•August 24, 2022•
By Cheri Burcham
Extension Educator
University of Illinois Extension

While family members of our military service members do not actively serve, they do have a very important job – holding down the fort. Military service members put their lives on the line to protect and serve our country while their families adapt, miss their loved ones, and support them from home. Eastern Illinois University graduate Kayli Worthey has written this article that includes very valuable tips for military families. Kayli says: in 2018, my brother-in-law was deployed to Germany for 9 months and left behind his wife and son. While the deployment was shorter than some, it still took a toll on my sister and their 2-year-old son, who both missed him dearly. Having one family member on the other side of the world can be extremely stressful, but luckily my sister was able to adapt and relied on family members to help her during those nine months. Read More

•August 24, 2022•
As millions of children and college students go back to school this month, the Illinois Emergency Management Agency (IEMA) recommends that all families review their own emergency preparedness plans and school safety plans. Whether your children are in school, on a bus, at music practice, or with their traveling sports league teams, planning and shared information is critical.
“Severe weather and other emergencies can happen at any time,” said IEMA Deputy Director Scott Swinford. “Parents should especially discuss with their children where to go for shelter, who to communicate with, and how to communicate with them during an emergency.” Read More

•August 24, 2022•
By Jim Baumann
NP Guest Writer

We’ve talked about portmanteaus — those fun combinations of words that create new words — as well as slang — informal ways of speaking, often defined by social and work groups.
But what about neologisms?
I dare say in all the years of writing this column I’ve never used the word.
Reader Gib Van Dyne requested I do so, and because I rarely get around to featuring Gib’s thoughtful and well-considered column ideas I thought this would be as good a time as any. Gib asked me to explore neologisms and coinages.
First, portmanteaus and slang could be considered subsets of neologisms, which are defined as a freshly coined words or phrases. But neologisms can also be new definitions of older words. Read More