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By HomeAdvisor

Colors have a proven psychological effect on our moods. And the colors we choose for our homes have a proven influence on our overall quality of life. Using color psychology, we can create a home that relaxes, energizes and focuses us where and when...

By Mary Carol Garrity

Settling into our cottage has been a long and languid journey. It started with the Great Purge, when Dan and I let go of many of the furnishings that filled our larger home in Atchison, Kansas. Because our cottage is so small, we could only keep the...

By Gabrielle Savoie

Times change. Twenty years ago, people saw yoga as a strange practice with no tangible physical benefits. Since then, we’ve been so widely exposed to its positive effects both on the body and mental health that it’s become as mainstream as green...

By LISA SPEAR

Sunlight streams in through the sliding glass doors as Lynne and Ron Dutton sit at their dining room table on a recent Saturday sipping cups of dark roast coffee, spiked with shots of liqueur. They can feel the room swaying, but it’s not because...

By MICKEY RATHBUN

How does a gardener celebrate the first day of summer? The June solstice was traditionally a time for farmers to mark their calendars for dates to plant and harvest crops. For Peter Schoenberger, the newest member of the Garden Club of Amherst, it’s...

This summer, you may have noticed that many trees and shrubs are being defoliated by gypsy moth (Lymantria dispar) caterpillars. We are experiencing an unusually heavy infestation this year, as we did in 2016, and the effect on our trees has been...

By LISA SPEAR

A Japanese maple tree with windswept branches leans to one side as if hanging off a mountain cliff —  but this tree has never seen high altitudes and the air here is mostly still.The tree lives in Jim Gipe’s backyard in Northampton in a shallow...

Most spring bulbs have flowered by now and are looking a bit forlorn, surrounded by burgeoning spring perennials that are growing almost visibly by the day. The green stalks and leaves of tulips, narcissus and other bulbs may look idle, but they are...

By JACK SUNTRUP

NORTHAMPTON — Local organizers have chosen a site for homeless youth and youth at risk of homelessness, and spent Sunday working to renovate the Hatfield Street property. Fundraising since January 2016, the two organizations — DIAL/SELF Youth &...

By Lynn Underwood

Leo Kuhl sat on the edge of a yellow tube. Then he disappeared. The 6-year-old twisted and turned down the curved, enclosed slide, then landed in the basement below. “It’s fun,” said Leo. “But a little scary when it turns.” “It is...

By Kim Palmer

What’s standing between you and your dream kitchen? Often, it’s a wall — a relic from the days when a separate dining room was a must-have in every home. Today, formal meals have gone the way of the rotary phone in most households, and a room...

By MICKEY RATHBUN

In 1966, an American archaeologist named Wilhelmina Feemster Jashemski was working on a dig at Pompeii, the ancient Roman city buried under ash and pumice during the volcanic eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 CE. She noticed something unusual going on...

By Kathy Van Mullekom

After redoing our 10-year-old yard with new plants and patio, we added the icing on the cake — bird feeders. After planting eastern red cedars, hollies and other bird-attracting plants in the natural area outback, we visited several birding...

We’re entering that dark cold part of the year, when color drains from the landscape and we yearn for some bright growing things. A terrific way to enliven the winter months is to pot up some amaryllis bulbs. At first sight, the large, knobby bulbs...