Shelley Osborne is sitting at the kitchen table in her well-appointed loft in a refashioned brick mill beside the Nubanusit River in West Peterborough, New Hampshire. On her shelves are small groups of English china, teapots, creamers, willowware and yellowware, treasures collected from chapters of her eclectic life. “Growing up, I lived in England, and […]
A small city by the sea, Portsmouth, New Hampshire, keeps traditional holiday spirit alive at Christmas.
In 1909, a young New Hampshire farm girl named Lucy Wells looked forward all fall to the event of the season: the Christmas pageant at South Danbury Christian Church. Weeks ahead of time, she set about making presents by hand for her sister Caroline and her parents, and throughout November she practiced her part in […]
On Christmas Day I usually have a crowd here–friends, neighbors, and occasionally a cousin or two, my idea of family. Everyone contributes to the feast, and there’s usually a heap of good food, which last year included smoked salmon, ham, a frittata, a raisin braid, orange rolls, and an impressive trifle. Folks start arriving around […]
Halloween is—after only Christmas—the most lavishly decorated holiday of the year. Neighbors try to outdo one another; schools have costume contests; in Jaffrey, New Hampshire, the entire town turns out for the annual scarecrow parade. We take pleasure in welcoming the talents of Sherry Bruce, as she shows you how to decorate for Halloween in […]
“I’ve been coming here for 50 years!” my dad announces as we sit in the back dining room of The Student Prince in Springfield. The waiter smiles. I’m sure it’s not the first time he has heard that. Looking around, I see a crowd that my grandmother, Rose, would have described in her northern Italian […]
New England, as we all know, is jam-packed with historical bragging rights, not only in the sense that our six little states were (and are) flourishing epicenters of business, food, industry, art, education, writing, politics (the list goes on and on) but the enduring tributes to these achievements – the schools, museums, factories, monuments, houses, […]
Woodstock is such a favorite destination for Yankee staffers that when we decided to do an Explore New England piece on the town, things got a little competitive. But then it occurred to us: This is such a major New England vacation hub, why not send two staffers there and tackle it from different angles. […]
Today is the Vernal Equinox, and it actually looks like spring. Normally in this part of New England, everything is muddy and gross. In honor of that, early spring is referred to as mud season, also known as the fifth season. While other areas are enjoying the first signs of spring, we usually suffer through […]
For one young woman dreaming of her future, New England’s iconic Jordan Marsh department stores offered a taste of elegance and sophistication.
In April 2006, at the start of the planting season, John Augustin had a tractor accident. It was the kind of hazard that goes with the occupation, the fear that farmers around big machinery live with every day and acknowledge without saying. It happened in an instant, in the time it takes a rotor-tiller attachment […]
How to make sunlights prints using paper, found objects, and the sun. Kids love this easy craft idea!
