Life & Style news

• From diets to friendship to reality TV: 25 things I have learned in my 25 years

  11-11-2017 16:18
  I’m infinitely less wise than I thought I would be by now, but these things I know …It is my 25th birthday this weekend, which means I am officially allowed to use the phrase “quarterlife crisis”. I am infinitely less wise than I thought I would be by now, but, because I am halfway through my third decade and adulthood is slapping me in the face like a wet fish, I’m well placed to share 25 things I have learned.1. Your physical and mental health, and that of those
  
  Read more

• Ade Adepitan: ‘Sporting success healed my relationship with my dad’

  11-11-2017 15:00
  The TV presenter, 44, talks about triumph on the basketball court, and surviving both polio and prejudiceMy earliest memory is of playing hide and seek with my cousins in Nigeria. I hid in a cupboard and the door jammed so I was locked in. When eventually they found me, I was screaming. I have been claustrophobic ever since.When I pulled out the ring Elle said: ‘I don’t care if you are in a wheelchair, you still have to get down on one knee’ Continue reading...
  
  Read more

• Four recipes for classic quick pasta sauces

  11-11-2017 13:00
  The following recipes we’ve picked using these five families of ingredients take as long to make as your pasta needs to boilDon’t skimp on the nuts and cheese here. To use as a pasta sauce, spoon the pesto into a large bowl and add just-cooked, drained pasta.Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat by Samin Nosrat, (Canongate) Continue reading...
  
  Read more

• Green shoots: 'gardening provides welcome relief from my infertility'

  11-11-2017 12:00
  Finding a lifeline in the garden when IVF has failedI have just got home from work, walked into our garden, trug in hand, and filled it with a beautifully crinkled savoy cabbage, slender ‘Musselburgh’ leeks, and freshly unearthed heritage carrots to accompany tonight’s lamb casserole. Lunch was spiced pumpkin soup using my ‘Uchiki Kuri’ winter squashes, followed by late-season ‘Egremont Russet’ apples, straight from the tree. My husband is a few miles aw
  
  Read more

• Advertisement

• 'We're having a menstrual liberation': how periods got woke

  11-11-2017 11:00
  Periods happen to half the population – so why are they still treated as something to hide? Meet the activists seeing redI am sitting in a hotel meeting room with 12 women, all of us squeezing menstrual cups against our cheeks. The blinds are down, the wine has been flowing for the past hour, and after a few people have taken selfies, Mandu Reid, an expert in “cupography”, explains how to use our menstrual cups.“Do you feel that gentle suction?” she asks. “Tha
  
  Read more

• Meera Sodha’s vegan recipe for celeriac, tofu and crispy kale gado gado

  11-11-2017 10:30
  A vegan take on the classic Indonesian saladEvery home cook can get stuck in a rut, and I’m sure I’m not the only person who occasionally stares vacantly at the vegetable rack, wondering how to transform a few lone rangers into dinner. You have to be on the front foot to keep putting plants at the centre of your plate.It’s not enough to have just one way with broccoli or the same old roast potatoes. You need a Swiss army knife of tools at your disposal: a bit of knowledge of wh
  
  Read more

• Yotam Ottolenghi’s recipes for warming autumn soups

  11-11-2017 10:00
  Autumn is a time of year for comfort food – and nothing ticks that box better than a bowl of warm soupSix years ago today, my husband Karl and I entered into a civil partnership. And six years before that, the first gay civil partnership in the UK took place at 11am on 5 December 2005. So what’s all this got to do with soup? Well, soup will for me always mean comfort and home, and comfort and home will always mean eating at the end of the day with Karl and our boys. Soup soothes and
  
  Read more

• Even the humble poppy can't escape the culture wars

  11-11-2017 10:00
  The war over the poppy has been building for some time, and it has become practically a national truism that anyone who fails to wear one is a traitorConsider the innocent poppy – for some time in this country a symbol of the memory of the fallen soldiers in the first world war, and all servicemen and women killed in conflict. Now, I don’t want to go too far out on a controversial limb here but that seems like a… good thing? Or – I ask whirling around to camera – i
  
  Read more

• Advertisement

• What I’m really thinking: the Muslim office worker

  11-11-2017 09:59
  I won’t mention the latest terror attack. If you bring it up, I’ll say it’s sick, awful, depraved. Is that enough? Or should I say I condemn it “as a Muslim”? My family has been in the UK for 60 years. We experienced racist abuse in public and at school, and saw our home vandalised many times. But that was the 1980s. Things got better and were meant to carry on getting better. Sadly, the abuse is back.Increasingly, I practise shameful pragmatism in the workplace. I
  
  Read more

• The bank of Mum and Dad: ‘It’s such a huge amount of money. And guilt’

  11-11-2017 09:00
  The only way many young people can buy a home is by borrowing from family. But is it healthy – and what if parents can’t help out?Your friend has bought a house. You’re in your 20s, or perhaps your early 30s, and because you’re not part of the wealthy elite, this seems unusual. The country is in the midst of a housing crisis that has seen home ownership plummet among younger people. Perhaps you’ve been trying to save, but what with the cost of living and the money y
  
  Read more

• Beauty: at last, some good news about melasma

  11-11-2017 09:00
  As a melasma sufferer myself, I’m delighted by the new treatmentsI have always promised that if I ever find a product that significantly improves melasma (large brown patches caused by defective cells failing to regulate melanin production, triggered by damage or hormonal changes, and worsened by heat and sunlight), I’d let you know. It’s been a long time coming.My own melasma – which appeared in my 20s and stepped up several gears when I became pregnant, spreading a
  
  Read more

• Which forest has England’s largest wild boar population? The Weekend quiz

  11-11-2017 08:00
  From Granny Gets The Point to Colin Kaepernick, test your knowledge with the Weekend quizThe questions
  1 Whose website describes her as writer, traveller, playwright, wife, mother, surfer?
  2 Where does a CME cloud originate?
  3 What was explained in 1971 by the film Granny Gets The Point?
  4 Which forest has England’s largest wild boar population?
  5 Which two elements are named after US states?
  6 What aircraft were developed at Felixstowe in the first world war?
  7 Who lived by the code of Bu
  
  Read more

• Should I rent a room to work in London but live in the south-west?

  11-11-2017 08:00
  I’m not sure if renting a room Monday-Friday will work at the age of 46 Every week a Guardian Money reader submits a question, and it’s up to you to help him or her out – a selection of the best answers will appear in next Saturday’s paper.This week’s question: Continue reading...
  
  Read more

• Fit in my 40s: ‘I’d rather eat earth than meditate for 17 more seconds’

  11-11-2017 08:00
  Mindfulness has to be principled, otherwise it’s just a guy in California eating a raisin really, really slowlyThe problem with mindfulness is that it spread across the world unhinged from the philosophy of human goodness that was supposed to underpin it. A sniper has to be mindful, in the sense of living in a state of complete presence and awareness; but he wouldn’t do much for the Dalai Lama. It doesn’t have to be religious necessarily, but mindfulness has to be principled, o
  
  Read more

• ‘I took my daughter everywhere – even to Narcotics Anonymous’

  11-11-2017 07:45
  Ana and Rita Nevoa, who appear in a new BBC series about Bristol’s drug problem, are an inspirational story that shows addiction does not have to end badlyThe BBC documentary series Drugsland, which begins this week, examines Bristol’s growing drug problem – on the frontline and in the backstreets and hidden stairwells. Cameras follow police, addicts and drug workers. It is a hard, dark programme to watch, but in the midst of the chaos, in an oasis of calm, are Ana Ne
  
  Read more

• A letter to ... my non-binary child, who has officially laid my son to rest

  11-11-2017 07:30
  The letter you always wanted to writeWhen you quietly and slightly nervously told us that you had come out as non-binary, a mighty rock splashed into the relatively calm waters of my life as a mother of young men.I was hit by choppy waves of surprise, incomprehension, newfound ignorance, admiration of your courage and your strong sense of self, anxiety, puzzlement, nostalgia, sadness, loss and excitement. A certainty that I hadn’t realised that I took for granted was sh
  
  Read more

• For the love of dog: how a pet changed a rabbi’s life

  11-11-2017 07:15
  Jonathan Wittenberg says his border collie has helped him in his work and at home, making him a better person and a better fatherFriday evening – with the candlelit blessing of the Sabbath loaves – is a special time in the busy weekly routines of Rabbi Jonathan Wittenberg and his family. And while his three children, now in their 20s and studying or working away from home, can no longer always be present, one member of the household never misses the occasion.Mitzpah, the family&
  
  Read more

• The clothes I’ve loved – and reduced to rags

  11-11-2017 07:00
  Our pop culture expert on loving certain items of clothing to deathI am settling into the age at which I quietly lament the clothes that have left my life. I don’t necessarily have “favourites” but I do own a lot of “one-and-onlys” – that pair of miraculous denim cutoffs that were somehow suitable for work and play; the leather belt I found for a fiver in a charity shop that has now been with me longer than a few of my best mates; the perfect sl
  
  Read more

• Children’s author Oliver Jeffers on explaining the world to his son – one room at a time

  11-11-2017 07:00
  The author and illustrator of some of today’s most treasured children’s classics says having his first child shed new light on the world – from saucepans and trees to lunch and shoes –giving him a new sense of wonderWhen Oliver Jeffers and his wife brought home their newborn son from hospital, they paused at the door to their apartment in Brooklyn, New York. The three of them stood on the threshold of family life. It was Jeffers who broke the silence. “Here we are,&
  
  Read more

• Blind date: ‘I don’t think he got my jokes’

  11-11-2017 07:00
  Did the numbers add up for 27-year-old economist Martin and artist Rosie, 30?What were you hoping for?To put myself out there and meet someone. Continue reading...
  
  Read more

• Killer Sudoku 579

  11-11-2017 01:01
  Normal sudoku rules apply, except the numbers in the cells contained within dotted lines add up to the figures in the corner. No number can be repeated within each shape formed by dotted lines.
  For a helping hand call our solutions line on 0906 200 83 83. Calls will cost £1.03 per minute, plus your phone company’s access charge. Calls from other networks may vary and mobiles will be considerably higher. Service supplied by ATS. Call 0330 333 6946 for customer service (charged at stan
  
  Read more

• Quick crossword No 14,825

  11-11-2017 01:00
  Continue reading...
  
  Read more

• Prize crossword No 27,352

  11-11-2017 01:00
  Continue reading...
  
  Read more

Follow @NL_LifeAndStyle on Twitter!