HINTS AND SUGGESTIONS.

Otago Witness, Issue 3899, 4 December 1928, Page 65

HINTS AND SUGGESTIONS.

Oil stains should be rubbed with a rag dipped in benzine. To prevent mould on cheese, nib the cut part with butter, and cover with white paper. Stains on piano keys will vanish if rubbed with a mixture of whiting and methylated spirit.

Salt will remove stains from dishes that have been burned in the oven, and the stains of tea or coffee from cups. You will save time, temper, and broken eggs if you add a little vinegar to the water in which they are being poached. To fireproof woodwork, paint it twice at a few days’ interval with waterglass diluted with eight times its volume of water.

Finger marks on highly-polished furniture can be removed with a cloth dipped in paraffin. When dry, the wood should be polished with a leather. Scrubbing brushes should be rinsed thoroughly after use, shaken well to get rid of as much moisture as possible, and turned on their sides to dry. White pumice-stone soap is an excellent thing with which to wash the hands after doing housework of any sort. It penetrates into the pores of the skin, removing stains of all kinds, and leaving the hands soft and white.

When velvet has been in wear for some time it gets a rubbed look and the pile is flattened. You can freshen it up and make it much better by giving it a good steaming. Fill a basin with boiling water and hold the velvet, pile downwards, over it so that the steam gets well into tlie pile. Velvet should not be brushed, but gently smoothed with the lid of a box or a heavy pad covered with the material. Hold the velvet so that you can see the way the pile lies, and smooth it gently by the pile.

Melt odds and ends of bacon fat, bits of suet, scraps of mutton fat, all and every scrap of fat, clarify it and keep it for frying. To clarify melted fat pour it the moment it is melted and all hot into a basin of cold water. The fat will rise to form a cake on top of the water, and the sediment will fall to the bottom of the basin. Your fat

will be clear, and good for frying. In sewing velvet care must be taken always to put the needle in so that the stitches will be exact. The careless putting in of the needle spoils the pile of velvet or any other material of which the pile can be flattened. Experienced dressmakers, when'sewing velvet or pile fabrics, cover- the forefinger of their left hand with a piece of the material. In this "way the marks of -pressing do not show'.

A non-slippery polish which will save the drudgery of “ knee-drill,” and will last six, nine, or even twelve months without a second application, can be made as follows:—Add 4oz brown shellac to one pint of methylated*spirit. This will take four or five days to dissolve; shake the mixture daily. The linoleum should be thoroughly washed and dried,, and the mixture applied rapidly (as the; spirit quickly evaporates) with a clean

paint brush. As the shellac tends to darken the linoleum, it is preferable to use it on brown shades, or to test its effect on a spare piece of linoleum. For the first time two or three applications are recommended. A highly-polished but non-slippery surface will be the result, and many hours of labour saved. Linoleums so polished will only need dusting and occasionally rubbing with a damp cloth.

A string bag is not nearly so satisfactory as a string pot. Paint an ordinary flow’er pot any gay colour that will make a bright splash in the kitchen, then tie together all your oddments of string and roll them into a neat ball, drawing the end through the drainage hole of the inverted pot. The string will pass through as needed, without the least entangling. If you are a gardener and possess a potting shed, a string pot of this sort is always handy on a shelf, and saves many an irritating moment looking for a “ little bit of string.” That cake you made for your party was a failure, and fell dow’n as heavy as lead. You cannot understand why this happened, for you had all your ingredients of good quality, you beat well, and your measurements were correct. The reason for your failure was that you opened the oven door to see horv the cake was going on. You were delighted to find that it was rising beautifully, and you slammed the door of the oven in a hurry to keep the heat in. That did it! First, you should not look too soon to see how a cake is baking—give it peace to go on steadily. Secondly, if you do open the oven door, shut it very, very gently. The current of air makes the rising cake fall, and nothing will ever raise it again.

There are always all sorts of odds and ends of draperies, ancient curtains, etc., to dispose of after spring cleaning is over, and many casement cloths with coloured borders will boil quite white and make excellent kitchen cloths and dusters. Casement cloth is quite free from lint, and may be used for glass cloths and as dusters for fine china. Another use to which such material may be put is to make outer covers for pillows, bolsters, and cushions, and joined together it may be converted into mattress cases. And here let me say that every mattress ought to be entirely covered, and not have a width of white material only sewn over the sides, to prevent spoiling the mattress when bed-making. No matter how well brushed a mattress is at regular intervals, a certain amount of dust and fluff works through the ticking, and into under-blankets, as anyone knows who constantly shakes such blankets lying on uncovered mattresses. But if the mattress is encased in a cotton case the dust is collected therein, and it can easily be shaken out. Many faded materials will revive wonderfully if a little vinegar is placed in the rinsing water. This is especially good for colours that have faded through using strong soaps and washing powders. Some faded colours will brighten up if they are sponged over with ammonia and water; but much depends on the cause of the fading. If soiled velveteen material is to be washed, make a good lather of soap jelly and hot water—the jelly is made by shredding some good soap the previous day, and covering it with boiling water—and cool it off to make it comfortable for the hands, then di.p the material to be cleansed up and down until all soil is removed. Do not rub, squeeze, or wring, but rinse several times in clear warm water, and hang in the shade until all water has drained away. Hie job should be done on a sunless day with a high wind.