Kathy Landin

The Elf on the Shelf—whether you find him cute, annoying or somewhere in between, he's everywhere these days, making the holiday season even more complicated for parents. We did a little investigating on this elusive creature that has become a phenomenon, and discovered a few things we didn't expect.

Christmas is a time for joyous giving and families coming together and singing and eggnog. But we all know that on some level it’s all about the presents.

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to understand that being a telemarketer isn’t the best job ever. Often you are interrupting people at bad times, offering them things they don’t want, encouraged to be pushy and then get hung up on pretty much all the time. This comes with the job. Which means, you shouldn’t threaten to bomb their homes when it happens. Unless they’ve changed how it’s done. Read

The school buses are running again, and the kids are out of the house. Finally. With the end of the far-too-long summer break, this return to school days can leave you with a little extra time on your hands during the day, right? Well, maybe not too much, but your daily schedule should ease up a bit, so now what do you do? You get back on the Internet, that’s what.

All the orphans from the movie ‘Annie’ lived a hard knock life — considering audience members really only gave their two-cents to the title character — and were always looking forward to tomorrow. By the end of the flick, it looked like they had a brighter future, but what really happened to those orphans from the 1982 movie ‘Annie’?

Somehow another summer has flown by and the kiddos are headed back to school again. Sure, that means vacations are over, the house will be empty and days at the pool are numbered. But what it also means is that it’s time to shop for supplies.

It stands to reason that a man named Jackmeoff Mudd would be up to no good. You saddle a guy with that kind of name and you almost guarantee that at some point, he’s going to get himself into some trouble. That’s exactly what happened in Ft. Lauderdale, FL recently.

To grab some more of that should-you-really-be-drinking-this market share, the makers of Mountain Dew have come up with a new green apple flavor. To promote this new flavor, they’ve been having an online contest to name it. But, it seems that someone has hijacked DubtheDew, most likely leading to extended marketing meetings at The Dew and some corporate input on name entries.

Wake up. Sound the alarms. Father’s Day is on Sunday. It seems like we talk about Mother’s Day for a month before it actually happens, but Father’s Day just sneaks up on us every year. If this has happened to you and you aren’t prepared with a gift, it’s not too late.

Even though you love your kids dearly and want to spend time with them, the months that kids are out of school can be the longest of the year for any parent. The key to a peaceful summer household is keeping the kids busy and entertained.

Even if you don’t realize it, you are already familiar with the latest hotness in social sharing apps. Instagram is the photo sharing app that allows users to take, filter, post, share, like and follow photos and photo collections. It makes even the worst photographer seem like a shutterbug. But what else can it do?

It turns out that the strange color of Ooompa Loompa orange that Lindsay Lohan’s skin has turned doesn’t happen naturally. It also doesn’t happen for free. Poor orange LiLo is having trouble with the court again, this time over a tanning bill.