September 1948

Will fuel be short again this winter!

LAST winter, fuel was short in many communities. Will history repeat this year? The opinions of fuel authorities, both in government and in industry, are summarized below.

The house on the cover

THE home you see on the cover of this issue of Better Homes & Gardens sits atop a gentle slope in Albuquerque, New Mexico. It is the home of Mrs. H. T. Anderson, and was designed by Charles Edman, Jr., of Lubbock, Texas.

Draperies and spreads that match

How to tie your house to the ground

Bedtime without bedlam

IS BEDTIME at your house the signal for protests and tantrums? It needn't be. Here's the secret of a low-pressure lullaby that avoids the arguments so often produced by nagging reminders that it's time for bed.

How to make a Ming tree

ORIENTAL Ming trees have become so popular as home and table decorations that we've asked a flower master, Mrs. Tomoko Yamamoto, to show you how they're made.

Use color--it will make your old house look new

LAST spring our family of six, crowded together in a too-small house, had a bad attack of that trapped feeling. Three of our four youngsters had reached the age where they liked to entertain their teen-age pals in boisterous bunches. The only place they could do it was the living room-- our only relaxing spot. On the other hand, Wes and I had reached the age where life begins (if you can take it), and we needed some place to escape occasionally from youthful exuberance.

You don't need a fancy fireplace!

YOU ought to have an outdoor fireplace. A simple, homemade one that's good to cook on. And better still, good to crowd around as evenings grow cool. A place to build a campfire where you and your family can watch the flicker and dance of the flames, can feel the magic of fire.

How to pep up a tired lawn

Will compulsory insurance help keep you healthy?

LET'S get down to brass tacks. What would it mean to you, your family, and your doctor if the United States were to adopt a health-insurance system?

Sunshine and storage space

THIS is the type of house you dream of owning, but rarely see. It is a house almost without flaws, built from plans which Designer Cliff May drew for Talton R. Craig, Jr.

Extra ways to use flower bowls

A NEW low flower bowl can be a versatile thing. It can be good to look at and just as handy for serving salads, candies, and nuts as for holding flowers or fruit.

Bigger show for your bulb money

Decorating--how to go about it. No. 2 of a series Dining rooms

DECORATING a dining room used to be a routine affair. You'd put a table in the middle of the room under a chandelier. On one wall there'd be a buffet. On another, a window smothered in draperies. Walls and floor could be almost anything, so long as they looked mousy.

Better Homes & Gardens Five Star Home No. 1809 is a Minimum-cost house

LET'S be frank. The five-room, two-bedroom house that was built and sold before the war for $6,000 to $8,000 now costs between $12,000 and $15,000 with the same workmanship. We see no immediate possibility of the cost returning to prewar levels-- or even to $10,000, for that matter.

HOW TO GET ALONG WITH THOSE YOU LOVE

Dr. Paul M. Landis, one of America's leading authorities on family life, retired last year as dean of the graduate school, Washington State College. Still only 47, he continues as chairman of the division of sociology and last year was president of the Pacific Northwest Conference on Family Relations.

FOOD NEWS

Macaroon mix makes 50 to 60 macaroons. You buy the mix in a 12-ounce can for about 49 cents. All you add to the contents of the can is the white of one egg. Bake the cookies 15 minutes if you like slightly chewy macaroons, 20 minutes if you like crisp, deeptan macaroons.

How to teach your child to say Thank you

WHEN you teach Johnny to say thank you, are you sure you teach him to mean it and want to say it, or is it an empty phrase?

Solving the rainy-day play problem

"I CAN'T do a thing with my 4-year-old when she has to stay indoors," an exasperated mother told me the other day. "She's always getting underfoot, and by the time her father comes home we're really in each other's hair."

Make two rooms out of one

WOULD you like to separate your living-dining room at mealtime? Do you wish you could shut off one corner of your bedroom for the baby?

CRUSHED ICE

One table you can use 5 ways

Curtain magic

SIMPLE, straight curtains need not be dull. Windows in your kitchen, dining nook, nursery, or playroom can have straight curtains that don't have the plain-Jane look yet withstand wear, are easily washable, and are inexpensive to make.

Shampoos can be fun

OF COURSE, washing your youngster's hair can be anything but fun. If you have to work in an awkward position while your Betty struggles and screams that she has soap in her eyes, you may come to dread each shampoo.

Four good little houses

IF YOU'VE done any house-hunting lately, you know that a good small house is hard to find. If the outside looks good, the inside is often poorly planned. If the rooms are well arranged, there isn't enough storage space. A house that looks well, is well planned, and seems spacious in spite of its size is about as rare as a thousand-dollar bill.

Your dog and mine

Not easy to deal with. Trick is to correct in the midst of the act with a dramatic scolding and spanking to impress the lesson. Must be repeated many times. Added help is to keep his nails trimmed close, as shortened claws hamper any real digging results.

BIG ideas for small houses

YOU can pack a heap of comfortable living inside a little house these days. The trick? Really there are hundreds of them. Some of the best are typified by the small homes on this page and the next.

St. Charles

Tips for flower arrangers

A bowl of bouncing snowballs makes a cool-looking centerpiece. Fasten a candle snow man or snowball (or Santa Claus candle) to the bottom of a battery jar or fish bowl with modeling clay or melted tallow. Fill the bowl with water. Then add 15 to 20 moth balls, 1 teaspoon citric acid, 1 teaspoon baking soda.

New bed has drawer space

There's good living in a garage

DOES the idea of living in a garage set you thinking of rough rafters and grease-spotted floors? Then take a long look at Sally Hunt's garage-home in Pasadena.

We want to know what you're doing

ARE you one of the thousands of Better Homes & Gardens families who are devoting your spare time, evenings and weekends, to home-improvement jobs, doing most of the skilled and unskilled work yourselves?

How to make a twirling shelf

YOU'LL find many uses for a simple twirling shelf in your kitchen. It will keep spices, sandwich spreads, or baby foods at your finger tips.

How small can your bedroom be?

THERE'S one nice thing about bedrooms. Most of the time you're in one, you are sound asleep. When you're asleep, you don't care how small the room is, or how it is arranged.

Your family albums for September

Eileen Farrell's large and lustrous voice is here properly reproduced for the first time. With Stokowski and the recording engineers as a harmonious team, she soars thru these songs with beautiful ease and expressiveness. "Songs," incidentally, is a slight misnomer for this music, since they are actually preliminary sketches for Wagner's Tristan, containing in compact form many of the finest ideas in that score.

How to handle a ladder

Have you painted with a spray gun?

ANYBODY can use a paint spray gun. So can anybody apply paint with a brush. The results you get with either depend on how much you know, and how much you practice.

Take a tip: It's house-cleaning time

Oil mops or treated mops may be washed in mild, lukewarm suds. If mop is very dirty wash it twice or more, using fresh suds each time. Then rinse in lukewarm water until all soap and dirt is removed. Recondition by dipping in a lemon-oil solution (¼ cup lemon oil stirred into 1 pint water). Squeeze out excess moisture, shake until fluffy. Hang to dry, mop end up.-- Mrs. F. A. Green, Kent, Ohio.

The best place for a telephone?

LIKE your car, your telephone is a convenience. But it is a nuisance if you are always four rooms or 15 stairs away from it when it rings. The trouble is that you are so used to a telephone that you give it little thought. But if you're remodeling or building, the time to think about your telephone and its location is before you begin work.

They're not ready for college

FOR more than a quarter of a century I've worked with young people. I've known a lot of them. And I've watched how they adapted themselves to the self-disciplines of life away from home.

Phonograph facts

Waterproof your basement walls

CAN you waterproof your basement walls from the inside? The answer is yes-- if you are careful and know what you are trying to do. You can do the work yourself.

Article

Is an only child behind the 8 ball?

"OH, WELL, he's an only child." According to popular opinion, the only child is a recognizable type. A cartoonist represents him as an arrogant "whipper-snapper" perched on a throne above his elders. Even college students go into a psychology class assuming that the only child develops into a selfish, egotistical, quarrelsome brat.

How to have a bright basement

LIKE most of you, we wanted a basement when we built our home. We wanted a recreation room where we and our friends, our three daughters, and their separate gangs could spend enjoyable days and evenings thruout the year.

SEPTEMBER GARDEN GUIDE

WEATHER'S on your side all this month. Chill nights have ripened most plants, making them easy to transplant. Mild fall rains and cool air keep plants from drying out. If you have any perennials that need transplanting, now is the time to transplant them. Now while you get full value, from moisture and cool weather.

The diary of a plain dirt gardener

Sept. 1 Donald is thru with his summer-school classes at the university. I have a breathing spell when I can get away from desk work. So this month is to be devoted considerably to travel. Several necessary business trips are in prospect, not related to gardening.

Garden clinic

how-to helps

Does your dog have a housing problem? Bunk him the year around in this All-Weather Doghouse. He'll be happy and comfortable-- and you'll find this house an easy trick to make. Pattern 3.428, 35 cents, gives complete instructions for cutting and assembling stock pieces of lumber.

Article

Care of spray gun and compressor

More personality for your house

YOU don't have to spend a fortune to make your house the one people remember. Not if you set out a few pots of brightly colored plants in one of the ways shown here.

THE MAN NEXT DOOR

As I shuffle thru the summer vacation's snapshots, it seems to me I wore myself out pursuing the family with a camera. When I ask 'em to pose they all act like a starlet working overtime when she's late for a date with Clark Gable.