MAINLY FOR WOMEN

Greymouth Evening Star, 22 September 1923, Page 8

MAINLY FOR WOMEN

NEWS AND NULLS.

Discussing cupboards in the course of a book upon "Decoration and the Care of the Home,” Mrs M. Vince, a well-known house decorator, writes. Besides deep built-in cupboards, I think, that every house—if it is in any way possible snould have also a “cup-board-room,” a room, that • is, with deep cupboards all round the walls and nothing else in it but a table in the middle. Such a room would be held in common by the family, and every member would have a right to share in it. The cupboards would have shelves as well as hanging space and I am sure that such a room would do more for tidiness, comfortable living, and well-kept clothes than any other device. In most houses of any size the cupboard-room should be easy to arrange. Where, however, it seems at first thought impossible is just where it is most needed—in flats. Yet 1 believe that people who live in Hats would do best to begin by determining to make a cupboard-room. Nearly every flat however well designed, has one room that is small, dark, and airless. It figures i nthe house agent’s book as a bedroom, and the tenants do their best —without any real success —to make a habitable, cheerful bedroom of it. It is far better to make it at once into a “cupboard-room.” It should be the aim of the housewife to prevent rust attacking her pots and pans. A spot of rust in tinware soon eats its way into a hole, and then the utensil is seriously damaged. Tinware should always be thoroughly dried before being put on one side. If for the final -rinsing scalding water is used the metal becomes so hot that the moisture soon evaporates. A very good plan to follow is to- rub all new tinware with fresh lard and then heat well in an oven. Articles treated in this way are not at all likely to rust.

Rust soon attacks the metal beneath enamel when the hard surface has been chipped away. At first sign of the crack rub some clean grease over the place, and this will prevent the coming of rust.

There is a secret in entertaining. Some women seem to be born hostesses. Their parties “go.” Other women spend far more lavishly, and the people who go to their houses come away bored! 1 used to think that the mystery was incommunicable (says an English writer), that either you had the gift or you had not, and that there was nothing more to be dope about it. But recently I asked a very successful London hostess to tell me wherein her triumphs lay. She laughed at me. “There’s no secret,” she said. “You have only got to remember how much more interesting social life would be, and how much more easy if everybody was labelled with a short account of who they are, what they have done, and what their hobbies are —a sort of ‘Who’s Who!’ in large print on their shirt fronts or round their necks. The wise hostess supplies that gap. She first of all chooses the right people to meet one another, and then having got them together she does not merely introduce A and B, but before she leaves them she throws out a salient hint or two on' some topic she knows will interest both of them, and the rest is easy.” I tried it with my party. T introduced a K.C. to one lady, and murmured, “He knows more about crime than is good for anyone.” I took a man up to a girl and added, “You know, of course, she wrote ‘Divisions.’ After a bit I shuffled them, carrying <mt the same plan. By that time I had prepared the ground a little by telling the people I was going to introduce to each other how niteresting they would find their new partner ami why. Tin 1 proof of the pudding is in the eating. I thought that none of them would ever go !

One thing that telephones have done is to mitigate the woes of homesick children the London “Star” tells us. No man or woman who ever experienced that terrible unhappiness, so unlike any other human suffering, will forget it, and they alone can realise what it means to a child, far from home and family, to place a receiver to the ear and hear familiar voices. One sympathetic woman discovered the balm of the telephone when she took care of the small child of a friend who was ill. The child was fond of the woman, but she dearly loved her home, and to be taken away from it almost broke her heart. Ihe first night was oiie of sorrow for all the house-

hold. The child was quiet, but the agony she wont through reacted on all the inembers of a sympathetic group. The next. day the child was visibly ill. The third day (he mother had a telephone installed near her bed. After that the child said “Good-night” and “Good morning” to her every day over the telephone, and was quite contented and happy. Incidentally, it had a beneficial effect on the mother to know that her little daughter was happy. When making a girdle of material, the amateur often finds difficulty in turning the “tube.” to the right side of the material after joining up the edges on the wrong side. First press the,, seam out Hat over a damp cloth, and then with strong thread sew a bodkin or large safety hook to one end of the tube. " It will, then be a simple matter to push this into the tube and pull the end through. Give a thorough pressing after making the ends neat. In ancient days Japanese women were fanrous in literature, and model n Japanese, women are showing talent in many departments of intellectual work and art. The artistic talent of Japan is pre-eminently shown by the paintings of Airs Shoyen Duimoura, which are famous in her own land and have been exhibited and greatly admired in Europe, and America. Airs Shoyen follows the old traditions of Chinese and Japanese painting, and her pictures are remarkable lor clear and transp.nent colouring, strength of composition and execution, and refinement, of feeling. She, paints in water-colours, on silk and paper, sitting on the, floor, Japanese style. She excels in portrait as well as Nature painting, and prefers women subjects.