Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 9, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 November 1874 — Fancy Work with Autumn Leaves. [ARTICLE]

Fancy Work with Autumn Leaves.

The bright tints of autumn leaves are very lovely for ornamenting our parlors, boudoirs and dining-tables. Brackets and picture-frames can also be adorned with them, and they add greatly to the beauty -of one’s surroundings. Collect a large quantity, combining every hue, from Crimson to scarlet, from scarlet to yellow, and from yellow to green. The red beech and the beautifully variegated sumach are very desirable, as also are the oak and ferns, but the maple exceeds them all in the great variety- of tints and the various sizes of its leaves. Smooth every leaf on the wrong side with a moderately warm iron, holding it upon the leaf only a minute. Then take a camel’shair pencil and a little olive oil, and carefully brush over every part of the leaf. Place them on a flat surface to dry, and let them remain until the next day. For wiring these leaves into garlands, etc., or for preparing them for bouquets, take the fine green-covered reel wire, such as is always used in manufacturing wax flowers, and attach it. around the stem, first laying it so that it will extend tlie entire length of the leaf to support it. Afterward wind around each stem, to conceal the wire, either narrow strips of green tissue-paper or brown Berlin worsted, and join the leaves together in sprays; of course the individual leaves on each spray- must be of the same species. Prepare a large number of these sprays mounted on wires, and then arrange them in vases, about picture-frames, over mirrors, and as ornaments to lace curtains, and your apartments will present a festive appearance although the dreary winter weather has broivned the face of nature. Oak leaves, acorns and brightly-colored beans, gummed upon a card-board frame, will make handsome corner-brackets, or wallpockets and vases to your beautiful leaves. The acorns and beans ought first to be cut in half,-when used for this purpose.— Country Getitleman.