April 1933

Across the Editor's Desk

I HAVE had two letters recently from Better Homes and Gardens families that are disappointed because they have tried and failed to get home loans from the Federal Home Loan Banks in their districts.

It's News to Me!

CHRISTINE HOLBROOK tells me there's a revival of the paper border for decorating walls. Gay and colorful, the new borders may set a color scheme for the whole room and are really very lovely.

"Sam, Why Don't You Start a Garden?"

HOW often someone says to me, "Well, I imagine you would be awfully disappointed if you should see my yard. I frankly tell you that I love flowers, but I haven't the first idea of how to grow them.

We Present the Prizewinners!

HUNDREDS of entries from 44 states literally poured into my office as a result of the Better Homes and Gardens Remodeling Contest which we announced in the July issue was to be for work done between June 20 and December 1.

$3,000 Cash Prizes offered by Better Homes and Gardens in Second Better Homes Contest

YOU have been wanting to improve your home by making one or more changes inside or outside. You have planned a fireplace or a room in the attic or a playroom in the basement or any of dozens of other repairs or improvements.

Soil

IF you have eyes to see, there are wonders beyond all imagination in the soft soil that comes up with your spade when you dig in the garden. There are castles, laboratories, zoological gardens; there is teeming life of visible soil-folk and revolutionary operations by unseen trillions of toiling bacteria; there are busy streams of water meeting busy streams of complex chemical compounds.

We Cover Floors, From Attic to Cellar

APPROPRIATENESS and color are essentials in the floor- coverings of every room in the home, from attic to cellar, because on them depends the entire keynote of harmony. Empty-appearing rooms can be furnished by patterned rugs, and crowded rooms can be made simpler and larger by using plain floor-coverings.

ABC's of Lawn-making

YOU may not be a gardener, but at least you are a lawner. Tiny indeed is the home that does not have a lawn problem. In the spring our minds are on the flowers, and the lawn is naturally so beautiful that we are inclined to think, "This year at least my lawn will be a model for the neighborhood.'

What Kind of Rose Bush Shall I Buy?

EVERYWHERE the rose continually proves itself the most adaptable of the world's flowering woody plants. It persists, it perpetuates and extends itself, it blesses mankind wherever he will look at it.

You Can't Be "Pals" With Your Children

MOST parents wish they knew their adolescent children better than they do. They wish they could win their confidence and be as close to them as when they were small. It was so easy in those days! To get close to a young child, one merely takes an interest in what he does and helps him do it.

A Vertical Garden

ONE of my pleasant recollections of last summer is a cheerful porch rendered still more charming by the Emily Gray Roses and Japanese Honeysuckles planted so that their growths intermingled. The colors of the white and yellow flowers of the honeysuckle harmonized beautifully with the golden flowers of Emily Gray and their foliage was an effective contrast.

Remembering-Sticks

WHEN I visited the rose gardens of M. Gravereaux at Roseraie de L'Hay near Paris last summer, the caretaker could speak no English and I could speak but little French. However, when we began a study of varieties we had a mutual understanding, for the species and varieties of roses were all labeled. In the rock gardens at Kew and the private gardens of Miss Ellen Wilmott at Warley, likewise, there was no uncertainty about the identity of a single plant.

Let's Go Native!

WHEN I roam the woods or fields I sometimes try to imagine what a marvelous experience it would be if for one wildflower season it were possible to be trans ported back a century or so. To be able to see a great bed of ladyslippers, butterfly- weeds, or other now rare plants in all their native loveliness, as John Bartram, Thomas Nuttall, or Daniel Boone must have seen them, would be an experience to treasure.

They're Pioneering Again in Kansas

THIS is a story of pioneering spirit, of coöperation, of friendliness, and of how guidance clinics have been secured for Kansas children.

BILDCOST

The Most for the Least

BOTH in appearance and in its real interior dimensions this little gardened home escapes the crampiness and tightness usual in the average small home. It is specifically designed for Better Homes and Gardens families that, while demanding of their homes a quality and a pleasantness above the average, still of necessity must obtain the utmost in living facilities for the least possible cost.

The Cost to Build This Home Our BILDCOST HOME PLAN Tells You

The Diary of a Plain Dirt Gardener

April 1 Fooled the lawn this evening. I slipped up when it wasn't looking and put plant food on the rest of it that I didn't get over about two weeks ago. There is still plenty of time.

FERNS Are Friendly

THE leaves of ferns are called fronds and each section is known as a pinna. Some fronds bear spores (correspond to seeds). These are usually less beautiful and called fertile fronds. The others are known as sterile fronds. An unfolding frond is known as a crosier because it resembles the pastoral staff of a bishop.

Turn the Leaves of Nature's Storybook

AS a family, we have been finding out, this last year, how really igno rant we are. Just last spring we pulled up stakes and transported ourselves-- cat, dog, canary, goldfish, and four children-- into the semi-country, where flower and vegetable garden, orchard and bees, horses, cows, and chickens awaited our fumbling approach.

Rest Well--Quality in the hidden workmanship of your mattresses and springs will give perfect comfort

WHAT is more marvelously refreshing than a good night's sleep? Nothing that I can think of-- probably because restful sleep is so essential for perfect health. The body should be comfortable, thoroly relaxed, lying free of all strain. Yawn, turn a few times if you like, then sleep serenely, offsetting the day's activities with the utter calm of the night.

A Three-Story Vegetable Garden

THE skyscraper idea has now come into the garden. In a space less than 25 feet square it is possible to construct a vegetable garden in which the tenants live on various levels and supply a family of four with all the table vegetables needed from May to October.

Housecleaning? Here's Help!

"NOW that April's here" means one thing to the poet and quite another to a woman who sees in the light of spring that there are spots on the upholstery, that the wallpaper needs cleaning, and the floors waxing. Dear, dear, what to do about it?

An April Fool-ish Frolic

THE Club Department this month might be serious, packed with advice to harassed program chairmen on how to achieve that sparkling, stimulating plan each club will need tor next year's programs. But on my calendar an impish April First flaunts an invitation to frolic.

YOUR CLUB IN APRIL

New Menus for April Dinners

DO YOUR Sunday dinners have a way of developing along monotonous lines? Roast chicken and mashed potatoes, molded salad, the favorite chocolate cake, and ice cream-- Sunday after Sunday-- good fare, of course. Nothing wrong with such a menu.

And So We Sow

SEEDS! What thrilling wonders that little word holds for us! I wonder how many of my Junior Gardeners remember that lovely fairy story of the Wishing Pebble?

And What a Difference!

ALTHO some folks thought it would be useless to plant anything where careless children would trample it, other residents of Whitney, Idaho, were sick and tired of looking at the treeless, grassless area around their schoolhouse.

New Beauty and Value

"A YEAR ago we bought this place cheaply, as no one wanted 'the big old barn,' a home built in 1790, deep seated in oaks and spruces, bordering a lake.

We Are Very Proud of It

"LIVING in an excellent residential section on a broad, winding street shaded by beautiful palm and maple trees and hoping to live here always, we decided to modernize our old-fashioned home.

"Best Frozen Dishes"

Contest Conditions

1. The Better Homes Contest begins January 1, 1933, and ends December 31, 1933. The work must be begun and finished within that period. Photographs and a 300-word letter describing the improvements you make must be mailed in an envelope which bears a postmark not later than midnight. December 31, 1933.

This is the way to Hard-Cook an Egg

The Question Before the House

There are two choices for floor: Lay flooring directly on ceiling joists or lay a subfloor and put the flooring on top of it. The latter is preferable. For wall and ceiling finish, either plaster on lath, wood ceiling, or plasterboard may be used. Some type of insulation is essential, either in the loose-fill form, in quilting, or as rigid board.

When You Need Putty

A Simple Wrenhouse

Your Home Service Bureau

SINCE the Better Homes & Gardens Scrapbook was first issued several years ago, it has become indispensable to literally thousands of gardened home families as the ideal place to keep Better Homes & Gardens leaflets and as a permanent file of home- and-garden information.

ALONG THE GARDEN PATH

FOR weeks I have been looking over my seeds, wondering when I can get them into the soil. I examine my bulbs of oxalis, gladiolus, and Tigridia and seem to think that if I don't plant them immediately something awful will happen to them.