Summary

Live Reporting

Edited by Emily McGarvey

  1. Presenter's pick: It's a dream come true to work in Urdu with Zayn Malik

    Noor Nanji
    BBC News Culture reporter

    Usama Ali, Ahad Khan and Raffey Anwar looking at the camera, all with short dark hair, Raffey on the right wearing glassesAGENT HAQ

    They are just three boys from Karachi.

    But for bandmates Usama Ali, Ahad Khan, and Anwar, it was a dream come true when they got to work with global superstar Zayn Malik back in January.

    A remake of Aur’s breakout hit Tu Hai Kahan featured the ex-One Direction singer, who sang in Urdu, sending the internet into meltdown.

    I was lucky enough to interview the band at the time.

    They were walking on cloud nine, and said none of their friends or family could believe it.

    "When we go out somewhere, people instantly recognise us," said one of them, Ali.

    "The reaction has been very good, not just friends, the whole of Pakistan has given us a great reaction."

    And in case you were wondering what Zayn is like, Aur were full of praise for him.

    “He is so down to earth, so humble. He sang in Urdu, what can be bigger than that?” they said.

  2. Groundbreaking gene-therapy allows Opal to hear unaided

    BBC generated image with the number 47 on the left hand side. There are red rectangles on the right and the background is purple.
    A little red-haired girl in pink striped shirt smiles as she hugs her mum, in polka dot shirt, who smiles backPA Media

    Opal Sandy hugs her mother Jo at their home in Oxfordshire

    Just before her first birthday, Opal became the youngest person to receive a new gene-therapy treatment for auditory neuropathy, which causes deafness.

    Born unable to hear, it was announced in May that at the age of 18 months Opal's hearing had been restored to close to normal levels in her treated ear, meaning she could hear sounds as soft as a whisper and begin talking, saying words such as "Mama", "Dada".

    Her hearing loss had been caused by a rare genetic condition which prevented her inner ear from communicating with her brain.

    She received an infusion of a modified and harmless virus in her right ear which delivered a copy of the gene needed, meaning the signals can now be passed on, allowing Opal to hear.

    Auditory neuropathy is typically treated with cochlear implants, which create the sensation of hearing by directly stimulating the auditory nerve that communicates with the brain, bypassing the damaged sound-sensing cells in the inner ear.

  3. 'Still just plain old Peg': From Britain's 'ugliest' dog to Hollywood star

    Pritti Mistry
    BBC News

    BBC generated image with the number 46 on the left and purple triangles on the right. The background is yellow
    Peggy – a pug and Chinese crested cross dog - wears a colourful bib and has a long, pink tongueits mouthHolly Middleton

    Peggy's rise to fame has been "surreal", her owner says

    The transformation from Britain's "ugliest" dog to Hollywood star has been unexpected and "surreal", her owner has said.

    Peggy starred alongside Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman in the latest Marvel superhero film, Deadpool & Wolverine.

    The five-year-old pugese – a pug and Chinese crested cross – was cast as "Dogpool" after finding fame last year when she was crowned the ugliest pooch in a national contest.

    Peggy's owner Holly Middleton, from East Yorkshire, said in August: "Not in my wildest dreams did I think anything like that would have ever happened."

    However, despite amassing "a massive fan base", Middleton said Peggy was not displaying any "diva behaviour" at home.

    On the contrary, the usually "reserved and lazy" pugese had gained "a bit more confidence" from the trainer who was tasked with looking after her during production of Deadpool & Wolverine.

    "She's still just plain old Peg," said Middleton.

  4. Tell us your heartwarming stories from 2024

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    We're nearly halfway through our 100 heartwarming stories of 2024, but we need your help.

    Some of our best tales, like a family uncovering their heritage through marketplace furniture, have come from you, our audience.

    The stories could be big or small acts of kindness by you or someone else, or anything that's made you smile in 2024. So, don't hesitate to send them in if you have any!

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  5. Wiltshire great-grandmother ticked off her bucket list - knits a wedding dress

    BBC generated image with the number 45 on the left and full and half prurple circles on the right. The background is green.

    Wiltshire great-grandmother knits wedding dress

    A great-grandmother who has been knitting since she was a child has fulfilled a dream of knitting a wedding dress.

    Shirley Ellicott, 80, who lives near Salisbury, taught herself embroidery, sewing, knitting, and crochet.

    "I've had the inkling to make a wedding dress for years," she said back in January. "It's what they call now - bucket list."

    "We used to have a show every year, a village show, and I didn't have anything to put in.

    "So Ken, my husband, he said to me: 'Why don't you make that wedding dress you keep on talking about?'"

    "I said: 'OK.'"

    Video editor: Emma Coleman

  6. 'Our way of giving a little back': Christmas kindness at cafe

    BBC generated image with the number 44 on the left and red circles on the right. The background is purple.
    Close up photo of a man's face, he's looking into the camera, wearing a blue fleece jumper with brown hair combed back

    A cafe is bringing joy to people in need by expanding its "pay it forward" scheme for Christmas.

    Hummingbird Cafe, based in Meeting Point House in Telford, is gifting Christmas presents to visitors who are less fortunate.

    Under the existing pay-it-forward scheme, customers buy a hot drink or meal for someone visiting later who otherwise cannot afford it. But the concept is being given a festive spin so that practical gifts may also find their way to others, including items of clothing and toiletries.

    Wayne Jenson, CEO of Meeting Point House, said about half of the people who visited the cafe were regular customers.

    "The cafe team had a fantastic idea to have some Christmas presents under the tree, so that [people in need] could have something for them," he said.

    "We've got a range of simple things... hats, gloves, socks, toiletries."

    The cafe is also encouraging customers to drop off a present to be given out.

    "Christmas is such a fantastic time of the year, we all want a present at the end of the day, and it's just our way of trying to give a little bit back," said Jenson.

  7. How a 121-year-old postcard reunited long-lost family members

    Aimee Thomas
    BBC News

    BBC generated image with the number 43 on the left with orange triangles on the right. The background is light blue.
    Left to right: Helen Roberts, who is wearing a blue embroidered short-sleeved blouse, and she has shoulder length blond hair, Nick Davies, who is the tallest in the group is wearing a stripey shirt and has short cropped grey hair, Margaret Spooner is stood next to him wearing a floral dress and a blue denim jacket. She has short blond hair and stood next to her is Faith Reynolds who is wearing a red v-neck t-shirt and blue jeans. She has short blond and brown balayage dyed hair and is wearing black glasses.

    Following media reports about the late postcard, relatives (left to right) Helen Roberts, Nick Davies, Margaret Spooner, and Faith Reynolds got together for the first time

    A postcard delivered 121 years after it was sent has brought together long-lost family members who recognised their relatives.

    The card, written by a boy named Ewart to his sister Lydia, arrived in August at Swansea Building Society's Cradock Street branch, even though it was posted in 1903.

    After seeing the story, two families came forward and found out they were related.

    Ewart's grandson said: "It’s like a family reunion, where the only connection you have is a common ancestor dating back to over a 100 years ago."

  8. How Billy met Molly - the otter now part of the family

    BBC generated image with the number 42 on the left hand side. There are purple rectangles on the right and the bacground is green.
    A man sits on a rock on the coast wearing yellow wellingtoon boots looking down at an otter sat on the same rock, looking up at the manNational Geographic

    The lives of Billy and Susan Mail changed forever when a starving otter cub showed up at their doorstep. It was 3 March 2021 when Billy noticed the emaciated animal, who he later named Molly, cracking crabs near his house in Shetland.

    Billy says nurturing the cub back to health made him rediscover the joy he had lost following the recent death of his parents. Billy knew a female otter had been found dead in the area recently, so he assumed the cub was her orphan.

    "She was really thin and emaciated, but she wasn't unhealthy - she was just hungry," he says. The couple say they always knew that, no matter how cute and friendly she was, Molly was a wild animal. After months of spending every day with her, Billy decided to stop feeding the cub, giving her plenty of time to learn how to fend for herself before the winter.

    "He knew when it was the right time to let her go," Susan says. But, on one snowy night, the camera in Molly's croft-house automatically switched on, alerting the couple there was a visitor inside. "We were really happy to see she was still alive, still thriving and in a really good condition. The bonus was that she was pregnant," says Billy.

    Molly gave birth to her own cub in "her house", and the two of them are still regular visitors to the Mails' garden.

    The pair have now been featured in a documentary, Billy and Molly: An Otter Love Story, which began streaming last month on Disney+.

  9. Pudding on a show

    BBC generated image with the number 41 on the left. There are purple circles on the right. The background is yellow.
    A man wearing a full costume entirely made out of Yorkshire puddings with only his head uncovered.Tiktok / JamesMarcusPaley

    Is it possible to eat so much that you physically turn into a Christmas roast?

    If you're anything like us on the live news team, you may well be on the road to finding out. (We hope to have an answer to the logistics of this by January).

    Thankfully, to give us an insight into what this outcome may look like, James Paley has already blazed the trail.

    Paley, landlord at the Saxon King in Southend-on-Sea, went viral earlier this year when he made a Halloween costume made from around 350 Yorkshire puddings.

    Here he is in all his glory...

    A man completely covered in a Yorkshire puddings, with just his eye poking out from behind a mask of Yorkshire puddingsTiktok / JamesMarcusPaley

    You can read all about how he made his pièce de résistance (and how he kept his part-completed Yorkshire pudding outfit at the bottom of the stairs for months) here.

    Oh, and spare us the debate on whether Yorkshire puddings go on a Christmas roast - if you can dress up like a Yorkshire pudding at Halloween, then we're sorry to say anything goes.

  10. Day three: Otters, pups, seals - oh my

    Jenna Moon
    Live editor

    Welcome to day three of our mission to bring you 100 heartwarming stories from the past year. The news this year has often felt overwhelming - and here on the BBC's digital live team, we see every extreme the world has to offer.

    That's why bringing you uplifting content is so important to us. When the news is so hard to face, there are still pieces of joy that can unite us and remind us that the world is a good and caring place.

    Stay with us today as we bring you everything from otter best friends to the girl who got to be a firefighter for a day.

    We promise to keep the cheer coming.

  11. Join us tomorrow for more uplifting stories...

    Rorey Bosotti
    Live page editor

    We've now reached the end of day two of our mission to share 100 heartwarming stories from the past year.

    So far, we’ve brought you the story of the Sycamore Gap tree which, after being felled last year, is now being given a new chance of life as 49 saplings were distributed to be planted across the UK.

    Then we learned of nine-year-old Cooper, whose uncanny impression of a seagull won him a European championship. And Britain’s most loyal customer, Rosie, who has been treating herself to lunch and a chinwag at the same restaurant for the past 37 years.

    Oftentimes, it seems there’s no escaping bad news but the stories we’ve brought you so far remind us all that kindness and joy are still around. We only need to look for it.

    We’re pausing this page for the evening but we’ll be back tomorrow with more stories reminding us empathy and goodwill still exist.

  12. Flowers left on benches to ‘cheer people up’

    Numbered banner marked 40 on pink background with a red arrow geometrical pattern to the right
    An elderly lady in a pink coat placing a bouquet of yellow and white flowers onto a green benchAnne Cradock

    Flowers have been left on a town's benches to "cheer up" people feeling lonely. Members of the Nateby and Wharton Women's Institute (WI) created about 30 bunches and left them around Kirkby Stephen in Cumbria earlier this month.

    One member of the public said the flowers "made [her] day" after she had a stressful week and was missing her mum. Anne Cradock, who was one of the organisers, said people were "glad they've come to live here because it's such a wonderful, supportive community".

    Members of the WI created bunches using flowers and herbs from their own gardens. The project was also sponsored by local shop Gregsons Spar, who supplied additional flowers.

    They also placed a handcrafted heart in each bouquet so people had something to keep when the flowers died.

  13. Orkney island shop orders more Easter eggs than population

    Numbered banner marked 39 on green background with pink oval and circular geometrical pattern to the right

    A shop on the Orkney island of Sanday experienced an order blunder at Easter this year after it ordered more Easter eggs than the island's population of 500.

    Sinclair General Stores needed 80 chocolate eggs in March, but it mistakenly ordered 80 cases, resulting in it having 720 Easter eggs.

    Dan Dafydd, who admitted the error to BBC Radio Orkney, described his feelings of "embarrassment and shame" when the large order arrived.

    "The rest of the staff were chuckling and finding it very entertaining," he said in March.

    What was he planning to do with all of the extra chocolate eggs?

    He had set about raffling off 100 of them to one lucky winner, in aid of the Royal National Lifeboat Institution.

    Dan Dafydd holds a crate of Smarties Easter eggs while stood next to a tower of Smarties Easter eggs. Dafydd is wearing a black puffer jacket and smiling at the camera. He has short brown hair.Sinclair General Stores

  14. Presenter's pick: This week I went to an intergenerational singalong

    Sarah Montague
    Presenter, BBC Radio 4 World At One

    Over the next week or so a lot of us will be getting together with our loved ones for Christmas, but for some it can be a very lonely time. Charity Age UK says 1.5 million older people feel more lonely at Christmas than at any other time of year.

    One way of tackling that at Christmas - but also throughout the year - is through intergenerational group activities.

    They've become increasingly popular, with parents and nurseries taking toddlers into care homes. The Together Project is a charity that has been doing that since 2017.

    In one of the most heartwarming jobs I've had this year I went to one of their intergenerational singalongs - called Songs and Smiles.

    Listen to how I got on below, and you can hear the whole story on today's World At One.

  15. 'Snoop Dogg and Dr Dre want to use my beats'

    Your Voice, Your BBC News
    By Perisha Kudhail

    Numbered banner marked 38 on yellow background with purple stripes geometrical pattern to the right.
    Tina wearing an orange t-shirt and white trousers is singing into the microphone next to Jack, who is dancing, both on a stage.Daylight Studio

    Tina Bruins and Jack Daley performing at Daylight Studio

    Tina Bruins from London has been making music with the charity Daylight Studio since 2016 and got a pleasant surprise earlier this year when Snoop Dogg and Dr Dre’s team wanted to use her beats in their latest music.

    Tina has learning disabilities and works with Jack, the founder of Daylight Studio, to rap and harness her creativity.

    Daylight Studio is a charity that specialises in utilising creativity to empower people with disabilities. Jack has been running support music sessions to enable neuro-divergent disabled users to harness their creativity through music.

    Jack said he received an email from Snoop Dogg and Dr Dre’s team after hearing Tina’s music on YouTube. Samples from her song Watermelon Fantasy was used in their new album, Missionary.

    Tina told the BBC: “It's wicked. I like Snoop Dogg and Dr Dre. Its proven I’m good at music and achieving it. I feel proud.”

  16. Just joining us? Prepare your heart to be warmed

    Rachel Flynn
    Live reporter

    If you're just joining the page, you might be wondering what ties these weird and wonderful stories together.

    What might an American bulldog in Suffolk and a 92-year-old in Northumberland have in common?

    The answer is simple - in one way or another, they've brought joy to 2024.

    What we've realised working on this page is that heartwarming stories are plentiful - but they often get lost amid the doom and gloom. That's why we're spending this week showcasing the very best of humanity.

    But, we still need your help to reach 100 - you can tell us your stories here.

    Coming up, a surprise email from Snoop Dogg and too many Easter eggs. Stay tuned.

  17. Boy, 10, wins photography prize with rock star squirrel

    Numbered banner marked 37 on light blue banner with circular geometrical pattern to the right

    Watch: A ten-year-old boy has won a prize at the Nikon Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards

    Ten-year-old Flynn Thaitanunde-Lobb won a prize at the Nikon Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards this year, making him the youngest-ever category winner.

    He picked up the award for Best Portfolio for his snaps of a rock star squirrel - an idea that stemmed from spotting a squirrel in his garden channelling its inner rock star one day.

    "I had my camera next to me and when I saw it, I just held the button down," he said.

    Speaking about winning the award, he said: "It feels amazing, because I know it is a really big competition and it is international and I'm going against adults and just to be the youngest person there and win it, is just an honour."

  18. The Upbeat: Get heartwarming stories to your inbox every week

    Kamilah McInnis
    The Upbeat

    ​​Thin, yellow, orange and pink banner promoting the Upbeat newsletter with text saying, “Start your week on a high with uplifting stories delivered to your inbox every Monday”. There is a pattern of shapes and different shades of colour on the right of the text.

    Hello! I’m Kamilah McInnis, one of the lead writers of The Upbeat, the BBC’s weekly newsletter showcasing uplifting stories and remarkable people from around the world.

    We love hearing from readers who share their favourite stories or send us new ideas. Recently, Fred told us his favourite story we’ve included in the newsletter “just has to be the otter”, referring to the heartwarming tale of a couple who rescued a starving otter. Another reader, Nadira, said she loved the piece about the Sussex sea snail sculpture accused of resembling a poo emoji.

    If you're enjoying the heartwarming stories on this live page, why not join us?

    Sign up to our newsletter, The Upbeat, and get uplifting news delivered to you every week.

  19. Instead of 'moping', law student cooks dozens of dinners

    Your Voice, Your BBC News
    By George Walker

    Numbered banner marked 36 on a green background with a pink arrow geometrical pattern to the right
    Visha takes a tray of food out of the oven in a kitchen. She has long brown hair and is a wearing a grey jumper and blue apron. There is a pink box of tea and a black blender on the white stone countertop.

    Cooking turkey with all the trimmings for your family is stressful enough.

    But with her folks over in Zambia, Visha, a legal adviser from Derby,hadto avoid “moping around in my studio”. Instead, she’s organised a community dinner for the city’s homeless and vulnerable people.

    Visha has always treasured the festive months as family time and struggled after her Christmas-loving Grandad passed away.

    “Christmas is difficult without him, but I want to keep his spirit alive,” she says.

    A dab hand in the kitchen, she soon had a community centre hired to her for free and "started getting donations, leaflets and volunteers together".

    Visha and her team are also making care packages with “warm clothes, hygiene products and food”.

    “When you’re in the kitchen on Christmas Day, you’re there for hours and hours but cooking for 40 to 50 people will be a whole new level," she said.

  20. Farmer proposes by mowing 'marry me' into field

    Bea Swallow, Sacha Bigwood and Andy Bennett
    BBC Somerset

    Numbered banner marked 35 on yellow background with oval and circular purple geometrical pattern to the right.
    Green field with words MARRY ME mowed into grass. A sandy beach and small pier are visible in the background.Chloe Morley

    Love is in the air...or mowed into a field if you're this Somerset farmer.

    Tom Heal proposed to his girlfriend by mowing "marry me" into his field and surprising her at sunset back in May.

    Under the ruse of forgetting to bring his dinner, his long-term girlfriend Chloe Morley headed down to the field near Hinkley Point in Somerset to meet him, only to find the huge letters carved into the grass.

    Chloe said: "I was in complete shock, but once it had settled after a few minutes, there were lots of tears."

    She said they had discussed the idea of marriage many times, but the timing came as a complete surprise.

    The happy couple have since received congratulatory messages online after someone posted a picture of the field on Facebook captioned: "So...did you get an answer?!"

    The pair said they have plans to marry next September.

    A man and woman smiling as the woman shows off a wedding ring on her fingerChloe Morley