Janelle Faignant

Last year, more than 80 locations in the small town of Brattleboro displayed the first-ever Festival of Miniatures — the only townwide festival of miniatures in the country.

When you google Paul Hoffman, a lot of Paul Hoffmans come up. There’s Paul Hoffman the English writer, not to be confused with Paul Hoffman the science writer, Paul Hoffman

Wednesday’s growing up fast. “She’ll be Thursday before you know it,” says her father Gomez.

Wednesday’s growing up fast. “She’ll be Thursday before you know it,” says her father Gomez.

In a setup the size of a shoebox or smaller, secret tiny scenes play out. You can’t see them from across a room, you need to get up close.

In a setup the size of a shoebox or smaller, secret tiny scenes play out. You can’t see them from across a room, you need to get up close.

The Center Street project in downtown Rutland may not break ground before next year, but last week City Hall hosted a public forum on the proposed redesign in the aldermanic chambers to solicit as much public feedback as possible.

As an admittedly hit-or-miss cook myself, I can say from experience, and with certainty, this is a pretty hard recipe to mess up! I brought it to a friend’s for a girls’ dinner and later found her husband eating them from the pot with a fork, calling out, “Who made the potatoes?!” A twist on mashed potatoes, which I think of as a heartier side for winter, but somehow comes off light in this recipe thanks to the lemon and lack of milk or dairy. It can be made in under 30 minutes; the only slightly tricky part is cooking down the garlic. It’s helpful to know the kind of stove you’re cooking on. My lowest heat setting is simmer, and even on that setting, mine cooked up a little too fast. When I tried again on someone else’s stove, the lowest setting was labeled low, and I had to turn it up three notches after realizing, 20 minutes in, that the garlic was still pretty raw.

Fat bikes are mountain bikes, but with a twist. What makes them really special is that you can ride them in the off-season, too. Fat bike tire bikes are typically 3.8- to 5-inches wide and are pumped up with lower pressure than mountain bikes. This creates a massive contact patch with the ground, providing unparalleled grip and float on loose surfaces.

By Janelle FaignantIf you’ve ever driven Route 7 on a summer night and noticed a raging bonfire high up on a hill in Rutland Town, you’ve seen the hallmark of the town’s unofficial annual “Hill Party.”