Experts say that the way siblings treat each other early in life can be a good predictor for how they'll relate to each other down the road. The relationship you start out with, though, doesn't have to be the one in which you wind up: Parents, it turns out, can take a more active role to help kids communicate better with their sisters and brothers. We speak with Takeaway contributor Lisa Belkin, who writes the "Motherlode" blog for The New York Times. We're also joined by psychology professors Laurie Kramer from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Valerie Purdie-Vaughns, assistant psychology professor at Columbia University.

Flu season starts officially on Sunday, and while the government has been urging schools to close only as a last resort in the battle against H1N1, there have already been at least 187 school closures since the school year started last month. Ross Hammond from the Brookings Institution discusses his new report that reveals that the true cost to the nation of closing schools and day care centers could be as much as $47 billion. Kathleen Murphy is a registered nurse and the health services coordinator for the Milwaukee Public Schools; she tells us what her school district is doing to prevent closings. We also speak to Dr. Faheem Younus, the medical director of epidemiology and infection prevention at the Upper Chesapeake Health Center in Bel Air, Md., who has some practical advice for parents who can't take the day off of work.

This Takeout comes from our listeners: We spoke yesterday about daughters overcoming difficult relationships with their mothers, and vice-versa. After we got off the air, 75-year-old Dolores from Oklahoma called us to talk about her relationship with her mother. We also got many responses here on the website, one from a woman describing taking care of her mother with Alzheimer's.

44 American servicemembers have died in Afghanistan so far in August, tying with July as the deadliest month yet for U.S. troops in that conflict. The increase in violence has reignited debate about the U.S. role in the country. We speak to some familly members of the troops stationed there about their take on sending their loved ones off to this war. 

Mary Galeti is from Cleveland, Ohio. Her husband, Russell, is a first lieutenant with the Ohio National Guard. He is currently training with NATO forces in Hungary, but will be deployed to Afghanistan in January. Kim Clark is from Erie, Pennsylvania. Her son Daniel is a Marine in an artillery unit near Helmand Province in Afghanistan. And Larry Syverson is from Richmond, Virginia. His son Branden is a sergeant in the Army's 5th brigade, 2nd infantry, near Kandahar, Afghanistan.

For our family segment, we take a look at a recent government report that shows a 30 percent increase in the number of women arrested for drinking and driving in the past ten years. This report comes out amidst a vigorous discussion in the blogosphere about mothers who drink. Are mothers more stressed out than they used to be, or has the feminist movement made it more socially acceptable to drink than a couple of generations ago?

To discuss this we speak to Lisa Belkin, writer of the New York Times' MotherLode blog; and Tara Trower, assistant features editor at the Austin American Statesman and writer for the Statesman's Mama Drama blog.

The economic downturn is making life harder than usual for teenagers. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics the unemployment rate among teens is 21.7 percent — the highest rate in nearly 20 years. And these aren’t just kids looking for iPod money. There are young people across the socioeconomic spectrum who are hoping to put themselves through school, or to pitch in at home. Joining us to explain what it means to have so many jobless teens is Beth Kobliner. She is a personal finance expert and author of The New York Times best-seller Get a Financial Life.

Are modern parents adopting the idea of the child as a noble savage? Slow parenting, free-range parenting, I-don't-give-a-darn parenting -- this new approach is gaining popularity in reaction to the hovering of so-called "helicopter" parents. The basic premise is to leave your kids alone and let them develop at their own pace. Are parents taking pride now in being labeled a bad parent? Lisa Belkin is a contributing writer for The New York Times Magazine and she writes about this new trend in parenting in this weekend's issue.

Want to hear more? Listen to our interviews with Ayelet Waldman and Heather B. Armstrong.

Two stories in different parts of the country have re-ignited the issue of when the state should step in and take over for parents. Yesterday a Minnesota judge ruled that the parents of thirteen-year old Daniel Hauser can regain custody of their son as long as he gets the cancer treatment that he needs. The Hausers lost custody of Daniel when his mother took him off of his chemotherapy treatments and then fled to California to escape a court order to resume the treatment. And last week the state of South Carolina set out to determine whether a child's morbid obesity is enough to charge the parents with neglect. The Takeaway talks to Kate Dailey, who writes for the Human Condition blog for Newsweek magazine about where we draw the line on negligence. To watch an interview with the Hausers, click here.

After Kate left the studio, she found she had more to say. For her additional thoughts, click here.

A ruling is expected today from the California Supreme Court that will either uphold Proposition 8, the gay marriage ban, or overturn it as unconstitutional. Whatever the California court decides, gay marriage is now legal in Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Iowa, and it will be legal in Vermont and Maine in September. And, inevitably, with marriage comes divorce. As couples and attorneys are learning, same sex divorce is at least as complex and controversial as same sex marriage. Frederick Hertz, an attorney in Oakland California and author of Making it Legal: A Guide to Same-Sex Marriage, Domestic Partnership & Civil Unions joins Farai and John with a look at the issue.

All week in our series Pomp in these Circumstances, we've been looking at life after graduation. Many young adults will be going out into the real world, trying to get jobs and to live on their own. But in this economy, many graduating students will be moving back in with their parents. How much financial help should you give your children? Here to advise us is Beth Kobliner, is a personal finance expert and author of The New York Times best-seller Get a Financial Life.

President Obama has lifted restrictions on travel and remittances for Cuban-Americans who wish to visit family or send money to their kin in Cuba. The Takeaway talks to Michael Voss, BBC correspondent in Havana and Joshua Johnson a reporter and anchor with WLRN, Miami Herald News, who has been covering the story from South Florida.

Dooce blogger Heather B. Armstrong earns a living revealing personal details — an act that actually got her fired from her job as a web designer seven years ago. Since then she's made a reputation for brutal (and often hilarious) honesty and openness. Her new book, It Sucked and Then I Cried: How I had a Baby, a Breakdown, and a Much Needed Margarita documents her post-partum depression and self-admission to a mental health facility. Not something many parents would be willing to put in hard copy. But you don’t have to be famous to have your personal details on the internet these days. So how do you shield your children from information you don't think they should know? And how much is okay to tell them? Heather B. Armstrong looks at how we decide where to draw the line.

Click through for the transcript

How much do you tell your children? What did your parents over-share with you? Tell us here.

Women have long battled with their biological clocks, but with men like Tony Randall cranking out kids in their seventies, many men don't really think about their biological clocks. In the wake of new studies, though, that might change. Lisa Belkin, New York Times Magazine contributing writer, makes the case in this week’s Magazine that there’s now even more evidence that when it comes to making babies, men have a sell by date.

Lisa Belkin's article will be available in the New York Times Magazine on Sunday.

How has the notion of the American dream changed for the new generation of Mexicans in the United States? The Takeaway talks to Gustavo Arellano, who writes the syndicated "Ask A Mexican" column, and is a contributing editor for the Los Angeles Times opinion page.

What is your American dream? Join the discussion on The Takeaway's New American Dream section.

Ants do it. (says E.O. Wilson)
Octopuses do it.
Humans...mmmm, not so much.

There's talk going around about the science of P-L-A-Y, and specifically, about what play means, how it lights up our brains, and why we feel like automatrons when we don't play. Today's prescription is written by Dr Stuart Brown, co-author of the new book, "Play," and founder of the National Institute for Play. He joins The Takeaway for a break from the real world.

When President Obama was sworn in yesterday, he was surrounded by family. That family was a rainbow of colors and ethnicities including his Kenyan step-grandmother, his Indonesian-American half-sister, Michelle Obama's black cousins and brother, his Chinese-Canadian brother-in-law, and a rabbi. It is quite a change from the typical white Protestant presidential family. To discuss this changing American portrait we are joined by New York Times' writer Jodi Kantor.

For more, read Jodi Kantor's article, In First Family, a Nation’s Many Faces, in today's New York Times.

Traditionally Christmas is a time for family, food, and friends. But unlike Thanksgiving, Christmas doesn't have a set menu of turkey and all the fixings. Every family has its own unique rituals that span the globe and reflect family history, roots, and experience. Chef Rocco DiSpirito and his mother, Nicolina, joined The Takeaway to share their family's holiday traditions.

ROCCO'S RECIPE

Struffoli
My Aunt Margaret gave me her recipe, which we love to eat at the holidays.

Ingredients:

• 9 eggs
• Approximately 3/4 cup olive oil
• 5 1/2 cups of flour, or more
• Vegetable oil for frying

To decorate:

• 1/4 cup of honey
• 1 to 1 1/2 cups of sugar
• Confetti sprinkles
• Sliced almonds

Instructions:

1. Beat together the eggs and oil.
2. Add flour into bowl, then knead for 20 minutes or longer, until soft. (it should be like a ball).
3. Break off a small piece of dough and covering the remaining dough. Roll the piece into a long narrow strip, and then cut the dough into pieces less than a half inch long. Repeat with remaining dough.
4. Using a heavy-bottomed frying pan, fill halfway up the sides with vegetable oil. Place dough pieces inside pan, without letting them touch. (Do not overcrowd, put in a only a handful in at a time; you may have to work in batches.) If oil starts to foam, the oil is too cool; raise the temperature. Cook until lightly golden brown.
5. To decorate, combine approximately 1/4 cup honey and 1 to 1 1/2 cups of sugar in a 12 inch frying pan. Cook on high heat until it boils. Add cooked pieces of strufoli, mixing until they are covered with the honey-sugar mixture.
6. Remove from frying pan and immediately mold strufoli into desired shape, traditionally a wreath. Keep cool water nearby for when hands become too warm.
7. Decorate with confetti sprinkles and almond slices.

View more recipes by Rocco DiSpirito »

Zimbabweans have long been entering South Africa to escape their country's economic decline. Now they're fleeing a cholera epidemic. South African resources are being stretched to the limit as health workers try to contain the disease. In Musina, fifteen minutes from the border, tents have been set up in the grounds of the local hospital to treat patients. Many of the Zimbabweans coming into South Africa do so illegally by swimming the Limpopo river. Officials have confirmed that tests carried out on the river have found it to be polluted. But South Africa is not turning away anyone who is sick. Sarah Jacobs from Save The Children discusses the situation.

When Nebraska's legislature crafted its safe-haven law to protect newborns from abandonment, state lawmakers had the best intentions. But without an age limit set, those best intentions have opened the door to some 30 children being abandoned at Nebraskan hospitals — and those "children" have often been teenagers, never newborns.

Read "The Momification of Michelle Obama" at Salon.com »

"Michelle Obama was a particularly threatening figure within a world that has traditionally been about white male power."
-- Rebecca Traister