From the Delaware Valley to the Shore, there is plenty to do on this long weekend, besides packing up the beach house, and last minute back-to-school shopping.

If you are staying inland, enjoy the crafts, musicians and artwork at the annual Riverfest in Frenchtown all weekend.

The annual Fine Arts & Crafts Show at Anderson Park in Upper Montclair all weekend brought to you by our friends and partners at Rose Squared Productions .

Try a ride on the only steam locomotive in the state departing from Phillipsburg and cruising along the Delaware River. Check out the Wine Train and the Mine Train .

Check out the Hoboken Farmer’s Market today at 3pm on Washington Street between Newark and Observer Highway.

Everywhere Is T ...

The new Smashburger in Bergen County is already drawing a packed house.

This hot new chain place is located within the Riverside Square mall-- It is all glass on the side facing into the mall, with it’s own entrance to the parking lot and to the shopping floor.

You cannot miss it, from the modern lighting fixtures to the wall of colored glass tiles behind the service counter. You can just see into the kitchen a bit, the smells that fill the air are of caramelizing meat being seared on the grill.

Great cheese, great bread- jagged edged pickles and is that ghee on the burger? Ghee is clarified butter if you don’t know) A Haagen-Dazs Strawberry milkshake? Hmmm they make it really hard to be on a diet.

CEO Scott Gillman ...

End of summer. Three words that I don’t particularly enjoy speaking out loud or even thinking. However, a chilly breeze in an otherwise hot night brings them front and center and I know that summer is quietly running out of fuel. And it’s time to ride the last wave, so to speak.

My adventure started by trying out the Flow House in Beach Haven .


The Flow House on Long Beach Island is the newest addition to the Thundering Surf Water Park and it has proved to be a mega hit.

The Flow House is a standing wave (one that never breaks) in an outdoor building. The ‘sheet wave’ is created by Wave Loch technology. Approximately 250,000 gallons of water flow at 30 mph from the bottom of the wave and rush up a c ...

This September, when hundreds of students return to Union City High School there will be a familiar, beloved face missing in one classroom.

English teacher Jack O'Connor, 56, died on July 16th. O’Connor was a popular teacher who inspired so many of us to go for our dreams, and served as a mentor long after many of us had graduated. He’d taught for more than 30 years in the Union City public school system.

I was among the more than 150 people who attending the funeral, stifling my cries long enough to sang "Wind Beneath My Wings," "You Raised Me Up" and "To Sir, With Love" to honor my mentor, friend and favorite teacher.

As news of his death began to reach al ...

I am one of those people who can't sit down. Unless I am already sitting down, in which case I am one of those people who can't stand up. This is probably why I am stuck in a lawn chair right now with large drops of water dripping onto my leg from the outside of my lemonade glass. What do they call that again?

The kids are lying out on the lawn with their heads together imagining shapes in the clouds. After they spot one that looks like my nose, they want something to do. They are bored listening to the crickets sing.

Not me. I love listening to the crickets. It reminds me of a gentler time, when life was simple and so was I. As opposed to now, when life is not so simple and ...

We’re not quite ready to close the door on the Summer of 2010! A couple of weekends left to savor the shore, or enjoy the solitude of quiet streets, stores and restaurants back home.

For an interesting mix of local and not so local talent, try Café Improv in Princeton on Saturday night.

See the best golfers in the world at the Barclay’s at Ridgewood Country Club in Paramus.

Bring the little ones to Suessical The Musical at the Open Air Theatre at Washington Crossing.

Bob Newhart tonight at Bergen PAC in Englewood. Special guest star is Sally Kellerman.

They are as American as apple pie! See the Legacy of Currier and Ives at the Morris Museum .

Help Judge the rescu ...

Fairway has cultivated a relationship with New Jersey’s firefighters; after September 11th the supermarket chain adopted local firehouses and supplied food for them throughout the search and clean-up process-- and offered firefighters a special shopping discount at five locations.

So when Fairway invited the bravest from all over the state to bring their mobile grills and smokers – teams of firefighters happily set aside their gear, hoses and axes and donned aprons and basting brushes, and headed to Paramus on August 18th.

New Jersey’s firefighters enthusiastically competed in Fairway’s Firefighters Food Face-Off, a grilling “throwdown,” behi ...

"This is a very simple game. You throw the ball, you catch the ball, you hit the ball. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, sometimes it rains." -- Bull Durham

A couple of weeks ago, I went to my first minor league baseball game. We won tickets to the Camden Riversharks last spring from a PTA Tricky Trade and, truth be told, I wasn't that excited about driving from Bergen County to Camden. Surprisingly, we had a great time.


After tickets and parking and food, you can easily blow through $200 at a Yankees game. Here, everything was cheap. Tickets cost between $5 and $25. I think I spent $25 for a hot dog at the last Yankee game.

After we found our seats, my eight-year old son immediately had to check out the bouncy castle ...

Silvert’s Furniture in Freehold has been in the same location since it opened its doors 81 years ago. But a few weeks ago, Larry Iserson, Silvert’s owner, announced that they are going out of business.

“My wife’s grandfather Isidore Silvert started the store in 1929, right before the Great Depression. It maybe wasn’t the best timing to open a business. But he was able to make it through and eventually passed the store on to his son Harry,” Iserson says.

Harry Silvert turned the store into a thriving business and worked into his eighties before passing away in 2004. “I’ve worked here for most of my adult life as well,” Iserson said.

The store has been virtually a landmark ...

Most people don’t call New Jersey home. This seems obvious, but you don’t really discover this until you travel someplace where people ask where you are from. In most parts of the country this is a conversation stopper. Like telling someone you are a plumber. People are hard pressed to think of a follow-up question.

I’m from New Jersey I respond to a pause, followed by a pregnant pause, followed by a pause which actually gives birth, something out of wedlock like, “have you ever seen Bruce Springsteen?”

But I do my part. I keep New Jersey a secret because I don’t really want anyone else to come here even though it might be nice to have a larger tax base.  I thrust forward ...

We know how stressful planning the perfect holiday party can be. While it’s fun to invite friends and family, orchestrating an event with a colorful theme and food that will please the masses can be a daunting task.
Take the guesswork out of your next party with the help of Basking Ridge party planning pro Dawn Sandomeno and her party blueprints.
Dawn is co-founder of PartyBluprints.com ä, the first ever website to provide e-party plans, and author of the PartyBluprints Blog (www.partybluprintsblog.com), a “real girls’” guide to home entertaining which received a “thumbs up” from Good Housekeeping.
She is also a regular expert contributor on various party and entertaining sites and she does this all ...

Sitting on the side of a forlorn lot just off the main drag in Florham Park, Viet Ai (www.vietai1.com) will delight your taste buds. The small lot in the back fills up quickly, so you may wish to park off Columbia Turnpike. Walk in through the back.
Smiling faces abound this nearly two year old temple of all things Vietnamese food. All from scratch and cooked with abundant love.
 This gem of a "hole-in-the -wall" restaurant serves "classic" Vietnamese food like Pho, the salubrious national soup dish, chock full of any kind of meat your heart desires. Rare beef is king here, as are navel, stomach, brisket and sweet slices of smoked then grilled barbequed pork.
One can never go wrong with a summer roll consisting o ...

Have you made your New Year’s Resolutions yet? Weight loss is one of the most common resolutions that people make at the beginning of each year.
Susan Jakers, of Avenel, is a Certified Health Coach. After battling her own weight problems for years,  she’s developed a system to help you manage your mind and your body, and is dedicated to the achievement of health and well-being.
Inspired by the other female entrepreneurs in her family, Susan teaches you (www.healthandwellnessadvisor.com) to improve your mental attitude and trust in yourself as tools to achieve your healthy body and weight goals. Through smart eating, enjoyable exercise and self-esteem building strategies, you’ll learn to maintain ...

Some people would say that Jim Barbour is a saucy kind of guy. But the West Windsor entrepreneur would take that as a compliment!
After launching his own line of all-natural barbeque sauces called FunniBonz (www.funnibonz.com) in December 2008, Barbour has been treating En Jay residents to his unique blends of sweet and tangy flavors. The inspiration behind the sauce came from Barbour’s own entrepreneurial spirit and love of cooking.
“I was always the kid at my mother’s apron strings and I have always had a curious fascination about good food,” Barbour said. “I spent a lot of time grilling out and I could not find a sauce that I really like, so I decided to make my own.”
After quitting his day job as an account manager in the city, ...

Have you ever realized there are fewer men’s clothing stores in our towns? Well… one Maplewood woman is filling that gap.
Renee Kingston opened Grade A Goods…(21 Scotland Rd South Orange 973-761-0876) a Soho style men’s clothing store  in the heart of downtown South Orange. The store  features an "urban classic trend," according to Kingston that mixes and matches styles. The store opened its doors in December, 2008.
Renee is a recent Cornell University graduate with a major in textile and apparel management. She opened Grade A Goods because she felt there was an absence of men’s clothing stores in the area.
Renee’s target customers are young men- twenty to early thirties- who are sophisticated, outgoing, and wil ...

Tanya Blue of Woodbridge knows that women going through chemo therapy have special worries about how the treatment will affect their beauty.

Hair loss, skin reactions, exhaustion—Tanya experienced all of it when she was diagnosed with breast cancer four years ago, just before her wedding. But Tanya was determined to maintain her beauty routine, and battled the disease by always putting her best foot forward.
Blue, who dresses Broadway actors for a living, knew that if she looked good, she would feel better and stronger. So she created Chemo Beauty Box (www.chemobeautybox.com) a web-based business where she combines accessories and cosmetics that women need into pretty gift boxes.
“I work in the theater, the land of make-believe, so what be ...

Keep the address 99 Rumson Road in mind this weekend. It’s the annual spectacular Stately Homes By The Sea (www.statelyhomesbythesea.com) showcase—it opens this week and you won’t regret making the trek to tour one of the foremost properties in this ultra-exclusive ‘hood. It’s all for a great cause, the Visiting Nurse Association of Central New Jersey.
In South Orange, you can celebrate some of the town’s magnificent homes, and help the town historical society this weekend by attending the Gems of South Orange House Tour on Saturday. (www.sohps.org).
Travel Around The World in Eighty Days without leaving En Jay this weekend, by taking in the Shakespeare Theatre’s (www.shakespearenj.org) production of the Jules Verne novel.
Watch former bandleader-turned-cabaret star Eddie Bruce’s famous tribute to Tony Bennett ...

NJ My Way sought out three purportedly delicious cupcake spots and sampled them in order to guide you, our readers, towards a more perfect pastry experience.
Cupcakes by Carousel (www.CupcakesbyCarousel.com) in Ridgewood has a variety of cupcakes beautifully displayed in the fun little shop, and evokes child-like enthusiasm for dessert. The cheerful staff happily answered my queries about flavor and ingredients, chatting welcomingly. The vanilla-on-vanilla cupcake I selected had dense cake coated in a generous layer of thick, sugary frosting. The cupcake prices ranged between $2.25 and $3.75, depending on how elaborate the flavors. On my way out, I grabbed a free colorful magnet and complimentary temporary cupcake tattoo. Cupca ...

This weekend, we devote our “picks” to helping the victims of the Haiti earthquake--- How can you help? Your options are all around you:
Wegmans throughout the state (www.wegmans.com) will accept customer donations at checkout through Saturday January 23rd. Donations will go to the American Red Cross.
The Peapack-Gladstone Bank is collecting donations in support of the Red Cross relief efforts, in all of its branches. Checks made payable to the American Red Cross can also be mailed to Peapack-Gladstone Bank, PO Box 178, Gladstone, NJ 07934.
Students at Gateway Regional School district in Woodbury Heights will be collecting spare change for the cause through Friday January 22nd.
Millburn students will be collecting funds in the downtown on Saturday January 23rd and Sunday the 24th.
Morris County churches are holding foo ...

If you haven’t heard, you can bet the ponies, and have a bite at one of the state’s best known restaurant brands, and not make the trek to one of the racetracks or Atlantic City.

Part massive simulcast center, part bar, part restaurant, the center known as Favorites at Woodbridge (it’s actually in Fords) will take your girls night out to a new level. Although we’ve heard this is the new singles hotspot…you may be the only girls there! This is still a guy’s club, at least it was when we stopped by on Friday.
The crowd includes some savvy gamblers who’ve made handicapping an art form.  But the look of the place is clean and upscale, like a modern control room, with hundreds of television monitors and computer terminal ...