Carrie Saum

I say this: Stop fat-shaming my toddler son. Fat will not make him fat. Fat does not make him unhealthy.

Stuffing things is the best. I mean it. Can you think of ONE THING that is stuffed that you hate?

I do this thing that I'm really proud of: 

I eat leftovers.

In the spirit of fall, I'm sharing this with you. You need it. I need it. We all need it to make it through the final days of fading sunshine and early days of falling leaves. Or something.

So, when your BFF moves into her first real home and her husband has a birthday at basically the same moment, you bake a cake. And not just any cake but a beautiful thing made of the best ingredients. You aim high, confident that you can come through for your BFF and celebrate her family's milestones with four spongy layers filled with thick raspberry preserves and succulent buttercream.

I know that our group of friends is special. But the specialness comes from some core values that I will share with you. I will give you fair warning: these are not for people who are interested in receiving. These eight guidelines are for people who are interested in building a community.

We're in flu season hell! In fact, according to, uh, science, it’s one of the worst seasons we’ve seen in the last 10 years.

Party City’s food allergies ad wasn’t an innocent lapse in judgment or poor agency vetting. It was a revelation of their core values.

No-bake cookies were always one of my favorite potluck eats. These seemed like straight-up magic to me, and I was fascinated by cookies that tasted awesome without baking them. It was potluck sorcery at Hogwarts level.

I also kind of feel like whatever I do eventually put in my body needs to be quality and filling and full of nutritious goodness. This is hard on mornings when it literally feels like all I can do to make toast. Sometimes I look at it, contemplate it fresh out of the toaster and briefly wonder if I really need to spread the almond butter on it. Because effort.