April 1938

ACROSS THE Editor's DESK

The Picture on the Cover: No danger of Monday-morning blues with such a blithe breakfast nook or room-corner to add zest to your cereal and coffee! It almost gives you the feeling of dining outdoors, with that trellis, seen thru the window, bringing the garden so pleasantly close. Yes, the homelikeness and skillful handling of colors are what make this room- corner so inviting and gay... Moreover, it's part of the color feature which begins on page 20.

From Fairyland

WHAT are they waiting for? What will they find? Do you think real fairies will come out while they watch? Surely the fairies and gnomes are right there now-- doing their work every minute.

IT'S NEWS TO ME!

To make open-face sandwiches quickly, here's a canape cutter (Sketch 1) with a sliding base. In the sketch you'll note the A-B-C process: cut your bread, spread while yet in the cutter and, to lift your canape, raise the cutter's base from below with your finger. [Standard cutter, 50 cents; stainless steel, $1, M. & M. Products, 163 South St., Pittsfield, Mass.]

Good News WE ALL GET A BREAK!

EVERYBODY, but especially the little fellow-- who is most of us-- is finally getting a break. The amendments recently written into the National Housing Act are primarily for his benefit. They're intended to make it easier for him to make the down payment on a home, and easier for him to carry the mortgage after he gets it.

TEN MINUTES FROM HOLLYWOOD

IF IT isn't one thing, it's another. As soon as the architect mastered the skyscraper that rears 70 stories up and houses a city within itself, the little house that costs less than $5,000 popped up to plague him. At present the little house is his real problem child.

Light WHERE YOU NEED IT

YOU can't blame Abraham Lincoln for doing his work by firelight. He just didn't have anything better. But no flickering eyestrain for us! Banished, even, are the glaring, spotty lamps of yesterday. Instead, smart modern affairs like those pictured here offer soft, comfortable lighting and perfect protection for eyes and nerves.

CURTAIN CALLS

AT HOME WITH Soft Colors

HOW TO Tie YOUR BEDS TO YOUR LAWN

NEATNESS is one of the prime requisites of a good garden, and whether the beds are formal or informal it's very often desirable to edge them in some way to emphasize either the straight lines or graceful curves. We can edge the beds by merely cutting the sod to a neat line with an edging tool or a flat spade. Some persons even use a butcher knife or mason's trowel to tidy the edges.

The Quickest Garden

WETHER you're terribly busy, whether you have abundant leisure-- whether you're an expert gardener or a beginner-- whether your soil is perfect or poor, you'll love annuals! Many grow in spite of neglect, but with a bit of time, care, and thought, they'll do wonders.

WASHINGTON In Bloom!

ABOUT one hundred fifty years ago a romantic French engineer named Pierre L'Enfant conceived the idea of making Washington a capital worthy of a great nation.

HE HAS COLLECT-ITIS

DAVE has gone in for minerals and fossils now. Anytime I expect to see him coming up our side drive with a dinosaur on his back.

FAIRIES LIVE IN THIS GARDEN

DO YOU believe in fairies? I certainly do. Indeed, I'm so sure they exist that I've even made a little home for them in our garden.

PLANNED FOR Miss Sixteen

OUR Jean was just 16. Refurnishing her room was our birthday gift to her-- and what young lady wouldn't thrill to this charmingly feminine room planned especially for her? Authentic furniture reproductions in mellow maple are lovely against lettuce-green washable wallpaper all scattered with white dots.

Kitchen Energy-Savers

IT TAKES a heap o'living... apologies to Eddie Guest and surely he'll agree... to make a kitchen a handy place to work.

TOMMY'S ROOM IS Washable

"TOMMY! Get your feet off that bed, and don't spatter the ink!" Such parental explosions no longer spoil the good times of this young man.

APRIL Wool-Gathering

SOMETIME soon you'll wake up on a still, clear morning-- just too calm to last-- and it won't. Before mid-morning there'll be a breeze. If your weather nose is dependable, you can start right in tubbing all those odds and ends of winter woolens so they'll be ready to catch the first balmy whiffs of a breeze from the South.

White Walls IN AN ORCHARD

SNUGGLED among many apple trees in West Hempstead, Long Island, is this well-bred little envoy of good planning and good building. It has the symmetry, the open scale, and the formal lines of a French Manor house. Actually, it's small-- six rooms, no wasted space. Its simple and classic form belies its true size.

First Aid to Turf

YOUR lawn can be damaged at any season of the year, even when it's snow-covered. Have you been careless about it during the winter by backing the family car over the edges? If you have, you'll discover this spring that some repair work is necessary.

THE QUESTION BEFORE THE HOUSE

For finishing the exterior of either new or old houses, asbestos shingles are both economical and permanent. Perhaps that accounts for their growing popularity everywhere. They're easily applied over any type of finish on houses being remodeled (see picture at right), and the improvement in appearance is notable.

My Sewing Nook

MENDING'S no chore and shearing out a dress is a real adventure in my sunny sewing nook. When we built our large bedroom there was an alcove with a double casement window left between the two closets. Waste it? Not we! With a bit of carpenter work it was transformed into the most inviting corner in our home.

We Grow Iris FROM SEED

WINTER winds swing down the Chinese gorges, just as they pull thru the famed vale of Kashmir, but the thatched roofs cling tight, held fast by Nature's anchor, the Roof Iris. In spring all the low housetops are a glory of wavy-margined flowers-- lilac-crested, blue-lavender, streaked with violet and purple.

IT WAS SHORN OF Bric-a-Brac

TO REBUILD an old house so there's nothing left of the original structure-- or the bank account --is downright easy. Anyone can do that. But the smart remodeler cuts off gewgaws, adds only vital details, ends up with the fewest possible changes.

Answering YOUR SPRING GARDEN Questions

DURING the days of early spring ambition, when everyone wants to begin gardening, even on the smallest plot of land, garden questions pop up that need an immediate answer. Time is scarce; the days and weeks slip by too fast.

STARTING Tuberous Begonias

TODAY the tuberous begonia has been developed to such a high degree that you may get varieties which will produce the most exquisite blooms. Some are delicately frilled, and there are other types that look like camellias, or are crested, carnation-flowered, or shaped like delicate rose buds.

Hotpoint

FOR OUR Feathered Friends

THE way to lick the host of worms and other wee creeping beasties that early wage war on your tender shoots and buds is to have ready a feathered battalion with appetites whetted for said enemies.

Lupines Are Lovely

LUPINES have become front-page news. They've always been loved for sentimental reasons. Occasional new varieties in the past have slipped quietly into catalogs. A few scattered accounts have been heard of varieties in rare colors being bred in Europe

Gloxinia STAGES A COMEBACK

GLOXINIA, the magnificent potted plant, can achieve unbelievable records-- 33 perfect blooms at once-- if you encourage it properly. Follow the directions to make it happy and it will respond with a dramatic display.

A Magic

TO MY mind there's nothing more fascinating, on a rainy afternoon, than playing magician with brush and enamels. An amazing variety of odds and ends can be endowed with new beauty by a few simple brush strokes.

Safe AT HOME BUT Are YOU?

ACCIDENTS at home don't just happen. They're caused. This puts a mighty serious indictment on our doorstep, but the ugly truth is that the majority of mishaps, from cuts and bruises to stark tragedies, happen because some household detail has been poorly planned, some dangerous economy practiced, or some piece of equipment left out of order.

THE MAN NEXT DOOR

April seems to have been the month when most American wars were started, partly because wives were too busy with their spring cleaning to notice what their husbands were up to.

OLD DESIGNS FOR A New Easter

TO ANCIENT races the egg was symbolic of new life and of the new year-- an occasion celebrated in the spring which became the Easter festival of Christian peoples. Many of the customs of the old celebration became associated with the new, and today in middle Europe you will find Easter eggs decorated with the designs of the ancient Persians.

WATCH THOSE "Children's Diseases"

ALL set for my interview, I arrived at the office of the director of the division of preventable diseases of the state department of health, just as that gentleman was holding a cryptic and rather gory long-distance telephone discourse.

We Parents

SOMETIME ago I started for my children a scrapbook entitled "What Shall I Do?" In it I've pasted many magazine articles pertaining to careers. Sometimes I've obtained only typed or penned comments from personal experiences, but the book is rich in help and interest. In this way I hope to guide my children in deciding which lifework they wish to follow and to avoid deciding too late; and my 12-year-old daughter and her companions greatly enjoy the career scrapbook.

Miracle

Early-Bird Bargains

SAYS B. L., father of one son of 20 and another just turned 25: "Of course I knew that rates for life insurance go up for every year you wait, but it was only last month that some figures startled me into talking the matter lover with my boys and deciding that it was worth some sacrifice to get them insured immediately."

CONFESSIONS OF GOOD COOKS

If you're ever in too much of a hurry to roll bread or cracker crumbs for a veal loaf or for hamburg patties, add rolled oats instead. You'll love the fine new flavor!-- Mrs. Mary C. Newman, Columbus, Ohio.

Among Ourselves

THE following was addressed to Better Homes & Gardens: "It was with a great deal of pleasure that I have read Gladys Denny Shultz' story on the Quintuplets. It is the best magazine story I have seen on the Toronto Symposium, and the entire theme is excellently handled."

Three Wings IN HARMONY

THERE is an ancient and honorable belief, an outgrowth of romantic fiction, that Kentucky Colonels live on horse farms and spend their days sipping mint juleps. Actually, most of them live in cities and towns, in rather modest quarters, and work every day, even as you and I. For this latter sort-- Colonel and Mrs. W. S. Taylor-- this Bildcost Gardened Home was built.

THE Diary OF A PLAIN DIRT GARDENER

Apr.1 This bright morning found me at the Monticello Hotel in Norfolk, Virginia, 650 miles from home, to attend the garden school under way in the hotel. This school is being sponsored by the Norfolk Federation of Garden Clubs in co-operation with the two Norfolk newspapers, the Virginian Pilot and Ledger-Dispatch.

WHAT DO YOU KNOW ABOUT Dogs?

TEST your knowledge about dogs. Read the problems carefully; check-mark your answers; then turn to page 129 and see how yours agree with those put forth by authorities. Give yourself a rating by scoring 10 for each correct answer. A score of 70 is perfect; 40 or over indicates you're proficient in dog-ology.

Cowsheds and Cider

HAVE YOUR Picnics at Home

I CAN'T RESIST A Vegetable Garden

MY VEGETABLE GARDEN is fun coming and going. I enjoy it when I work in it, eat it, and think about it. In winter it becomes a green pasture for my mind to wander in. I forget weeds, bugs, and blisters and revel in the remembered joy of the first sweet corn.

There's Contentment Here

TUCKED neatly away behind shrubs and trees in a certain home grounds in Chicago is this rock garden-- one of the most inspirational ones of its kind I've ever seen. Part of the reason for its lure is in the rocks, laid with that charming naturalness so necessary to any rock garden that is to be permanently pleasing.

ALONG THE Garden Path

NOT long ago I had occasion to check the time consumed in cultivating the 200 feet of finished border in my Long Island garden. It was just under an hour.