I'm very proud of my Nigerian heritage. I wasn't fortunate enough to be raised in a heavy Nigerian environment because my parents were always working. My father was with D.C. Cabs and my mother worked in fast food and was a nurse.

Sometimes I even now feel like a stranger in my country. But I knew there would be problems because I had seen the world as a skater. And now? A lot of people in eastern Germany have lost jobs rents went up food costs went up unemployment went to 20 percent. Freedom is good but it is not easy.

My parents owned a soul food diner. It inspired me to go to culinary school.

I travel around and hear from so many kids. Their parents say they were always very picky but they watch the show and they want to try stuff. The show is entertainment but I think it has done so much for the public perception of what food can be.

Heads know that failing to invest in good nutritious food is a false economy and parents won't tolerate reconstituted turkey being put back on the menu.

I wanted to be a great white hunter a prospector for gold or a slave trader. But then when I was eight my parents sent me to a boarding school in South Africa. It was the equivalent of a British public school with cold showers beatings and rotten food. But what it also had was a library full of books.

Food was always a big part of my life. My grandfather was one of 14 kids and his parents had a pasta factory so as a kid he and his siblings would sell pasta door to door. After he became a movie producer he opened up De Laurentiis Food Stores - one in Los Angeles and one in New York.

As the proud father of two teens and past Chairman to the Presidents Council on Physical Fitness and Sports I am committed to educating parents and especially young people on ways to live a long healthy and active life.

Let children read whatever they want and then talk about it with them. If parents and kids can talk together we won't have as much censorship because we won't have as much fear.

Vaccines save lives fear endangers them. It's a simple message parents need to keep hearing.

I'm famous by default. I came out of the womb and people wanted to know who I was because of my parents.

It was a mixed blessing to have famous parents. It was tough to go to auditions and be bad since I couldn't be anonymous.

When we were growing up our parents somehow made it clear that being famous was good. And I mistakenly thought that if I was famous then everyone would love me.

My parents did a great job raising me and my two sisters. We all graduated from high school and we all graduated from college. So to be a good representative of my family is probably my greatest accomplishment thus far.

When I'm home the heart and soul of our family is in the kitchen. Growing up my parents both worked so dinnertime was for family - the TV was off. I think it's important to grab that time and really make it special even after a tough day.

It's one of the worst-kept secrets of family life that all parents have a preferred son or daughter and the rules for acknowledging it are the same everywhere: The favored kids recognize their status and keep quiet about it - the better to preserve the good thing they've got going and to keep their siblings off their back.

There aren't a lot of ironclad rules of family life but here's one: No matter how much your parents deny it - and here's betting they deny it a lot - they have a favorite child. And if you're a parent so do you.

Playing guitar was one of my childhood hobbies and I had played a little at school and at camp. My parents would drag me out to perform for my family like all parents do but it was a hobby - nothing more.

Getting a family into work supporting strong relationships getting parents off drugs and out of debt - all this can do more for a child's well-being than any amount of money in out-of-work benefits.

By measuring the proportion of children living with the same parents from birth and whether their parents report a good quality relationship we are driving home the message that social programmes should promote family stability and avert breakdown.

My family although they're very large on both my parents' sides they don't know much about their family tree. Occasionally they try to dig but they can't get very far and it's baffling. In Dublin it seems that so many public records were wiped out it's proven to be very difficult so I know very little.

Here's the thing: the unit of reverence in Europe is the family which is why a child born today of unmarried parents in Sweden has a better chance of growing up in a house with both of his parents than a child born to a married couple in America. Here we revere the couple there they revere the family.

A lot of parents never speak to their transgender kids again that's not the case in my family.

It never occurred to me that I wouldn't go to college and have a career - as well as a family - of my own. Both my parents but especially my mother encouraged me and led me to believe that it was possible.