O-H Class _/_____// *7 / Book_ CopyrigIitN°. COpyRiGHT DEPOStH GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS BY CAROLYN SHERWIN BAILEY WITH NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS FROM PHOTOGRAPHS y |||||i|||||K NEW YORK FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY PUBLISHERS < v^ \ Copyright, igi2, by Frederick A. Stokes Company All rights reserved, including that of translation into foreign languages, including Scandinavian September^ igi2 % CI.A3iJ()747 PREFACE Make-at-Home-Things for Girls suggests play occupations which will amuse and at the same time educate girls because they will be able to read and follow the text of the book and the illustrations with little or no assistance from grown-ups. The book also outlines new uses for the waste material of the house and the out-door material which children can find in wood and field, giving them ideas along the lines of imaginative and in- ventive play and the ability to entertain them- selves. /^-^^^/3 CONTENTS PAGE Preface v Marble Dolls and How to Make Them . . . i Button Dolls 5 The Funniest Dolls of All 9 How to Make Your Dolls' House . . . . 13 Making a Dolls' Cottage out of Paper ... 19 Paper Furniture for the Dolls' House . . 29 Box Building and How to do It ..... 37 Match Box Furniture 43 Shoe Box Furniture 47 The Play House Larder 53 Peas Craft 59 Potato Patch Fun 65 Ten Necklaces 71 Raffia Work ^J What to do with Autumn Leaves .... 83 Garden Games 89 Fun with Picture Post Cards 95 Bead Necklaces loi What a Box of Paints Will Do 107 Work Basket Treasures 113 Worsted Playthings for the Baby . . . .119 Cork Toys 125 vii viii CONTENTS PAGE How TO Make Clay Toys 131 Magic Toys and How to Make Them . . .137 String Craft 143 How TO Make Your Own Picture Frames . . 149 How TO Make a School Bag . . . . . .155 How to Cover Your Own Books 161 How TO Stencil Your Own Aprons .... 167 Christmas Gifts a Little Girl Can Make . .173 Christmas Bags a Child Can Make . . . 179 A Home Trimmed Christmas Tree .... 185 Homemade Valentines 191 How TO Make the Easter Rabbit 197 Making More Easter Toys 203 Half a Dozen May Baskets 207 ILLUSTRATIONS A Group of Dolls Made of Clay Marbles . Frontispiece FACING PAGE The Button Father and Two of the Button Children 6U The Button Mother and Two More of the Button Children 6 ^ The Hickory Nut Grandmother 7^ The Hickory Nut Family 7 ^ Acorn Brownies 10 1^ Cucumber Man II^- A Potato Lady 1 1 i-^ Clay Pipe Dolls 14 ^ Marshmallow Boy 14 Dolls' House Made of Empty Cardboard Boxes . 15^^ A Cork Cabin 28 '^ The Nicest. House in the Dolls' World .... 28 ^ Cardboard Furniture 29 Spool Box Bedroom Set for a Doll 42 Match Box Furniture 42 Dolls' Four-poster Bed Made of a Shoe Box . .43 Dolls' High-backed Chair Made of a Shoe Box . . 58 Peas Work: Chair, Bed, Tools, Wagon, Barn . . 59 The Rose Family at School 66 Grandpa and Grandma Rose 67 ix X ILLUSTRATIONS FACING PAGE Ten Little Indians . 67 "^ Twin Rosebuds 70*^ The Twin Potato Boys 701^ Necklace Made of Corn and Beans; Acorn Necklace 71/ Poppy Flower Chain 711/ Necklace Made of Beans of Contrasting Colors . . 71 >/^ Raffia Work : Hat, Napkin Ring, Photograph Frame, Mat 78^ Raffia Dolls 79 Home Made Grace Hoop and Sticks ; Japanese Kite 94 - Toys Made of Picture Post Cards 95 Necklaces Made of Beads and Seeds 104 Painted Borders for the Dolls' House .... 105 '/ Worsted Mammy \22 y Worsted Baby 122 v Cork Furniture ... I23\/ DdII Made of Corks 123 1/ Clay Dishes a Child Can Make 136 ^ Peanut Spider; The Straw Gymnast; A Ballet Girl 137 String Hammock 144. String Bag; String Horse Reins 145^ Picture Frame Decorated With Scrap Pictures . .150 v/ Chintz Picture Frame I5c> Picture Frames Decorated With Handcolored De- signs 151 Decoration for Child's School Bag 15^^ Decoration for Child's School Bag ^S7 ^ Decorated Paper Book Cover 166 ^ ILLUSTRATIONS xi FACING PAGE Linen Book Cover a Child Can Make .... i66 - Stencilled School Apron 167 Knife Case; Spectacle Case; Pin Roll; V/ork Bag; Memorandum Pad 174-' Home Dressed Dolls, Representing Different Nation- alities 175 Handkerchief Work Bag 182 Party Bag 182 ' Doll Work Bag 182 Nursery Laundry Bag 183 Home Made Valentines 192 The Funniest Valentine of All ....... 193^ Jointed Cardboard Rabbit 200 Rabbit Made of Cotton Batting and Twigs . . . 201 Egg Shell Cradle and Flower Basket .... 204 Egg Grandmother, Rabbit and Brownie .... 204 Egg Woman, Roily- Polly Man and Chinaman . . 204 May Baskets 205 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS MARBLE DOLLS AND HOW TO MAKE THEM THERE are so many different kinds of mar- bles; peewees and agates and coffees and commies, more than a little girl can tell the names of. Brother knows how to play as many marble games as he has marbles in his bag, but a little girl can find a different use for the fascinating little round balls. They look just like dolls' heads. Why, they really are dolls' heads. All one needs to trans- form a marble into a doll is a little ingenuity, and a body and some clothes. Find your piece bag, your needle case, the scissors, and the glue bottle. Boys may think it fun to play in the street with marbles, but a little girl can have just as much pleasure making marble dolls in the house. The best marbles for making dolls are the little clay commies which brother despises be- I 2 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS cause they break so easily; but they are white, can be drawn upon, and take the glue well. The first marble doll that the little girl makes is Mrs. Commie, the mother of the younger marble dolls. Make a rather tight roll of white cotton cloth and sew it with over and over stitches so that it will not unroll. To the end of this cloth body, glue a marble for a head, and when the glue is dry, mark Mrs. Commie's features and her hair with a soft black pencil. A shorter, smaller roll of cloth sewed, crosswise, to Mrs. Commie's body makes her arms, and then she is all ready for her clothes. She has a very full petticoat, made of stiff white lawn, ruffled and gathered about the waist and sewed to her cloth body so that she will stand alone when it is fin- ished. Over this the little girl slips Mrs. Commie's dress skirt cut from a piece of grand- mother's spotted blue calico morning gown, and she sews a pair of puffed sleeves to the doll's rag arms. The waist she sews on too. It is just a straight piece of the calico draped over the sleeves, and fastened at the waist. A full white ruffle finishes it at the front and Mrs. Commie is dressed, ready to take care of her children. Johnny Commie is made next. The roll of cloth to which Johnny's head is glued is only half MARBLE DOLLS 3 as long as the one used for Mrs. Commie, and two rolls of cloth are sewed to it at the waist for Johnny's legs. His arms are made in the same fashion as were his mother's, and then his face and hair are marked, but his hair is not parted in the front as was Mrs. Commie's. He wears a bang and a Dutch cut at the back. Johnny's shirt has no sleeves. It is just a straight bit of white lawn with slits for the arms. His trousers are cut from brown velvet to fit his rag legs and are carefully sewed on. Rolls of the same brown stuff are slipped on his arms and sewed to his shoulders (or the place where his shoul- ders should be), and his little round jacket with slits for the armholes, like his shirt, is sewed to his neck. Johnny wears a round Eton collar made of white note paper, and he has a very gay necktie, indeed, which is a scrap of baby ribbon. Last of all, the little girl makes the Commie baby. Her body is a long cloth roll like her mother's because her legs do not show and that is the easiest way to make a marble doll. The baby's long white dress is made of crepe paper, gathered at the neck, and tied with a draw string and rufiled around the bottom. She wears a very charming cap with a flopping brim to keep 4 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS the sun out of her eyes when she goes out in the garden. A very full ruffle of crepe paper is glued to the top of the baby's head. Over that ruffle a full crown made of a one inch gathered circle is glued. When she is dressed, the Com- mie baby is nearly as big as her mother, but the little girl can't help that, because marbles, at least this sort, are nearly all of the same size. Where shall the Commie family live? The little girl wonders and wonders, until at last she spies an empty note paper box on the library table. Just the very thing for a marble doll's house, strong and substantial and exactly the right size. It is very easily transformed into a tiny home. Stand it up on its side and cut some square windows in the bottom and ends. Then paint a pattern of yellow crocuses on the walls with the nursery paints just like the crocuses one can see through the big window, out on the lawn. A bit of red flannel makes a fine carpet for the box house, and when the Commie family are set inside they all say ( save the baby, who of course can't talk yet), that they wouldn't ask for a pleasanter place in which to live out their days. BUTTON DOLLS THEY are made from big, two eyed bone but- tons, and very ugly ones at that. They are the kind that mother sews on the back of your gingham aprons and around the bottom of brother's blouse, but that is not really their only use. They are little round heads for dolls with two big eyes, and little fat cheeks waiting to be painted pink. The people in one of mother's old fashion books are just the right size for the patterns of the dolls' bodies. The mother doll, of course, should be made first. Cut out a very pretty, slim lady from a sheet of a fashion book, and lay it down on a sheet of white cardboard, drawing all around it with a pencil — that is, all save the head. Then cut it out. One of the larger bone buttons makes the doll's head. Glue it to the body and fill in the holes in the button with black paint making very large eyes. Paint a little red mouth on the button and two pink cheeks. Paint a pretty lavender dress and then cut out the first button doll, the mother of the button family. 5 6 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS The father doll is made from the pattern of a fashion book gentleman. Like the mother, you must first draw the outline of the doll on a bit of white cardboard. Glue a bone button to the top of the body to make the head and fill in the holes with black paint to make the eyes. The button father wears a painted mustache, and his spandy suit is painted brown with water color paints. The button children are the most delightful little creatures in the world and you will find that you are able to draw their bodies with no pattern at all, and so make some of the children fat and some lean, and some with painted curls and some with pig tails. Some of the button children may have blue eyes and some brown, just splashes of paint dropped into their hole eyes, but it is possi- ble to give a button doll's eyes a great deal of ex- pression, just by the way you paint them. They can look up or down, or roll their eyes, or look at their button parents if you leave a little white in the button hole showing, uncovered with paint. Nearly all of the button dolls wear clothes that are painted right on their little cardboard bodies; either done in stripes, or polka dots, or drawn in pretty red and green plaids. Their hair is painted around the edge of their button heads on the cardboard before they are cut out. BUTTON DOLLS 7 and the smallest button child is cut with a candle in his hand because he is afraid to go upstairs to bed at night alone. A few of the quaint little button dolls may be left undressed. Cut them out with plain white cardboard bodies so that you can have the fun of dressing them in real, live clothes afterward. These button girl dolls wear dainty underclothes cut from the lace paper that lines empty candy boxes. Cut little skirts and underwaists for each doll and paste them to their cardboard bodies. Bits of stiff print and scraps of colored calico from mother's piece bag make their dresses. The dresses are cut out like paper dolls' gowns, whole at the shoulders with a hole in the neck and a slit down the back through which the little button doll can slip her head. The button boy dolls are made without clothes and have beauti- ful brown reefer suits cut from scraps of brown wrapping paper and pasted to their cardboard bodies. Such a jolly procession as they make when they are finished ! THE FUNNIEST DOLLS OF ALL SOME of them live in the woods, and others in the garden. They are strange Httle crea- tures, but most deHghtful to make and they are always ready to accommodate themselves to a homemade dolls' house and live in it contentedly all their days. The nut dolls are a family by themselves and their heads are to be found all over the ground in the woods the morning after the first frost in October. Grandmother Hickory is the oldest member of the nut family and she has a wrinkled walnut for a head on which eyes, nose, mouth, and a pair of spectacles are traced with a pencil. Her body is a roll of cotton cloth glued to her head and her arms are two smaller rolls sewed to her body. She wears a checked gingham dress, a white kerchief and cap, and in her hand she carries her work bag. Her son, Jake Hickory, is a farmer. His body is made also of a roll of cloth, but, in addi- tion to arms, he has two longer rolls of cloth sewed to his body for legs. He and his wife and 9 lo GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS his very stylish daughter shown in the picture are dressed in crepe paper, ruffled in the case of Mrs. Hickory and Miss Hickory, and sewed to their bodies. The acorn brownies have paper bodies. Rolls of tissue paper are glued to the under side of their acorn heads and twisted lengths of tissue paper make their hands and feet. Bits of white paper glued to their faces form eyes and mouths and they are dressed in brown crepe paper or paper muslin. They wear their own acorn caps, and the Chinaman has a braid of black darning cotton glued to his head for a queue. Mrs. Rose Potato lives in the garden and has a meat skewer stuck in her head for a body and two twigs for arms. If her skirts are made very full she will stand alone, and the paper sun hat which she wears keeps her face from turning browner than it grew. Her eyes, nose and mouth are cut out with your paper knife. Just next door to the potato lady lives Mr. Cucumber, a most gallant, green young fellow. He has twig legs and arms with paper hands and feet. He wears a leaf hat to protect his squash seed eyes, and his paper collar and necktie make him look very spick and span. The clay pipe people come with bodies and ■^^^K^K^K^^^Sj^ ^^^!>.>\j^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ -^^^^^^B '' Mi^^9 ^H^H^H^r ^B^H^BBkS^j^iSBi^BOBB^iKSr. s .i^tjKS^^" ,•# THE FUNNIEST DOLLS OF ALL ii very fine heads so one needs only to mark their faces, and glue some rolls of paper to the pipe stems for arms. The pipe man has his face drawn in pencil on the back of the pipe and the lady's face is drawn on a circle of paper that just fits the bowl of the pipe and is pasted to it. They are both dressed in gay bits of cloth and they make very nice little dolls. You must be careful though, not to drop them. The little fig man is made on tooth picks. His legs and arms are raisins with almond feet and hands. Two figs make his body. He has a marshmallow head with a fig cap. He loves to visit the dolls' house at dinner time. HOW TO MAKE YOUR OWN DOLLS' HOUSE THE very tiny, china doll needs a house, not a very large one, but a house just about the size of a cigar box. The hinged cover of the box makes a swinging door as the box stands on end, and the inside should be covered with scraps of wall paper. Pictures of furniture may be pasted to the walls of the cigar box house for furnish- ings, or the furniture pictures may be mounted on cardboard backs to make them stiffer, and glued to very small blocks of wood that they may stand in the house. The floor of this doll's house may have a rug cut from a bit of bright colored flannel or velvet, and a portiere of the same may be hung at the door. Four strong shoe boxes will make a most com- modious four-room apartment for a little French bisque doll. The boxes should be of uniform size, the covers should be removed, and the boxes glued together at the ends and long sides, mak- ing a dolFs house which has two rooms upstairs and two downstairs. When the glue is perfectly 13 14 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS dry, a door may be outlined with ruler and pencil in the upper and in the lower partitions which separate the rooms. The outline is then cut with a sharp knife. In the same way a window should be drawn, and cut in each room. Now we have a kitchen and a dining-room, down- stairs, and a parlor and bedroom in the upper story of the house. The walls of the rooms may be decorated with the nursery water color paints. A pot of enamel paint will be found very satis- factory also to color with, as it will make the shoe box house stiffer and more durable. In using the prepared enamel paint, the brush should always be filled with sufficient paint to cover the entire surface of one wall that a neatly painted surface may result. Pale green, yellow, or tan will be attractive colors to use. When the paint is dry, a border made of tiny silhouette animals, or flowers, or mother goose figures cut from black paper may be pasted at the top of the parlor wall and the doll's bedroom. When the shoe box house is finished, it may be furnished with a set of strong, cunning dolFs furniture made by glueing match boxes together, and upholstering them with scraps of flowered chintz. What sort of a house would the little rag doll like ? Suppose we make her a log cabin ! '4 '•^ #► f»/ r POLLS IIOaSE MAIJE OF EMPTY CARDBOARD BOXES THE DOLLS' HOUSE 15 There is a box of old corks up in the attic. Bring them downstairs, and, selecting those which will fit well together, glue them by their ends, forming ever so many make-believe logs. A square of heavy straw board serves for the floor of the cabin. The cork logs are glued to- gether for the walls in cabin fashion, and are then glued to the straw board floor. The roof of the cabin is made of the brown corrugated paper that comes to the house wrapped about parcels. An oblong piece of this corrugated board is bent to resemble a pointed roof, and is fastened to the cork walls of the cabin either by long pins, or with glue. The little log cabin will be even more realistic if there is a fireplace inside constructed of clay bricks, and a chimney outside. Modeling clay to make these bricks may be found in the toy shops now. There are still the larger dolls to be housed. What kind of an apartment can we find for them to live in? Ah, those clean, strong, wooden soap boxes which cook has just emptied will solve the problem! Take three of them out to the barn. Find a hammer, some nails, and the toy saw. Who said that a little girl can not play carpenter ? One soap box is placed upon the other, and the i6 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS two are nailed securely together making a two- story house. Partitions of heavy cardboard may divide each large room into two smaller ones, or the covers of the boxes may be measured; sawed, and nailed inside for partitions. Stairs may next be made of stiff cardboard, folded into steps, and having a strip of obliquely cut card- board pasted along the edge of the steps to keep them in place. Windows and doors may be drawn with a pencil and sawed out. The wood is soft, and thin and not difficult to cut. Three sides of the remaining box, one short and two long will make the gable roof of the house which should be nailed securely into place, after it has been carefully measured and sawed. The out- side of the soap box house may be painted with some real house paint, red, or colonial yellow, or green. The inside of the house will suggest all sorts of attractive furnishings. Cretonne may be hung on the walls, and some real little rag rugs may be woven of strips of calico on a loom made of an old slate frame, to cover the floor. Perhaps the little girl carpenter will be able to make furniture for this house from carpenter's blocks nailed together for chairs, and tables, and beds, and then painted with enamel paint. How- ever it is furnished, it will be a strong, attractive, THE DOLLS' HOUSE 17 serviceable dolls' house, this soap box house. Last of all there is a dolls' house made of heavy wrapping paper. It will be a suitable home for any doll, paper, rag, bisque, or china, because the wrapping-paper house may be made as large or as small as you wish. The size of this last house depends upon the size of the square of smooth, stiff wrapping paper which you are able to rescue from the scrap basket. Lay the square of paper on a table where you will have plenty of room to work, get out the glue pot again, the scissors, the ruler, and the pencil. Then you will be ready to begin. Fold the square into sixteen small squares. Then, on opposite sides of the paper, make three cuts with your scissors, each one square long. The two center squares which have been cut on each side should then be laid on top of each other and glued into place. The two remaining end squares are then brought to- gether, and glued at the edges, forming the ends of the house. That is the house foundation. It may have a corrugated roof and as many win- dows and doors as one cares to cut. The win- dows may have paper shades and lace curtains, and there may be cardboard partitions inside the house, making as many rooms as one wishes. Tiny woven paper rugs cover the floors. 1 8 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS The picture shows how pretty a wrapping paper dolls' house may be. Five homemade dolls' houses and they are quite as strong, and just as beautiful, and a great deal more charming than the kind one buys in a toy shop — because the little girl will have made them her very own self. MAKING A DOLLS' COTTAGE OUT OF PAPER A DOLLIES' cottage! Doesn't it sound fas- cinating? I wonder if they haven't real cottages of their own in Make-BeHeve Land, where they eat and sleep, and study and play when you're tucked up tight in your bed and the sand man is on his way. It is a cunning, cozy little bungalow cottage, with square-paned windows and a brass knocker on the front door, and a front porch with pillars, and a red, red chimney for Santa Glaus to come down. The body of the house is shown in Fig. i. It is made from a strip of heavy drawing paper eighteen and a half inches long and four and a half inches wide. A flap a half inch wide, and four inches long is left at one end for pasting, and the rest is divided by lines into four sections — two of them four inches wide, and two five inches wide, as shown in the diagram. The four- inch sections are the side walls, and the five-inch sections, the front and back walls. The extra 19 20 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS half inch at the bottom is cut where the corners of the house are, so that when the house is folded in shape, and the end flap pasted inside of the back wall, the flaps at the bottom may be folded in like the edge of a floor and the corners where they lap over each other fastened with the little brass fasteners that are used for pierced brass work. This gives the house strength and firmness, and makes it possible to slip a four by five inch piece of paper in for a removable floor or rug. On each of the side walls are two little win- dows, each of them one inch square, and with sixteen little square panes of glass, and the win- dow sills an inch and a half from the floor. These windows are made by cutting out the squares, and pasting on the inside some trans- parent paper which has the little square window panes marked on it. At the back of the house there are three little windows in a row, and in front are two windows with a door between. The door is an inch and a half wide by two and a half high, with two cross panels at the bottom and twelve little panes of glass in the upper portion, and of course a brass knob and knocker marked on. It is cut round three sides, so that it will open, with the fourth side as a hinge. ^ m J -_ _, fXEE r-t-r ■ "■ -lf s > ^^ iH ^ H^ G « s Ml_ Jk r^ -.£ -nr- ^■' ^ Mc«l (V( ^ >i: ^i ^..'.. ^^.^-4 N - /O" - 22 A PAPER DOLLS' HOUSE 23 Next comes the porch floor (Fig. 2). This is two and a half inches by five and a half, with a projection at the back a half inch wide by five inches long, which slips underneath the front of the house, and fastens with the same fasteners that hold the bottom flaps of Fig i. The four little flaps shown in Fig. 2 are to be cut with a knife on the full lines and folded up on the dotted lines, to fasten to the pillars. Fig. 3 shows the pillars themselves. There are four of them, each made from a piece of paper two and one-half inches by three inches. This is folded into five sections a half inch wide by three inches high. The pillars are square, but there must be five sections, because one has to lap over to hold it in place. These do not need to be pasted — simply folded and placed up- right on the porch floor, with the sides which lap over each other against the back of the little flaps. Then a fastener through the three thick- nesses will hold each pillar in place. Fig. 5 shows the upper front wall. It is made from a piece of paper five and three-quarters inches by six and one-half, drawn and cut to the shape shown. The curved line and the slanting lines just below the window are not to be cut, but simply drawn to represent boards. The 24 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS four little flaps are cut just as those in the porch floor were, but they are not bent. They project straight downward and fasten to the upper ends of the pillars. The lower part of Fig. 5 is folded back to form the porch roof, and the little flap at the edge is folded up and fastened to the front of the house, so that the porch roof is exactly three inches from the floor. For the upper back wall a piece is made like the upper part of Fig. 5 — just as though it were cut off at the dotted line A-A, and had no flaps. This is pasted to the back wall of the house so that it is even with the front. Now conies the roof (Fig. 4). This is just an oblong seven inches by ten, folded on the dotted lines to fit the top of the end walls. There are two slits for the chimney. The exact position of these slits does not matter, so long as they are in one of the topmost sections, but they must be parallel, five-eighths of an inch apart, and five- eighths of an inch long. Fig. 6 shows the chimney. After it is cut and folded, the two end sections should be lapped and pasted, and the two points slipped through the slits in the roof, and folded back and pasted un- derneath. It serves not only as a chimney, but as a very good handle for lifting off the roof. A PAPER DOLLS' HOUSE 25 The roof is to be left unfastened, so that the hands that are still too big to reach through the doorway of dollies' world can arrange the furni- ture from the top. The furniture is very plain. First there is a table, and this is made of a three-inch square of the same paper that you used for the house. Draw the diagonals, or lines from adjoining cor- ners to the opposite corners, and then fold each corner of the paper into the point where these diagonals cross. After these folds are creased, lift the points up until they are at right angles with the inside square. Then turn the table over and rest it on the points. You will find that it stands quite steady, and gives somewhat the effect of a table with a long tablecloth on it. Next comes an old-fashioned settle. This also is made from a three-inch square. It is folded once through the center in each direction, then each edge is folded to one of the center creases, forming sixteen squares. Then, with the paper double, the ends are opened to look like Fig. 6, and cut, through one thickness of paper from a to b and from a to c. Then the two sections marked e are folded forward to form arms, and the two sections marked d are pasted to them. The two squares which were cut loose are lifted 26 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS up and bent in the opposite direction, while the two squares underneath them are folded up to form the seat. Then the two loose squares which were bent down at the ends of the seat are pasted in place. The settle is very easy to make once a child learns how. The chairs are made in exactly the same way, except that after the sixteen squares have been folded, one row of four squares is cut off, so that the proper width for a chair is made. The bed is an old-fashioned four poster. The body of it measures two and a half inches long by one and a quarter wide. From each side pro- ject two pieces a half inch long by a quarter inch wide, which bend down and form the legs. At each end are two pieces an inch long by three- sixteenths of an inch wide which bend up to form the tall posts, and white paper bedclothes and pil- low make the bed look very inviting for its dolly occupant. Who do you suppose this occupant is? She is just a dear little old lady doll, with old-fash- ioned dresses and apron, and bobbing corkscrew curls. The little cottage is too small for a whole dolly family to live in, but let me tell you a secret — the dear little old lady has relatives. She has sons, and daughters, and cousins, and oh, so A PAPER DOLLS' HOUSE 27 many little grandsons and granddaughters. And they all come to see her, and when too man}^ come to be entertained in the little house, the little old lady entertains them on the porch and in the garden and if you make all these dolls, you can have just as jolly times as she does. (a) a cork cabin (b) the nicest house in the dolls' world PAPER FURNITURE FOR THE DOLLS' HOUSE NEXT best to having a family of dolls small enough to dress in scraps from the rag bag and carry around in a little girl's pocket, is the fun of owning a set of dolls' furniture just the right size for these little dolls to really use. Of course one may buy a set of tiny furniture at the toy shop, but if a little girl has had the experi- ence of going shopping for beds and chairs and tables for the playhouse, she will have found out that so very often the things that the toy shop man makes are not the right size. The bed is too small, and the chairs are too high, the stove is way up above the little cook dolFs head, and the piano is too big to go in through the doll house door. There is a splendid way out of this furniture dilemma, though. Why should a little girl not make her own set of furniture ? It will be very easy to do when she learns how. The materials, just scraps of stiff paper, or thin cardboard are right at hand, and the fun of measuring, cutting, 29 30 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS and pasting the chairs, tables, dressers — every- thing in fact which a Httle doll needs — will make many rainy indoor afternoons most happy ones. Book cover paper which may be bought for a few cents a sheet is just the right quality for making paper furniture. It comes in lovely, soft colors — greens, blues, and tans, and with some scraps of figured chintz to paste on the finished articles for upholstery, the furniture will be even prettier than any that one buys at a toy shop. Bogus paper is also attractive and stiff enough to use for the furniture. It is a kind of heavy, brown paper that the butcher uses to wrap his wares in, and he will very likely give a little girl as many sheets as she wants for the asking. Bristol board is an excellent furniture material, and even the pieces of strong wrapping paper that come to the house with parcels will make dolly happy indeed after they have been trans- formed into dainty bits of furniture for her own special delight. One will need some glue or paste, a nicely sharpened pencil, a pair of scissors and a ruler. Mother's kitchen table will be splendid to work on, or one may spread one's materials on the piazza floor and work out of doors. First, the paper will need to be cut into PAPER FURNITURE 31 squares, as many squares as the number of bits of furniture one intends to make. These squares must be laid out very exactly with the ruler and pencil, because, if the edges and cor- ners are not true, the finished furniture will not stand straight. No one would want a doll to fall out of her chair and break her little nose, just because the chair was not made well. When the squares are all cut just the size one wishes — and six-inch squares will be a very good size — they must be folded, each into sixteen small squares. Lay a square of paper on the table in front of you, and fold the front edge even with the back edge. Next open the square and fold the back and front edges until they just touch the first fold which was made. The right hand edge of the square should then be folded even with the left hand edge, the square unfolded again and the right and left hand edges folded to touch the last fold which was made. If these directions are carefully followed, the paper will be found to have sixteen small folded squares. We will make a table first for the dining-room in the doll house, because that is the easiest piece of furniture with which to begin. Make four cuts, each one square long and two squares apart in the large square. The paper must then be 32 GIRLS' i\lAKE-AT-HOME THINGS folded where there are dotted Hues in the draw- ing and the squares that were cut are carefully pasted underneath the two uncut squares on each side, forming a square box foundation. Invert rotdina /or Ts-^U and 3tovc. rotdtn^ /or Chatr. fblcCi-rta /or 3^ \ t ,^ 1 N if #^%' ^^ $ ^ * *4 ^^^-SB' €SSS <^ (a) necklace made of corn and IVEANS; ACORN NECKLACE (b) poppy flower CHAIN (C) NECKLACE MADE OF BEANS OF CONTRASTING COLORS TEN NECKLACES THERE never was a little girl yet who did not love to "dress up," whether she lived in the town or in the country. It is fun to wear mother's apron tied on at the back and trailing along the ground for a train. It is fun to dress up in grandmother's shawl, but the greatest fun of all is to wear a necklace. The city child can't do that sort of dressing up very often. City mothers' necklaces are too fine for little girls to wear, but it is very different in the country. There a child may string as many chains as she likes. She may have a necklace for almost every month in the year. They grow on bushes in the country — do necklaces. Listen, and you shall learn how to make ten. The prettiest necklaces of all grow in the sum- mer, and they are daisy chains. You may braid the long stems of the daisies and make the chains that way, or you may use just the blos- soms and string them together on a long, white thread. Then there are lilac bloom necklaces. The 71 ^2 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS lilac blooms are made up of so many tiny flowers. Take a fine needle, threaded double, with white thread, and string these tiny lilac blooms; white ones, or purple ones, or purple and white alternat- ing. They make the daintiest sort of a necklace to wear in the summer time. The grown-up per- son who is writing about all these necklaces opened one of her books the other day, and there, between the leaves was an old, old string of lilac blooms. It had grow^n quite yellow from being shut up so long, but it was a rather pretty sort of necklace, still. The grown-up person remem- bered a sunny day, once-upon-a-time when she sat in her grandmother's lap in a garden, way, way off; and her grandmother helped her make that lilac chain. And she almost wished, as she closed the book, that she could be a little girl again and make another string of lilacs. Summer doesn't last very long, but when it is over, there are the leaves to be made into chains. The smaller red and yellow maple leaves make the prettiest necklaces. They should be laid upon an ironing board, and pressed with a medi- umly hot flatiron which has some beeswax rubbed on. By pressing the leaves they keep their beautiful colors all winter, and they may be lapped one upon the other, and fastened together TEN NECKLACES ^^ with pins, or the leaf stems may be thrust through to fasten them. When Thanksgiving comes, a necklace of crim- son rubies may be made by stringing cranberries ; and a pop corn necklace will be almost as pretty as if it were made of pearls. If the little country girl knows where the ground was strewn with acorns in the woods last fall, and if she was a provident child and gathered a basket full, she may have a very charming acorn necklace. To prepare them for stringing, the acorns should be pierced with an awl through the cup end. If the nut is loosened from the cup, a drop of glue will hold it in place. Strong shoe thread should be used for stringing the acorns which are fastened by double stitches so that they will hang about an inch and a half apart, as seen in the illustration. A pendant for the necklace is made by stringing together four acorns and fastening them by a longer thread to the front of the chain. Kernels of yellow corn and the larger, flat, white melon seeds are most attractive material for a necklace. These seeds are too hard to be sewn through easily without soaking, but if they are allowed to lie for an hour in a cup of tepid water, and are then removed, and laid on a towel 74 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS to dry, they will be found perfectly soft and pli- able to work with. Heavy white thread and a rather coarse needle will be needed to make the necklace. A melon seed is put on the thread first, the needle being put through its longest di- mension. Four kernels of corn are then strung, the thread being fastened in the first kernel to hold the four together, and then passed through a second melon seed. The melon seeds and the groups of corn kernels alternate until the neck- lace is completed. When flowers, and leaves, and seeds give out as materials for necklaces, a little girl who is deft with her fingers will be able to make some dainty chains of colored paper, plain and tissue. The morning glory chain has, for a foundation, very narrow strips of green paper pasted and inter- linked. The morning glories are made of an ob- long piece of white crepe paper, pasted together in cup fashion and ruffled at the edge to look like a real morning glory. Dashes of blue paint are put also on the flowers and they are pasted, to- gether with some circular leaves cut from the same green paper that was used for the links, to the chain. A holly necklace has the chain links cut in holly shape from green paper. They are fastened to- TEN NECKLACES 75 gether by smaller links of narrow red crepe paper to which little circular berries made of red crepe paper are glued, covering and concealing the smaller links which join the holly leaves. Ten necklaces — but there are ten more for the sharp-eyed little country girl to find! The kernels of corn may be strung alone, alter- nating red kernels and white, or yellow kernels and red ones. The melon seeds may also be used alone. Dried peas, soaked as was the corn, look like real beads when they are made in a necklace ; and the many colored beans, red, and purple, and white, and black may be strung in the same way. Pine needles make a dainty chain. The very pointed end of the needle is thrust into the thicker end, forming a link. Another link is interlaced, and then another until a long green chain i§ finished. They are really countless necklaces instead of only ten for the clever little country girl. She may "dress up'' as gorgeously as any little prin- cess of fairy tale fame. RAFFIA WORK RAFFIA, once upon a time, used to be just plain, field grass of a specially long and tough variety. Then, someone discovered that when it was dried, it made fine, strong cord with which to tie bunches of flowers and leaves and ferns, so the flower man bought some of this raffia and kept a big bunch of it in his shop to use for string. Then, wonderful indeed, some other person found out that raffia wanted to play with a child. It wanted to be made by a child's fingers into all sorts of delightful things — napkin rings for the whole family, and a mat for father's desk, a picture frame for mother's picture, and a hat for the little girl's best doll. Since raffia really wants to make all these de- lightful things suppose we buy a pound and trans- form it into something pretty and useful. The florist will, doubtless, give a little girl a bunch of plain colored raffia, if she asks him for it very politely. Or, one may buy a pound of raffia at a kindergarten shop, where it comes spe- cially prepared and dyed in lovely colors, green, 77 y^ GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS or rose, or yellow, or blue. Then with a pair of scissors and a tapestry needle that is short and has a very long eye, a little girl is all ready to make these charming raffia things. First, the raffia will need to be soaked for a few moments in warm water to make it soft and pliable. Upon being taken from the w^ater it should be laid between two towels where it will be kept damp enough to be easily worked with, but not too wet. Now we are ready to make one of the napkin rings that is going to surprise the family some night at supper. A strip of card- board is cut an inch and a half wide and seven inches long, which is to be the foundation for the napkin ring. This strip is joined by a few stitches or a brass paper fastener, pushed through the two ends of the cardboard where they are lapped over each other. A wide strip of raffia is selected and it is passed under and over the card- board ring, winding it, and covering it until the end of the strip is reached. A second length of raffia is tied to the first and the weaving is con- tinued until the cardboard is covered completely, when the last end of the raffia is threaded into the needle and fastened on the under side of the ring where it will not show. In tying on new lengths RAFFIA WORK 79 of raffia, the knots must be kept underneath the winding where they will not show. After the napkin ring is finished, one will be able to make, very easily, a cardboard picture- frame. The foundation for the frame is card- board also, an oval that measures five inches by four inches and which has a center hole where the picture will show, measuring three inches by two inches. The cardboard frame is then cov- ered with a winding of raffia just as the napkin ring was, and when this is finished, a stifif paper back is glued on to hold the picture in place. When a child has learned how to wind raffia neatly and with the greatest care, he is ready to begin braiding it, and the braid can be made into the mat to hold father's desk lamp, or his ink well, or a vase of the flowers that a child brings in from the garden. Six wide lengths of raffia are selected, knotted together, and pinned to a table or window ledge. Then the braiding is begun, using two lengths of the raffia for each strand that the braid may be quite wide. The braiding should be kept loose. If the raffia is pulled tightly, the braid will be twisted and thin. As the ends of the raffia are approached, a new length is slipped in and 8o GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS braided with the others so that the joining;' does not show at all. \\'hen there is a line loni;- braid ready, perhaps a yard and a hall" lon<;-, the mat niav be beo-nn. The needle is threaded with a leni^th of raftia; then, holding" one end of the braid ilat, it is sewed ronnd and round with up and down stitehes, beini;' kept cjuite smooth and tlat. AX'hen the mat is as lari;e as one wishes it, the end of the braid is eut ott, and sewed neatly on the wrong* side of the mat to finish it. A best hat for the dc^ll, one that will eover her ])retty enrls and keej) her eyes shaded from the sunshine, is made like the little mat, of a braid o\ raflia. This braid should be a trille finer, though, than the one that was used for the mat. Three wide strands of raffia may be braided, and when the braid measures two yards in length, the hat may be begun. The top of the erown is sewed with a needleful of fine raffia stripped from a wider strand and is made like the mat, in spiral, flat fashion imtil it is as wide as the doll's head. Then the braid must be drawn a little tighter and bent down, being sewed in this way until the crown of the hat is about two inches high. The rim is started by holding and sewing the braid more loosely, almost full, and continuing it until a broad, drooping rim is finished, llie end of RAFl JA WORK 8i the raffia braid is fastened underneath the last row of tlie braid and is sewed as was the end of the mat. A doll's hat of ^reen raffia will be so pretty if it is trimmed with a wreath of wliite everlastings, llie little live- forever flowers that a child may find in the fields if he has sharp eyes. The wreath is made by laying the flowers, one head and one stem together, and tying each with a bit of thread. When the wreath is long enough, it is fastened to the crown of the hat by a bow of raf- fia. A hat of bright red raffia will be most be- coming for a doll with brown eyes and dark hair. One can buy a beautiful bright red shade of raffia. All this hat will need for trimming is a big red pompon made of the same material as the hat. To make the pompon, wind raffia thickly over a strip of cardboard two inches wide. Then slip it off, and sew it very securely through the center, leaving an end threaded to sew it to the hat. Snip the looped ends, and the little ball will fliuff itself out into a full ball which is sewed to the front of the hat. When a little girl has learned how to wind and braid raffia, she can, perhaps, make a long enough braid to sew into a big sun hat that mother or little sister will wear out in the garden. WHAT TO DO WITH AUTUMN LEAVES THE dictionary and the big atlas, and other every available book are full of them; the gorgeous tinted autumn leaves that you gath- ered and put between the book covers to press and keep. When the snow drifts, and the wind howls down the chimney, and play and games have lost their fascination, just take out this store of glori- ous leaves; maple, oak, and beech; red, orange, and soft toned brown in color and find some beau- tiful and artistic uses for them as a new kind of winter busy work. ■ To make a maple leaf keep its red color which reminds one of the red sunset that filled the sky that lovely fall afternoon when the leaf fell flut- tering down to the ground a child should give it a coating of wax. Mother's ironing board, her lump of parafiin, and one of her flatirons will be useful for waxing leaves. Cover the ironing board with a layer of newspapers that the wax may not penetrate to the ironing cloth and spoil it for mother's use. Lay the leaves on top of the 83 84 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS newspaper, right side up, and pass an iron on which has been ruhhed paraftin, over each leaf quickly. The flatiron should not be too hot, or it will scorch the leaf. Leaves coated in this way are glossy, tough, and what is l)est of all will keep their beautiful colors for a long, long time. With a table full of waxed leaves one is ready to make all sorts of pretty things. A little girl will delight in dressing up in colored leaves. Lay two leaves, one on top of the other, lapping a little way, that they may be fastened together with a pin, or a leaf stem which is snipped off with a pair of scissors. A stem is quite as secure a fastening and a very much prettier one than a pin. This way of lapping leaves and securing them is the foundation of all sorts of charming leaf costumes for little folks' play. A chain of leaves joined at the end forms a crown for a fairy king and queen. A longer chain of leaves can be hung around a little girl's neck and will trans- form her into a princess. A whole leaf dress can be made by pinning together long chains of leaves and fastening them to a child's waist in streamers that come as far as the knees. INIore leaf fes- toons are draped about the child's shoulders and wrists and arms. This lovely leaf dress changes a plain school frock into a costume fit for a fairy, AUTUMN LEAVES 85 and the child who makes it some Saturday after- noon can play the Babes in the Wood, Brunhilde, The Sleeping Princess, or any other forest fairy tale. There are other delightful uses for waxed leaves. One never has enough picture frames, and tiny waxed maple or beech leaves make a lovely frame. Select dark green, or tan, or brown cardboard for the frame. Cut it square with an oval opening for the picture, or circular with a round opening. In cutting a round pic- ture frame, a saucer or a small plate makes an excellent pattern and a butter plate may be drawn around as the pattern for the inner circle where the picture will show. When the frame is cut, a child is ready to decorate it. The round frame may have very small red and yellow maple leaves glued about the edge. The square, or oblong frame has bunches of leaves at the corner, also glued on. When the leaves are in place, a paper back and a cardboard support by means of which it may stand upright, are glued to the back of the frame, a picture is inserted and the frame is put under a pile of books to press and dry. Waxed leaves make lovely calendars. A long, narrow strip of gray or tan cardboard is cut, and a calendar pad that one may buy for a few cents 86 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS at the stationer's shop is mounted at the bottom of the cardboard. At the top a row of tiny waxed leaves is glued in an irregular line as if they were just fluttering down from a tree out in the woods. Two holes are punched in the upper edge of the calendar and a bit of gilt cord or ribbon is tied in by which to hang the calendar to the wall or father's desk. There is still another, and a most beautiful use to which you can put colored autumn leaves. Mounted on cartridge paper they make an artistic border for a room which has plain walls, or for the ugly plain space above the blackboard in a schoolroom. All sorts, and sizes, and kinds of leaves may be used for these borders but the effect will be better if leaves which follow out the same scheme of color are grouped on one border ; brown and gold oak leaves, or red and yellow maple leaves, or sprays of green maiden hair fern which may be waxed also, and make a most artis- tic border mounted on soft green or gray wall paper. To make a leaf wall border, find out first just how wide the wall space is which the border will cover. Then cut exactly the required width, as many strips of cartridge paper as will be needed to go around the walls. Lay these strips of paper AUTUMN LEAVES 87 flat on a table and scatter the waxed leaves over them as they look on a windy day out in the woods when the air is full of their whirling, dancing shapes. Some thought will be required to make an artistic arrangement of leaves. They should be grouped, not placed in rows. A small leaf has a larger one next it, and some are mounted with the stems up, and others will be attractive ar- ranged with the stems down. As soon as the arrangement of the leaves is decided upon, each leaf is carefully glued in its place on the paper, and a flatiron, a paper weight, or a book is laid for a fev/ moments on top of each to keep it per- fectly flat and smooth. When all the strips of paper are covered with leaves the effect is more beautiful than a real, store designed wall paper. The leaves dry quickly, and each strip is pasted to the wall with the ends carefully matched, just as the paperer does his hanging. The leaf border will last for a year, and longer, a beauti- ful reminder of the woods and the wide out doors. Waxed leaves will make needlebooks and pen wipers; such attractive, different, pretty ones. Choose two large maple or beech leaves that are as nearly as possible the same size. Mount them with glue on a piece of thin green or dark red leather and then cut the leather close to the edge 88 GIRLS' i\lAKE-AT-HOME THINGS of the leaf, leaving the outline. These form the covers of a needlebook, and if the mounting is done securely, and the leaves were thoroughly coated with wax, they will make substantial and durable needlebook covers. Some patches of flannel are put between, the covers are tied to- gether with ribbons at the stem end of the leaves and the dainty needlecase is done. A pen wiper made of chamois in book form may have one or two waxed red ivy leaves mounted on the front for decoration, while the squares of chamois are tied together with a bit of red ribbon which just matches the color of the leaves. Who would have thought that there were so many beautiful and dainty uses for leaves? And one will be able to keep them until winter is over and trees and shrubs awake to burst into real leaves again. GARDEN GAMES A GAME that you play out in the garden or in a meadow, or a country lane is just twice as much fun as any indoor game. With the sun smiling down on you, with the fresh wind blow- ing your curls and your cap, and with no roof but the blue sky you can romp, and shout, and play to your heart's content. No one will stop you, and no one will say — *Uess noise, please." There are some simple home toys you can make in the house some rainy day, and take out doors when the spring comes to help you in your play. They are the queer, old-fashioned toys that our grandmothers and mothers played with when they were little; cup and ball, ring toss, grace hoops, and in addition you can make a Japanese kite and every one of them is made with home materials. First, the cup and ball. The ball is of w^orsted, made upon a cardboard foundation. Ask mother for a bit of stiff cardboard that has come to the house wrapped about a parcel. From the card- board cut two circles that measure two inches 89 90 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS across. In the center of each circle draw rings that measure about a half inch in diameter, cut out these circles together and with a needle wind worsted over the edge of the cardboard circles and in and out the center holes. When you have wound in so much worsted that the needle will not go through the center hole, unthread the needle, and holding the worsted covered circles in your left hand, cut the worsted at the edge with sharp pointed scissors; then holding the circles a little way apart, tie a strong thread firmly between them. When you tear away the cardboard circles a fluffy, round little ball remains, and if you trim it down about a quarter of an inch it will be firm, hard, and ready for your play. The cup in which you are going to try and catch this ball is just a five cent tin funnel, bright and shining in the tinsmith's window. You can buy it, or perhaps mother will give you one of her kitchen funnels. Knot a long coarse thread and draw it through the center of your ball, tying the end to the handle of the funnel. Then toss the ball as high in the air as the string will let it go and try to catch it in the funnel, a fine outdoor play. A ring toss outfit is delightfully easy to make. Find an empty wooden soap box, turn it bottom GARDEN GAMES 91 side up, and saw the sides down to one-half their original height. This cutting down of the box may loosen it a bit so it will be a good plan to put a few more nails in the side to hold them firmly when the sawing is done. Next, saw a foot and a half length from a broomstick and glue it ex- actly in the center of the bottom of the box, which is the top of the game. Glue the sawed end, leaving the round finished end of the broom handle on top. When the glue has set, rub down the standard and box with sandpaper and paint both green with the kind of paint used for window blinds. The rings are embroidery hoops of graduated size wound with scarlet and green ribbons of narrow width. When the game is done, set the pole and box standard at the end of the garden path, and standing on the front steps see if you are able to throw every hoop over the broomstick. It was our grandmothers' mothers who named the game, grace hoops. They thought that tossing the gay little hoops up in the air from two crossed sticks and catching them again on one stick made a little girl agile and graceful. No doubt the motion does train muscles and the toy shops are selling very expensive sets of grace hoops and sticks now. They are not one bit nicer 92 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS though than the set a child can make, all himself, at home. Cut six straight, lilac branches into lengths that measure two feet, each. Three make each wand with which the game is played, and they are w^ound loosely together with string. Over this tying, wind green raffia tightly, using wade strips which will bind the lengths of lilac boughs firmly together. Lilac branches, or wil- low make the hoops with which the game is played. The lengths should be straight, pliable, and about two and one-half feet in length. Curve each branch into hoop shape, and tie it with string or strong thread. Last, wind it smoothly and firmly with raffia, and the game is done. To play grace hoops, each child needs two wands and one hoop. Two players stand, facing each other, and quite a distance, say the length of the garden path, apart. Each child holds her grace hoop on her crossed wands, and, releasing the wands quickly tosses the hoop to her partner who must catch it with one of her wands and return it in the same way that it was tossed to her. Both hoops are kept in the air at once, and the game is ever so much fun. Japanese kites are always in the form of bats, or queer shaped birds or dragons. They are most fascinating toys as a child sees them in the GARDEN GAMES 93 toy shop window, but you can make one all your- self very easily. Run down to the brook and gather some long pliable willow twigs with which to make the bird kite's skeleton. Two straight lengths will be needed, one about three feet long, and the other two feet long. Put the middle of the shorter stick across the longer one, one-third of the distance from the top. Then tie the two sticks firmly together at right angles to each other. Now, loop up each twig end, forming the body, head and wings of the bird, and tying them securely at the point where the first tying was done. Bright red tissue paper is going to cover this bird skeleton, but you must buy a tough, firm quality of paper that will not tear easily. Coat the entire framework of the kite with glue, and then lay it carefully upon a sheet of this red paper. Cut the paper a distance of a half inch from the kite framework and roll over the edge in just the same way that mother rolls a rufile hem. The paper will stick to the glued frame- work, and this makes a stifif, firm finish for the kite. On the right side of the kite mark the eyes, beak and wing feathers of a bird with India ink. This can be done with a piece of charcoal. Tie one end of a ball of light cord to the strong crosspiece of the kite, and it is finished, ready to 94 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS fly over the fields and the fences, and as far as you can run with it. And when you have made one cup and ball, one ring toss game, one set of grace hoops, and one bird kite for yourself — go to work and make some of these outdoor games for the child next door who is not as clever with her hands as you are. FUN WITH PICTURE POST CARDS SUCH a crop of gaudy colored post cards as the vacation left in its wake! Post cards from the country, post cards from the seashore. Post cards from away across the ocean with pictures of the quaint scenes and queerly dressed little folks from these far away lands. Poor old Uncle Sam has been obliged to make himself double as many mail bags since the picture post cards came into fashion, and one wonders that he has not struck, but Uncle Sam is a jolly old fellow. He knows what a delight it is for a child to receive such very pretty mail — a gay picture from the person he loves with a cheery message right on the outside close to the color. So our long suffering Uncle Sam goes on dropping post cards in the mail boxes, and the friends keep right on sending more. Sometimes a little girl has as many as a hundred — and what shall she do with them? Of course every one thinks that the proper place for a picture post card is inside a neat, tidy, post card album. Shut in between two black 95 96 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS covers the post card has to stay and it never sees the world again after its journey in the mail train is over. A post card album is a very good place for very unusual post cards such as foreign ones, and those having pictures of very special places, but the ordinary picture post card doesn't care to be stuck in an album. What do you think it likes best of all ? Why, it likes to play. When the long, cloudy fall afternoons come, and vacation days are so far away, that one al- most forgets there ever were any, the little folks may gather in front of the nursery fire with scis- sors and paste and ruler and pencils — and, best of all, every one of the picture post cards that w^ants to play. First, one may build houses and castles and bridges with them on the hardwood floor. The foundation for the building will be the tent form that every child knows how to make with a box of dominoes or a pack of playing cards. But the forms one builds with picture post cards will be much prettier than any domino houses, as one piles tent upon tent carefully and skillfully. Next comes a whole dolls' house made of pic- ture post cards. The little post card screen in the picture shows how the walls of the dolls' house can be made. A long strip of cardboard or FUN WITH PICTURE POST CARDS 97 heavy paper should be cut a Httle wider than the longest dimension of a post card. Some of the most attractive cards are then carefully pasted, side by side, on the strip of cardboard just a little distance apart to allow the cardboard to be bent. The finished screen may then be folded to form a little enclosure which one may easily use for a dolls' house if it be set up on the nursery table. The furnishings for the dolls' house can also be made of post cards. A little care should be exercised in selecting the most decorative cards for the furniture. The easiest piece to begin with is the little dolls' table shown in the picture. The top of the table is just a square cut from a Dutch post card, the square first being marked with ruler and pencil so that the picture on the card will come in the center of the table. The chair is a little more difficult to do, but not too difficult for a careful child. The end of a post card which has two little Dutch figures is selected for the back of the chair, the top being cut out to show the two little heads, and the bottom of the card is bent up in a quarter inch flap to fasten it to the seat. The seat is cut to fit the back from a scrap of a windmill scene that decorated the same post card, and it is glued to the back. Four of the kindergarten sticks are glued on for the 98 GIRLS' i\lAKE-AT-HOME THINGS chair legs which will make it quite strong enough to hold a tiny doll. A desk for the post card house can be made in the same way as the chair, save that more of the picture on the card may show. In place of the kindergarten sticks, toothpicks may be used for the furniture supports. By piercing holes in the cards with a coarse needle or embroidery stiletto, the toothpicks may be in- serted and, although not quite as strong as kindergarten sticks, they will hold the parts of the furniture together very nicely. A little girl will be able to make all sorts of other doll furnish- ings with post cards, beds, dressers, and book shelves. A charming puzzle can be made of picture post cards. As many cards as one can spare are cut into pieces, either in strips, triangles, or after the manner of the perplexity puzzles. If one likes, the cards may be mounted on heavy board before they are cut so as to make the pieces stronger. After the cards have been cut, the pieces may be put in a box and the children who are playing the game may draw a certain number of them, trying to fit them together to form the original cards. The child who makes the most cards from the pieces wins a prize. FUN WITH PICTURE POST CARDS 99 There are more picture post card plays, but with all these it remains for the children to guess the others. Who can think of something else to do with a picture post card that doesn't like a post card album, but just wants to play? BEAD NECKLACES GLASS and porcelain beads may be found at almost any shop where craft materials are kept. They cost very little, and come in strings of lovely color. The only other necessary ma- terials for bead craft are some coarse needles, and strong white thread. Dental floss is an ex- cellent thread for bead stringing as it never breaks. Coarse, white buttonhole twist is equally good. A daisy chain is a simple necklace to begin with as the beads are all strung on one thread. It is so dainty that a child will take great delight in making it. Some green, and white, and yel- low beads will be needed for the daisy chain. A needle is threaded with white floss or linen thread, and one bead is tied to the end of the thread to hold the rest, as a knot may slip through and spoil the chain. Sixteen green beads are then strung on the thread. Next, eight beads are strung which are to form the petals of the daisy. To shape the flower, the needle is slipped through the first white bead, a lOI I02 GIRLS^ MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS yellow bead is strung to indicate the center of the flower, and the needle is put through the fifth white bead. Now, if the thread is drawn rather tightly, the little bead flower will be complete. Sixteen more green beads are put on, and a sec- ond flower, the pattern being continued until the chain is finished. A number of color variations may be had. Yellow beads for the petals of the flower, and a black bead for the center will make a black-eyed-Susan instead of a white daisy. Pink beads with yellow centers will make a wild rose chain, and a forget-me-not chain may be made by using pale blue beads for the flower. The next step in our bead craft will be string- ing with two threads. Two rather long strands of floss are tied together at one end and a bead is tied in at the fastening. Each end of the floss is then threaded with a number five needle. Both needles and the threads are then passed through the beads. At the third bead, the threads are separated, and two beads are strung on each. The strands are brought together again and three beads are strung doubly as in the beginning. The double and single stringing is continued until the chain is finished. If pale green beads are used for the double stringing, and those of a darker shade for the single threads, BEAD NECKLACES 103 a four leaf clover chain will be the result. Any soft contrasting tints may be combined with charming effect. As a variation of the double chain, seeds may be used with the beads. Melon seeds, if they are soaked for a few minutes in tepid water will be- come soft and pliable for craft work, and they are almost as strong, and quite as pretty as the beads themselves when they are used for a little girl's necklace. The seed necklace is started in the same way as the first double chain. There are two strands, fastened together at one end with a knot and one bead, and each is threaded with a coarse needle. Each strand is next strung with beads for a distance of perhaps two and one-half inches. Then one needle is passed through a melon seed, and the second needle also, the seed being pushed up close to the two strings of beads, and fastening them together. The strands are separated again, and each is strung with exactly as many beads as before. A second seed is strung, and the chain is continued in this way until it is long enough for the small girl's neck. A chain made almost entirely of watermelon seeds, strung together with beads is a trifle more difficult to do, but it will be very dainty when it is I04 GIRLS' MAKE- AT-HOME THINGS finished. Two threads will be needed for this necklace also, and two needles. A bead is tied to the end of each thread and the two threads are laid on a table or in one's lap, side by side. Five beads are then strung on the thread at the right and the needle at the left is passed through these five beads, and the thread is drawn up tightly. A melon seed is then strung on each thread. Five more beads are put on the strand at the left, and the opposite needle is passed through the five making a square. More seeds are strung, and more beads are put, alternately, on the threads, the opposite needle being passed through them always until the chain is the re- quired length. If the little girl who is adept in bead craft lives in the country, she may gather sweet grass and use it with the beads for her necklaces. Three strands of the grass may be braided for a dis- tance of a few inches. They are then separated and each is strung with a pale green, or a pink crystal bead. The strands are then brought together and braided the same distance as be- fore, and more beads are added. When the chain is finished the ends of the sweet grass should be t^ed securely together. When the small craftswoman is able to make NECKLACES MADE OF BEADS AND SEEDS PAINTED r.ORDEKS FOR THE DOLI>S HOUSE BEAD NECKLACES 105 all these chains, she will find that she can invent some new styles in necklaces for herself. She will discover the way to string new bead flowers. She will be able to copy the real flower colors in her bead work. She will have a necklace for every day in the week, and one for Sunday, too, perhaps, to wear with the best white Sunday frock. WHAT A BOX OF PAINTS WILL DO A CHILD'S box of paints usually does ex- actly what it should not; it daubs itself and everything else, including pinafores, blouses, and fingers. It mixes its colors in very strange ways, and dirties its cover, and leaves its brushes all thick and full of color when it finishes with them. But this is really not the way that a box of paints likes to play. It only daubs and is un- tidy because a child does not help it properly to make beautiful things. Listen, and you shall find out just what won- derful things a box of paints will do if you only give it a chance. The best kind of paint box to buy is one made of tin, and it holds eight cakes of soft, water color paints; red, orange, yellow, green, blue, violet, black, and brown. The first six colors are the bright colors that the rainbow gives us, and with the brown and black paint they can be made darker if one wishes. A tin box containing these eight cakes of paint costs only twenty-five cents at a Kindergarten shop, and as soon as a 107 io8 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS cake of paint is used up another one in a little tin pan may be bought to replace it for three cents. A long handled, thick, Japanese brush is the best to use, and may be bought for five cents. With a pad of white water color paper, a cup of clean water, and a soft cloth for wiping the brush after it has been washed, a little girl is ready to go to work, painting. First, one must learn how to put on a wash. That doesn't mean really washing, but just covering a space on a sheet of paper with paint smoothly, and neatly, so that it will be just the same color all over. Select a rather large sheet of paper and fasten it by means of thumb tacks at the corners to a drawing board. Dip the brush in the pan of water and then fill it full of paint by rubbing it gently round and round on one of the cakes of paint; green, perhaps, and then you can use the finished sheet to paper the walls of a dolls' house. In filling the brush with paint, and in painting, too, be careful not to flatten the brush. Keep it pointed, and then it will do very much better work. When the brush Is ready, holding it up almost straight, begin covering the paper with paint, drawing the brush back and forth with long. A BOX OF PAINTS 109 steady strokes, and trying not to let it show where one stroke ends and the other begins. As soon as the paint in the brush gives out, fill it full again and continue painting until the paper is covered. It will take quite some practice be- fore one is able to put on a wash well, but once this is learned one will be on the road to fame as a little artist, because it is the first thing that a real painter learns how to do. The soft, green washed paper may be cut the right size and pasted to the walls of a dolls" house, making very attractive wall covering. At the top of the paper there may be a painted bor- der, made also with the little box of paints. Making water color borders is the next step in learning to paint after a child has grown skilled in putting on a wash. There are so many pretty patterns you can use as a unit of design. For a border, the unit is the figure which you draw on a narrow strip of paper and repeat over and over again at equal spaces until the border is long enough to go around the top of a doll's room. A three-leafed clover is a simple border design for a child to draw himself, and paint. A penny will help in making the leaves quite round. Lay the penny down on a strip of paper and draw no GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS three circles that overlap a little at the center. A row of these clover leaves makes a lovely bor- der for the dolFs room, whose walls you covered with the green painted wall paper. Each clover after it is drawn is filled in carefully with green paint. If you know how to draw brownies, you can paint a brownie border. Draw the nicest brownie you can as the unit in your border. Lay a sheet of tracing paper over him, and with a soft pencil draw the little man's outline. Transfer the outline to the strip of paper that you are going to use for your border by retracing it, and draw ever so many brownies in a row on the border. You can have ever so much fun painting the brownies. Some may have red coats and jackets and brown trousers, some can be dressed in orange and brown, and others will be very gay in suits of red and green. Another way to make a border is to try and sketch your own unit of design instead of tracing it. Just look out of the window and you will see ever so many things that you will be able to copy, and then fill in the outline with a dainty water color wash. The leaf that the wind has just pulled from a tree and sent fluttering down to the sidewalk is very easy to draw, and it can be col- ored a beautiful red, or yellow, or brown. A A BOX OF PAINTS in yellow dandelion may be repeated on a border, or a black and yellow daisy, or a pansy, all of which are flowers that any child can draw. A simple outline of a bunny with a short tail and a pair of fine, long ears makes a very artistic border for a dolls' house room and looks like the pictures the little Japanese children like to paint. When you have learned how to make borders, you can begin painting dainty cards to send to some other child who has a birthday. Mother will buy you a sheet of water color paper from which to cut the cards. One sheet of this paper should make as many as two dozen cards if it is cut carefully. In the corner of each card, draw or trace from a picture book a figure of a toy, or an animal, or a flower, or your precious Noah's Ark. Then fill it in with color, smoothly and carefully with the same steady brush strokes you learned when you first began putting on a wash. In the plain space of the card letter, neatly, the child's name to whom you are going to give it, and it is done. A long, narrow strip of the water color paper can be decorated with paints and used for a cal- endar back. Paint a long, brown twig across the upper part of the card using the point of the brush. At the end and sides of the twig and 112 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS fluttering away from it down the paper, paint, free hand, some Httle red leaves. At the long edge of the card paste a tiny calendar pad and hang the calendar to the wall over father's desk by a length of red ribbon. There are just two or three rules for the little artist to remember and then she will soon become expert in the art of brush and color work. Always hold the brush lightly so as to secure freedom of stroke. Take long strokes, begin- ning at the top of the paper and moving from side to side slowly downward. Have plenty of water on the brush so the color will not dry before a stroke is finished and spoil the neatness of the painted surface; and always wash a brush thor- oughly, drying it on a soft cloth before using another color. WORK BASKET TREASURES GRANDMOTHER'S big sewing basket stands in the corner of her room, full to the brim and running over with all sorts of delightful things, big and little spools, buttons of every size and color, flat, wooden button molds and pins, long, short, fat, and thin. Grandmother sews almost all day long. She begins when the sun shines in through her white curtains and over the gay red geraniums in the window box. She keeps on mending the stock- ings and patching the holes and darning the tears until the sun is ready to go to bed and drops his big yellow head down behind the orchard. If you put your little red chair by grand- mother's big yellow rocking chair, and help her as much as you can, threading needles, and picking up scraps from the floor, and finding grand- mother's spectacles when she loses them, she will give you some of her work basket treasures. Empty spools and buttons and even pins make fine playthings if you only know how to use them. 113 114 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS Small, empty spools make the most fascinating little dolls' trees. Paint as many as grandmother has used the twist from green with your paint box. They may need two coats of paint for the wood of the spool is soft and absorbs the paint. When you have succeeded in making them bright green, stick a burnt match in the hole of each empty spool. Cut long, narrow strips of green tissue paper and fringe them with grand- mother's embroidery scissors. Wind each burnt match with one of these strips of paper and glue it. You will have made a number of pretty little green shade trees to set in rows along the win- dow sill. It is a tiny boulevard now, instead of a window sill and a doll may walk along it between the trees that line the street on either side. A very fat, long spool that grandmother's basting thread came on, makes a road roller for your play boulevard. If you have a Noah's Ark, one of the wooden horses will be just the right size to draw this spool road roller. If you haven't a little wooden horse, two animal cracker horses fastened together in a span by means of a long pin will do finely for this play road work. Tie a length of coarse thread through the spool and fasten the horses to the end. You can pull WORK BASKET TREASURES 115 the spool road roller back and forth along the window sill street and roll it down into fine con- dition for the little carriage that is to take the paper dolls out for an airing in the sun and be- tween the lines of spool trees. It is to be a two-wheeled trotting sulky. Two of the big button molds like those that grand- mother covered with blue cloth and sewed on your new coat make the wheels of the cart. On each button mold paint bright red or green spokes so that they will look like real wheels ; or they may be painted all over some bright color. When the paint has dried, find a coarse, strong wooden toothpick and stick each end in one of your button mold wheels. Cut an empty thread box in half, crosswise, and glue it to the tooth- pick axle, making the body of the little sulky. Two more toothpicks make the shafts of the wagon and a bit of cardboard from the other half of the box makes the seat. Four button molds having halves of burnt matches whittled down to points and inserted in the holes for axles form the wheels of a little farm wagon that will bring the dolls in from the country, and along the window sill boulevard. The body of the wagon is a whole empty spool box, into the sides of which the free ends of the ii6 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS whittled matches that hold the wheels are in- serted. At the end of the window sill you can build a spool elevator. A very long, narrow box placed on end, makes the shaft of the elevator. Near the top on each side punch a hole. These holes should be opposite each other. Through an empty thread spool thrust a meat skewer or a bit of reed such as is used to make baskets. Insert this in the holes of the box elevator shaft so that the spool will act as the upper wheel of the ele- vator and form a pulley. A small box makes the elevator. In each of the sides, holes are punched and strings of equal length are tied in the holes, and knotted together at the top. A string, as long as the elevator shaft is high, is then tied to the four knotted strings that suspend the elevator and the other end is carried over the pulley. The spool can be revolved by pulling one end of the string and in this way the box elevator is pulled up and down the shaft. All the paper dolls who have driven the length of the window sill boulevard in the button mold sulky or the farm sulky may pile into the spool elevator and be lifted up so high that they can see out of the upper sash of the window and over the garden — a wonderful view for dolls. WORK BASKET TREASURES 117 What can you do with the stray pins and needles in grandmother's work basket? Oh, so many things! But the nicest of all is to make them into hat pins and breastpins for dolls. A large darning needle from which grandmother just broke the eye will make a pin to fasten on a doll's picture hat. Take one of the red candles that was left from your birthday cake. Melt it in the flame from the fireplace and then roll it into ball shape on the end of the broken end of the darning needle, making the head of the hat pin. Grandmother will surely be surprised to see all these wonderful play treasures that came out of her work basket; trees, road rollers, wagons, an elevator, and doll jewelry. You see she did not know that they were hiding there. WORSTED PLAYTHINGS FOR THE BABY WHAT shall we give baby to play with ? He loves toys just as much as you do, but he does not understand yet just how to play. He wants to throw his playthings upon the floor. He would like to squeeze them because he loves them so dearly. He would even like to chew them. He has probably been surfeited with rubber dolls and animals. Why not make him some gay worsted toys that will be unbreakable, and may be squeezed, and even chewed without any material damage resulting? They are so simple that the smallest sister can make them. In addition to giving the baby de- light, they will furnish the other children with fascinating busy work for many days. Germantown worsted is most satisfactory to use in this work. It is coarse enough to be easily handled without knotting, and the finished play- things will be large and soft for the baby to hold and cuddle. Several skeins of Germantown will be needed, in the rainbow colors, and black and white. A large bone crochet hook should be pur- J19 I20 GIRLS' MAKE- AT-HOME THINGS chased also, and some scraps of baby ribbon will be found useful. We will begin the baby's gifts with some charming worsted dolls. A simple doll for a little girl to make is a worsted baby. A whole skein of white German- town worsted is tied tightly in the center with strong white thread. Holding it by the center where it was tied, the ends are brought together and the skein is again tied tightly a distance of two and one-half inches from the first tying, mak- ing the doll's neck. The ends of the worsted are then cut loose so that the baby appears to be dressed in a long, white gown. Some strands of the worsted are separated at each side and are braided from the neck for arms. These arms should be cut the required length and tied with thread to indicate the doll's wrists. A darning needle is threaded with black worsted and is used to make some long stitches in the doll's face to indicate the eyes, nose, and mouth. There should be a bow of blue wash ribbon for the doll's hair ribbon and some ribbon also tied around her neck. She will prove a splendid bedtime doll and she may also be fastened to the front, of the go-cart when the baby goes out for his daily airing. WORSTED PLAYTHINGS 121 Black Germantown worsted is used to make a mammy doll who will look like the baby's own nurse. This doll's construction is identical with that of the baby doll, except that a third tying, three inches from her neck makes the belt of her waist. Stitches of white show the mammy's features. A square of red and white checked gingham is knotted about her head, and fastened with thread for a turban. The little girl sister can make a white apron with shoulder straps for the mammy, and the baby will have a lot of fun with his soft, black doll. All babies love rattles. A ribbon bolt may form the foundation of a homemade worsted rat- tle. Through some holes punched in the end of the ribbon bolt with a stiletto some beans are in- serted to make a noise. A circle of scarlet worsted is crocheted to fit the end of the ribbon bolt, and a strip that will cover the outside is cro- cheted also. These are sewed together over the bolt, forming a cover. A crocheted cord is fastened to the rattle, and forms a string by which the baby may shake the toy. The cord may be crocheted long enough to go around his neck when the rattle will look exactly like a gay red drum. There isn't anything which so fascinates a 122 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOiME THINGS baby as a ball. If the very little baby is given six soft worsted balls of tlie rainbow colors to play with, they will do nuich toward opening his eyes to the color in the world abont him. The small sister can make a set of rainbow balls for the baby, and, at the same time, learn deftness of fingers herself. Strips of cotton batting are rolled for the fonndation until a ball three or four inches in diameter is formed. This should be wound with gray yarn that it may keep its shape. Last, a cover is crocheted for the ball. This is done in plain crochet stitch, widening every other stitch until the cover is cup shape, and will fit snugly over the ball foundation. Then it should be slipped over the ball and the remainder cro- cheted, narrowini?- until all of the ball is covered. A long end of the worsted is left to sew the cord by which the ball swings. The cord is twisted in four strands and knotted at the end. The knot is pushed through the cover of the ball at the top that it may be secure, and it is sewed in place. Six of these balls may be made and covered — red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and violet in color. A still softer worsted ball for the baby is made on a cardboard foundation. Two cardboard discs five inches in diameter are cut with center holes measuring an inch and a half across. WORSTED PLAYTHINGS 123 These discs are put together. A long thread of the Germantown worsted is tied to the discs, and is passed up through the center hole and over the outside. When the thread gives out, a second is tied on, and the process is continued until there is space for no more worsted in the hole. The center of the ball must then be sewed very se- curely with a thread of the worsted which is left long enough to form a loop for the baby's hand. The edges of the ball are then cut with sharp scissors, the cardboard discs are torn out, and the worsted ends fly out, forming a dainty, fluffy little plaything. CORK TOYS Ur ill ll)c ,'illic ill a far corner wli(*r(t tlic eaves almost liidc it, stands j^raiHlniollier's ])asket of corks. It is a most fascinating, treasure sort of ])askel, full of corks of every size and shape. Grandmother collects them every winter, and washes them, and ]>uts them in the hasket to save for lier fall canninj.^ ancl ]>reservin^. There are lonj4", slraij^iit corks for tlie liottles r>f catsup and ^rape juice, and hij^" flat crirks for the jars of chili sauce, and middle sized flat ones for the hottles of (jran^e .and ^rajje fruit jam. Perhaj)S, some day, when a child doesn't know what to do next, when he is tirecl of dolls, and trains, and ])icture hooks, ^ranchnotlier will let him ^o up to the cor- ner of the attic where th(! crjrk hasket stands and make some fine, strong little cork toys. A dolls' lunise, the dr)ll lady herself, who lives in the house, some furniture, a stove, and a tahle and a chair for the house! All these, and more, too, a child can make witli corks. it will he a new kind of ]>lay, and ever so much fun to sit down on the floor with a jackknife, and 126 GIRLS' MAKE- AT-HOME THINGS the glue bottle, and some pins, and make all these cork toys. The table is one of the least difficult pieces of furniture, so we will make it first. A large, flat cork is fastened to a long, narrow one by a drop of glue, and the little table is done, all ready to be set with some of the smallest toy dishes a child owns. After the table, the stove can be made. One of the big flat corks is glued to one of the middle-sized flat ones. The stovepipe is made of three long straight corks glued together, and then fastened to the back of the stove. A cork chair has four long pins stuck in a middle-sized flat cork for legs. A row of pins is put in the back of the cork half-way around, and brown worsted or very narrow strips of cloth cut from one of the scraps in grandmother's piece bag is laced in and out of these pins to form the back of the chair. There can be ever so many cork chairs with red, or green, or yellow rag backs; and worsted is pretty, too, to use for the lacing in the pins. In making a chair, the pin legs should be put in care- fully or the chair will not stand straight. The cork house is a little more difficult to make than cork furniture, but when it is finished, it will look like a real little log cottage standing in some play woods for a doll hunter or a dolly summer CORK TOYS 127 girl to live in. The first step in making a cork house is to glue together some logs. Three long, straight corks like those grandmother puts in the catsup bottles will make a good sized cork log. One needs ever so many of these cork logs so it w^ill be a good plan to make them all at once and stand them up to dry as one works. When the glue is perfectly dry the logs may be piled up to make the side and back walls of the house and fastened together by pins thrust through at the center of the walls and at the corners. The door of the house is made by gluing rows of single corks on either corner of the side walls and half of a large, round cork may be put over the top of the door to make it look Colonial. Then comes the roof. Some of the cork logs are cut off at the top in a right angle and are fastened side by side with pins until there are two roof sections as wide as the side walls. They are then fastened together by pins and the entire little pointed roof is glued to the walls, completing the house. Why, a child couldn't find any dolls' house as nice in a toy shop, even. Now come the cork dolls. A little girl may have a whole big family of them and they are so light that they will float, alone, in the bath tub, or dance, alone, on a window sill if the window is 128 GIRLS' MAKE- AT-HOME THINGS raised a few inches to let in a breeze. First a child must find a middle-sized, flat cork, to make the doll's head. With a very soft pencil the doll's eyes, nose, and mouth and some hair are drawn on one side of the cork. A big, flat cork makes the doll's body. It will need to be shaped a little with the jackknife, but that is very easily done because cork is so very soft. The large cork is whittled down until it looks as nearly as possible like a doll's body with a neck and shoulders and waist. A hole is bored in the body, and one in the doll's head and the head is fastened to the body by means of a toothpick stuck in the two halves which lets the head turn, too. Almost anything will do for the cork doll's legs and arms. Two meat skewers may be stuck in the body by their pointed ends to make the arms, and two more will make the legs. Some rolls of cotton cloth, sewed with over and over stitches may be pinned to the cork for arms and legs. Twisted tissue paper will make arms and legs, too, but they will not last so long as the cloth. A cork doll is delightful to dress. It is so easy to stick pins in her body to hold on her clothes that one doesn't need buttons and buttonholes. She should have a very full petticoat, a dark homespun working dress, a white apron, and a CORK TOYS 129 wide frilled cap. A cork baby will not need any legs at all if she has a long dress, and she looks so cunning in a little white cap tied in a bow under her chin. A cork child will do for an Eskimo, too, because it has exactly the right complexion. It should be dressed in a pointed, white flannel cap and a long, white coat made of cotton batting. HOW TO MAKE CLAY TOYS WOULDN'T you like to make mud pies in the house? Suppose the mud were the clean, soft, white earth that the Indians used to mold into dishes, and the Mound Builders used for their beautiful, painted jars and the mason shaped into bricks. Then suppose you were able to make, not only mud pies, but marbles, and dolls' dishes, and snow men, and mice, and apples, and bears, and necklaces, and soldiers — more pretty toys than one can tell — all with this same clean, house-mud. Would it not be fine? You must buy five pounds of clay flour at a shop where artists' materials are sold. Clay may also be bought all ready mixed for use, and tinted in lovely colors, but mixing your own clay is part of the fun. You must ask mother to give you an old stone jar, and a strong iron spoon. Then put on a long apron that covers you all up, and then you will be ready for work. It takes ever so much time and patience to mix the clay flour well, and sometimes a child will want to hurry too much ; but the slower, and more 131 132 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS carefully you do it, the better will the toys be. Put part of the flour in the jar, and pour in a little water, stirring until it is the consistency of a thick, gray paste. Add more flour, and more water, and after awhile, when the clay begins to thicken, you may roll up your sleeves and put your hands right in, mixing it with your fingers. Presently you can take it out of the jar and lay it on a smooth board where it should be kneaded, and rolled, and pounded until it is very pliable and soft. A teaspoonful or two of glycerine kneaded in will help to soften it and make it more flexible for handling. Roll a tiny bit in your fingers and see if it cracks when you bend it. If it does not crack the least bit, you may know that you have mixed your clay very well. It may be kept in the stone jar for a long time without hardening. Wrap it in some damp cloths or in oiled paper, and lay it on an inverted tin basin which has been placed inside the jar. Cover the bottom of the jar with water that there may be sufficient moisture, and put on a tight fitting top. The clay will be found as soft in a number of weeks as when it was first put away. Now for the toys! Tools, someone said? But every child has ten tools on his two hands. A broad, flat paper knife may be used to help in HOW TO MAKE CLAY TOYS 133 shaping the clay, and a piece of brass wire ham- mered flat and fastened to a wooden handle is a good tool for fine work, but your ten fingers are really all the tools you need. Very good ones, too, you will find them! First, you must learn to make a perfectly round ball, smooth, and able to roll, and having not a single crack or corner. Did you ever think how many things there are in the world that look like balls? There are apples, and teapots, and sugar bowls, and beads, and people's heads, and little round furry cats, and pumpkins — one might go on all day, counting them. Take a piece of the clay and roll it round and round in the palms of your hands until it is quite spherical. Smooth the creases away with your thumb and see how many toys you are able to make with balls for the foundation. Some small balls may be strung on a strong piece of shoe thread, and a little heart locket made of a flat piece of clay is added to form a necklace. If one does not care for a necklace, the balls may be colored with water colors and they make very fine marbles after the clay has hardened. A teapot is made by adding a roll of clay for a spout, and a second bit, twisted to form a handle, to a larger sphere. Half a ball, hoi- 134 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS lowed with the thumbs does for the porridge bowl from which the little bear ate his supper. And it is possible to model all sorts of round fruits; grapes, oranges, apples, plums, and melons. Some more half spheres may be shaped and molded into dolls' tea cups, and the saucers and plates for the tea set are made by slicing a clay ball in sections and then molding the edges like those of real dishes. When you have grown very expert at making balls, you may attempt a cylinder. This isn't as hard as it sounds. It is only a smooth roll of clay with a flat, circular face at either end. A clay cylinder forms the foundation for a little bear's body, two smaller ones with some big paws added, will make his front legs, and his back legs are two more rolls of clay, having some broad, flat feet molded in place. His head is spherical in shape. Then the nose is pinched into the right position; his pointed ears are put on, and his features are traced in the soft clay with the wire tool. What else can one make from a cylinder foun- dation? There are drums, and firecrackers, and candlesticks, and tall windmills, and mallets, and dolls' pitchers, and toy pails and mugs. If you are big enough to know what an ovoid HOW TO MAKE CLAY TOYS 135 is — that really means just an egg shape — you will find that a clay ovoid can be changed to a mouse with a very long tail, or a pear, or a duck with toothpicks stuck in for legs, or a bunny with long ears. And a cone is the form you must shape with your clay if you want to make an Indian's wig- wam, or a carrot for the bunny, or a seashell. Then you can mold little clay bricks and build your own small houses, or model square blocks which may be used for walls, castles, and bridges. There isn't any end to the toys which ten clever fingers will be able to make with clay. Did you ever see so fine a soldier as this one? From his hat to the tips of his boots he is all clay, every bit of him. His soldier hat has a crown that is made in the form of a cone. The rim is rolled up at one side, and there is a coil of clay twisted about the rim to look like a cord. His head is a big ball with a nose, some eyes, and a mouth put on ; and be sure not to forget the buttons on his jacket. His jacket is cut rather square, and so are his shoes which come up very high over his trousers. His hands are large enough to hold a gun se- curely, and when he is finished, he should be able to guard the nursery from any sort of danger. 136 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS There are so many other toys waiting for you inside a lump of clay. And you, who are the cleverest child of all, will find them hiding there. Farmyard animals, and carts, and little clay dolls, and wild animals, there are, too, perhaps — just waiting for your ten fingers to pull them out. CLAY DISHES A CHILD CAN MAKE MAGIC TOYS AND HOW TO MAKE THEM THERE are men at all the street corners in a big city who have queer, magic toys to sell — toys which seem almost alive because they will really do things. Every child who goes on a visit to the city wants to spend all his vSpare pen- nies for the little tin clown that turns such clever somersaults on the sidewalk, or the monkey that climbs a stick, or the dancing bear. These city street toys break very easily, though. They are not half as satisfactory to play with as the magic toys which he can make himself with very ordinary materials ; just corks, and stiff paper, and peanuts. In addition to the fun one has making them there will be also the pleasure of a magic toy party some evening and inviting in a lot of his mates to show them how the live toys work and what they will do. The little cork ballet dancer is a very gay and lively creature. Her head is cut from a small cork, while a smaller one is shaped to represent her body. The head is fastened to the body by 137 138 GIRLS' MAKE- AT-HOME THINGS a bit of wire which is pushed down through both corks and the Httle lady is then dressed in full ballet skirts made of white tarleton, white crepe paper, or the dainty lace paper which comes in candy boxes. Four stout wires are run into the lower cork. This little dancer, you see, has four legs instead of two. Coarse broom straw will serve instead of bristles, or long pins that have round heads can be used. The cork dancer is then placed upon her four feet on the sounding board of a piano, and a lively two-step or jig is played. What do you suppose happens? Why, the little cork doll begins to dance gaily about, quite alone, and keeping time to the music. A most fearful, live sea serpent can be made of a piece of cardboard. The board should not be too thick and upon it is drawn the outline of a coiled serpent. A child can find a pattern for the serpent in a natural history book or a book which tells about the jungle and the sea. When the outline is drawn, with a pair of sharp scis- sors, carefully cut out the serpent, going round and round until the tip of its tail is reached. Paint it with water color paints a very bright green and gold in stripes. Fasten a thread through its tail and suspend it from the mantel- piece where the heat from the open fire reaches it, HOW TO MAKE MAGIC TOYS 139 or hang it from a chandelier. The slightest cur- rent of air makes the little toy serpent writhe and twist like a real snake. These serpents make splendid, gruesome room decorations for a Hal- low-e'en party. A most agile acrobat may be made of an old black kid glove. The first two fingers of the glove should be cut down to the second joint and the glove slipped on the child's hand. A pair of tiny doll's socks are put on the two first fingers below the gloves and the tips of the cut-off glove fingers may be put on over the socks for shoes. A cardboard figure, either of a soldier, a clown, a highlander, or a brownie is cut out, colored with paints or crayons and glued to the glove just above the cut fingers. The child then doubles up his remaining fingers so that they do not show at all and he makes the little acrobat dance upon a table on its nimble finger legs. Magic bags while they are not so gay in ap- pearance as these other live toys will furnish quite as much fun at a party. Some fortunes, funny and suited to the party guests are printed on slips of paper. Penny toys, too, to serve as jokes for the children are selected and one fortune and one toy are put in each small paper bag. The bags are ''blown up," tied tightly at the top with a bit I40, GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS of ribbon and one bag is given to each guest. After supper the bags are burst, furnishing a lot of noise, and the children find their toys and the fortunes. Hairpins and straws make acrobats. The straws may be bought at the apothecaries where they stand in big jars on the soda water fountain. One straw will make two acrobats. Loop two hairpins together and put straws on each wire of the lower pin, bending the hairpin ends up to form the little man's feet. The upper hairpin is strung wdth one short straw for the acrobat's waist and then the remaining ends are bent out and strung with straws for the arms. A third hairpin strung with a short length of straw for the head is bent out in similar fashion and in- serted in the sleeves to help make the acrobat's hands. Very fine, wire hairpins should be used, because the straws break so easily, but when the little figure is done it will, with a child's help, go through all the contortions of a real circus acrobat. The last magic toy is an apple witch. She has eyes, nose and mouth cut with a fruit knife from an especially large and rosy apple. She has cloves stuck in rows above her eyes for eyebrows, and cloves make her teeth as well. Her hair is HOW TO MAKE MAGIC TOYS 141 long shaving curls fastened to the top of her head with pins. Does a child wonder wherein lies the old witch's magic? Why just in this, the top of her head, her shaving curl wig comes right off if you lift it by the apple's stem and discloses a hol- low inside the apple filled with red and white candy peppermint drops. STRING CRAFT THERE is always so much string and twine that comes to the house with every parcel from market or shop. Usually, like the wrap- ping paper, it is looked upon as only waste ma- terial, and is consigned to the scrap basket, but it has play possibilities. Think of the tops that our waste bits of twine will help to spin. Think of the kites it will furnish with tails. Think of the cat's cradles it will make when the nursery fire burns low and the children sit about the hearth telling stories after tea. There are other possibilities in bits of string. As soon as a parcel comes to the house wind the string into balls, and save it for some stormy afternoon's busy work when one can't go out of doors, and the joys of games and books are exhausted. With a little practice you will be able to make whistle chains, school and lunch bags, horse reins, or a doll's hammock from this same ball of waste twine. The little hammock is not difficult to make and is very strong and attractive when it is completed. The size may be decided by the child who is mak- 143 144 CIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS ing" it, but twelve strands makes a doll's hammock of very good width. The lengths of string should be laid evenly together and bound about the middle by winding them in the center with an extra piece of twine. The short end of a bit of twine is laid on the middle of the twelve strands with the tip turning toward the left. Wind the long end round and round from right to left, binding the strands together for a dis- tance of three inches. The two ends of this bind- ing are brought together to form a loop, another bit of twine being wound about them, and the ends tied securely. A brass ring may be wound in with the binding to hang the hammock by. There are now twenty-four ends of string to knot together to form the body of the hammock. An ordinary sailor's knot will serve w'ell for the knotting. The strands of the hammock are then knotted in twos at a distance of three inches from the loop. In tying* the second row of knots, the left strand in the Hrst pair should not be tied in, and after knotting the row across, the right strand of the last pair is also left imtied. In starting the third row of knots the loose strand on the left side of the hammock is knotted in with the left one in the first pair of strands in this row. This method of tving is continued, the STRING BAG STKlNi; 1U)KSK KKINS STRING CRAFT 145 strands which are left untied at the sides of the hammock when the second, fourth, sixth, and all the other even numbered rows have been knotted are tied in with the outside strands in the follow- ing row. After the last row has been tied, the ends of the strands should be brought together, a new strand is started two inches from the last row of knots and the ends are bound tightly to- gether to make a loop similar to that at the begin- ning. When the loop is finished, the ends should be cut loose to the binding. A tapestry needle threaded in the end of the binding strand sews it through and through to make it secure, and the hammock is finished. A string bag that will be found very useful for carrying a school or picnic lunch may be made in almost the same way as the hammock, except that the ends are bound to form a loop. Each strand which is to be used for the bag should be pinned to a cushion, or fastened with a thumb tack to the edge of a table or a drawing board that they may be drawn taut. The knotting is done similarly to the knotting of the hammock, beginning perhaps four or six inches from the end. This is continued until the bag is double the required length. The knotted strip is then folded through the middle, the ends being brought 146 (;1KLS' MAKi:-AI-II()MK IIIIN(;S lof;"ctlicr, and llic sides arc sewed with coarse thread in an over and over slileh. 1lie loose ends of llie si rands are llien (ied in loops thronj^h wliicli a ril)l)on is passed to draw nj) (he lop ol llie ba^', or some small brass rim;s may l)e lied to the ends, and ribbon passed ibroni^b these. A red silk lining will make the bag stronger and also daintier. If twine of contrasting shades is nsed for the constrnction of the hammock and the bag -bine and pink, or red and green — the linishcd article will be more ellective. A piece o^ rather coarse string mnst be nsed for the whistle chain. It is cnt long enongh to fasten to the small boy's top coat bntton, and slip into his tronsers i)ocket. It is tied in sailor's knots, at distances n\ two or three inches apart, and a whistle is fastened to the end. When a boy has a whistle attached to a line, long whistle chain, he is ready for any emergency — a i)lay lire, or a police call, or any other sort of fnn. The horse reins are made of the same coarse twine as that which was nsed for the whistle chain. The reins shonld be two or three yards long, and knotted at intervals of fonr inches. A crosspiece has a bell tied into each knot, and it is fastened to each side of the reins far enongh from STRING CRAFT 147 the middle to allow for its being slipped over the boy's head. In addition to these string playthings, a toy fish net may be made with the fine cord. It may not catch many fish, but it will perhaps entice a minnow or two, or some innocent polliwog. Twenty-four strands should be used for the net and knotted at distances of three or four inches until the net is square. The loose ends may be tied to long willow branches. A butterfly net can be made of string. It is constructed like the string lunch bag, except that the knotting should be done closer together to form a finer mesh. One side of the bag is fastened to a long stick, and the other side is left loose. There are so many craft things to do with our discarded twine. After this, we are going to save every bit of it. HOW TO MAKE YOUR OWN PICTURE FRAMES THERE are so many photographs that a Httle girl just loves and wants to keep always. There is the picture of dear grandmother, the first she has sat for in, oh, ever so many years. There is the picture of the baby, and a snap shot of father in his camping suit, and a picture of mother, and one of Brother Tom, and one of her dearest friend, Dorothy. The very best way to keep all these precious pictures fresh and spotless is to put each one in its own picture frame and it is possible for a little girl to make, all herself, six pretty picture frames to hold these six pretty pictures. Dear grandmother's picture first. Tucked away in the corner of the attic is a bunch of dried sweet grass that you gathered on the farm last vacation. The very material to frame dear grandmother's white curls and soft eyes. Put the grass soaking in a basin of w^arm water and then cut out the foundation for the picture frame. It is a piece of oval cardboard four 149 ISO GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME IHINGS inches wide and six inches high. The oval hole for the picture is just the same shape as the out- side of the frame, and is cut an inch in from the outside. \Mien the cardboard is cut, the grass is soaked and is soft and pliable so you can dry it with a soft towel and begin winding it around the frame, covering the cardboard. When an end of the grass is not long enough, tie on an- other one, keeping the knot always on the wrong side, and soon a dainty green grass frame is fin- ished. Then lay the frame down on a piece of stiff paper and draw the outline of the back. Slip grandmother's picture inside the frame, and glue the back on to hold it in place. You may hang the picture and its frame by a loop of sw^eet erass to the wall of vour own little room where you will see it the first thing in the morning and the last tiling- at niq;ht. Father's picture comes next. A square of birch bark, with a square opening in the center for the picture makes his frame. There is a bit of birch bark in the attic with the sweet grass and it came from die very tree next father's camp so it couldn't be put to a better use than framing his picture. The baby's picture is made of chintz because you want it to stand on your dressing table and ■^Jk^ ;>* V-^''^ ^ '^■^, ^ L. ? ^ W =: < t^ ^ w ^- PICTURE FRAMES 151 the table is covered with chintz under the white Swiss cover. The foundation for the baby's frame is cardboard, a square that measures just six inches on each side. In the center of the frame there is an oval space for the baby's chubby face and the whole frame is covered with chintz, keeping the roses in the pattern at the top. When you cut out the oval in the chintz leave it a little wider than the cardboard opening and slash it with your scissors so that it will turn back neatly and smoothly. A second six-inch square of cardboard, glued to three sides of the chintz frame makes the back and the baby's pic- ture slips in nicely through the bottom open edge of the frame. In one of the cubby-holes of your desk there are some scrap pictures of wild animals. They are left from the last scrapbook, and they are colored and very gay — just the very decoration for Brother Tom's picture frame. Lay one of your largest doll's plates on a very clean piece of cardboard, draw a pencil line around it, and then cut it out. That is to be the shape of the wild animal frame. Then lay a dolls' saucer, exactly in the middle of the big circle and draw around this, also cutting it out to make the opening for Tom's picture. Why, it looks like a little circus 152 GIRLS' xMAKE-AT-HOME THINGS ring, this last picture frame ! Around the border of the frame, paste neatly a procession of the scrap picture animals and fit a paper back to the frame. When Brother Tom's photograph looks out through the animal frame, it is really smiling just as any boy would smile at a circus. How shall we frame mother's picture, dear mother who is always so busy mending, and bak- ing, and picking up toys, and amusing the chil- dren? Find your paint box and open your school reader at the pages where the sunbonnet babies are drawn, queer little figures in red bon- nets and red dresses and white aprons to keep the red dresses clean. Why, you could trace the pictures with some thin paper, turn the paper over and transfer the sunbonnet child to the square picture frame you have just cut. Draw busy sunbonnet babies sewing, in two corners of the frame and toys in the other corners. Paint them red just like the pictures and make a card- board back for the frame for mother's picture. There is only one picture left now without a frame, the photograph of Dorothy, such a splen- did chum and always ready for any sort of a romp. Her picture frame is made seven inches wide and nine inches long, with an oval opening in the center through which Dorothy's merry PICTURE FRAMES 153 face will peep out at the brownies that decorate the frame. Trace the brownies from your brownie book on white drawing paper and then cut them out. Their queer little pointed caps, and their pointed shoes, and their jackets you can paint black with ink, and the top brownie sits on a stone wall with an orange paper jack-o'-lan- tern at his side. The brownies and the pumpkin are pasted neatly to the frame, with no spots of paste anywhere to spoil it. It is really hard to tell which of the frames is the prettiest when they are finished. HOW TO MAKE A SCHOOL BAG THE materials for the bag are a half yard of heavy gray canvas, a skein of crimson rope silk, a little white muslin cloth, and some scraps of red, orange colored, russet brown, and moss green cambric or sateen. The canvas comes in different widths, but the thirty-six inch width is the most suitable for a school bag. First, cut from the canvas a strip two and a half inches wide. This should be cut across, and not in the direction of the selvedge, because the selvedges are to be used for the hems. This strip is to be laid aside and used later for the strap for the bag. Next, turn each selvedge in to form a hem four inches wide. Only one turning is necessary be- cause there are no raw edges. Then crease the material across three inches below this fold, so that you will have a straight guide to sew by, for the sewing is to be done on the outside, and must look well. If you are a good little seamstress, you may sew this across with a chain stitch, or a feather 155 156 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS stitch, but the easiest way for small hands is a simple back stitch. To do this, the thread should be started from underneath near the right hand end. Then the needle is put down through the canvas a short distance back of this and brought up through an equal distance ahead of it. The next stitch goes back to the starting point and again ahead, so that the appearance when it is done is like machine stitching. If you don't understand from this how it is done, I am sure mother will show you. When these hems are both done, the cloth is ready to be made into a bag. Each raw edge is to be turned in a quarter of an inch and creased, and the two hems folded until they meet. The two edges at each end are to be basted together, and backstitched firmly to make a strong seam. The crimson rope silk looks very bright and pretty against the gray of the canvas. This forms a bag measuring fourteen inches high by fifteen wide, which is quite large enough to carry all the books you need to bring home. The strap is the next thing to be made. Take the strip which you first cut from the canvas, and fold each raw edge in a quarter of an inch. Then fold these two sides to meet each other and backstitch them together with the silk. This DECORATION FOR CHILd's SCHOOL BAG nF(.'OKA riox i-i^K rii 1 1 i> s M lut'M i;ai; now '{() MAKE A S('[fO()L P>AC; 157 iTinkes a strong flat stra]j ihirty-six inches long and <)]\c incli wide. It is to he fastened tightly to the imderside of the hag at each encL You must ni.'ike lliis fastening esjjecially strong, for it is to hear tJic whr)le weight of the hooks. Now you are ready to decorate the hag, and this is wliere you will he ahle to make the hag as jjretty and as unlike the other girls' as you please. i^'or the decoration shown in the picture, some ducks were selected, and grass, and a tree. iJid you ever see ducks waddle? They never run in a flock as chickens do, hut almost always in Indian file, ''one follows after, and one hehind" — right foot, left foot — all tliC right feet together, and all tlie left feet, and then suddenly they all sto]> and wag their little jjointed tails. These ducks are sort of nursery ducks, on red standards like those the little tin soldiers have, hut I have made them follow each other as the real ducks do, and each is a little smaller than the one hefore it, for each is a little farther away. Tlie first jjart of this decoration to he made is the grass, h'or tliis you should take a piece of the green sateen frjurteen and a half inches long and slanting at the lojj in an irregular line from six inches at one end to ahout seven and a half at 158 cnULS' MAKE-AT-HOME TIlINCiS the other. This ^ives the appearance of a side of a hill with little huininocks on it. Next cnt from the russet hrown sateen a strip which will look like a part of a hig old tree trunk, which will reach just ahove the top of the hill and have a sut^gestion of hranches, the ends of which are hidden hy some irregular pieces of green sateen which look like masses of leaves seen from a distance. Of course, the whole tree is so very hig that you couldn't possihly put it all on. It shows just as a tree sometimes shows in the cor- ner of a picture, with more of it out of the picture than there is in it. Now that the landscape is done, you may jnit in the ducks. First draw a simple pattern, which you may copy from a Mother Goose hook, or, if you hapi)en to live in the country, from a real live duck. And make the pattern in three sizes. When this is done, cut the ])atterns into four sec- tions — the hills, hodies, feet, and standards. The standards are to he made of the red sateen, the hills and feet of the orange colored, and the hodies of the white muslin. When everything is cut out they should he pasted, with a plentiful supply of photo paste, to the outer side of the hag, and the lines of feet, HOW TO MAKE A SCHOOL BAG 159 win^s, bills, and eyes iiiarkcd in with a black crayon. You can vary the decoration of this l)a^ hi a hundred ways. It nii^lit have a mother hen with her flock of downy chicks, or little Red Riding Hood, or the Three Bears, or just some grass and trees, with an orange colored sun peep- ing over the hill, or a crimson sun dropping be- hind it. Only remember that the more simple the decoration the more attractive will be tlie result. HOW TO COVER YOUR OWN BOOKS IT is so hard to keep your schoolbooks look- ing as fresh and neat as when they first came from the shelves in the book shop. A school- book leads a very strenuous sort of a life and you often allow it to grow dog-ears and to lie open on the library table or your desk at school. This tires a schoolbook fearfully. It is hard enough that it has to multiply and do sums and spell and bound foreign countries all day long without being so unkindly treated by a child that its bind- ings grow tired and its leaves drop out and its pretty colored cover gets grimy and faded and torn. A schoolbook will work better and teach you more if you are careful of it. The man who wrote your book spent, maybe, a great many years thinking about how to say the things which you find inside the covers. The man who printed it had a huge factory filled with great presses to help him and he spent a thousand dollars — maybe more — to make that one little book which you bought for a dollar. Books, you see, hold a great deal that i6i 1 62 GIRLS' MAKE- AT-HOME THINGS is precious — records of things that have been learned by years and years of study, facts that would never have lived any longer than the people w^ho knew about them if they had not been printed upon the leaves of a book, and stories of events that have made the history of nations. You never thought about all this, did you, when you bought your last schoolbook? Now you are going to be very careful indeed of it and you are going to sit down the first spare evening you have and make the new schoolbook comfort- able by giving it a new dress — a strong, nicely fitted, artistic book cover. A good material to use for a book cover is the heaviest hardware paper, or, if you can find it, ''building" paper. This latter comes in either gray or a peculiar shade of terra cotta, and the fiber of it is exceedingly tough. Either color may be used to advantage, though the gray is better, for it lends itself to almost any sort of decoration, while the terra cotta can be decorated only in black or with Indian reds and blues. To make the book cover you must first find the size of your book, measuring the height of your book, and then, with a tape, measure around it from the front edge of the front cover to the front edge of the back cover. This measurement HOW TO COVER YOUR BOOKS 163 should be taken loosely, and it will be found to be a little more than if the width of the covers were added to the thickness of the book. That is, if the covers are five and five-eighths inches wide and the book is a half inch thick, the measure- ment for the paper cover, instead of being tw^o 1 1 1 times five and five-eighths, plus a half inch, or eleven and three-quarters inches, will be about twelve and one-quarter inches. If the book measures seven and a half inches high, this will make an oblong seven and a half inches by twelve and one quarter. This should be marked on the paper with a pencil and straight 1 64 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS edge, and a second oblong marked outside of it whose sides are two inches away from the inner one in every direction. This margin is to fold over on the inside of the covers. (Fig. i) The full lines are cuts and the dotted lines are folds. The little sections which are cut in the middle for the back of the book are folded down inside for strength. The other margins are also folded under, and, where they lap, are pasted. Now the cover is ready for decoration, and in this a child can display a great deal of taste and imagination. For a set of schoolbooks a good scheme is to make either uniform, or similar borders in pen and ink on each cover, and then put the name of the book on in ''block" lettering. If the book is small the border may be extended only across the top and bottom, with a single line connecting the two at each side, but if the book is large enough or the border narrow, it will look better if carried around all four sides. For this border there are any amount of things which may be used. Plain geometrical forms, or a leaf or flower may be conventionalized, and re- peated, or reversed, or alternated with something else in a hundred different ways. A very pretty border may be made by alternating a flower pat- HOW TO COVER YOUR BOOKS 165 tern and a leaf of the same plant, and coloring them in their natural colors with paints or crayons. The block lettering is shown in Fig. 2. Six parallel horizontal lines are drawn about a six- teenth of an inch apart. The letters are made about a quarter of an inch wide and a sixteenth- inch space is left between each two letters. The upright parts of the letters are just lines, and the cross pieces "blocks. '^ It is a very simple and effective way of lettering. The only letter which does not follow the regular spacing is the A, in which the cross piece drops a little below the center section, because the upper part is so small that it would look top heavy with the bar exactly in the middle. When you grow tired of making borders as a decoration for your schoolbook covers, you may trace some of the favorite pictures in your story books on a sheet of carbon paper, transfer these patterns to the book cover and then fill in with Indian ink or paints the outlines you have made. i66 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS Puss-in-Boots may be pictured on the cover of one book, on another — Little Red Riding Hood, or Cinderella, or Jack and his wonderful bean stalk. You see you may have just as pretty and differ- ent covers for your books as you have time to make. — ""nffailS r- *' .. ^ ' '- ■'>^--- STENCILLED SCHOOL APRON HOW TO STENCIL YOUR SCHOOL APRONS MOTHER said that you must wear a homely, long-sleeved apron to school to cover the pretty new dress and you didn't want to, one bit. Perhaps you were a pouting little girl for a while, and the sky seemed all covered with clouds, and there was a scowl on your forehead where there should have been a smile. An apron is not always pretty, especially if it is a useful, high-necked one that covers a child from top to toe. Perhaps it is made of plain blue chambray without a frill or a bit of embroidery anywhere. But, listen! When mother next gets out her workbag and the big shears, ready to make you a new apron for school, ask her to give you some pieces of cloth large enough to cut into shape for the collar and pockets of the apron, and then you, a little girl, can really stencil the cloth in some lovely flower or animal patterns that will make the homely, long-sleeved apron quite a thing of beauty. You can buy designs for stenciling at an art 167 1^8 (;ii;ls' m akk-ai-iiomk iiiings store l)iil il is \rr\ cisy lOr ;i cliild lo make \\vv own i)atU'riis and 11 will ])c Iwicr llir tun. Any (losii;!!, wlu'lluT \<)n lind i( in a l)il ol crclonnc iU' cliinl/, an animal picinrc l)()(>k, or a drawing;, will do (o make (lie pallern if il only lias real lines lo eo|)\'. In elioosini; llie desiiMi \'on wanl, a \c\'\ simi)le one a leal, a \iiie, a moinin^" i^lorv, or jnsl one animal lorm will he lonnd easiesl lo eopv. Somelimes a liL;nre on wall paper — a carpel, or rni; will .L;i\e one a i^ood idea. ( )ld magazines ai'e perUni Ireasnre lro\es of design and inside llieir ad\ crlisim; pact's, pie- Imes n{ ships, birds, eliildreii, and animals can he lOnnd which will he jnsl iii;hl lo make inlo slencil designs. W hen Non ha\'e selecled ihc design, it is time to make the slencil. The paltern is fnsl drawn Ol' Iraced upon thin while IraciiiL^ paper and then carelnlU liansltMred with a sheet ol carhon to the stencil paper or hoard. This slencil hoard you would best buy at an art shoj). Il comes in larj;c sheets at only a few cents a sheet. Two inches should he allowed as a mari^in about the pattern so that the lingers and fabric need not he stained in a|)pl\ in*; the color. 1 1 stiMicil hoard is not ohlainahle, ordiiiar\' slilT manila i)a|)er or cardboard ina\ be used, aiul the cardboard ])al- SCHOOL APRONS 169 tern can be preserved if, after it is cut out, it is washed over with a thin coat of varnish or shellac. Manila paper patterns may be treated with a coat of paraffin, spread on with a hot flat iron. These preservatives prevent the color from blurring when the design is painted in. No great degree of skill is needed to cut the pattern out, or to apply it. The only require- ments are a good, sharp knife and patience. The pattern should be thumb tacked to a board. The knife should be held vertically, and only the point used in making a clean, true cut. By drawing the knife point over a bit of sand paper or whetstone after a few cuts, the point will be kept sharp. Small scissors, both straight and curved will be necessary to correct any errors made in the knif^ strokes and to true the corners and curves. After the design is cut, it should be tacked se- curely to the fabric which is to be stenciled. A sheet of blotting paper must be put under the goods to absorb the surplus color and keep the paints from blurring, and the edges of the pat- tern must be held firmly or the brush will work its way under and spoil the outline. Dyes and oil paints give the best results in color. In using oil paints, the desired color is I70 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS thinned with turpentine to the right consistency. If too thick the color will go on in streaks and if too thin it will spread and blur. It should always be tried first upon a small waste piece of the fabric before the actual painting is begun. The regular stencil brushes are round and short and stiff. They may be bought in any art or paint shop and their size should depend upon the size of the design. One brush should be used for every color. Dip the brush in the paint and press out all the moisture against the side of the saucer, and then upon a small piece of blotting paper, to make its dryness absolutely sure. The brush should be held firmly and vertically, and the paint worked in from the edge of the stencil towards the center. The stencil should be carefully wiped with an old, soft cloth each time it is taken off. Any sort of cloth that will tub can be stenciled by a little girl. The best apron materials, of course, are chambrays, ginghams, or linens, but dainty muslins, madras cloths, and even organdies may be stenciled for afternoon wear. When a plain chambray is used for the apron, white linen col- lars and pocket stenciled in an animal design like the one in the picture will be most effective. There, the little girl has finished her stenciling SCHOOL APRONS 171 just in time for mother is ready to cut, and fit, and stitch the collar and cuffs. It will be the prettiest apron of all when its little owner proudly walks up the school aisle with it on in the morning, and she will forget all about how much she hated to wear the homely, long-sleeved apron that isn't homely any more. Before we know it, the little girl artist will be stenciling the nursery window curtains, and the nursery table cover, and maybe a couch cover, too, she will have grown so expert at the work. .,»,(-. CHRISTMAS GIFTS A LITTLE GIRL CAN MAKE grandmother's spectacle case. THIS is going to be the very Christmas gift that dear grandmother most needs. She is always losing her spectacles, or looking for a scrap of soft cloth with which to polish them. This case which any child may make grand- mother can fasten to her belt, and it will keep the spectacles safe — and bright — and shining. A strip of soft, tan colored chamois or leather is cut six and one-half inches long and two and one-quarter inches wide. One end of the strip is cut in a half circle, and the opposite end is left straight. A second strip is cut the same width as the first, but eight inches long. Both ends are rounded like a half circle. The two strips are then laid together with the wrong side of the material inside, and the end of the longer strip folded over for a lap. The case is laid on a cutting board and a row of holes is punched around the edge through both pieces. The top holes are punched through the flap, also, a nar- row strip of the chamois or leather used for the 173 174 CrIRLS' MAKE- A'l -HOME THINGS case is laced in and out ibrou^i^h the holes, and the front is decorated witli a flower design done with the child's nursery paints. mother's work bag. It is a dainty, tiny work Ijag, the right size to fit in mother's apron pocket where she can find it easily when she makes her house rounds in the morning, and wants to sew up rips and put on buttons. A circle of pink Dresden flowered silk eight inches in diameter is cut. Four deep scallops are then made in the edge, and the i)iece is lined with white silk. This gives the lit lie work bag four sides. Narrow white or pink baby ribbon is then feather stitched across three of the sides, mak- ing compartments for a pair of scissors and four tiny bits of cardboard upon which are wound black thread and black silk, white thread and white silk. To the fourth side, scalloped flannel needle hearts are fastened with feather stitch- ing. The work bag is then folded together flat along the lines shown in the picture and pressed with a hot flatiron. A soft cloth should be laid over the silk to prevent scorching. Two lengths of baby ribbon tie the work bag at the top. (a) knife case (b) spectacle case (c) pin roll (d) work bag (e) memorandum pad * « •» * • » vl W W « o Q Q W CHRISTMAS GIFTS 175 father's memorandum pad. Father is always forgetting the errands mother asks him to do down town. Christmas morning he will find a fine new memorandum pad on his desk to help him remember things. The foundation is a little square pad of unruled paper from the stationer's. A hole is punched all the way through the top of the pad. The shoemaker will do this for the child, or he can do it himself with a hammer and wire nail. Three strands of sweet grass and some blue glass beads make the cord which is tied to the pad and fastens the pencil. The strands of sweet grass are knotted in the hole in the pad and braided for a distance of two or three inches. A second knot is then made, and on each strand a bead is slipped. This braiding and knotting is continued until the cord is about fifteen inches long when the pencil is tied on. sister's pin roll. Big sister is getting to be such a grown-up girl. She does up her hair and wears more pretty dresses and goes to more parties than lit- tle sister can count. Her Christmas gift shall be a dainty ribbon pin roll to lie on her dresser 176 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS table so she will always know just where to find a pin when she needs it ; and won't she love it be- cause Little Sister made it, all herself ! Half a yard of Dresden ribbon that is six inches wide makes the pin roll. A strip of white eider-down is cut as long as the ribbon but an inch narrower. The eider-down is laid on the ribbon and the ribbon is hemmed over on it at the edges with very small stitches. One end of the ribbon is pointed, and the other end has a shirred silk pocket to hold shirtwaist pins. Baby ribbon is sewed on the pointed end to tie the pin roll when it is not in use. brother's knife case. Brother has a fine, new jackknife, but he has lost it, ever so many times. The Christmas gift which will delight him more than any other, is a knife case just the right size to hold that jack- knife, and stay in his pocket and keep the knife from running away. The material for the knife case is a piece of either bright red or dark green leather, the Christmas colors. It is made in almost the same way as grandmother's spectacle case except that it is smaller. One strip of leather which makes the knife case is cut four and one-half inches CHRISTMAS GIFTS 177 long and two inches wide, and the other is the same width, but five and one-half inches long. The first piece is made half round at one end and straight at the other, and the second piece is rounded in the same way at both ends. The holes in the edges of the knife case are punched a little closer than those in the spectacle case — a quarter of an inch apart is a good distance. The lacing is done with a very narrow strip of leather. Brother's monogram is done on the outside of the knife case with India ink. THE baby's dolls. The baby has so many old dolls that she has loved and played with until they are dirty, and without any clothes, most of them. The little girl sister may wash their faces, comb their hair, and dress them in the scraps of cloth from mother's piece bag to represent some queer little folks who are enjoying Christmas, too, in other lands. The Japanese doll and the Chinese baby are dressed in brand new crepe kimonos, cut all in one piece and slipped over their heads. The rag dolls are dressed in gay colors, like Tyrolean peasants. The little sailor doll's suit is of white flannel and he wears a white tam-o'-shanter hat I7S (.IKLS' MAKI':-A'I-II()MK IIIIN(iS made of .1 j^alluTcd ciiclc, sewed in ovcv and over slilolu'S lo a slrai^lil hand. Tlic lilllc Swedish hoy and ^irl dolls woai- llannci snils, and Mu'ir loalhcr shoos arc made of Ihc scraps IcTl from ihc knife case. When (lie hahy finds her old dolls in (heir new cosliinies on ( hris(nias nioinin^, she will love (hem more liian ever and he((er (han (he new dollic. CHRISTMAS BAGS A CHILD CAN MAKE THERE are so many things for which bags may be used, and so many ways, too, of mak- ing them that a Httle girl can give her friends a goodly number of homemade Christmas presents which will all be different, one from another, and will still answer to the same name — Bag. It is just a question of choosing the prettiest designs, and selecting the material which will be most suitable for the use to which the bag is to be put. There is the darning bag for grandmother, which can be made in straight fashion of a yard of brown linen with a gay holly ribbon in the hem at the top to draw it up by. Brother may have a shoe bag to hang on his clothespress door. Chintz, in a flowered design should be used for this bag. An eighteen inch square is bound with white tape and four square pockets to hold brother's best shoes and his bed- time slippers are stitched to the square. A box pleat at the bottom of each pocket makes it hold the shoes better and tape loops hang the bag to the hooks on the clothespress door. 179 i8o GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS Mother will just love a pink linen bag to hold her dusters, and the little girl herself will need a dainty bag to hold all her sewing things while she is at work on the other bags. Suppose we make that one next ; a little girl's work bag. A very pretty, and inexpensive one may be made from an ordinary large fancy handker- chief, just a man's size handkerchief with a col- ored border, and some flowers or a conventional design on it. These handkerchiefs may be ob- tained in very pretty designs and colorings and at a cost of only ten or 11 f teen cents. All that one needs aside from the handkerchief to make the work bag, are two yards of baby ribbon the color of the handkerchief border, or of a pretty contrasting color, and a skein of embroidery silk of the same shade as the ribbon. First, fold one side of the handkerchief over to meet the other side and crease it through the center. Then fold each of these sides back, one being folded toward you, and the other away from you, so that they extend about an inch be- yond the crease. Next, take a needleful of the embroidery silk and join each outside end fold to the adjoining inside end fold, in a "catstitched" seam. This makes what appears to be a long, double pocket. CHRISTMAS GIFTS i8i Catstitching is done by making two parallel rows of stitches, taking first a stitch above and then one below, so that the thread crosses itself each time, as in Fig. i. Then do a row of catstitching across each of the long edges of the handkerchief, not joining it to any other part, and making the rows of stitching about three-eighths of an inch apart. This is for a casing for the draw-strings. There are two draw-strings, each made of a yard of the baby ribbon. They are run through the casing on both sides, one of them starting at one end and one at the other, and the two ends of each are tied in a little bow. Now the bag is done, and if you put something in it and pull on the little ribbon bows, you will be surprised to see it fall into the shape shown in the picture, that you hadn't expected. Sister's party bag will be the next Christmas bag. It IS so pretty to work upon. This is the most expensive one of all, for it requires two i82 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS yards of ribbon five inches wide, seven-eighths of a yard five-eighths inches wide, and two yards of three-eighth inch ribbon. A plain ribbon a. a. b ^ dC cL C c with a Httle figure is very attractive. Still more so is a ribbon with a satin edge in a different color, which gives it an unusual effect. The nar- rower ribbons may be of a plain color. NURSERY LAUNDRY BAG CHRISTMAS GIFTS 183 The five inch ribbon is to be cut into four equal strips, which will be eighteen inches long. One end of each strip is to be turned in for about an eighth of an inch, and the end overhanded to the side of the next strip, so that the strips will all be sewed in the position shown in Fig. 2. The other end of each strip should be finished with a narrow hem. Next, each two adjoining sides, which are at right angles to each other in the diagram in Fig. 2, are to be overhanded together as far as the hem on the shorter side. That is, a is to be joined to a, h to h, c to c, and d to d. This will leave four points at the top of the bag. Now you must stitch your five-eighths inch ribbon on the outside of the bag for a casing. It may be put on with a short running stitch, and should go straight around the bag just below the points at the top. It must be put on in two pieces, with the raw ends turned under, and a little space left on each side where the casings come together, so that the draw strings may be run in. These are made of the narrowest ribbon and are put in just as you did for the first bag. It is a very dainty party bag, and will accom- rnodate fan, handkerchief, slippers, opera glasses, or whatever may be required. 1 84 GIRLS' MAKE- AT-HOME THINGS Mother's pink linen duster bag is very simple to make, and very, very useful. A yard of linen — the better quality which comes at about twenty- five cents a yard — will be sufficient. Fold the cloth double from side to side, so that the sel- vedges are together, and baste it all around the edge. The lower end should be trimmed per- fectly square and the upper one should have the corners rounded. Next, measure fourteen inches up from the lower end and fold this fourteen inch section up to form a pocket. This also should be basted in position. With ordinary tape, or with bias lawn seam tape (which is better) bind the side and top edges, fastening the pocket in place and mak- ing a finish for the raw edges. Now the eight inch section, which you will find left about the pocket, may be folded down for a lap, and the word "Dusters" written across it in pencil and embroidered in a simple outline stitch with a bit of colored silk or worsted. Three brass rings placed at the center and two ends of the top of the bag to hang it up by, make it complete. And when a little girl has made all these bags, she will be ready to stop and rest awhile and think about hanging up her stocking and wonder what Santa Claus is going to put in it. A HOME TRIMMED CHRISTMAS TREE OF course one can buy, if one wishes, a whole boxful of the gay toy shop Christ- mas tree baubles; bells, and balls, and tinsel things, that the German toy man makes and sends across the ocean to us at Christmas time. But there is another, a much nicer way of mak- ing the little tree look pretty as it stands indoors, in the Christmas firelight. Instead of covering its waiting branches with ornaments which one buys, a child may make the Christmas tree look even more beautiful by decorating it with some pretty homemade things. It really seems as if a Christmas tree's branches would be happier, too, holding the ornaments that a little girl really makes, and you will have had all the pleasure for days and days before Christmas of working to make the decorations and thinking just how lovely they are going to look when they are hung in the tree's green depths. One should remember in selecting the colors to be used in making Christmas tree ornaments at home that white, and gold, and red are really 185 i86 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS the only colors that will look well against the wonderful dark green of the tree. A pot of gold paint, some red and white paper, a sheet of card- board — these are the only materials a child will need to buy. All the other necessary materials for making some more Christmas tree ornaments are to be found right at home. Everybody knows how very dainty pop corn, strung on white threads, looks, festooned from branch to branch of a Christmas tree. But if cranberries are strung, alternately, with the ker- nels of corn, the chains will be even prettier. Another dainty use for pop corn is to pin single kernels to the extreme ends of the Christmas tree twigs, and cranberries may also be fastened on in the same way, the little red balls making the tree look very gay indeed. Nuts, the larger round ones, preferably, such as English walnuts, or almonds, may be covered thickly with gold paint and either strung in long chains on gold cord after the fashion of the glass balls one buys in a shop, or hung from the ends of the branches. After the nut is gilded, a hole will have to be bored through it to admit the gold cord, but this can be done very easily with an awl, and in the case of an almond with a darning needle. Blocks of sugar tied with white thread A CHRISTMAS TREE 187 and suspended from the ends of the branches form a unique tree decoration. Still another tree ornament is the ever lovely Christmas star. This should have a cardboard foundation on each side of which gold paper is pasted and then cut out exactly even with the edges of the star. Christmas stars may be pinned to the branches or suspended by thread where they will swing and sway with every breath of air. Some of the small colored pictures to be found in the pages of the Christmas magazines may be cut out and used as ornaments for the Christ- mas tree. The holiday magazines are always issued quite a long while before Christmas so there will be plenty of time to prepare these pic- tures. The smaller ones will make the more at- tractive tree decorations ; pictures of Santa Claus, children, toys, or Madonna pictures. After they are cut out, they should be mounted on card- board backs, and a tinsel frame is pasted around the edge of the cardboard with a few stitches. The tinsel comes on spools and one spool will be enough to frame ever so many of these pic- ture ornaments which hang from gold cord to the tree. Some quaint little dolls to hang from the Christmas tree are made of lollipops. If possi- 1 88 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS ble, red lollipops should be used, and the doll's face is drawn with either a very soft pencil, or black crayon on the white oiled paper that covers the candy. A roll of white paper glued to the stick a short distance below the head serves for the lollipop's arms, and the doll is dressed in a very full skirt and waist made of red tissue paper. A number of these lollipop ladies may hang by red ribbons tied about their necks to the Christmas tree as gifts for the little girls who come to see the home decorated tree. Harlequins for the boys may be made of red and white peppermint candy sticks. A stuffed white tissue paper head on which an inked, clown face is drawn is tied with thread to the top of the stick. A pointed, red tissue cap with a very tiny ball at the top is slipped over the head, and a very full ruffle of red tissue, also, is gathered about the little harlequin's neck and tied in half way down the stick. The remaining half of the candy stick is left bare. These little candy clowns will form a very novel Christmas tree decoration, and their heads and blouses will slip off with the greatest ease when a child wishes to eat the peppermint stick. Snow flake crystals cut from white rice paper, and fastened together l)y pasting at the points A CHRISTMAS TREE 189 so as to form a long chain makes another novel tree decoration. Halves of egg shells gilded, may be used as tiny candy baskets, the edge of the shell being bound with a strip of gold paper and suspended by a loop of the same. There is really no end to the list of home orna- ments one may make and hang on the Christmas tree. And won't old St. Nicholas be surprised when he comes down the chimney and discovers that his work is all done? HOMEMADE VALENTINES ON St. Valentine's Day, when the children are sending to each of their friends a lit- tle bit of the heart's gold, those who send as well as those who receive the precious missives will find in them a great deal more pleasure if they are not the ordinary shop purchased kind, but made by careful little fingers. But you don't know how to make valentines, you say. The valentines you buy are so prettily decorated with flowers and hearts and cupids, and paper lace. Well, was there any prettier lace than that which was in the box of candy father brought you last week? Or, if you want to use perfectly fresh paper lace, you can buy it in strips. If your bookshop man doesn't keep it he can get it for you, and it costs very little. Then, too, you can buy the most fascinating lace paper hearts, and flowers — singly or in bunches or sprays — whole sheets of them, which have only to be cut apart. The small hearts and cupids, etc., it is very easy to cut from red or gold paper. Aside from this, you will need only 191 192 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS some sheets of stiff red paper, a pair of sharp scissors, and some library paste. Then you are ready to begin making valentines. One of the prettiest valentines to make is also one of the simplest. Take one of the lace paper hearts which measures about five inches from the point to the indentation at the top. These hearts are made in various sizes to use as table decorations at valentine parties, so you can get whatever size you prefer. Lay this heart on the stiff red paper and with a pencil draw a heart which will measure about a half inch larger all around than the lace one. Cut this red heart out carefully, and fasten the two together with a little library paste. The hearts do not need to be pasted all over. Just a little dab of paste here and there will be sufficient. Then cut from the red paper a flying cupid, like Fig. i. His wings are lifted and his arms outstretched to- ward the little boy or girl to whom he is flying. Paste this cupid nearly in the center of the lace heart, and on the back of the valentine you may write if you like; All hearts are yours, Both great and small; But mine's the truest Of them all. 1/ vnot. of me sheuia. ceasa X/' *jt!' f%e<3.rt \ HOME MADE VALENTINES THE FUNNIEST VALENTINE OF ALI, HOMEMADE VALENTINES 193 Another very attractive valentine requires nothing more in the way of material than a little of the stiff red paper, a bit of raffia, or gold cord, and a pen and ink. Cut from the red paper four hearts which are quite evenly graduated in size. The first one measures three inches from the point to the top indentation; the second one measures two and one-half inches ; the third, two inches; and the fourth, one and one-half inches. Punch two holes near the top, and two near the bottom of all except the smallest heart, spacing the holes in the largest heart about an inch and a half apart, and narrowing down the spacing for the others correspondingly. The smallest heart needs only two holes at the top. Thread a darning needle with the raffia and string the hearts together, sewing down through the top hole of one heart, up through the bottom hole, down through the top hole of the next one, and so on, placing the largest heart at the top, and the others in the order of their size. When you have reached the smallest heart, bring your raffia up through the second top hole, and string up the other side of the hearts. This fastens the hearts together on one continuous string, and leaves the two ends to tie at the top in a bow. Now come the decorations. 194 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS Print neatly with pen and ink the following message : For the first heart : // you of me should cease to think The second : My heart would shrink The third: And shrink The fourth : And shrink. A third valentine is made like a little book, using the stiff red paper, some thin white paper, two paper roses, and some red or gold paper hearts. Cut from the red paper an oblong which measures four and a half inches long — that is, just twice as long as it is wide. Fold this through the center, making a square book. In the middle of each inside page, paste a paper rose. If you have not been able to buy the paper roses, some flowers cut from the colored pages of an old seed catalogue will do just as well. Next, cut a piece of thin white paper — rice paper is the best, but almost any transparent paper will do — four inches square. Fold this on one of the diagonals, so that two opposite cor- ners shall meet. Then fold again, so that the other two opposite corners shall meet each other, HOMEMADE VALENTINES 195 Next cut this as shown in Fig. 2. The cuts are made parallel to the long side of the triangle, and are an eighth of an inch apart. Next, unfold the paper again, working very carefully, for the parts which have been cut will cling together and tear easily. When you have made your square flat again, fold forward each little corner that you have made with your cuts, and you will find that by lifting the center, your paper will come up in a very surprising way. Paste this square on the right hand page of your book, over the rose, and on each corner of the white border paste a small gold heart. On the back you may write: Your heart's like this rose That I scarcely can see, If I Und the way in Will you give it to me? Very few of these valentines will fit an ordi- nary envelope, so it is better to make a special one for each. For a square or heart shaped val- entine mark a square large enough to hold it, and draw its two diagonals forming four equal tri- angles. Then draw against each side of the square a triangle like these. But these, if folded in would pot lap over each other, and you want 196 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS them to lap over like a real envelope, so you must make lines outside of the edges of these triangles and parallel to them and curve them down at the ends like Fig. 3. Then lay your valentine in- side, fold the triangles over, and seal the en- velope with a heart. If the valentines are to go by mail you can put the address on a larger heart pasted on the front of the envelope. If the child to whom you are sending it lives nearby, it is much more fun to put just Miss Dorothy Smith. Courtesy of St. Valentine. and then tuck it under Dorothy's door, ring the bell and run. HOW TO MAKE THE EASTER RABBIT THE Easter Bunny has come to town. He chatters about snowdrops, and carols, and crocuses as he trots from out the woods and across the new green grass, and he brings a basket of eggs for all good children. The Eas- ter Bunny is the Santa Claus of the spring. The white aproned, wooden shod Dutch children from over the sea look forward to his visit and write him pretty notes which they hide under the leaves and moss of the forest. They think that they hear his soft footsteps at night when they are tucked away in their hard beds, and they believe that he trots up and down the village streets at night, lifting all the latches and peer- ing through the keyholes to find the good chil- dren who will merit the gayest colored eggs on Easter Sunday. The Easter shops are full of rabbits at Easter time, candy bunnies, soft wool bunnies, and real hair bunnies. A child is scarcely able to choose between them all, but if your pocketbook is empty of pennies you can still have an Easter 197 198 GIRLS' MAKE- AT-HOME THINGS rabbit of your very own at no cost at all. You will be able to make your own bunnies; one for yourself, and as many more as you like to give away for Easter gifts. The most satisfactory of homemade Easter rabbits is the one shown in the picture. He is serviceable enough to form a nursery playfellow for ever so many days, and he will be a much more unique Easter gift, carefully wrapped in dainty tissue paper, than any Easter card to be found in the shops. He may be big or little, colored or white. In whatever dress he appears he will be a delight to the child who makes him and the one who receives his rabbit-ship. To make the Easter bunny, a sheet of rather heavy paper is needed. Water color paper will serve well, or book cover paper, or a light weight bristol board. The rabbit may be white, but if he is to be used for an Easter card, he will be very pretty made of a delicate shade of tan or green or blue paper. He must have a fat body, and two legs, two paws, a head, and a short tail. The patterns shown in the illustration show just how these separate parts are to be made. They may be used the exact size of the printed diagram for a tiny Easter card, or they may be enlarged to Pattern for card board rabbit. 199 200 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS make a big toy bunny for the nursery. As soon as the patterns for the different parts of the rabbit have been obtained by tracing from the printed illustrations or enlarging them, a child may begin making Easter rabbits. The sheet of paper to be used for the rabbit is laid, smooth and flat on a table or desk. Each pattern whether of head, ear, paw or tail is laid on the paper separately, using as little space as possible so as to obtain a number of bunnies from one sheet of paper. Each pattern is held down securely, with a child's fingers or with pins and it is drawn around with a soft pencil; cutting with scissors very carefully on these lines, is the next step, and then the rabbit can be put together. His legs, paws, ears, head, and tail are fastened to his body by means of brass paper fasteners which may be bought in different sizes from very tiny ones for an Easter rabbit card to large ones that will serve for a big play bunny. At the points in the diagram where there are dots, holes should be punched in the sections of the rabbit with the point of a knife or an embroidery stiletto. Five paper fasteners put through these holes fasten the sections to his body. The Easter bunny should be given inked eyes, and when he is finished, he will carry a lit- JOINTED CARDBOARD RABBIT THE EASTER RABBIT 201 tie folded paper basket of candy eggs on his arm, he will stand up or sit down, move his head, cock his ears, — in short, he will be as much alive as Bre'r Rabbit, Peter, or Benjamin Bunny. Peanuts make fine little Easter rabbits. Se- lect the long, fat peanuts that are straight and well grown. Cut two long ears and a tail from white cotton batting and paste one ear each side of the peanut rabbit's head and glue a cotton tail in place. Two short pieces of fine wire wound with cotton stuck in the front of the nut form the little rabbit's front legs. Similar wires bent at the center and pushed into the opposite end of the nut form the back legs. Round pencil dots form the eyes and a short, straight pencil line the rabbit's mouth. A number of these queer little peanut bunnies may be scattered about for table decorations for an Easter break- fast or luncheon with novel effect. The twig rabbits are the most attractive of all, and will be delightful little creatures to make. Two short twigs are crossed, sawhorse fashion, and tied together to make the rabbit's front legs. Two more are crossed and tied in the same fashion to make the back legs. A longer, straight twig is laid across these, just as a strip of wood is placed on a pair of sawhorses. 202 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS and it is tied to the two sets of shorter twigs. This is the twig rabbit's skeleton; his back- bone, and his four Httle legs. His head is a ball of cotton batting, the kind known as absorbent cotton will be best, tied to another twig, a bit of the twig being left for his neck. The cotton head and neck are then tied to one end of the body. Each little twig leg is wound with cotton which is tied in at the top with thread. Last, a long piece of cotton, wide enough to cover the whole body is cut and slipped over the longer twig and fastened underneath with a few stitches. The rabbit's cotton head may be very easily shaped by pulling out the nose and cheeks a bit. Stitches done with black worsted, or bits of black paper glued on make the eyes, and two long cotton ears made separately, are stitched to the head. When a number of the cotton rabbits have been made, they may be hidden about the house, and a jolly hunt instituted after the Easter break- fast when the children and grown folks try to discover their hiding places. MAKING MORE EASTER TOYS THE eggs must be either boiled or blown for making Easter Gifts. The simplest and most satisfactory method of blowing is to make tiny pin holes, one in each end of a smooth, white egg. Then, holding the egg over a saucer and blowing steadily in one end, the yolk and white will be emptied out of the other end and the shell will be left intact and hollow, ready for any sort of fascinating transformation. The boiled egg can be easily decorated by the younger children so as to make a charming little home gift. The simplest treatment is to cover it with a thin wash of water color ; bright yellow, pale green, or violet, the colors of the spring. When this wash in perfectly dry, the children may paste to the painted surface one or two scrap pictures ; a picture of a rabbit, a spray of flowers, or one of the child figures that may be bought in sheets at a stationer's or kindergarten shop for a few cents. A second method of decorating one of these painted eggs is for mother to sketch the outline of a spring flower — tulip, dandelion, 203 204 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS or crocus — in pencil on the eggshell before the wash in put on. The pencilled lines will show through the soft tint of the wash and after the paint is sufficiently dry the flower outline can be filled in with a deeper shade, yellow for a crocus or dandelion, and scarlet for a tulip. The grandmother egg has pink cheeks done with crayon or water color paints, and the eyes, nose and mouth are drawn with ink. Two cir- cles drawn around the eyes and connected by a curved line will do for the old lady's spectacles. One roll of white crepe paper will make frilled caps for a score of these grandmother eggs. A long, narrow strip of the paper is ruffled with the fingers and pasted to the ruffle, covering the whole back of the tgg for the crown of the cap. A flopping bow made of another strip of paper is fastened to the grandmother's chin to represent cap strings and will also help her to stand on the table which she is to decorate Easter morning. The Chinaman's face is done entirely in India ink or with a soft black crayon. He has a small mouth and nose, and a pair of slanting eyes done in black on the white surface of the tgg. When the Chinaman's face is finished he should be given a long pigtail made of braided strands of raffia. A bit of black worsted ties the end of ^ & ^^^^l'-*' /$^^ '^^-^^^n^ (a) egg shell cradle and flower basket (b) egg grandmother, rabbit and brownie (c) egg woman, rolly-polly man and chinaman MAY BASKETS MAKING EASTER TOYS 205 the braid and it is glued to the top of the egg by means of a circle of black cambric to which it is sewed. About the pigtail a fringe of hair can be drawn in pencil on the egg, and the jolly little egg Chinaman is done. It is possible to cut a blown eggshell if one goes about it very carefully. A very sharp pair of scissors is necessary to do this cutting neatly without breaking the shell. A line should be drawn around the shell lengthwise or crosswise, as the egg is to be cut, and the scissors are in- serted in a hole in the shell made with a pin. Special egg cutting scissors can be bought, or manicure or embroidery scissors may be used. A lovely Easter egg gift for children to make is a growing green plant in half an egg shell. The shell is cut in halves, horizontally, tinted some soft spring color with water or oil paints, and filled with damp earth. A bean, some bird seed or some hempseed is planted in the earth a week before Easter and the tiny green plant that sprouts out of the shell just in time for the feast of flowers will make a unique and dainty Easter offering. Quaint little rolly-poly men can also be made of eggshells from which the contents have been blown. One of the holes should be enlarged 2o6 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS sufficiently to allow of a few tiny shot being dropped in. A dozen of these little lead balls will be sufficient, and after they have been in- serted, the opening in the egg is closed by means of a scrap of cloth that is pasted over it. The rolly-poly's face is then painted on one side of the egg. Cotton will do for hair, pasted over the paper, and a pointed cap, cut from brown crepe paper, is made cornucopia fashion and set on top of the little man's head. A doll's cradle can be made of a portion of an empty eggshell. Pencilled lines are drawn lengthwise and crosswise on a blown eggshell dividing it into quarters. One quarter is cut out, carefully, leaving the little cradle shown in the picture. A cotton batting lining and a little lace paper spread complete the dainty bed. HALF A DOZEN MAY BASKETS WHO found the first anemone this spring? Who knows the spot in the woods where the violets show their tiny blue faces first when the snow melts? What child came home from school one afternoon with a bunch of violets as blue as the spring sky? Don't forget the green places in the woods where the spring flowers blossom. And don't pick all the flowers before May Day. So many wonderful things happen on the eve of May Day. The fairies dance on the green. You can be sure that they danced because they leave bits of their short cobweb skirts in the grass and their tiny footprints in the dew. Another wonderful thing may happen on May Day Eve, too. Perhaps someone whom you are very fond of will come creeping quietly through your garden after supper, will run up to your front door and hang a May basket full of the dainty, new spring flowers on the door knob, and then run away before you can find out who it is. When you discover the basket, and take out the 207 2o8 GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS blossoms, tucked in among them there may be a sHp of paper with a bit of rhyme written on it, all about spring, and flowers, and the other happy things of May. Would you not like to hang May baskets,- too? Listen, and you shall learn how to make six. Every little country girl knows where to find sweet grass. If May is a cold month, and the sweet grass is not long enough to braid into lengths for a basket, some narrow strips of rushes will do quite as well, or the new green willow sprouts. Three strands are woven into a long braid, new strands being spliced in when the first ones give out. When the braid is three or four yards long, it should be shaped and sewed with strong green thread into basket shape, a portion of the braid being saved to sew on for a handle. An old cardboard candy box will make a charming May basket. The cover is removed, and the outside of the box is covered with pink crepe paper, wider by an inch top and bottom than the width of the box. When the crepe paper is glued to the box the overlapping edges are ruffled, and some tissue paper roses are glued in for decoration. A strip of the cover is cut for a handle, is wound with the pink crepe or pink HALF A DOZEN MAY BASKETS 209 ribbon and is fastened to the box with a few strong stitches. Three more roses are tied to the handle, and the basket is done. A May basket made in the shape of a heart will be very attractive. A cardboard heart as large as one wishes the basket to be, is cut to form the bottom of the basket. Six inches in the widest part is a good dimension for this basket. A strip of cardboard, three or four inches high, is sewed to the edge of the heart with over and over stitches, and is sewed to- gether at the point of the heart. The basket is then covered with pale blue crepe paper, ruffled at the top, and a wire handle, wound with blue ribbon and having a big ribbon bow at the top is added. Fill your heart May basket with vio- lets and see how pretty it will look! Two more hearts may be cut from a delicately tinted bristol board. They are fastened to- gether with a binding of gold passe partout tape, and a handle cut from the same bristol board is glued to the back of one of the hearts to hang the basket by. A ribbon bow is added to the handle and a bunch of artificial flowers is glued to the front. Water color paper, or construction paper which can be bought at an art shop may be woven, or 2IO GIRLS' MAKE-AT-HOME THINGS folded to make two attractive May baskets. The woven basket is to be heart shaped also. Two pieces of paper measuring eighteen by six inches are folded in half so as to make two oblongs measuring nine by six inches on a side. The upper edges of each are curved with scissors, and the folded edges are cut into six one inch strips, the strips being six inches long. These strips are then interlaced, fastening the two pieces of paper together, and a dainty, woven heart basket is the result. Two soft, contrasting tints of color should be chosen for this woven basket, a pale green and a darker shade of the same tone, or pale pink and blue, or two tones of yellow. A square of water color paper may be folded to form a dainty May basket. The folding is done according to the diagram in the illustration. The square measuring twelve inches on a side is folded on the diagonals, and the diameters. The corners are then folded to meet the center of the square. Cuts are made as shown by the dotted lines in the diagram to form the handles. Two corners are then folded in to form the ends of the basket, and it is folded up on one diameter. The triangles formed when the handles were cut are next folded over the outside for flaps, and the basket is done. HALF A DOZEN MAY BASKETS 211 Now we are ready to fill our six May baskets. Soft moss may be laid in the bottom of each bas- ket first to keep the flowers fresh. Then some violets, and anemones, and buttercups, and wind flowers, and bloodroot blossoms. All our dainty woods flowers are laid on the moss. Shall we write some rhymes to lay in the top of the bas- kets, too? Sunshine and laughter and joy together These do we wish you this sweet May weather. Here is a nosegay, sweet and gay Plucked for you on this eve of May. Blue, blue violets — they are your eyes — Pinks — your cheeks where the dimple lies. Trailing wind flowers — your curling hair — Forget-me-nots — for my love are there All in a nosegay, sweet and gay, Plucked for you on this eve of May. THE END SEP 18 1912