Handy Hints

Manawatu Times, Volume 64, Issue 304, 26 December 1939, Page 2

Handy Hints

It looked queer to see the legs of a table wearing stockings with garters. Tho explanation was that the table was a valuable one, and was about to be “conveyed by removalists” to a new home. The idea is worth passing on. A blocked drain-pipe may be a job for a drainer, but, if it can be got at, pour down kerosene, followed by boiling -water. It will te both cleared and cleansed. After mincing meat, pass a few pieces of dry bread through the mach* ine to clean it. Dried fruits—dates, figs, etc—will go through more roadily if a little lemon juice has first been poured into tho machine, and the subsequent cleaning will be simplified. Powdered borax, strewn on the fioor. will keep ants out of tho larder. All suspicious holes should be filled with cement, after being painted with turpentine. Rice starch is excellent for cold water starching. Parsley will keep fresh for a week or ten days if stored in a wide-mouthed screw-top jar. Excellent for mending china is plaster of Paris mixed to a paste with the beaten white of an egg. To remove the smell of stale tobacco smoko from a room quickly, burn a few drops of vinegar on a hot shovel. A good way to stiffen linen is with gum arabic. Dissolve 2oz. in 1 pint hot water and use 2 tablespoons of the solution to 10 quarts of water. Your shopping bag should have a rubber cover ready for use if rain! comes. A strip from an old rubber apron can easily bo adjusted.