(CNN) — Sam Lamott, the baby star of best-selling author Anne Lamott’s classic memoir, “Operating Instructions,” was finally grown up and safely ensconced at art school in San Francisco.

Before Sam was born and during his childhood, Anne Lamott had developed a community of [...]]]> By Katia Hetter, Special to CNN
Updated 7:14 AM EDT, Fri April 6, 2012

(CNN) — Sam Lamott, the baby star of best-selling author Anne Lamott’s classic memoir, “Operating Instructions,” was finally grown up and safely ensconced at art school in San Francisco.

Before Sam was born and during his childhood, Anne Lamott had developed a community of family and friends who had known and loved them during the lean years. She had written several notable novels and works of nonfiction. Now that Sam had moved out, Anne Lamott had the rest of her life to live. Surrounded by the love of her community, she had a wonderful home in Northern California with room for guests and dogs and an interesting professional and personal life.

One day before Lamott’s Thanksgiving dinner for 25, she got the call. Sam, only 19, told her that his girlfriend was pregnant. Or was it his ex-girlfriend? Sam and Amy had broken up a couple months earlier but clearly had continued to spend time together. They were keeping the baby.

Jax Jesse Lamott was born on July 20, 2009.

Lamott, who turns 58 on Tuesday, had famously recounted her first year with Sam in a memoir that validated all the joy and agony and terror foisted upon her during her child’s first year, made more challenging by the absence of the would-be father.

In a new memoir, “Some Assembly Required: A Journal of My Son’s First Son,” Lamott (with Sam’s help) recounts her surprise and acceptance at becoming a grandmother earlier than expected, her fears related to Sam and Amy becoming parents at such a young age and her daily celebration of her grandson’s life. The book will debut Sunday on The New York Times best-sellers list.

“I was happy all the time at the thought of Sam’s being a father, and my getting to be a grandmother, except when I was sick with fears about their future, enraged that they had gotten themselves pregnant so young or in a swivet of trying to control their every move, not to mention every aspect of their futures,” she wrote.

In a conversation with CNN.com, Lamott described her ongoing challenge — a classic dilemma of the grandparent — to contain her overwhelming need to advise Sam and Amy on every aspect of her grandson’s young life. To read the conversation, click here.

Editor’s note: CNN’s Freedom Project highlights the horrors of modern-day slavery, amplifying the voices of the victims, highlighting success stories and helping expose the web of criminal enterprises trading in human life.

(CNN) — Kimberly Ritter could not believe what she was seeing.

Girls wearing [...]]]> By Katia Hetter, Special to CNN
Updated 1:38 PM EST, Wed February 29, 2012

Editor’s note: CNN’s Freedom Project highlights the horrors of modern-day slavery, amplifying the voices of the victims, highlighting success stories and helping expose the web of criminal enterprises trading in human life.

(CNN) — Kimberly Ritter could not believe what she was seeing.

Girls wearing almost nothing at all, suggesting all sorts of sexual acts, listed on page after page of Backpage.com’s escorts section. When she looked closer at the photos, she noticed something eerie.

She could recognize the rooms.

Ritter is a meeting planner at Nix Conference and Meeting Management of St. Louis. She and her co-workers work with 500 hotels around the world and visit about 50 properties annually. She can identify many hotel chains used in escort ads by their comforters, bathroom sinks, air conditioning units and door locks. Sometimes, she can also identify a specific property.

Meet Kimberly Ritter, sex trafficking sleuth. To read more of her story, click here.

(CNN) — The Girl Scout cookie can’t seem to catch a break.

Under fire in years past for including trans fats, high fructose corn syrup and palm oil in its cookies, the Girl Scouts’ current cookie selling season is under fire because of policies [...]]]> By Katia Hetter, Special to CNN
Updated 7:23 PM EST, Fri January 13, 2012

(CNN) — The Girl Scout cookie can’t seem to catch a break.

Under fire in years past for including trans fats, high fructose corn syrup and palm oil in its cookies, the Girl Scouts’ current cookie selling season is under fire because of policies that have nothing to do with the actual composition of the cookies.

A group calling itself HonestGirlScouts.com has posted a YouTube video calling for a boycott of Girl Scout cookies in response to a Colorado troop’s decision to allow a 7-year-old transgender child into its troop. Gay rights and transgender rights groups have reported a grassroots LGBT movement of supporters buying Girl Scout cookies in response to the video.

“I’ve decided to purchase as many boxes as my modest budget will allow and donate them to the local LGBTQ community center,” says Mara Morken, a lesbian stay-at-home mom in Fargo, North Dakota. “I want to show support for GSUSA in their honorable decision to allow all girls to participate in their programs. However I do not want that support to show itself on my thighs, so I will donate the entire cookie order!”

To read the rest of the story, click here.

(CNN) — Many New Year’s resolutions are flawed from the start, destined to fail.

People resolve to lose 20 pounds or stop eating junk food or stop smoking or keep a spotless house. The resolutions are too enormous, the behaviors too ingrained, the [...]]]> By Katia Hetter, Special to CNN
Updated 7:41 AM EST, Fri December 30, 2011

(CNN) — Many New Year’s resolutions are flawed from the start, destined to fail.

People resolve to lose 20 pounds or stop eating junk food or stop smoking or keep a spotless house. The resolutions are too enormous, the behaviors too ingrained, the thinking too negative.

Take my CNN colleague Jessica Ravitz, a brilliant reporter who’s written about untold stories of rape during the Holocaust, failed Doomsday predictions and, in lighter news, an ongoing debate over babies in Brooklyn bars. Her work is clearly important, and she’s good at it.

Yet Ravitz’s desk is in chaos: covered in papers, stacks of documents and unpublished story materials. The file drawers in her small working space are full. She says she has no place to put the stuff. Boxes holding documents from old investigations sit at her feet.

Her home office, she says, isn’t much better: piles of papers about stories, notes about books she hopes to write, research on her family history, stacks of letters she can’t bear to toss, materials on her late father, articles about places where she wants to go, people she’d like to meet, chapters in history she wants to understand.

Her mess is clearly making her unhappy and adding stress to an already stressful job, so I offer her a New Year’s resolution challenge: I’ll invite a professional organizer into the office if she commits to a New Year’s resolution to keep a clean and workable desk. Read the rest of the story here.

(CNN) — David Murphy hasn’t started shopping for his two boys yet, and he knows he had better get started. The divorced father of two boys, ages 11 and 14, has custody for a full week around Christmas Day this year and needs [...]]]> By Katia Hetter, Special to CNN
Updated 7:42 AM EST, Wed December 21, 2011

(CNN) — David Murphy hasn’t started shopping for his two boys yet, and he knows he had better get started. The divorced father of two boys, ages 11 and 14, has custody for a full week around Christmas Day this year and needs to get a tree and start buying presents.

Every other year, Murphy (who didn’t want his real name used to protect his children’s privacy) doesn’t have Christmas custody. So, he tries to do something completely different. Divorced for four years, he has traveled with his mother to visit England, where she was born. He has joined his father and stepmother on a trip to Carmel, California.

He hasn’t crashed his ex-wife’s Christmas Day plans, even though she lives only three miles away from his home in suburban Virginia.

“We try not to mess with the schedule when we don’t have to because it’s easier on both parties,” said Murphy. “As each party has moved on, it happened to work that way. We try not to interfere with each other.”

With the U.S. Census Bureau counting nearly 4 million divorced parents in this country, many parents are facing the challenges of negotiating holiday custody schedules, battles over presents, new significant others and simply the pain of being apart.

Whether you have the children for Christmas or not this year, going through a separation or divorce means giving up the dream of a perfect Hanukkah, Christmas or Kwanzaa. With the fantasy of the perfect nuclear family obviously over, it can be lonely even with the kids — but much worse without them. Facing the first holiday since the split, how do people ever survive this holiday season? And eventually even thrive?

To read more, click here.

(CNN) — Noël Plummer can’t imagine making a conscious decision to inflict physical pain on her 8-year-old daughter as a punishment. She’s only slapped her daughter once, without thinking, when her then-5-year-old was having an enormous tantrum.

She’s never hit her again.

While she recognizes [...]]]> By Katia Hetter, Special to CNN
Updated 2:12 PM EST, Tue November 8, 2011

(CNN) — Noël Plummer can’t imagine making a conscious decision to inflict physical pain on her 8-year-old daughter as a punishment. She’s only slapped her daughter once, without thinking, when her then-5-year-old was having an enormous tantrum.

She’s never hit her again.

While she recognizes that physical punishment may encourage immediate fear-based compliance, “I’m interested in my child respecting my authority and decisions, and adopting my values about appropriate behavior,” says Plummer, an attorney living in Albany, California. “When I discipline my child, I am teaching her how to behave appropriately.”

That’s why Plummer uses a rewards system for positive behaviors and regular “time-ins” where she gives her daughter her undivided attention. She also decides what behavior she wants and gives her daughter advanced notice of what to expect — no surprises in her home.

“It’s getting late,” she’ll tell her daughter in the car. “When we get home, I want you to brush your teeth and get into your pajamas. If you’re done in 15 minutes, I will read to you. If not, I won’t be able to read to you tonight.”

Just like practicing a musical instrument or practicing the backstroke over and over in advance of a performance or competition, teaching our children to behave properly in a variety of situations takes preparation on our part and practice, practice, practice.

To get started, click here.

(CNN) — I have no idea why my 3-year-old wants to be a cowboy for Halloween this year, because she won’t tell me. That’s OK. I don’t need to know her reasoning to make it happen.

Thanks to her outdoorsy grandparents who live in [...]]]> By Katia Hetter, Special to CNN
Updated 9:47 AM EST, Fri October 28, 2011

(CNN) — I have no idea why my 3-year-old wants to be a cowboy for Halloween this year, because she won’t tell me. That’s OK. I don’t need to know her reasoning to make it happen.

Thanks to her outdoorsy grandparents who live in the Colorado mountains, we already have the cowboy hat and handkerchief. We found a great pair of overalls on sale for $1.69 at the local Salvation Army store. But we still needed a cowboy jacket, a flannel shirt and boots. And whatever else might make her look like a 3-foot version of a cowboy.

Entering a temporary Halloween store that popped up in our town, I headed to the kids’ costume section. The little girls’ costumes seemed odd to me — so many little skirts attached to superheroes and vampires. Even if I could find a cowgirl costume among all the girly-girl stuff, my girl would probably find a cowgirl skirt pointless. How would she ride her toy horse with a skirt? Sidesaddle?

As I turned toward to the boys’ section to continue the search for accessories, I saw the costume that scared me more than any vampire or ghost: the little black dress.

To read the rest of the story, click here.

(CNN) — Olivia Nakamura can still remember the neighbor who always hosted a barbecue in his front yard for his son’s birthday party. He’d invite all the kids on their suburban Seattle block, except her son and the Asian-American children who lived there.

“I [...]]]> By Katia Hetter, Special to CNN
Updated 8:52 AM EST, Tue October 4, 2011

(CNN) — Olivia Nakamura can still remember the neighbor who always hosted a barbecue in his front yard for his son’s birthday party. He’d invite all the kids on their suburban Seattle block, except her son and the Asian-American children who lived there.

“I think it was racially motivated since he never invited the other family as well,” says Nakamura (not her real name), who has since returned with her husband and two sons to her home state of Hawaii. “My son was only 3 years old, so I just told him they were having a family party.”

Welcome to exclusion on the play date circuit.

What should parents do when someone else won’t let their kid play with yours? No matter who you are, some parents won’t like your family.

To read the rest of the story, click here.

(CNN) — Colin Ryan was attending his second day of high school on September 11, 2001, when an airplane crashed into the World Trade Center’s north tower.

Ryan, then 14, received a note in school saying his father, John, who worked on the 89th [...]]]> By Katia Hetter, Special to CNN
Updated 2:57 PM EST, Fri September 9, 2011

(CNN) — Colin Ryan was attending his second day of high school on September 11, 2001, when an airplane crashed into the World Trade Center’s north tower.

Ryan, then 14, received a note in school saying his father, John, who worked on the 89th floor of the south tower, had called his wife to say he was safe. Fifteen minutes later, United Airlines Flight 175 crashed into the south tower.

John Ryan of West Windsor, New Jersey, left behind a wife of 20 years and three teenage children, all grieving their sudden loss in their own ways. Colin Ryan, now 24 and a screenwriter in Los Angeles, was one about 3,000 children who lost a parent on September 11.

“After my father was killed, I spent a lot of time focused on school and sports, but what I remember most is the time I spent with a few close friends,” said Ryan, who has written about the anniversary.

“We didn’t talk much about what happened, and in fact we didn’t do much at all aside from skating, driving around, watching movies and otherwise goofing around. But it was important for me to feel like a typical kid, especially with the highly public nature of my father’s death.”

While most children won’t lose a family member in such a public attack, childhood loss is fairly common. More than one in seven young Americans lose a parent or sibling before age 20, and the emotional and financial upheaval on their lives can be severe, according to the National Alliance for Grieving Children.

To read the rest of this story, click here.

CNN) — While the Bible Belt is known for its devotion to traditional values, Southerners don’t do so well on one key family value: They are more likely to get divorced than people living in the Northeast.

Southern men and women had higher rates of divorce [...]]]> By Katia Hetter, Special to CNN
August 25, 2011 9:34 a.m. EDT

CNN) — While the Bible Belt is known for its devotion to traditional values, Southerners don’t do so well on one key family value: They are more likely to get divorced than people living in the Northeast.

Southern men and women had higher rates of divorce in 2009 than their counterparts in other parts of the country: 10.2 per 1,000 for men and 11.1 per 1,000 for women, according to a new report from the U.S. Census Bureau released Thursday.

By comparison, men and women in the Northeast had the lowest rates of divorce, 7.2 and 7.5 per 1,000, which is also lower than the national divorce rate of 9.2 for men and 9.7 for women.

“In the South, there are higher rates of marriage and higher rates of divorce for men and women,” said Diana Elliott, a family demographer with the U.S. Census Bureau and co-author of the new report. “In the Northeast, you have people who are delaying first marriages, and consequently there are lower rates of marriage and lower rates of divorce.”

To read the rest of this story, click here.