Democratic Sentinel, Volume 3, Number 21, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 July 1879 — HOUSEHOLD ECONOMY. [ARTICLE]

HOUSEHOLD ECONOMY.

To restore elasticity of rubber springs, bauds, etc., place the rubber band or springs iu hot water. Put a few pieces of charcoal, tied in cloth, into the pot where onions, cabbage or meat are boiling, and the hotise will not be filled with the offensive odor. In making an Irish stew, the suet should be chopped finely and the dough kneaded as lightly as possible. The less it is kneaded the lighter the crust will be. Fish and other dishes often come upon the table very greasy. Tho way to prevent this is to place browned white paper over them, letting it touch the greasy surface. Paper absorbs fat. A child’s bed should slope a little from the head to the foot, so that the head may be a little higher than the feet; but never bend the neck to get the head on the pillow. This make the child round • shouldered, cramps the veins and arteries, and interferes with the free circulation of the blood. Even when a child is several years old, the pillow should be thin and made of hair, not feathers.

How to Take Care of Furs.— Ladies, it lias been remarked, as a general rule, imagine that care in putting away furs is all that is required; they think they can wear them when and how they please, provided they expend a few pence for camphor when they lay them aside. This should be corrected. More harm is done to furs by wearing them for a week after the weather has become warm than during the whole cold season. When they are put aside they should be brushed the right way with a soft brush, an old linen handkerchief folded smoothly over them, and a piece of gum camphor kept in the box all the time, to scare intruders in the shape of moths. How to Wash Laces. Now that lace and muslin ruffles are universally worn, the pleasure of the possessors is a little dashed by the knowledge that the pretty varieties will lose their freshness and half, at least, of their beauty iu the wash, unless recourse be had to the expensive skill of a French laundress. But if they are washed at home after the following manner they may hold up their heads with the best of the unwashed: Cover half a dozen wine or porter bottles with old stockings, sewed on to fit as tightly as possible. On these baste the soiled lace, carefu.ly catching down every tiny loop in the border. The work is tedious but necessary. When the lace is fastened, cover the bottle in hot suds made of fine soap and change the cooling suds to hot again several times a day. Or, better still, put the bottle in the boiler, and let it boil two or three hours, by which time the lace will be quite clean.

Set the bottle in the air, and leave it tall the lace is nearly, bat not quite, dry. Then rip the lace off carefully, and press it in a book sot a few hoars. It will come oat spotless, not too white, and with the aimost-imperceptible stiffness which new lace has. Even point lace emerges unscathed from this process. With half a dozen bottles much lace can be cleaned at once, and the lace can be tacked on at odd minates.