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A very special rescue pup from Lexington, Kentucky, is looking for her forever home. Emerson, a four-month-old German shepherd, was born with spina bifida, hip dysplasia, and deformed knee joints, leaving her unable to use her hind legs. Paws 4 the Cause General Manager Anita Spreitzer told WKYT that staff noticed something special in Emerson the moment she arrived at the shelter. “She so much wanted to live and was not allowing her disability to hinder her in any way,” Spreitzer said....

Few visions are more romantic than that of a gorgeous climbing rose flowering across a wall or arcing over a fence. One of the loveliest that we’ve found is Teasing Georgia, an English climbing rose bred by David Austin that’s been charming gardeners for more than twenty years. Teasing Georgia was launched in 1998 and has been a favorite ever since. Its calling card is its large yellow blooms, which it bears bountifully throughout the summer....

The last Texas lighthouse still open to the public will glow again for the first time in more than a century this week. The Texas Historical Commission (THC) and the Port Isabel Lighthouse State Historic Site recently funded and coordinated the reproduction of a new lens for the lantern room at the top of the historic Port Isabel Lighthouse. The new installation will offer visitors a peek at the working past of the lighthouse and the service it provided to the Gulf Coast....

Did you know that for four years the South had one more state? Here’s the wild story of the state of Franklin, the so-called lost state of America. At the end of the American Revolution, the colonies didn’t all rush to form the United States as we now know it. Some communities including the residents of a chunk of land west of the Appalachian Mountains and east of the Mississippi were given “the option of creating jurisdictions within existing states, forming new states within the union, or creating their own sovereign republics,” Jason Farr wrote in The Tennessee Historical Quarterly....

Sure, she’s at the helm of a popular television show and an ever-growing business empire, but other than that, Pioneer Woman Ree Drummond is just like the rest us. As mom of four on a working cattle ranch in rural Oklahoma, it’s fair to say that she has a lot on her plate—pun intended. Fortunately, she’s got a few tricks up her “blousy” sleeves. Speaking with Kitchn recently, the Food Network star revealed that it’s her freezer that’s the key to getting meals on the table when life gets hectic....

The first time I heard that phrase “social distancing,” I thought, Well, that’s going to be hard to do, down here. How in the world do you tell a Southerner, in a time of crisis, to be “physically distant?” How do you tell one of the most gregarious, social people on the planet to pull together, but apart? When a tornado a mile and a half wide tore through Alabama in 2011, neighbors I barely knew appeared with chainsaws and casseroles....

We’re all familiar with the saying, “New year, new me.” But for 2022, we’re ready to declare, “New year, new home” instead. Our homes have seen us through the ups and downs of the pandemic, providing us with safe havens to rest and retreat. Decor trends have also seen a shift, with invigorating color palettes rising in popularity over more neutral schemes. Zillow predicts that in 2022, homeowners will invest in projects and features to make our abodes feel like places where we can thrive....

Dried beans have been a staple in the American diet for centuries. Native Americans used to trade them between tribes, and they eventually made their way to Europe and back, having become a part of dishes like glandoulat, a southwestern French dish with red kidney beans, pork, carrots, goose fat, spices, and Armagnac. In the mid-1800s, the dried bean industry started to flourish in New York and in the American South, where beans became central in several staple dishes, such as red beans and rice and Hoppin’ John....

In summer, we can’t get enough of hollyhocks. These plants are long-blooming summer flowers that appear in spikes of bright blossoms. Hollyhocks (Alcea rosea) are cottage garden favorites because of their appearance and extended bloom time. The warm-weather bloomers are low-maintenance plantings and make great additions to cut flower gardens. They’re also known to attract birds to the garden. These perennials and biennials thrive in the sun and in the right conditions will grow to heights of 3 to 8 feet and widths of 1 to 3 feet....

Between posing with Goofy for a photo and going on a snack run for Dole Whip — and oh yeah, the rides! — days at Disney World tend to be pretty jam-packed. That’s why we probably wouldn’t be surprised to learn that you tossed your Disney dining receipts or they live hidden in the underbelly of your purse. Well, if you want to save money at Disney World, it’s time to change that: “If you dine at one of the restaurants at Disney World look out for a coupon on the back of your receipt....

On November 8, June Rountree discovered her beloved dog Abby’s collar and leash in her backyard, but the black pup was nowhere to be found. For three weeks, she and her husband circled their neighborhood in Dothan, Alabama, looking for the four-year-old dog. Then, on November 28, Rountree was working her regular cashier shift at the local Walmart when she heard a commotion. There was a dog running around inside the store, and people were trying to catch it as it darted through the aisles....

It wasn’t enough to smell like Dolly Parton herself, now you can smell like her favorite place on earth too! Exactly one year after the release of Parton’s first fragrance, the country legend is back with a lovely new scent. “Smoky Mountain,” the Tennessee songstress’ latest collaboration with Scent Beauty, the first fragrance from Parton’s new Front Porch Collection. Available now in discovery size bottles, “Smoky Mountain” is described as a “woody, floral scent featuring notes of Tiger Orchid, Warm Tonka, and Cashmere Woods....

This year, an 89-year-old great-grandmother spent the holidays in Florida wearing a cap and gown. Joan Donovan and her family recently celebrated the achievement of her latest goal: a Master of Arts in English and Creative Writing from Southern New Hampshire University (SNHU). She is SNHU’s eldest 2022 graduate. “I’m a goal-seeker,” Donovan said in a statement to SNHU. “And it was a goal, and I reached it. It’s a dream come true, really....

When it comes to finding a fun lamp for the console in your entry or an indoor/outdoor rug for the laundry room, there are few better places to find a good piece at a bargain price than HomeGoods. That the inventory’s always changing and that you never know what you’ll find are just part of the fun: Is there anything more exhilarating than the thrill of the hunt? Of course, a place like HomeGoods has its pitfalls, too....

If you’ve recently bought a cast-iron skillet, it’s probably already seasoned, so maintaining the skillet is a matter of instilling good habits of care each time you cook with it. But for most of us, we’ve had our skillets for a while, and often, that means they need a little more attention. Check Your Skillet If it has rust spots, it needs to be seasoned. Even if it hasn’t rusted, you may still notice the skillet is harder to clean because food is adhering to the surface....

In the fast-paced world we live in, it seems a whole lot easier to take shortcuts than to do things the old-fashioned, slow, stop-and-smell-the-roses way: to buy the pie instead of making it from scratch, to shoot off an email instead of penning a handwritten note. But when it comes to playing hostess, it’s important to slow down, make Grandmother proud, and take time to do things the old-fashioned way. Here, we’ve rounded up 3 winning, old-school approaches to entertaining that are here to stay—and for good reason....

Fringe tree, or Old Man’s Beard, (Chionanthus virginicus) has always played twelfth fiddle to dogwood, saucer magnolia, flowering cherry, Bradford pear, and numerous others choices for spring-flowering trees. Indigenous to the eastern U.S., it grows from Canada all the way down to the Gulf Coast. It’s tougher than dogwood, more dependable than saucer magnolia, longer-lived than cherry, and smells better than a Bradford. Fringe tree gets its name from its clouds of fleecy white, softly fragrant flowers that hang from the branches in late spring and early summer....

We’re calling it: Easter eggs are out, and resurrection gardens are in. This is the season for creating a long-lasting resurrection garden that you can admire well after the Easter season. It’s a meaningful DIY project perfect for the entire family, and the end result is a gorgeous table centerpiece or gift that represents the resurrection of Jesus Christ. This is an easy, at-home project that you can do on the patio, porch, or even on the kitchen table (just put a towel or paper down to protect the surface)....

Making Christmas sugar cookies is one of those skills that seems instilled in most Southerners from birth. So much so that sometimes it almost feels embarrassing to admit that you might not know all the answers when it comes to baking them. Whether it’s your first time making them with your own family or you want to discretely check to see if you are indeed the sorceress of sugar you claim to be, take a look at this list....

Hurricane Ian made initial landfall on Cayo Costa island off the coast of Fort Myers, Florida, Wednesday afternoon as a category 4 storm. This “ferocious storm,” as ABC News’ Ginger Zee called it, has caused catastrophic damage both from winds upwards of 150MPH and the flooding from storm surges throughout the state of Florida from the east coast, straight across to the greater Orlando area. And as of Thursday morning, Ian was still on the move....