Sometimes we forget that celebrities have real feelings and are real people under all the makeup and paparazzi flashes. Even their children often look like props in a photoshoot entitled "just like us."

But Angelina Jolie, in a stunning op-ed in the New York Times, shows us that beneath the glamour, celebrities have the same pain and anxieties that as we do. 

Jolie chose to have a double mastectomy. She carries the mutated BRCA1 gene which dramatically increases her risk of breast and ovarian cancer (though BRCA1 and 2 mutations only make up 5 to 10 per cent of breast cancers). Jolie's mother died at 56 from the disease, and only met one of her six grandchildren.

I hate shopping at Abercrombie & Fitch. The heavy scent of cologne and teen angst makes me want to pass out. 

I don't need much of an excuse to steer my tween to some other mall store that sells overpriced preppy clothes in a loud obnoxious environment that's too dark to see the price tag. And thankfully, the CEO of Abercrombie has handed me and many other mothers a reason to cross the aisle.

Did you know that if you got a serious sunburn before the age of 18, your chances of having a melanoma are doubled? Raise your hand if you got a serious sunburn before you were a teen. Because I sure did! My pale, freckly skin has burned to a crisp more than once. And that freaks me out.

Melanoma can be deadly. And it can be caused by sun exposure. (I admit it, before this post my knowledge of melanoma came from Izzie's experience on Grey's Anatomy.) 

I want to make sure that my kids don't raise their hands when asked the same question about sunburn. So I buy sunscreen all year round and yet, I still find myself confused at the aisle, with 483 different lotions at the drugstore. Is SPF 80 double the strength of 40? Is 15 even worth it?

Luckily, I went to a lunch sponsored by Coppertone where dermatologist Dr. Sonya Cook explained the ins and outs of SPF and sunscreen. 

"Does this jacket make me look fat?"

I overheard my seven-year-old daughter asking her 10-year-old brother.

"Yes," he answered, "It's a weird shape."

Did I spring into action? No. Most likely a mistake - but I didn't want to make a bigger deal of it than it was and decided to tackle the subject at another less time-sensitive juncture.

But I forgot. Until the next day when I realized that my daughter was now choosing to wear her raincoat instead of the trapezoidal snow jacket.

So I took hear aside (school bells be damned! We are dealing with the big issues here!).

I said to her, "I noticed that you aren't wearing your snow jacket anymore, even though it is cold out. Why is that?"

"I just don't like it anymore and it is just not that cold out," she answered.

"Does this have anything to do with what you asked your brother yesterday?"

She looked at me sheepishly: "Yes."

You know what I don't want to discuss with my 7-year-old daughter? Victoria's Secret or its little sister PINK. Or sexy underwear in general.

This means we generally avoid walking by PINK (or La Senza) with their psuedo-cute/sexy images featuring girls far too young to have fake boobs spilling out of gingham push-ups. PINK is Victoria's little sister -- aimed at college girls but with appeal to the younger ones as well. It's all pink and cutesy/sexy like Selena Gomez in store form. 

The Globe and Mail is reporting that a 10-year-old Ontario girl foiled a would-be kidnapping by using her smarts. A man approached her after school and told her that her mother had sent him to pick her up, she asked him for the pre-arranged family safe word and he got it wrong.

She realized that it was a bad situation and got away, catching some of the license plate letters too. According to police they are searching for a man and woman in their 20's.

It is my unscientific guess that every mother of girls fears the weight issue.

Not that their daughters are putting on too much weight -- but that at the back of their minds a little voice telling our sweet daughters that they aren't good enough. We worry that our daughters are starting on a lifelong journey of worrying about their bodies and their food. 

And many of them are. 

A mom in Australia found a list that her daughter was keeping about her "diyet". Her daughter is only seven, the same age as my own daughter. The girl's misspellings would be adorable, but instead make the list even  more heartbreaking. The girl does "pooshups" and is allowed to eat "appals" and "yoget".

You may remember slam poet Shane Koyczan from his moving poem We Are More at the Olympic Opening Ceremonies in Vancouver. That poem may have been what introduced him to the world, but this seven-minute poem and video may change it.

"I think," I tell my husband, "that he has THE FLU." Dun dun dun DUNN!

I then immediately come down with guilt for not schlepping my 12-year-old son to get the flu shot out of sheer laziness on my part. 

"Maybe it is just a cold," says my husband. "And who cares what it is?"

And then hit me. As long as the kids are sick but not overly sick; why should I care if it is the flu or a cold? Just because the government has released more Tamiflu; and flu season has been "nasty and deadly and normal"? This does not mean we are in a pandemic, or that I should panic, because that's the nature of influenza. (I don't do well in pandemic season, one day I will write about our SARS experience that left me scarred forever).

So, I set off to find the differences between the common cold and flu:

The blank page is a little bit daunting today. There are lots of topics to write about, but really there is only one thing that I can think of. The violent loss of 20 Grade One students in Connecticut hangs heavy on every parent -- no matter where you live, or how old your children are.

There is really no good way to talk to your kids about an act so brazen and so violent that you can't talk about it without crying yourself. How would I tell my 6-year-old that girls her own age were hurt in a place they consider safe? That teachers and the principal lost their lives for those kids? So I chose not to tell my 6- and 9-year-olds. I'm not sure if that was the right decision; I'm not sure if someone will say something at school or not. But for now, that is what we've decided.

My 12-year-old had to know, as he is out in the world. Before I could do that, I compiled some ideas from experts to keep in mind when talking about this tragedy: