Blog Posts by Lylah M. Alphonse, Senior Editor, Yahoo! Shine

Are any of your favorite books on the banned lists?

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Pop star Rihanna was asked to stop production of her music video after the farmer on whose land she was shooting took offense to her skimpy outfits. (Photo: Stephen Hamilton/Presseye.com via CNN)Alan Graham, 61, said that he had never heard of Rihanna before one of her people called to ask if the sexy pop star could shoot part of her "We Found Love" video on his farm in Northern Ireland.

"Someone explained she was as big as it gets as far as pop stars were concerned," he told British newspaper The Telegraph. "I am a bit illiterate about those issues."

Graham, who owns 60 acres just outside of Bangor, Ireland, said she could. He even pitched in to help the crew, using his tractor to pull some recording equipment out of the mud and filling in a hole in his field with some straw. The field in which they were filming is near a busy road, and traffic quickly came to a standstill as fans stopped to gawk at the 23-year-old sexy superstar.

But when Graham was heading home later that day, he spotted the singer sashaying through the barley wearing a barely-there red bikini. And that was too much for the devoutly Christian father-of-four and local political representative to put up

Photo: LamaG6/YouTubeJust two days after Saudi Arabian King Abdullah declared that women would be allowed to participate in local elections, a Saudi Arabian court has sentenced a woman to 10 lashes with a whip for driving a car.

"Flogging is a cruel punishment in all circumstances but it beggars belief that the authorities in Saudi Arabia have imposed lashes on a woman apparently for merely driving a car," Amnesty International's Middle East and North Africa Deputy Director, Philip Luther, said in a statement Tuesday.

"Belatedly allowing women to vote in council elections is all well and good, but if they are still going to face being flogged for trying to exercise their right to freedom of movement then the King's much-trumpeted 'reforms' actually amount to very little," he added.

Other women have also been charged with driving by themselves and now face the possibility of flogging as well. "They called me in for questioning on a charge of challenging the monarch on Sunday," Najla Hariri, who was

Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah at his Riyadh Palace in April. (Photo: Chip Somodevilla/Getty ImagesIn his annual speech broadcast Sunday on Saudi Arabia's state-run television station, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia said that women would be allowed to nominate themselves or other candidates for the next set of local elections, effectively giving them the right to vote in the Arab nation.

Though other nations and women's rights activists hailed the announcement as "good news," the move may be largely symbolic: Women will be able to participate in the next round of municipal elections, not in the one that is slated to take place on September 29-but no one knows when the next one will be held. This week's municipal election is only the second one that's taken place in nearly 50 years. And even though they'll be able to hold local office and serve as members of the King's group of advisers known as the Shura council, women still aren't allowed to hold cabinet positions, travel outside of the country without permission from a male relative, or drive a car.

The same religious rules that

You may think you're doing a good job of shielding your kids from your anxiety and stress. But research shows that your children are probably picking up on it anyway-and it's affecting them, physically and emotionally, more than you could imagine.

"Parental stress can weaken the development of a child's brain or immune system, increasing the risk of allergies, obesity, or mental disorders," says David Code, author of "Kids Pick Up on Everything." Research shows that kids can "catch" their parents' stress, overloading their systems until they act out or exhibit mental and physical illness, he says. "Stress is highly contagious between parent and child, even if the parent is unaware of his or her own anxiety."

Parenting expert Lori Lite, a mother of three, author, and founder of the "Stress Free Kids" line of books, CDs, and lesson plans, agrees. "I do believe that children feel their parents' stress," she says. "Children that do not know how to manage stress in a healthy manner will

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With the school year in full swing, parents are bracing themselves for the unofficial start of kids' birthday party season-and the budget-busting, anxiety-inducing party planning that goes along with it. Where's the perfect party location? To goody bag, or not to goody bag? Do you foot the bill for uninvited siblings? And how much should you spend on the whole event, anyway?

In spite of reports of $5,000 parties for 1-year-olds or a mind-blowing $32,000 bash for a spoiled little princess (though she insisted that it was actually for her 6-year-old daughter), a look through the Yahoo! Shine archives shows that a couple hundred dollars is the average that parents are willing to spend on a birthday party for their young children-and that the kids are fine with it.

"My parents TOTALLY spoiled me at my last b-day party," Katy Nash, 11, commented on this 2008 post about a $100 birthday party. "Each of my guests got the goody bag of a lil' kinz webkinz, which are $12 each. I was very

At midnight on Tuesday, the U.S. military officially ended Don't Ask, Don't Tell, its 18-year-long policy against on gays openly serving in the military.

"As of today, patriotic Americans in uniform will no longer have to lie about who they are in order to serve the country they love," President Obama said. "Our armed forces will no longer lose the extraordinary skills and combat experience of so many gay and lesbian service members."

"The law is repealed," top Army officials including Army Chief of Staff General Raymond T. Odierno wrote in a memo sent to generals on Monday. "From this day forward, gay and lesbian soldiers may serve in our Army with the dignity and respect they deserve."

It's a situation that some of us who haven't served in the military can't quite wrap our heads around. As working women, we're used to being asked whether we're married. We're used to questions about our kids, and concerns that being a parent will negatively affect our ability to work. But sexual