Is your bedroom starting to look old and tired? Revive it in a weekend with these inexpensive and easy DIY ideas. Update Your Headboard Transform that old wooden headboard with this inexpensive trick. All you need is a staple gun, scissors, quilt batting, and a designer bed sheet or thin bedspread. Start by covering the […]
Learn about the difference between “hot” and “cold” methods of composting. Composting is a method of recycling naturally decomposing matter. Ingredients, size of the pile, local weather conditions, and your maintenance habits will affect the outcome. Note that shredded leaves, chipped wood, and chopped food scraps generally decompose more quickly than whole or large pieces. […]
Let’s begin with the kitchen. No, it’s not the biggest we’ve been in, not even close. But how many kitchens have massive oriel windows that extend up two stories on three sides? When you stand there, you’re surrounded by granite counters with old-fashioned tiles depicting English nursery rhymes, placed randomly along the sides. There are […]
I’m haunted by a pickle. The kitchen shelves glimmer with jars of homemade preserves after a summer’s worth of gardening, harvesting, and putting up. Clove-scented beets glow deep garnet, and the cauliflower sparkles crystalline, bejeweled with tiny bright-red–and lethally hot–Thai peppers. Zucchini pickles stack up right next to the oven-roasted tomato sauce. Strawberry and wild-blueberry […]
Here’s a way to keep oceanside memories close even when you’re landlocked: Make a seashell planter using a terra-cotta garden pot. The materials are simple: just the pot, some sanded grout (available at craft stores such as Michaels and A.C. Moore) and hot glue, and the shells. For that last item, you can scour beaches […]
Whether you seek isolation or bustle, waves or calm ripples, there’s a beach—and a beach town—for everyone in South County, Rhode Island.
I once realized with sudden clarity that owning a home, a home that has some land and a few outbuildings, perhaps some animals, is no different from owning a small business. I manage the budget and prioritize the needs the same as any shopkeeper, lying awake with worries as well as hopes for expansion and […]
An unusual-looking contraption with an equally odd-sounding name, the origins of the word “hod” are uncertain; however, I think it’s a translation for the term “workhorse.” Not necessarily a prize-winning beauty, but it reliably gets the job done day in, day out. (I have to admit, upon unpacking my first shipment of garden hods it […]
Want to add an interesting focal point to your garden area? Consider installing a backyard water garden. I installed my miniature backyard pond in one day with the help of a friend. Though we were both rookies at the time, we must have done something right, because eight years later my water sanctuary is not […]
Banish Peanut Butter Boredom There’s no denying that fixing a peanut butter sandwich is fast and easy. To counter the boredom of eating the same thing day after day, take an extra minute to blend a custom peanut butter spread. To ½ cup peanut butter, add a few tablespoons each of finely shredded carrot, sunflower […]
There is nothing like walking out to the garden on a summer day to snip fresh mint for iced tea or tender chives for a sautéed meal. Once you have used ultra-fresh herbs for your recipes you won’t want to go back to using the store bought variety. I grow an outdoor herb garden, and […]
Boston is often considered “a city of neighborhoods,” each with its own personality and attractions. The North End is where you go for pasta and cannoli, Beacon Hill for brownstones and swan boats, and Kenmore Square for Fenway Franks and the Citgo sign. These Boston meccas are worthy of their immediate recognition, but they are […]
