras that fast food places stuff in the bag with our order.

Sometimes he goes to the ...Read more

I’ve seen a really scary change in how kids are raised over the course of the last quarter century as I’ve worked with parents as a teacher and principal and as a behavioral consultant.

In, I’m sort of guessing, an attempt to value the individuality of their kids (whatever that means), today’s parents often seem to be letting their ...Read more

Q: My co-parent and I just had a custody evaluation done. He has a very complicated mental health diagnosis that includes autism and narcissistic personality disorder. I knew he was difficult to communicate with, but now I see why. How do I co-parent with someone with this serious diagnosis?

A: Learning that your co-parent has a mental health ...Read more