Let’s Go Gossiping

Waipa Post, Volume 47, Issue 3357, 29 July 1933, Page 10

Let’s Go Gossiping

WOMEN’S INTERESTS : THE HOME.

BEAUTY. IF YOUR SKIN IS DRY. Your skin is protected with cosmetic oil, a natural secretion of the glands embedded in the tissues underlying Lie .skin. It gives your skin resilience to resist blows —and makes wrinkles. It makes your skin waterproof, prevents it from drying into parchment, cracking and splitting, as it would if it faced all kinds of weathers without this protection. But, ala,s! this clever lubricating plan, like many of Nature’s provisions, has gone slightly agley in the process of civilisation. Our life of nervous tension without much physical exercise tends to retard the active circulation which should nourish the glands generously. They languish and fail to secrete enough oil to lubricates the skin. The arid atmosphere of heated houses hastens the evaporation of the skin’s natural moisture, and so contributes to the dryness of the skin.

Sometimes dity skin is evidence that your system would be grateful for more fats in your diet. Sometimes the dryness and flaking arc a sign of constipation. Failure to drink enough water would make your skin dry and scaly. Drink eight or ten glasses of water a day to (provide the moisture content of all your tissues, Dry skin often comes from sluggish circulation: wc all need exercise.

The majority of women have dry skin. You realise it when your powder reveals patches of scale arid roughness on your nose and cheekbones. Nothing contributes more to wrinkles and a general old look in the skin than this need of softening and protective oils. The obvious thing to do is to use lots of oily creants —a cold cream, tissue cream, skin food, cleansing cream, are all oily. But that is not enough. A dry skin is benefited by the use of a miild skin tonic of freshener type of lotion, which stimulates the lagging circulation about the skin glands. And a dry skin, like every skin, whether dry, oily, young, or old—needs the deep cleansing stimulus of soap and watei washing every day. The greatest dermatologists confulm this.

/Some woman avoid using soap and winter on the face if they have a dry skin, cherishing the belief that their skins arc too fragile and sensitive for such a workaday method of cleansing. But to this belief the dermatologists say “Pooh! Pcoh! v They add, more emphatically, that even dry skin needs to be as deeply, immaculately clean as soap and water can make it. That a washed-clean skin has greater capacity to resist infections —such as pimjples an daches. That the warmth, friction, and tonic action of a soap-arid-water cleansing’ are good stimulation for all skins.

Every night at bedtime wash your face carefully with warm—not hot — water and soap. Work the lather as you would a cream into the nose and chin, where balckheads and coarse, clogged pores are most frequent. Rinse with warm water, dash with cold. Don’t use ice on a very dry skin; it is a little too astringent, and chilling the skin has a drying effect. Wjork a softening cream into your face after washing it, either a cold cream or a tissue cream or skin food. Especially on an older face a tissue cream or skin food containing some lanoline is excellent for dryness. And I mean “work.” You miss half the value of a nourishing or softening type of cream if you just slither it around or smooth it on and trust it to soak in of its own accord. The skin isn’t a sponge. It is in great measure waterproof. But you can force oil into it by the manipulations of the massage. After several minutes of deep, stirring massage, use a paper tissue to wipe away the excess cream which reim'ains on your face. If you have a tendency to coarse pores or blackheads it will be well to wipe your face with a skin tonic or freshener lotion, so as to remove any unabsorbed cream that has lodged in the pores. But if dryness is a more serious problem to you, then leave some cream on your face over-night. In the morning- wash your face with cool, clear water. Two or three times during the dajy—always before going cut—iuse softening, oily creams generously to give your skin rich fortifioation against the weather. Use a cold cream for day-time cleansing, followed by a second application of cold cream; to be worked deeply into the skin. Or use a special cleansingcream, followed by upward massage with a tissue cream or skin food. Or use a liquid cleanser, followed by a rich, softening cream or skin food. To give clarity and freshness t-> your skin, next after creams, pat it with a sk;in tonic, freshener, or gentle n-sti’ingent lotion. On a dry skin I suggest that you use only the mild preparations of this type: avoid the stronger astringents intended for coarse skins. Even if your face is old and flabby, if it is dry I would reeemimend a mild toning liquid, applied with sipacks and fast patting for greater stimulative effect, rather than a powerful astringent.

(By Miss Mary Tellis.—Special Service to The Waipa Post.)

Alter this patting many skins are in perfect readiness for powder without the use of a make-up foundation. But, if your skin is scaly, spread on a little foundation creatn to mjnkc yOur powder more smoothly brooming. You may have Vc experiment with two or three foundation methods to find the one that is ideal for your skin and for the current weather. In midwinter, or midsummer heat, you mtay find your richest tissue cream intakes the best means of making powder lie evenly.

A dry skin which lias a glazed, papefly surface needs i: fine powder—powder which has a certain pasty or creamy basic quality stays on a dry skin well. If your cheeks are scaling or patched with roughness you will find a creator rouge easier than dry rouge to smooth in a smooth, natural blush. When you do use dry, compact rouge apply it after ;you powder; then the powder will have prepared a smoother surface for the colour. KNITTING. START A JUMPER NOW. Here arc the directions for making a jumper, using any wool, needles, or stitches that you like. A scaffolding on which to build a pretty garment, with none of the complexities of the ordinary knitting pattern. First, find out hew many stitches go to an inch, by knitting a small piece with the wool and needles you intend to use for the main part of the jumper. Eighteen inches across is an ordinary size, so if you have five stitches to an inch, cast on ninety stitches; four stitches to an inch, cast on seventy-two; etc. But cast the stitches on to needles considerably smaller than those on which you intend to knit the main part of the jumper, and ,beg*in with a rib, making it two inches and a-half, then change tc your larger needles and knit plain stocking stitch until you have a piece thirteen inches 'long. Now you must decrease for the armholes. Roughly, you should take off a fifth part of the width of the jumper for this, or rather less; thus, if you have ninety stitches on the needles, cast off four stitches at the beginning of the next, four rows—that is, eight stitdhes at each side. With seventytwo stitches, cast off seven stitches at each side; etc. You must do as you feel inclined about the neck. You can divide for a V when you have cast off for the armholes and decrease one overly other vow until it is the right width—that is, one-third cf the number of stitches whicto you have on. Thus, if you east on. ninety stitches in the first piece and you cast off sixteen for the armholes, you will .now have seventy-four —that would be twenty-five for each shoulder and twenty-four for the neck opening.

Then go on knitting until the armhole measures eight inches, cast off a third of the stitches for the shoulder end, continue knitting to the neck and 'back again, then cast off another third, and again knit to the neck and back again, and then cast off the remaining stitches'. Finish the other side in the same way.

A square neck may be made tiy knitting for three inches above the armholes, and then casting off a third of the stitches in the middle and finishing off in the same way as the v V neck. For the back proceed in the same way, exceipt that you must cast off after the armhole measures sixinches, again casting off in three parts for each shoulder, but making no neck opening and casting off' the neck piece last.

To start the sleeve cast on six stitch.es and knit them, and then cast on two stitches at the beginning of each row until you have three-quar-ters of the number of stitches you started the jumper with. Knit for about an inch, and then knit two stitches together at each end of every six rews until it seems enough, then knit until long enough, allowing for two inches ribbing’ on the small needles before you east off. Eighteen inches is an ordinary med-ium-length sleeve.

The neck opening may be finished off by knitting a hand one inch wide in garter-stitch on very small needles and stitching it on, or by doing some stitch that will not curl at the edges (like one plain, one purl for one row and one purl and one plain the next) all round the neck opening in the main piece of knitting. Press all the parts on the wrong side under a dam]) cloth with a hot iron, join the seams, and press again paying particular attention to these parts. THE ROME. OLD LINOLEUM IS SO USEFUL. If you have any pieces of old linoleum lying about, they may be used in a variety of ways, you know. •For instance, the largest-sized pieces do beautifully for covering leaky places in the roof and sides of sheds, fowl runs, or other outhouses. Give

them a good coat of tar when fixed, and they will make the structures weatherproof for two or three seasons. Smaller pieces, when cut into squares or oblongs, come in very useful to line floors of cupboards, or to place on the table next to the stove when cooking, so that saucepans can be rested thereon when dishing up. This often saves dirtying a recentlyscrubbed table. On a wet dajy, too, small pieces (oblong) can be laid down in the hall or the living room, in order to save the “ tread ” when the children come in from school. This is much better than putting newspaper down, as is usually done, for the newspaper only becomes wet, and the sodden print on it mines off on to the linoleum or the carpet, and makes it almost as soiled as if no protecting material had been put down at all. Then, again, have you ever tried lighting a fire with small strips and scraps of linoleum ? They make a splendid blaze —a tip useful to know if you happen to run out of kindling on a ccld winter’s morning i

THE HOUSEKEEPER. WIRELESS HELPS, EVEN WITH WASHING DAY ! •Oh, the misery of a wet washing day ! Vvßiere is the housewife who does not dread the arrival of rain on the day set apart for the weekly washing ? What an uncomfortable business ! Outside the rain beats on the window piffle? l . Inside there is steam kind the clammy unpleasantness of \vet clothes. Even the fire, the bright spot that can be counted to cheer most wet days, is eclipsed By the clothes-horse. Ugh.! Why do we do if ? Once, perhaps, we had an excuse. We did not know what the weather was going to be. Forecasts were unreliable. Go we made our plans for the week’s work and took no account of outside circumstances. Are we justified in carrying on in the same way to-day ? We have our wireless sets. They give us pleasure in idle moments. We could use them, also, to help us in our business of housekeeping. Listen-in to the weather forecasts i After all, it is not often that all the working days of one week are wet. Choose a day which promises to be fine for your washing day.

You say your washing day is Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday; that you always wash on that day, and cannot alter it ?

'Have pity on your family, and on yourself ! Adapt yourself to modern conveniences. When you know Monda,v will be wet—brash on Tuesday.

A FEW HINTS. THINGS YOU OUGHT TO KNOW. Ircmuould: When it is on coloured fabric, hold the stain over a basin of boiling water and apply a mixture made of equal parts of salt and lemon juice. Leave on for a second, soak in the hot water, and then apply a little weak amjmonia. Repeat as often as necessary. Should the colour be affected-, sponge with chloroform. As with this treatment there is a risk of the colour being affected, he sure to take this into account. On white material, soak in water and then cover with cream of tartar and salts of lemon, and put in the sun. Keep damp. Scorch Marks: When the mark is not very bad 'make a paste of pipeclay and water. Put this all over the mark and place in the sun. Repeat if necessary. For a bad scorch mark, treat with the following - mixture: Boil together the juice of an onion, a tablespoonful of soap jelly, half a cupful of vinegar, and two tablespoonsi'ul of fuller’s earth. Allow this to coo], and then spread over the damaged material. When dry wash and put in the sun. Tt may he necessary to repeat the treatment several times.

After a* severe knock, to prevent any ugly bruises from appearing, the skin must be protected from the air. This is done by moistening a little dry starch, or arrowroot with cold water and applying.