The ongoing pandemic changed the way we live and socialize with one another. Sadly, it affected young children as well. In the past, typical 11-year-old kids would spend their days hanging out, playing games, and engaging in a number of extracurricular activities. These days, they tend to spend their time at home, making sure they stay safe and sound.
Lauren Nelson, 11, decided to spend her days doing something incredibly inspiring. She, as many young girls her age, wanted the newest toy camper of American Girl which cost $650. When she asked her dad to buy it for her, he said, “That’s ridiculous, you could buy your own camper for that price.”
And that’s how the idea for a real camper was born.
Source: YouTube/ WKBW TV | Buffalo, NY
Lauren had some money on her own, and she was determined to spend it on a vehicle that she would later turn into a home.
Speaking to NY Post, her mom, Aimee, explained, “Lauren really does have an envelope where she saves money. And it’s just a little bit here and there from things, like $5 at Easter or Tooth Fairy money. It just added up.”
Source: YouTube/ WKBW TV | Buffalo, NY
The great thing was that Lauren didn’t need to look far as one of their neighbors was selling his camper for $500. The thing was that Lauren only had $400 so she negotiated and managed to get the camper for the suitable price.
“He said $500 and I said $400 because that was the money I had in my bank account and he said sold,” the girl explained.
Source: YouTube/ WKBW TV | Buffalo, NY
Once she got the camper, she needed to save more money in order to renovate it. At the end, she ended up spending additional $400 for the furnishings and accessories for her boho-styled hideout.
She used the HGTV show Tiny House Hunters and Pinterest for inspiration.
The final result is mesmerizing to say the least. Lauren’s camper has everything a cozy home needs, and that’s a nice living space, a four-bed bedroom, a bathroom, and a kitchen. It also has a number of cool decorations such as plants, decorative pillows, and a bunch of cupboards.
Source: YouTube/ WKBW TV | Buffalo, NY
Lauren is a creative young lady. However, it wouldn’t be possible for her project to turn into reality if it wasn’t for her parents who let their daughter stretch her creative wings.
For more on the story and a tour inside this beautiful home go to the video below. You’re going to love it!
With the temperatures getting higher and higher, we should all have in mind the consequences of leaving young children and pets locked inside hot vehicles. Many adults believe that their children being left alone inside the car for a short period of time would do them no harm, but the reality is that it sometimes takes a moment for a tragedy to take place.
Back in 2019, the Charles County Sheriff’s Office got a call from a 4-year-old boy who told them that he and six other children were all alone inside a hot car. They boy said that they all had troubles breathing and were sweating. His voice was trembling and the officers could tell he was terrified and fearing for his life.
Charles County Sheriff’s Office is currently investigating after authorities say seven toddlers from ages 2 to 4 years old were left in a hot car in a parking lot of the St. Charles Towne Center in Waldorf. https://t.co/Z4gjFmepZD
Unfortunately, he was way too young to be able to tell where they were parked. The officers, however, managed to track the call down and arrived at the parking lot of the shopping center in Waldorf, Maryland just in time. The boy’s mother came some 10 minutes later and claimed that she was only gone for 20 minutes.
Two of the children, who were all aged 2 to 4, were her kids, and she was babysitting the rest. She was later charged with confinement of children inside a motor vehicle.
People seem to be more and more into reality shows nowadays than ever before. Why we love these shows so much is that they show real people doing real things. One of the shows that is on air for over a decade and is as popular today as it was back in the day is Pawn Stars.
It started with Richard Harrison, known as The Old Man, and his sons running their Gold & Silver Pawn Shop in Las Vegas, Nevada. Over the years, they purchased, sold, and evaluated a huge number of artifacts with incredible background stories.
Sadly, The Old Man passed away in 2018, at the age of 77, and his son Rick Harrison took charge of the famous shop which resembles a history museum and brings a lot of cash.
Shutterstock
After Richard’s death, Rick paid a tribute to his father with a touching message.
“He will be tremendously missed by our family, the team at Gold & Silver Pawn and his many fans the world over,” Rick wrote on Instagram. “He was my hero and I was fortunate to get a very cool ‘Old Man’ as my dad. That I got to share him with so many others and they got to see what a great family man he was is something I am grateful to have experienced with him.
“I think about him every day. I had a different relationship with him,” Rick said.
“Most people, when they turn 18, they go off to school, get a job and move out. I worked with my father from the time I was a kid. He stayed in the Navy for years because of me. Otherwise, it would have been really difficult with my medical expenses. But despite my epilepsy, he never treated me differently.”
Youtube/PawnStars
In fact, in order to be able to work alongside his father, Rick dropped out of high school and learned how the business was done. Speaking of his childhood, he says he started buying and selling stuff from young age, and soon after, he expanded from dealing with coins and gold, to vintage cars, firearms and a huge number of different antiques.
Speaking to Review Journal, rick recalled how his dad found the idea of doing a show “the craziest, stupidest thing he’d ever heard.” The great thing is that he later changed his mind and that’s how Pawn Stars was born.
“I remember telling him, ‘Dad, you’ve got to come in Saturday for the sizzle reel.’ And he looks at me and says, ‘Rick, you’re never getting a bleeping TV show. It’s just not going to happen.’ I begged him to come in that Saturday. But we had to have him. He was the grumpy old man that everyone loves,” Rick said.
“At first, I just thought a season or two would be good for business,” he added. “It’s really bizarre. I’m just a fat pawn broker, and now I’m known all over the world.”
Instagram/RickHarrison
Today, Rick runs the shop with his son Corey and his friend Austin “Chumlee” Russell. The pandemic affected the income and Rick confessed that before it, the shop made $4,000 a day and now it went down to less than $400.
Over the years, Rick managed to accumulate a net worth of around $9 million all thanks to his business, the reality show, and his restaurant.
He’s giving a significant amount of money to different charities and is on the board of the Epilepsy Foundation. Having epilepsy himself, Rick is hoping to raise awareness about the condition. Speaking to Fox, he said: “If you have a seizure, you’re going to know it,” he explained. “There are some people, you have, like they’ll have small seizures when they sleep and they don’t even know it. It’s a disease that I think just a lot more people need to know about or maybe need some more awareness about it, and hopefully I’m going to find a cure for it one day, well, not me, the Epilepsy Foundation, not me.”
Pawn Stars airs in over 100 countries, and people can’t have enough of Rick. “First off, most reality shows are pretty much scripted. Mine is not,” Rick said of his show. “And it’s truly different every week. You can have a show about motorcycles or cars, but there’s only the only so much you can do with a motorcycle or a car every week. And people want to learn, but they don’t want to feel like they’re sitting around with a professor. I give all the history lessons and I make learning entertaining on the show.”
He says he is a real celebrity and people not only from America but basically from all around the world recognize him. The show aired in France recently and although a great portion of it had to be filmed there, Rick says he doesn’t mind traveling around.
“Seventy-five percent of TV shows in France have to be made in France, so it was very difficult to be on there,” he told Review Journal. “They are watching the very beginning of the show right now, so I’m like a rock star there and before the lockdown 15 percent of my business was French.
“I went to Buenos Aires and was mobbed. Last season, when we were filming in Rome, everyone’s running up to me. In Kuala Lampur, they know who I am.”
A lot has been said for the sacrifice the veterans made for this country, and no matter what we do for them, we can never thank them enough for keeping us safe.
Sadly, as time passes by and these brave people reach their old age, not many are around them. Although this should never be the case, it does happen and many elderly veterans are left on their own.
Nick Morales is a veteran himself. He and his fellow biker friends show appreciation for those who fought for this country whenever possible. In fact, they have started a project through which they honor the life of veterans who passed away and no one to claimed their bodies. This group’s motto is Vets helping Vets.
Youtube / FoxNews
Recently, they learned of the death of Mr. Robert Krause who served as a Marine in the 1950s. He was living all by himself, with no friends of relatives who could organize a decent funeral for him. That’s when Nick Morales and his crew stepped in.
”I’ve heard it said that a veteran dies twice: once on the battlefield and the second time when people stop saying his name,” Morales told Fox 13 News. ”If there’s anything we can do to prevent the latter, so be it.”
The kind volunteers escorted Mr. Krause’s casket from the James A. Haley Veterans’ Hospital to the Florida National Cemetery and that way they paid tribute to his service.
“We’re not going to let any vet go to their final resting place by themselves. We all have a common bond of service – our service, what we’ve done for our country. And regardless of what we’ve done after our service, we still have that bond,” Morales said.
Youtube / FoxNews
We are very thankful for everything these bikers do for the fallen veterans. You are our heroes, may God bless you all.
Take a look at the touching story in the video below and don’t forget to share it with your friends because these people deserve all the praise in this world.
Dubbed one of the most beautiful actresses that have ever walked this Earth, Elizabeth Taylor was a true diva. Her unique appearance, her double row of lashes due to a condition known as distichiasis, and her incredible eyes which were purple-colored only added to her gorgeousness.
Her beauty, along with her raw talent, were a reason enough for her mother to “push” her into the world of film. Well, it wasn’t that young Elizabeth didn’t like to act, although she would confess later in life that she was sorry she missed having an ordinary chidhood.
She signed her first contract with Universal Studios when she was still very young, and at 10 years of age, she already had her debut in the film There’s One Born Every Minute. What followed were the films Lassie Come Home (1943) and The White Cliffs of Dover (1944). Her big breakthrough, however, came with the film National Velvet in which she played a tomboy. At that point, she already had her contract with MGM because apparently, she was fired by Universal Studios before that for reasons unknown. Some magazines reported that the casting director believed “her eyes were too old,” and that “she didn’t have the face of a child.”
Over the years, she appeared in a number of movies and received plenty of attention and awards, including two Academy Awards for Best Actress in a Leading Role for Butterfield 8 (1961) and Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1967), as well as the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award, awarded to individuals for “outstanding contributions to humanitarian causes.”
Elizabeth’s private life was as exciting as her very successful career which spanned almost her entire life. Her eight marriages placed her name in a number of gossip and celebrity news headlines, but despite that, she never stopped looking for love.
The Cleopatra star was married eight times, twice to the same man, actor Richard Burton.
Youtube/Astrotema
Her first marriage, to hotel heir Nicky Hilton, didn’t last long because according to the actress herself, she was too young and probably expected a lot. He second husband, Michael Wilding, was twenty years her senior. They had two children together, Michael Jr., born in 1953, and Christopher, born in 1955.
Elizabeth married movie producer Mike Todd in 1957. The two welcomed daughter Lizz, but just a year later, he died in a plane crash. During the time of grieving, she got really close to her late husband’s best friend Eddie Fisher, who was married to actress Debbie Reynolds at the time. One thing led to another and the two decided to marry. Only after their divorce did Elizabeth and Debbie smoothed things between them.
One of her most controversial relationships was that with actor Richard Burton. They married twice and divorced that many times. They adopted a daughter from Germany named Maria together.
In 1967, Elizabeth married her seventh husband, John Warner, a Republican politician from Virginia.
Youtube/TheNewYorkTimes
Her last husband, Larry Fortensky, was 20 years younger than her. The two met at the Betty Ford Clinic in 1988. According to him, she was there for pills and he for beer.
Their relationship continued even after they left the clinic and tied the knot in 1991 in a ceremony held at Michael Jackson’s ranch Neverland. The wedding cost $1.6 million.
As their relationship was surrounded by plenty of rumors, Larry decided to speak up and reveal the truth. “Of course, she was very pretty, and I wasn’t too bad-looking in those days either. We had an instant physical attraction,” he said of the time they first met.
He spoke of her as of a very special person with a sense of humor and childish spirit. One of the most vibrant memories of her that he cherished was from their trip to Switzerland. “I chased her outside, and she fell in the snow and started waving her arms around giggling like a little girl. That is my favorite picture. I keep it by my bed,” he said. “That’s how I remember Elizabeth. She had a childishness about her. She was 20 years older than me, but I never felt she was old.”
Elizabeth was very passionate about their relationship and she would often shower him with expensive gifts. One time, she bought him a brand new Harley-Davidson motorbike, as well as a BMW for his birthday.
He, of course, couldn’t compete with her. “I knew I couldn’t compete with Elizabeth, so I didn’t try. When she gave me the bike, I gave her chocolate-covered roses. Another year I bought her a baby lop-eared bunny which she loved,” he said.
He added how she was used to being photographed all the time, but he had a hard time coping with paparazzi and cameras.
Even after their divorce, Elizabeth and Larry remained very close friends and that friendship was something they both nurtured until the end of her life.
When she passed away in 2011, from congestive heart failure, Elizabeth left Larry $500,000 in her will to “honor their friendship.”
Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images
The rest of her huge fortune was inherited by her children. As for her jewels and perfumes, they were auctioned off and the money went to TheElizabeth Taylor AIDS Foundation, a cause she kept close to her heart her entire life.
It’s been almost a year since the presidential elections in the U.S. took place, yet, media outlets are still covering different stories related to it.
Former President Donald Trump, who now lives in his family’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, said during many occasions he is planning on running for president again in 2024. A former White House aide, however, suggested that he might not even be able to run because of his health so we are yet to see how Trump’s story will unfold.
One thing about the elections is that the presidential race was sort of toxic. Both Trump and Biden said harsh words about one another and many believed they both crossed lines.
Source: Shutterstock/Nuno21
Their debates were heated, including the very first one moderated by Chris Wallace, during which Trump interrupted Biden multiple times; 128 to be exact, as reported by Slate. Biden on the other hand called Trump a “clown.”
Now, according to a new book, Rigged: How the Media, Big Tech, and the Democrats Seized Our Elections, by Fox commentator and The Federalist senior editor Mollie Hemingway, Trump is still mad at Wallace.
Daily Mail obtained a section of the book and revealed Trump to have said, “The problem was Biden would speak and it was lie after lie, after lie. Everything he said was a lie, this guy, and then Chris Wallace wouldn’t let you respond. Chris Wallace was terrible.”
Source: Shutterstock/Evan El-Amin
One person who believed Trump crossed the line during the debate and the presidential race was his son Barron Trump. Apparently, Donald confessed that his then 14-year-old son told him he was “too harsh” on Biden. Baron was even reported to have told his dad that he “caught wind” of some of the negative feedback.
“People thought I was too belligerent,” Trump said, according to the book. “I will say my own son Barron said, ‘Dad, you were too tough. You didn’t have to keep interrupting him.’”
Barron now attends the private school Oxbridge Academy and is part of the class of 2024. The spokesperson of the school said, “We look forward to welcoming him into our school and community,” as reported by People. On the school’s website it says that the institution is “committed to providing both merit scholarships and generous financial aid in an effort to attract the most qualified students and to make Oxbridge financially feasible.” They offer a number of classes, including teaching students kindness.
Source: Getty Images North America/Chip Somodevilla
Melania Trump protects her son from scrutiny and the teen is rarely spotted out in public.
Recent photos of him and his parents show how tall Baron grew up to be. His dad, Donald Trump told New York Post jokingly, “Barron is 6-foot-7, can you believe it? And he’s 15. Eric (Trump) is short — he’s only 6-foot-6.”
The pain of not having your mom or dad in your life leaves a void in the heart. It is especially difficult to lose a parent at a very young age.
8-year-old Sianna from England lost her daddy when she was just four months old. It was a difficult time for her mother, Sarah Tully, who was left to raise her daughter all by herself. As time passed by, the little girl was eager to learn where her daddy was. She was looking at her friend’s fathers and couldn’t stop wondering why hers wasn’t around.
One day, her mom explained to her that she did have a daddy, but he was in heaven, looking down on her from above.
Sianna decided to send a letter to her father and addressed it to Cloud 9. She then put the letter in a postbox.
The following day a mailman named Simon was picking the post when the handwriting on Sianna’s letter attracted his attention. When he read the address, his heart broke in two. He just couldn’t stop thinking of the child who was desperately trying to reach her father. Aware that the letter could get lost in transit without a proper address on it, he went to his manager and asked for a permission to try and track down the child who wrote it.
“I’m a postman in the Braunstone area; earlier today I emptied the red pillar box…and there was a letter in a child’s handwriting addressed to their dad in Heaven, Cloud 9,” he wrote in the plea he posted on Facebook.
“I’m trying to find the parents of the child as I would like to reach out to them and with their permission sort out a little something for the child.
“I myself lost my dad last year and as an adult found it hard so I can only imagine what this child is going through. Please, if anyone has any details then it would be hugely appreciated.”
In no time, someone who knew Sarah told her about the post. She then contacted Simon and explained how her daughter believed her dad would get her letter. She was also touched by the number of responses on Simon’s plea. “I never thought this would happen. I’m in shock,” she told the BBC.
Sarah took the letter but said she won’t open it.
“I have no idea what is in it, I always say that’s between her and her dad.
“I told her it was too late to post it at first but she started crying, so I said ‘come on then’ and we walked to the post box down the street.”
Along with the letter, Simon also brought a gift to Sianna, a beautiful father-daughter figure Sarrah put picture of on Facebook with the following caption: “The gift Simon the postman brought my daughter… this has been a very touching time for us …its been overwhelming thank u to u all x.”
Many took their time to praise this kind-hearted mailman’s act. He truly is an angel.
During our lifetime we hear of people who do deeds so daring and noble that they don’t deserve anything less than to be hailed heroes. Army Spc. Ezra Maes is one of them. This young man’s bravery touched the hearts of many and what he did for his crewmates became a symbol of compassion and sacrifice.
It was back in 2018 when Maes served in Poland along with some of his friends. During an overnight training exercise, the tank in which he and his fellow mates stayed suddenly started rolling down the hill.
Maes was convinced it was part of the exercise or maybe some sort of prank and yelled to the driver to step on the brakes. But when the driver replied that it wasn’t him, Maes realized they were all in big trouble.
Perseverance and resilience 💪@USArmy Spc. Ezra Maes undergoes physical rehabilitation at the Center for the Intrepid, Brooke Army Medical Center in Texas. Read his inspiring story of determination and how he plans to keep moving forward: https://t.co/WtjP2B5MV6#KnowYourMilpic.twitter.com/KJOi4wigsF
The tank was moving with 90 miles and hour and stopping it was impossible.
“We realized there was nothing else we could do and just held on,” Maes said about the accident.
After a number of sharp bumps, the tank crashed into an embankment. Maes flew across the machinery and his leg got caught in the turret gear.
Initially, he believed his leg was just broken and seeing his friends being severely injured with one breaking his back and another one bleeding profusely from a deep cut on her thigh, Maes started twisting and turning his leg desperately trying to release himself so he could offer them help. In the next moment, he was free, but he lost his leg.
He explained: “I pushed and pulled at my leg as hard as I could to get loose and felt a sharp tear. I thought I had dislodged my leg, but when I moved away, my leg was completely gone.”
.@USArmy Spc. Ezra Maes spent four months in intensive care undergoing near daily surgeries and battling an infection. He’s now assigned to the Warrior Transition Battalion and undergoing physical and occupational therapy. https://t.co/Zu59r6y1Zq
Despite losing a lot of blood that was pouring from his leg heavily, this brave soldier managed to get to the medical kit and grab a tourniquet.
He couldn’t think of the pain or the leg he lost as the lives of the fellow soldiers rested on his shoulders.
“All I could think about was no one knows we’re down here,” he continued. “Either I step up or we all die.”
Luckily, one of the phones was still working and Maes was able to call for help that soon came to the place of the accident.
Maes was quickly rushed to the nearest hospital and later transferred to Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany.
After an Abrams tank crashed into an embankment, Spc. Ezra Maes noticed his leg was stuck in the turret gear.
He later amputated his own leg and used a belt for a tourniquet to free himself and help two other injured soldiers.https://t.co/lP14A8K3Nz
— ConnectingVets (@ConnectingVets) October 8, 2019
“I feel super lucky,” he said. “My crew all does. So many things could have gone wrong. Besides my leg, we all walked away pretty much unscathed.”
Sgt. Maes is an exceptional person who sacrificed losing a part of his body for the sake of his fellow soldiers’ lives. He deserves the whole country’s deepest respect!
