Blog Posts by Jessica Ashley, Senior Editor

Just this morning, I was complaining to my doctor about how many viruses my son and I swapped since this summer. He gave me a list of recommendations to help boost immunity but the advice that stood out to me the most was one my mom swears by -- zinc.

My mother once attested that gargling was the answer to all that ails you. Now she keeps a stash of Cold Eeze, those homeopathic lozenges loaded with zinc gluconate glycine, all over the house, in the car, and at the very bottom of her purse.

A review released by the Cochrane Collaboration, an international medical research evaluation organization, finds that taking zinc when cold symptoms first appear shortens the life of your cold. Researchers observed that participants who took zinc lozenges or syrup within 24 hours noticing symptoms cut back on the cold by a day and also reported milder effects than people who did not take zinc.

These results, derived from from 13 trials of 966 participants, contradict a 1999 review by the same

Each year, somewhere between 6 and 12 million people get lice worldwide. Some school years, it might feel like most of those parasites are living in your child's classroom.

Now a new breed of hair salons (let the lice puns begin) is helping parents deal with all those creepy crawlies. Professional lice removers do manual comb-outs, apply treatments, conduct re-checks, and even make house calls to make sure your children, you, and your home are rid of the offenders. Some salons have video games and movies to keep kids occupied while technicians manage the (oh, God) infestations (really, that's what the websites say).

If you're not willing to roll on the rubber gloves and get to work on your child's scalp (and stuffed animals and sheets and carpeting), be warned that it's spendy to have someone else do the dirty work. While at-home kits cost anywhere from $20 to $120, a professional lice removal boutique services start at about $40 for a consult and quickly escalate.

Removal costs

Justin Bieber with mama Pattie MalletteIt's time to get personal, maybe even make myself a little vulnerable. It's the moment when I say aloud what we've been quietly whispering about in our home. My parenting confession? I'm kinda into the Bieb.

Perhaps to most parents, the pop star's presence in their homes, cars, piping up from the basement during a play date -- those "Oh baby baby baby"s over and over and over in a mind-worm that somehow gets deep into a parents' brain even more than it affects small children -- just means that their kid's are entering that awful rest-of-life phase of listing music that is beyond their control. While going from shimmying to Justin Roberts to pop-locking to Justin Bieber overnight is alarming. But before my boy starts idolizing someone singing lyrics I can't even begin to decipher or recreating some full-body rocker tattoo-piercing thing, I'm going to embrace this leap to the the feather-swept hair singer.

Of course, we'd heard Justin Bieber songs around, but my six-year old son and I

You spent a SQUINTILLION dollars on school supplies at the beginning of the year and it might seem crazy to invest one more cent in more stuff. But your little one if your little one is really rocking name-writing or your middle one is tearing up the analysis of Treasure Island and the oldest has ag

No matter how many kids you have, how much time you've allotted, or how well you think you've got it down, one forgotten lunchbox or one missing gym uniform or one breakfast accidentally made with blueberry wheat waffles instead of blueberry whole grain waffles can lead to all kinds of morning stress.

Until some divine moment of parenting enlightenment reveals how to avoid a.m. meltdowns altogether, here are twelve insanely helpful tips we culled from real moms and dads who have somehow -- by the grace of charts, rules, timers, and bribes -- managed to make morning routines go a lot smoother.

Here's to bringing back the ahhh you once felt when you sipped your first cup of coffee.

And here's to finally fulfilling the dream of one day getting all those kids to school, each with two shoes on their feet and carrying someone's backpack, not sobbing, and maybe even before the bell.

The Jackson family was and is clearly wrought with issues, abuse, addictions, and all kinds of sadness. It's no surprise that the child singers grew up to appear untouchable and strange, even as they got more famous. it isn't a shock when one of them reveals some dysfunction that still scars them. Still, it doesn't make it less awful to hear.

Janet Jackson opened up to TODAY'S Meredith Vieira this week about how her father and brothers contributed to the body image she still struggles with as a woman. Jackson has been spotlighted in the press many times for her weight losses and gains and chronicled her body issues in her new book, "True You: A Journey to Finding and Loving Yourself."

Jackson says her brothers (yes, Michael included) taunted her with nicknames like "horse, pig, cow, slaughter-hog." At times, she says she coped with the pain of feeling unattractive by literally banging her head against the wall.

Although she says she is "in a much better space" than she was as a

I've had two pretty big realizations in the last year. First, that I want more children, or at least another child. And second, I am not sure I ever want to be married again.

I recognize this isn't in line with everyone. Most of the friends and family I've discussed this with have offered amazing words of encouragement, moments of levity, and quiet nods of support. Some very liberal women-friends have told me in one breath that they support those plans and, in the next, gone off on women who choose to be single parents or some other surprising tangent. Other people have given me the head-shake-of-disbelief that I no longer feel compelled to have a husband and they'll see me when I'm walking down the aisle. But I've done both -- had a child and been married -- and right now, it's the kid thing I'm sure I'd like to do again, no matter what the doubters and head-shakers have to say about it.

Because I am still in the research phase of these two realizations -- asking myself what it would

Nanny cams are so late '90s. And word-of-mouth? Well, that's not going to tell you if your sitter has ever gotten a ticket for a moving violation or has pitiful credit. Nanny Track, a new background checking service aimed at parents who rely on caregivers, will give you all that information and more, however.

For a fee of $555, Nanny Track will provide a comprehensive report on your nanny's public records, which includes the National Sex Offender Registry, driving records, credit history, bankruptcy information, and more. Also filed into your nanny report will be verifications of past employment, reference checks, and interviews.

Nanny Track's founders have a big investment in this service -- both as mothers and as private investigators. Applying their experience doing background checks on hedge fund and portfolio managers through their firm Back Track Reports, Leah Clarkson and Casey Drucker are now focused on investigating the people who are caring for "your most precious