In 2009, when Rachel Marks and her husband married, the young Jewish couple struggled to find the perfect ready-made ketubah. “There weren’t many options back then, and the artwork was more traditional than we wanted,” says Rachel. So, the trained landscape painter designed a ketubah as a keepsake of their special day. A ketubah, a…
Five Fun Things in Newport, Rhode Island
Recently, my husband and I slipped away for a few days to celebrate our anniversary. Our first getaway in a long while with no traveling partners, business calls, or grandchildren. Just us. We began in Boston (although Providence is a good starting point also) and meandered our way down to Newport—a 1 ½- to 2-hour…
Hassan Sharaff – Hydroponic Farming
Hassan Sharaff had “no gardening experience whatsoever” when he and his dad built a greenhouse in their suburban New York backyard. While he experimented—on a small scale—with growing crops in water, he researched hydroponic farming and developed his business plan. Ten years earlier, Hassan graduated with a Mechanical Engineering degree from Vanderbilt University. He held…
Gaili Schoen and Two Summer Reads
Gaili here, and I’m excited to tell you about a couple of summer reads I’ve enjoyed! I love the phrase summer reads; the light-ish books to read as you sip a cold drink. Or listen to while you take your morning walk. Bloomsbury Girls, a historical fiction novel, and Iona Iverson’s Rules for Commuting, contemporary fiction, are…
Hunter Gibbes – The Maze Man of Sunset Beach
Years ago, sandcastle-building kids in Sunset Beach, North Carolina nicknamed Hunter Gibbes. His moniker? The Maze Man. A celebrity in this part of the world, Hunter is a big part of the Brunswick Islands’—a chain of five barrier islands—charm. Hunter grew up vacationing in family-friendly Sunset Beach, the Brunswick Islands’ southernmost beach. Nestled between Wilmington…