Still feeling broody: Khloe Kardashian shows off her edgy new hair colour as she dotes over a baby at husband Lamar's basketball game

With her latest niece or nephew's arrival just around the corner Khloe Kardashian was getting some aunt practice in on Sunday night.
It is no secret that Khloe yearns to have a child of her own, so the star broke away from watching her husband Lamar Odom's basketball game in Los Angeles, California, to chat to a new mother and her adorable daughter.

What game? Khloe Kardashian enjoyed spending time with a baby on Sunday while at her husband Lamar Odom's basketball game in Los Angeles, California

The 28-year-old lovingly smiled at the child as it sat on her friend Khadijah Haqq's lap.
The two women, and Khloe's former assistant Malika Haqq, completely forgot about the game momentarily as the little girl peacefully sat with them in their row.
Khloe also used the Sunday night game to debut her new hair style.
The Keeping Up With The Kardashian star obviously made a trip to the salon on Sunday, adding longer hair extensions in and darkening most of her locks with even more bleach at the tips.

Girl's night: The host attended the game with her former assistant Malika Haqq and her twin sister Khadijah

Quick change: The Keeping Up With The Kardashians star has added extensions to her hair and bleached her  tips even more. The day before at the Four Seasons in Beverly Hills, California, she sported much shorter locks

Clearly happy with the results, Khloe wore her hair flowing and in soft waves in order to better show off her new shade.
Despite the adorable brief distraction, Khloe's focus was on her husband as he and his team, the Los Angeles Clippers, fought it out at the Staples Centre against the Oklahoma Thunder.
While the Clippers lost 104 to 108 the close game had Khloe and the Haqq twins on the edge of their seats.

Bad call: The star took to yelling at the referee during the game

Throw it that way: Khloe screamed out support to her husband

Not impressed: The 28-year-old seemed to take offence to something another fan shouted out shooting them a less than amused look

The star was very animated during the game telling exactly what she thought about bad calls by the referee, shouting support for her team and covering her face in shock as the Clippers could not make up ground.
At one point, the 28-year-old seemed to take offense to something another fan - no doubt from Oklahoma - shouted out, shooting them a less than amused look.
For her girl's night trip to the basketball game Khloe went for a casual but comfortable look.
The brunette beauty donned distressed tight blue jeans with knee high brown boots, a long sleeved top with a Mexican-inspired pattern and accessorised her outfit with a quilted brown leather Chanel handbag.

Her team: Khloe was very animated during the game shouting support for her team and covering her face in shock as the Clippers could not make up ground

With her sister Kourtney recently giving birth to her second child and Kim six months pregnant to boyfriend Kanye West, Khloe has been very open with her desires to have a child of her own.
Khloe first spoke out about her struggle to conceive last year, telling Us Magazine: 'If it happens, it happens. It takes time, I guess... I don't know what the problem is.'
'People keep saying, "Why aren't you pregnant yet?'
'That's what scares me, when people are like, "Did you go to the doctor? Do you know if everything's working? It's nerve-racking. Sometimes I feel like I'm letting everyone down,' she said.

Casually cute: The 28-year-old wore distressed jeans, brown boots and a patterned shirt

I'm keeping all four!' What this courageous mother replied when doctors said: Sacrifice two of your quads to save the others

Pregnant with quadruplets, Emma Robbins was told again and again that she should terminate two of her babies to give the others a better chance of survival.
Again and again, she told doctors she had no intention of sacrificing any of her boys, who were conceived naturally at odds of 750,000 to one.
Now she has all the proof she needed that her instinct was right: four happy, healthy and utterly adorable one-year-olds.

The healthy quadruplets from left to right, Sammy, Zachary, Joshua and Reuben Robbins at home. Mother Emma Robbins was advised to consider terminating two to save the other two during her pregnancy

Mrs Robbins told the consultant that she was keeping all four babies after an overwhelming sense of love rushed through her

Zachary, Joshua, Reuben and Sam had their first birthday party yesterday.
The brothers are even more remarkable because they were born on February 29 last year – at odds of 3.5million to one – so will celebrate their true birthday only once every four years.
Mrs Robbins, 31, and her husband Martin, 39, already had a son, three-year-old Luke, when they tried for what they thought would be their second child.
Mrs Robbins said: ‘Never in a million years did we think we’d have four babies at once. I’d be lying if I said it was easy, but we’re so glad we never gave up on our babies.’
She added: ‘At ten weeks I was a lot larger than I’d been with Luke and I was suffering from horrendous morning sickness. I was worried that something might be wrong.
‘The sonographer looked at both of us wide-eyed, turned the screen to us, then said she could see three amniotic sacs and not just two babies but four. And not just quads but identical twins as well.’
Mrs Robbins said her husband, a sign-maker, ‘looked numb and just laughed’. The next time they visited St Michael’s Hospital in Bristol, the consultant congratulated them – but then warned the couple they should consider terminating some or all of the babies. 
‘He told us the risks were so high it would put me in danger and the babies too,’ she said.

 

More...

• Supersize twins: Meet Hannah and Thomas (combined weight of 17lb 8oz) whose mother's waistline grew to a bumper 57ins during her pregnancy
• Mother told to abort her baby as he had 'no chance' of survival speaks of her joy as he comes home from hospital

‘He said we had three options. We could terminate the pregnancy, reduce the pregnancy by terminating some of the embryos, or carry on. Instinctively I clutched my bump. An overwhelming sense of love rushed through me and I told him that we were keeping all four of them.’

Happy family: Left to right, mother Emma Robbins with her sons Reuben, Joshua, Zachary and Sammy and husband Martin at home in Bristol

The former project manager, who lives in Bristol, said the same advice was given after her 12-week scan.

She said: ‘I’d just been scanned and had been told everything looked fine but now he was pointing out the risks again and asking me to consider aborting the twins for the sake of the other two. I was beginning to feel pressured and it didn’t feel fair. We’d already made our decision.
‘All our babies were doing well. We’d seen their tiny outlines on the screen and we’d already begun to think of them individually.’  Once again, at 16 weeks into the pregnancy, the couple were told to consider aborting the twins. Mrs Robbins said: ‘By now I felt under immense pressure and I was getting angry.

With his newborn son: Martin Robbins with Zachary, one of the identical twins out of the quadruplets very unusually born on 29 February 2012

Mummy's little miracles: The quadruplets were conceived naturally at odds of 750, 000 to one

‘Each time I went to the hospital it was all about the risks and asking me to consider aborting the twins to save the other two babies. But I knew that each time I looked at my surviving babies I’d also be thinking about the ones I’d lost. The thought of it broke my heart.’
At Mrs Robbins’s 18-week scan the consultant warned her again, saying 20 weeks would be the last time a termination or selective reduction would be possible.
She said: ‘By now we’d found out that all our babies were boys and as soon as he’d finished I told him it wasn’t an option and that was final.
‘We didn’t know how we’d manage financially and practically but I felt it must have happened for a reason. I decided I’d do everything in my power to give birth to four healthy babies.’
On February 29 last year, two months before her due date, Mrs Robbins went into labour. Reuben was the first to be delivered by caesarean section, weighing 2lb 14oz, followed by  Zachary, 2lb 8oz, and his twin Joshua, 3lb 1oz, and finally Sam, 2lb 13oz.
After two months in hospital, the boys, whom Mrs Robbins calls her ‘little miracle Peter Pans’ were strong enough to be taken home – where they soon made their presence felt. She said: ‘Each night the babies would wake up one after the other and start screaming, which would wake Luke up too.
‘We had to turn our lounge into the nursery and would take in turns to sleep down there. With four breastfeeds to coordinate every four hours, day and night, as well as bottles, 30 nappy changes and endless baths, life was exhausting.’
And as the boys get bigger, so do the challenges. Mrs Robbins

Gay sex rings, 'The Filth' corrupting the Vatican...and why the Pope REALLY quit

The former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger wrung his hands above his head in triumph as he emerged as Pope on to the balcony of St Peter’s eight years ago. He had won!
He had longed to be Pope. He has loved being Pope. He expected to die as Pope.    
Two weeks ago he announced in Latin he wasn’t up to it any more. Up to what? He spent most of his time writing and took time off to tinkle on the piano and stroke his cat.
He’s been waited on hand and foot. He has his handsome secretary Georg Ganswein to do his every bidding.  
Abuse victims speak out... Scroll down for video

Benedict greeted crowds at the papal retreat Castel Gandolfo on Thursday evening before disappearing from public view ahead of his retirement

Benedict, pictured on his election in 2005, resigned to purge the Church of 'The Filth', says John Cornwell

There’s been talk of frailty, encroaching dementia, mortal illness. There’s been pious spin about a holy act of ‘humility’.
But one of his predecessors, sprightly Leo XIII, who died 110 years ago, went on until he was 93. Benedict knew from the start, aged 76, that he would grow old in office.   
We’ve heard about the so-called papal ‘resignation’ almost 600 years ago. But there wasn’t one. There were three rival Popes back then, and one of them was a psychopath.
They were sacked by a council of all the bishops and cardinals to get back to one Pope at a time. Since then, every Pope has died in office.
Resignation isn’t in Benedict’s vocabulary. The real reason he has quit is far more spectacular.
It is to save the Catholic Church from ignominy: he has voluntarily delivered himself up as a sacrificial lamb to purge the Church of what he calls ‘The Filth’. And it must have taken courage.
Here is the remarkable thing you are seldom told about a papal death or resignation: every one of the senior office-holders in the Vatican  – those at the highest level of its internal bureaucracy, called the Curia – loses his job.
A report Benedict himself commissioned into the state of the Curia landed on his desk in January. It revealed that ‘The Filth’ – or more specifically, the paedophile priest scandal – had entered the bureaucracy.

He resigned in early February. That report was a final straw. The Filth has been corroding the soul of the Catholic Church for years, and the reason is the power-grabbing ineptitude and secrecy of the Curia – which failed to deal with the perpetrators. Now the Curia itself stands accused of being part of The Filth.     
Benedict realises the Curia must be reformed root and branch. He knows this is a mammoth task.
He is too old, and too implicated, to clean it up himself. He has resigned to make way for a younger, more dynamic successor, untainted by scandal – and a similarly recast Curia.
Benedict was not prepared to wait for his own death to sweep out the gang who run the place.
In one extraordinary gesture, by resigning, he gets rid of the lot of them. But what then?
The Curia are usually quickly reappointed. This time it may be different. It involves scores of departments, like the civil service of a middling-sized country.
It has a Home and  Foreign Office called the Secretariat of State. There’s a department that watches out for heresy – the former Holy Inquisition which under Cardinal Ratzinger dealt with, or failed to deal with, paedophile priests.

Benedict realises the Curia must be reformed root and branch. He knows this is a mammoth task

Two weeks ago Benedict announced in Latin he wasn¿t up to it any more

 

Abuse victims call for decisive action from new Pope

And there is a Vatican Bank, the dubiously named Institute for Works of Religion (IOR), which was rocked by scandal in the early Eighties for links with the mafia.
The Curia is a big operation. It maintains contact with all the bishops of the world, more than 3,000, in 110 countries.
The Curia oversees the hundreds of thousands of priests  who care for the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics. The flow of information, and money, in and out of the Vatican is prodigious.
What makes the bureaucrats different from normal executives is they don’t go home and have another life.
Unless you’re a full cardinal, with a nice flat and housekeeper, you go back on a bus to the microwave and TV in a Vatican-owned garret.     
Rivalries between departments, vendettas between individuals, naked ambition, calumny, backstabbing and intrigues are endemic.
The former president of the Vatican Bank, Archbishop Paul Marcinkus, once told me that the Curia is a  ‘village of washerwomen. They wash clothes, punch ’em, dance on ’em, squeezing all the old dirt out’.  

Confidant: The Pope with his secretary Georg Ganswein

But who was he to talk? In that same interview Marcinkus admitted he appropriated $250 million from the Vatican pension fund to pay a fine, levied by the Italian government, for financial misdemeanours. Amazingly, he saw nothing wrong with that.  
Not surprisingly, some of the bureaucrats let off steam in unpriestly ways. Some are actively gay men who cannot normalise their lives with a partner because of Catholic teaching.
They frequent discreet bars, saunas and ‘safe houses’. On another level there are individuals known to have a weakness for sex with minors.
It appears the people who procure these sexual services have become greedy. They have been putting the squeeze on their priestly clients to launder cash through the Vatican. There is no suggestion that the bank has knowingly collaborated.
But in January, Italy’s central bank suspended credit-card activities inside Vatican City for ‘anti-money-laundering reasons’.
The Pope was already furious over the theft by his butler of private correspondence and top-secret papers last year. The thefts were probably an attempt to discover how much the Pope knew of malfeasance within the Curia.  
Then news of a Vatican sex ring and money scams reached his ears late last year. Benedict should not have been surprised. Hints of a seamy Vatican underworld have been surfacing for years.
In March 2010, a 29-year-old chorister in St Peter’s was sacked for allegedly procuring male prostitutes, one of them a seminarian, for a papal gentleman-in-waiting who was also a senior adviser in  the Curial department that oversees the church’s worldwide missionary activities.
Last autumn Benedict ordered three trusted high-ranking cardinals to investigate the state of the Curia. This was the report that was delivered to him just weeks ago.
It was meant for Benedict’s ‘eyes only’ but details of a sex ring and money-laundering scams last week reached the Italian weekly Panorama. Then the daily La Repubblica ran the story.
The timing of the report has coincided with fresh allegations of priestly sexual abuse in Germany. Meanwhile, Cardinal Roger Mahony of Los Angeles and Cardinal Sean  Brady of Ireland have been accused of covering up paedophile abuse.

Cardinal Roger Mahony of Los Angeles, left, and Cardinal Sean Brady of Ireland, right, have been accused of covering up paedophile abuse

Benedict has resigned to ensure that the whole ‘Filth’ from many countries of the world right up to the Vatican centre is cleansed. He has given up his job to kick out all the office-holders and start again.
While the college of cardinals appears to have been shocked by  the resignation, Benedict’s drastic decision was both predicted and strongly recommended two years ago by an eminent American psychologist and former priest.
In 2011, Dr Richard Sipe, a greatly respected world expert on the priestly abuse scandal, declared that only the Pope’s resignation would resolve the paedophile priest crisis. Sipe charged that ‘along with other bishops, Benedict was complicit earlier in tolerating and covering up the crimes of the priests’.   
This month a documentary film, Mea Maxima Culpa, is on release in the UK. It claims that Benedict, as Cardinal Ratzinger, refused to remove a paedophile priest called Father Murphy in the Nineties.
Sipe concluded that the Church’s only hope was a ‘courageous act’ on the part of the Pope. He could begin to heal the Church ‘by resigning from the papacy and calling for the resignation of all the other bishops, like him, who were complicit in the abuse scandal’.

'Benedict's self-sacrifice is the biggest ever gamble in the Church'

So the Pope’s resignation could be just the beginning of a wave of resignations, and/or sackings, when the new Pope comes in.
With just three days left of his  pontificate, Benedict accepted with lightning speed Cardinal Keith O’Brien’s resignation. O’Brien was not involved in covering up for paedophile priests – but allegations that he had made inappropriate advances towards priests in the Eighties were enough for Benedict to confirm that he was not to join the conclave.      
On Tuesday, Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor, former head of the Catholic Church in England, declared that the Vatican must ‘put its own house in order’.
In a bold castigation of the papacy and the Curia, the cardinal said: ‘There is no doubt that today there needs to be renewal in the Church, reform in the Church, and especially of its government.’  
The cardinal was referring to the decision made at an historic meeting of the world’s bishops in 1962, known as the Second Vatican Council, which called for devolution of power from Rome.
Bishops and lay Catholics throughout the world complain that the shift of authority away from Rome to the local churches has not happened. As a result, the absolute power of the Vatican has been corrupting absolutely.    
The establishment of a large, over-powerful Curia is a quirk of history. When the Pope lost his papal territories, which stretched from Venice down to Naples, in the mid 19th Century, the civil service stayed on to run the Church from Rome.   

On Tuesday, Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O¿Connor, former head of the Catholic Church in England, declared that the Vatican must ¿put its own house in order¿

The culture of a highly centralised Church government is now deeply entrenched. John Paul II, the energetic superstar Pope, seemed just the man to clean up the Curia.
But he bypassed it, preferring to spend his time travelling the world. Benedict might have made a start on it – but he retreated into bookish pursuits. 
But even if a reformer gets in, he is going to have his work cut out to change an institution that has amassed such a centralised grip. Choosing a new team to be trusted may take just as long. There is every chance that the old ways will return.
But Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor may well be disappointed if a Pope in the mould of Benedict is elected. Benedict believes in strong central government. He has no time for devolution. And he may still have influence.
He has gone on record to assert that those who dissent from Catholic teaching should leave. He has said that he would be happier with a smaller, totally loyal and faithful Church.  
Benedict’s favoured candidate would likely bring a puritanical pressure to bear on sexually active Catholics living together outside of marriage, or using contraception, or in gay relationships.
The coming conclave is set to be the most contentious for centuries. Whichever side wins – the conservatives, the reformers or the devolutionists – will create tensions and antagonism between Catholicism’s different pressure groups.
My guess is that we are going to get a younger Benedict. I believe that we will get a Pope who will remove any cardinal, bishop or priest who is in any way implicated in the paedophile scandal.
But he will also move to exclude Catholics, high and low, who are not prepared to follow the Church’s teachings on sexual morality as a whole.  
Benedict’s stunning self-sacrifice constitutes, in my view, the greatest gamble in the papacy’s 2,000-year history. If it works, the Church will begin to restore its besmirched reputation. If it fails, we Catholics are headed for calamitous conflict and fragmentation.

Don't make a fuss! Queen refuses ambulance and works up to the last minute before being taken to hospital with suspected vomiting bug

Stoicism is what she is known for – and even as the Queen was taken to hospital for the first time in a decade last night, she insisted that there must be ‘no fuss’.
Despite suffering from debilitating sickness, the 86-year-old refused to allow an ambulance to collect her.
And as she waited for her car to pick her up instead, Her Majesty even decided that she might as well honour one more long-standing engagement.
She awarded a favourite female member of staff a medal for long service in her private apartments at Windsor Castle, where she had been advised to rest.
A source said: ‘It would have to be something extremely serious for her to let a loyal member of her household down.’
Doctors have speculated that the Queen is suffering from norovirus, the winter vomiting bug that closes hundreds of hospital wards every year.
Well-placed sources said that after handing to Janet Doel, her housemaid at Windsor Castle, a Bar to the Royal Victorian Medal (silver) yesterday, the Queen insisted on walking to her car by herself, before also walking in through the hospital doors at the King Edward VII Hospital in Central London .
Her Majesty did – ‘reluctantly’ – agree to cancel her engagements for the next week, including a high-profile visit to Rome, which indicates that the stomach bug which struck on Friday has taken its toll.
But aides were asked to stress that she was in ‘good health and good spirits’, and said she regarded the hospital stay as merely a ‘minor inconvenience’.
And it will be business as usual for her husband, the Duke of Edinburgh,  who remained at home and will undertake a solo public engagement today.

 

It is due to be a normal working day for  Philip as he attends an event as an Honorary Member of the Imperial Poona  Yacht Club at the Royal Thames Yacht Club in Kingston.
Indeed, none of the Queen’s immediate family is expected to visit her during her stay – though they were being continually updated about her condition last night.
Scroll down for video

Taken ill: The Queen, pictured during a visit to Royal London Hospital on Wednesday, has been taken to hospital with a stomach infection

Tall order: Britain's tallest police Anthony Wallyn, 26, left, who stands at 7ft 2ins and has to import his size 17 shoes from the U.S., was among the officers keeping guard outside the King Edward VII Hospital in London today

Medical help: The Queen was taken to King Edward Hospital, Marylebone, London, with gastroenteritis around 3pm on Sunday

Health scare: Press gather outside the entrance to the hospital awaiting news of the Queen's condition

Stomach bug: The Queen, pictured on Wednesday, is in 'good spirits', as experts say it is likely that her infection has been caused by the norovirus

As the Queen was taken to hospital it is believed that Prince Charles was in Wales with his wife following a public engagement while Prince William, the Duchess of Cambridge and Prince Harry were travelling back from Switzerland after attending a friend’s wedding.
It is only the fifth occasion in her six- decade reign that the Queen has been taken to hospital. Palace officials say she is likely to be kept in for around two days as staff at the hospital, where the Duchess of Cambridge was treated for acute pregnancy-related sickness in December, monitor her condition.
‘Very much like her husband, the Duke of Edinburgh, she is proud of her robust health and does not give in to these things lightly,’ said a source.
A Buckingham Palace spokesman  commented: ‘The Queen is being assessed at the King Edward VII Hospital, London, after experiencing symptoms of gastroenteritis.

'As a precaution, all official engagements for this week will regrettably be either postponed or cancelled.’

A ROYAL SHOW OF TRUST IN KATE'S HOAX-CALL HOSPITAL

The Queen is being treated in the hospital where the Duchess of Cambridge stayed just three months ago with severe morning sickness.

Tragically, a few days after the Duchess was admitted to King Edward VII Hospital in central London, a nurse committed suicide after a hoax phone call.

Jacintha Saldanha spoke to two DJs from an Australian radio station – who were pretending to be the Queen and Prince Charles – asking for an update of the Duchess’s condition and put them through to a nurse on her ward.

Hospital pranked: While the Duchess of Cambridge, pictured outside the King Edward VII Hospital, was treated for acute morning sickness it was subjected to a hoax-phone call which was blamed for a nurse's suicide

The 46-year-old was found hanged in her living quarters after a recording of the conversation was broadcast worldwide.
Hospital staff have insisted the nurse was not reprimanded for taking the call, but sources close to the family claim she was ‘ticked-off’.
Senior managers were also accused of failing to support the devastated nurse after the prank because they were more concerned about the hospital’s image.

Big protection: PC Wallyn and a colleague outside the hospital last night

But the Queen’s admission to the private hospital yesterday indicates it is still trusted by the Royal Family.
The Queen is the hospital’s patron and in December 2003, underwent an operation there to remove torn cartilage from her left knee.

A night’s stay reportedly costs £1,000 and each room has an en-suite bathroom and large flat-screen TV.

The hospital says it recruits the highest-performing doctors in the country and claims to be so clean there has never been a case of MRSA or C-difficile.
The Queen can also take heart that Britain’s tallest policeman is standing guard outside the hospital.
At 7ft 2in, Anthony Wallyn, 26, of the Westminster Police Borough Support Unit, was among the officers manning the door.

PC Wallyn, who has his uniform custom made and imports his size 17 shoes from America, said he was used to the attention his height attracted.

He said: ‘If I work in the West End, I get anywhere between 100 and 500 requests for a photo. It’s like being famous but without the money.’

Last week the Queen undertook almost a dozen official engagements and meetings, including a trip to the Royal London Hospital in Whitechapel – leading to speculation over whether she may have contracted the illness there.
During her visit to the hospital in East London on Wednesday, she toured the renal  ward, children’s playroom and dining areas. However, the Department of Health said there have been no recent outbreaks of the illness on the hospital’s wards.
Experts have speculated that doctors may be forced to administer fluids either orally or intravenously in order to prevent the monarch from becoming dehydrated, which is a significant risk in elderly patients suffering from diarrhoea and vomiting bugs.
Gastroenteritis is an infection of the stomach and bowel, most commonly caused by either norovirus or food poisoning, and is often passed on by hand to hand contact.

Despite her advancing years, the Queen, who will celebrate the 60th anniversary of her official coronation in June, still conducts hundreds of official engagements each year.
In 2012 she undertook 425 meetings, visits and investitures – 100 more than the previous year – and publicly re-affirmed her determination to serve her people for the rest of her life, putting paid to continuing speculation that she would consider abdicating in favour of Prince Charles, her son and heir.
Inevitably, however, yesterday’s developments will  spark renewed debate as to whether the nation is asking too much of its elderly monarch and her husband.
Philip will turn 92 this  summer and despite recently suffering several bouts of ill-health himself, has just announced plans to fly to Toronto next month for a military engagement.

In care: The Queen is expected to spend two days at King Edward VII Hospital in central London

Leaders: Although the Queen has suffered various illness and injury in recent years, it is the health of Prince Philip that is more often in the spotlight

Well wisher: Prime Minister David Cameron took to Twitter to wish the Queen a speedy recovery

Likewise, the hugely pragmatic Queen abhors any  ‘fuss’ and will see her hospitalisation, sources say, merely as a ‘minor inconvenience’.
Remarkably for someone who has visited so many hospitals in her six decades as monarch, the Queen is believed to have been hospitalised just five times in her life, the first in July 1982 when she had to have a wisdom tooth extracted.
In January 1994, she broke her left wrist in a horse riding accident, although the injury wasn’t diagnosed for 24 hours, during which time she remounted her horse and rode back to Sandringham.
The last time that the Queen was hospitalised was in 2003, when she underwent surgery on her right knee in January of that year, followed by her left knee that December.

Host: The Queen was well enough to award Jessica Ennis a CBE and Nicola Adams an MBE at the Investiture ceremony on Thursday, but spent the weekend resting at Windsor Castle before she was taken to hospital

Honoured: Olympic cycling coach David Brailsford received a Knighthood at The Queen's Investiture ceremony

Her determination for business as usual to continue also means she has cancelled barely a handful of engagements over the years, largely due to unusually heavy colds or, more recently, back pain.
Among the key engagements she has been forced to cancel this week was a two-day visit  to Rome, her only foreign visit until at least the end of the year.

She and her husband  had been due to lunch with the outgoing president of Italy, a keen monarchist who has a photograph of the Queen on his desk at work and last night sent his best wishes for her speedy recovery.
She has also been due to visit HMS Lancaster at West India Quay in London on Tuesday and had already cancelled an appearance at a military celebration in Wales during the country’s St David’s Day celebrations on Saturday.
The Prime Minister, David Cameron, last night sent a message wishing the Queen well and said ‘he hopes she makes a speedy recovery’.

Evolution of a beauty! Bar Refaeli's mother opens the family album and proves she's always been a natural in front of the camera

With her long blonde hair, incredible bone structure and lightly freckled skin, Bar Refaeli is a natural in front of the camera.
And it is clear it has always been that way.
The Israeli model's proud mother opened up the family album on her Instagram account as she shared a series of snapshots of the young Bar.

Bar at two: Her mother pictured a picture of the thoughtful toddler sucking on her finger and wearing a birthday crown

'Never stop smiling': Bar Refaeli smiles at the camera in a picture of her as a toddler posted on Instagram by her mother Zipi

Chilling out: Bar holds a bottle as she and her younger brother pose for a photo; the model and her three brothers grew up on a horse ranch in Israel with their parents Rafael and Tzipi

And the images showed that Bar was no ugly duckling, looking as beautiful as a girl as she does now.
The photogenic youngster is seen clutching her baby bottle, posing in a tutu on a Jewish holiday, clutching a baby brother and cuddling up to the family's menagerie of pets.
The intimate images give an insight into Bar's seemingly idyllic childhood, as she and her three brothers go horse riding, play dress-up and pose with their parents.

Holiday time! Bar and her brother dress up as aSpiderman and a fairy as they celebrate the Jewish festival of Purim

Treasured: Bar's model mother is obviously proud of her photogenic brood

The four grew up on a horse ranch in Hod HaSharon in Israel with their parents Rafael and Tzipi.
As a former Israeli model herself, under her maiden name Tzipi Levine, Bar's mother quickly recognised her daughter's potential.
The blonde-haired baby did her first modelling work at just eight month's old. After  a break while she wore braces on her teeth she resumed modelling at 15.

Family: The young Bar poses with two of her three brothers

A natural: Bar could strike a pose even as a young child

By age 15, she was featured in campaigns for the fashion brands Castro and Pilpel, also starring in a commercial for Milky. 
Refaeli has appeared in ELLE (France), Maxim, and GQ (Italy).  She debuted in the 2007 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue, becoming the first Israeli model to appear in the magazine, posing with rock band Aerosmith. 

The young model: Blonde Bar starred in her first advertising campaign when she was just eight months old

Growing up: Bar looks like her model self in this snap from her teenage years

 In 2009, Refaeli was the covermodel for the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue.

Previously linked to Baywatch actor David Charvet, Refaeli began a relationship with Leonardo DiCaprio in November 2005 after meeting him at a Las Vegas party thrown for members of U2.
  In the course of their trip to Israel in March 2007, but the relationship ended in mid-2009. 

As she is now: Bar pictured on Sunday in a Twitter snap of her own

I said no pictures! Shy lion covers eyes with his paw as photographer snaps him

Lions may be the kings of the jungle but this one has come over a little bashful all of a sudden.
Covering his eyes with an enormous paw, the lion was either finding the intense African heat in Rwanda too much, or he was feeling camera shy.
The retiring lion then settled down to keep his cub company in the undergrowth as the sun went down, but always kept an careful eye out for predators or potential dinner.

 

No photos please: This lion covers his face with a giant paw to play hide and seek - or the photographer's attention was proving too much for him

The lion's hide and seek moment was captured up close by amateur photographer Nelis Wolmarans in Sabyinyo, near the borders of Rwanda, Uganda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Mr Wolmarans, who runs a gorilla trekking lodge in Rwanda, said: 'He covered his eyes as if to hide himself. It was a really unique moment.'
Seeing a lion, known for their ferociousness, looking vulnerable has captured people's imaginations.
'The reactions to the shy lion picture have been overwhelmingly positive,' he said.

 

Resting with his cub: The lion shares a tender moment in the wilds of Rwanda, Africa

Majestic: Keeping an eye out, the lion's beautiful mane took on a reddish colour in the sunset

Contrary to popular belief, lions spend large parts of their day resting, conserving energy ready to hunt prey.

 

Males like this one can grow up to around six-and-a-half foot in length and weigh between 265 and 420 lbs. 
This lion was careful to lie down behind his cub, keeping an eye out to protect him from harm. He will also have a responsiblity to protect his whole pride's territory, which can stretch over some 100 square miles.
In recent years, Rwanda has had to bring lions and rhinos over from South Africa.
Their numbers of lions, as well as other wildlife, had become dangerously low after widespread poaching.
The wars of the 1990s had a devastating effect on the wildlife as animals were hunted in ever larger numbers.