left under each, which, when bent back, makes a stand.
General Instructions
The front legs of chairs, the legs of tables, and the backs of
furniture must be neatly joined together by narrow strips of
stamp-paper or adhesive tape. To do this, cut a strip of the right
size, crease it down the middle, and stick one side. Allow this to
dry, before you fix the other.
Wherever in the pictures there is a dotted line, it means that the
paper is to be folded there. It will be easily seen whether it is to
be folded up or down.
Before the furniture is folded it should be painted. Wood, iron,
brass, and silk can all be imitated in color.
In cutting out small spaces of cardboard--as between the bars of a
chair--lay the card on a board, and keeping your knife, which should
be sharp at the point, against a flat ruler, run it again and again
along the lines you want to cut, until you have cut through. If your
furniture is made of paper, the spaces can be cut out with finely
pointed scissors, taking care to start in the middle of the space,
for the first incision is seldom a clean one.
[Illustration: KITCHEN TABLE
(Cut out the oblong parts marked AA.)]
[Illustration: KITCHEN RANGE AND KITCHEN CHAIR
(A is turned up to form a shelf for saucepans; B is glued down over
the back.)]
[Illustration: SCREEN
(To be made of one piece of paper folded into three equal parts and
cut out in accordance with the illustration.)]
[Illustration: VARIOUS POTS AND PANS
(Under part to be folded back for a stand.)]
[Illustration: DINING-ROOM TABLE AND CLOTH]
[Illustration: SIDEBOARD]
[Illustration: SOFA AND ARM-CHAIR
(The corners must be fastened to the sheet by very narrow strips of
paper.)]
[Ilustration: WOODEN BEDSTEAD]
[Illustration: WARDROBE
(Join the sides AB and AB, and then bend the top down, glueing the
flap C to the back of the wardrobe.)]
[Illustration: DRESSING TABLE]
[Illustration: WASHSTAND]
[Illustration: ROCKING-CHAIR, TOWEL RACK, AND CHAIR]
[Illustration: CHILD'S HIGH CHAIR AND COT
(In the chair the lines AB and BA must be cut. In the cot the four
pieces marked A are cut out on their sides and bent down to form
legs.)]
Paper Dolls
Paper dolls are not as good to play with as proper dolls. One can do
much less with them because they cannot be washed, have no hair to be
brushed, and should not sit down. But they can be exceedingly pretty,
and the keeping of their wardrobes in touch with the fashion is an
absorbing occupation. Paper dolls are more interesting to those who
like painting than to others. The pleasure of coloring them and their
dresses is to many of us quite as interesting as cutting out and
sewing the clothes of ordinary dolls.
Making Paper Dolls
The first thing to do is to draw the doll in pencil on the cardboard
or paper which it is to be cut from. If you are not good at drawing,
the best way is to trace a figure in a book or newspaper, and then,
slipping a piece of carbon-paper (which can be bought for a penny or
less at any stationer's) between your tracing-paper and the cardboard,
to go over the outline again with a pencil or a pointed stick. On
uncovering the cardboard you will find the doll there all ready to cut
out. It should then be colored on both sides, partly flesh color and
partly underclothes.
The Dresses
The dresses are made of sheets of note-paper, the fold of which forms
the shoulder pieces. The doll is laid on the paper, with head and neck
lapping over the fold, and the line of the dress is then drawn a
little larger than the doll. A small round nick to form the collar is
cut between the shoulders of the dress, and a slit is made down the
back through which the doll's head can be passed. After the head is
through it is turned round. (Of course, if the dress is for evening
the place which you cut for the neck must be larger, and in this case
no slit will be needed.) All the details of the dresses, which can be
of original design, or copied from advertisements and fashion plates,
must be drawn in in pencil and afterward painted. Hats, trimmed with
tissue-paper feathers or ribbons, are made of round pieces of
note-paper with a slit in them just big enough for the tip of the
doll's head to go through. The illustrations on pp. 260 and
261 should make everything clear.
Other Paper Dolls
Simpler and absolutely symmetrical paper dolls are made by cutting
them out of folded paper, so that the fold runs right down the middle
of the doll. By folding many pieces of paper together, one can cut out
many dolls at once.
Walking Dolls
Walking ladies are made in that way; but they must have long skirts
and no feet, and when finished a cut is made in the skirt--as in the
picture--and the framework thus produced is bent back. When the doll
is placed on the table and gently blown it will move gracefully
along.
[Illustration: WALKING PAPER DOLLS]
[Illustration: PAPER MOTHER AND CHILD, WITH CLOTHES FOR EACH]
[Illustration: A PAPER GIRL WITH SIX CHANGES]
Tissue-Paper Dresses
Dresses can also be made of crinkly tissue-paper glued to a foundation
of plain note-paper. Frills, flounces, and sashes are easily imitated
in this material, and if the colors are well chosen the result is very
pretty.
Rows of Paper Dolls
To make a row of paper dolls, take a piece of paper the height that
the dolls are to be, and fold it alternately backward and forward
(first one side and then the other) leaving about an inch between each
fold. Press the folds together tightly and cut out the half of a doll,
being careful that the arms are continued to the edge of the fold and
are not cut off. Open out and you will have a string of paper dolls.
Other articles to be made from paper and cardboard will be found on
pp. 284-291.
PLAYHOUSES OF OTHER PEOPLES
It is not in the least necessary to confine yourself to making
playhouses that are like the houses you live in or see about you, for
with a little ingenuity you can construct bits of all sorts of strange
countries right in your play-room. In one of the schools in New York
City the children study geography and history of certain kinds by
making with their own hands scenes from the places about which they
study.
One of the most valuable materials for making these playhouses is
ordinary modeling clay. You can buy fifty pounds for from fifty cents
to a dollar, and with this you are equipped to make almost anything
you can see in pictures. Put the clay (if bought dry) into a jar, pour
over it clear water, and stir it up with a stick until perfectly
smooth and about the consistency of hard butter. The first thing to do
is to make a supply of bricks for building. This should be shaped like
real bricks and about two inches long. Smaller ones are also possible
if you wish to have your settlement on a very small scale. These
should be made as regularly as possible and as nearly of the same
size. After a little practice one becomes very expert in this simple
art. They should then be dried in the sun and are ready to use, though
they must be handled carefully. If you can obtain terra-cotta clay,
and have it baked hard you will have real bricks that will outlast
your play-time.
A Pueblo Settlement
Suppose now that you have been reading about the life of the Pueblo
Indians in our Southwest, and you have a picture of one of their
singular settlements. The accompanying picture shows what was done in
the way of constructing such a settlement by a class of school
children, none of whom were over eight years old. You can model little
clay Indian inhabitants and paint them as you please, to represent
their brown skins and bright-colored clothes. If you can have a box
with a little earth in it to set before your Pueblo village you can
sow wheat seed, or mustard, and model Indians working in the fields
with their crude plows. Anything of which you can find a picture can
be reproduced. Indian villages and camps are easy to make and
interesting. And once you are started on Indian life it may be fun to
make yourselves Indian costumes. The costumes in the picture shown
were made by the boys who wear them. By looking closely at them you
can copy them.
An Esquimau Village
Another class in the same school painted their bricks white to
represent blocks of snow and made an Esquimau village. This is
fascinating and easy to do. Or, the rounded huts can be modeled all in
one piece directly from the clay. Any book describing the life of
dwellers in the Arctic region will tell you how they make their houses
and you can make tiny imitations of them that will be infinite fun to
construct and the admiration of all your friends when finished.
Cotton-wool can be used for snow (powdered isinglass also is pretty),
and bits of broken mirror for ice-ponds. Little sleds can be made on
which to put your Esquimau hunter, who may be one of the
white-fur-clad dolls so cheaply bought in toy-stores. Or you can model
a little doll just the right size to be entering the door of your tiny
rounded white hut.
[Illustration: AN ESQUIMAU SLED]
[Illustration: INDIAN COSTUMES
(_Facing page 266_)]
A Filipino Village
Or if you get tired of living near the Arctic circle you can sweep
your table clean of Esquimau dwellings and construct a Filipino
village. For these you do not need bricks (which can be given a rest
and put away in a box) but little splints of wood the same size and
length which you can make yourself with a knife. Make a little thin
floor of damp clay (but drier than you use it to model with) and stick
your upright pieces in this in the shape of the house you wish to
make. When the clay has hardened they are held quite firm and you can
make a wattled hut by weaving long straws or grasses in and out to
form your walls. A thatched roof can also be made of long grasses,
tied in little bunches and laid close together all sloping down from
the ridge-pole. Almost every magazine of a few years back has in it
pictures of Filipino villages which will furnish you with models to
copy. According to the size of the table or board on which you make
your settlements you can have more or less extensive tropical country,
surrounding your village. Mountains can be made of the clay, covered
with moss or grasses to represent the jungle and a river with
overhanging trees arranged with bits of broken looking-glass, and
twigs with tiny scraps of green tissue paper glued to them for leaves.
The exercise of your own ingenuity in using all sorts of unlikely
materials which you will find all about you is the best part of this
game.
After you have decided to change the climate and character of your
village, the clay used may be broken up and put back in your jar, wet
again, stirred smooth and is all ready to begin again. Great care
should be taken that it is kept clean, that bits of wood or glass be
not left in it, or you may cut or prick your fingers in handling it.
A Dutch Street
You cannot only wander from one climate and from one nationality to
another, but from one century to another. If you are studying early
American history nothing is more fun than to make a street in an old
Dutch settlement. Your bricks are painted red for this. Almost any
history-book will have pictures of one or two old Dutch houses which
will show you the general look of them. They are harder to construct
than the ruder huts of savages and may need to be held together with a
little use of damp clay. It is interesting to try and reconstruct old
Dutch Manhattan, from the maps and pictures, showing the bay and the
walk on the Battery.
Or if you are interested in Colonial New England, make a settlement of
log-houses with the upper story overhanging the first. On any walk you
can pick up enough small sticks to use as logs after trimming and
measuring.
Other possibilities in this line are suggested below. You will have
more fun in working them out yourself than if you are told just how to
proceed. A Roman arena with gladiators fighting and a curtain which
may be drawn to keep off the sun. A little fishing-village beside the
sea (a large pan of water) with tiny nets spread out to dry and little
walnut shell boats drawn up on the sandy beach.
A farmhouse, barn, pig-pen, dog-kennel, carriage-house and the like. A
very pretty settlement can be made of this with fields of growing
grain, brooks, water-wheels, etc.
All the animals of a farm can be modeled and painted. When they are
skilfully made they are very pretty and add much to the picture and
when they are done unskilfully it is fun to have people guess what
they were meant for. However, with a little practice very presentable
animals can be modeled. It is easier to make them in clay than to draw
them.
A gypsy camp, with tents and open fires (bits of yellow and red
tissue-paper), under a black kettle (made of clay and painted) swung
on a forked stick, can easily be made.
Of course with tin or lead soldiers the number of games one can invent
with these tiny settlements is innumerable. One favorite with some
children is the attack and capture of the Filipino village by American
troops. Sometimes it is burned, and this is always a stirring
spectacle. Indeed with tin soldiers (which are just now unjustly out
of favor) one's range of subjects is unlimited, and one always has
plenty of inhabitants for any settlement. An army post can be made,
with a fort and barracks and a wide green parade ground with the
regiment drawn up in line for dress-parade. A tiny American flag
flutters from the flag-pole and after the sunset gun booms (a
fire-cracker exploded or only some one striking a blow on a tin pan)
it can be lowered to the ground while the best whistler of the company
executes "The Star-Spangled Banner."
INDOOR OCCUPATIONS AND THINGS TO MAKE
Painting
Painting is an occupation which is within almost everybody's power,
and of which one tires very slowly or perhaps not at all. By painting
we mean coloring old pictures rather than making new ones, since
making new ones--from nature or imagination--require separate
gifts. On a wet afternoon--or, if it is permitted, on Sunday
afternoon--coloring the pictures in a scrapbook is a very pleasant
and useful employment. After dark, painting is not a very wise
occupation, because, in an artificial light, colors cannot be
properly distinguished.
All shops that sell artists' materials keep painting-books. But old
illustrated papers do very well.
Flags
An even more interesting thing to do with a paint-box is to make a
collection of the flags of all nations. And when those are all done,
you will find colored pages of them in any large dictionary, and
elsewhere too,--you might get possession of an old shipping guide,
and copy Lloyd's signal code from it.
Maps
Coloring maps is interesting, but is more difficult than you might
perhaps think, owing to the skill required in laying an even surface
of paint on an irregular space. The middle of the country does not
cause much trouble, but when it comes to the jagged frontier line the
brush has to be very carefully handled. To wet the whole map with a
wet brush at the outset is a help. Perhaps before starting in earnest
on a map it would be best to practice a little with irregular-shaped
spaces on another piece of paper.
Magic-Lantern Slides
If you have a magic lantern in the house you can paint some home-made
slides. The colors should be as gay as possible. The best home-made
slides are those which illustrate a home-made story; and the fact that
you cannot draw or paint really well should not discourage you at all.
A simpler way of making slides is to hold the glass over a candle
until one side is covered with lamp black and then with a sharp stick
to draw outline pictures on it.
Another way is to cut out silhouettes in black paper, or colored
tracing-paper, and stick them to the glass. In copying a picture on a
slide put the glass over the picture and draw the outline with a fine
brush dipped in Indian ink. Then paint. All painting on slides should
be covered with fixing varnish, or it will rub off.
Illuminating
As a change from painting there is illuminating, for which smaller
brushes and gold and silver paint are needed. Illuminating texts is a
favorite Sunday afternoon employment.
Pen and Ink Work
There is also pen and ink drawing, mistakenly called "etching," for
which you require a tiny pen, known as a mapping pen, and a cake of
Indian ink. If the library contains a volume of old wood-cuts,
particularly _Bewick's Birds_ or _Bewick's Quadrupeds_, you will have
no lack of pictures to copy.
Chalks
In place of paints a box of chalks will serve very well.
Tracing
Smaller children, who have not yet learned to paint properly, often
like to trace pictures either on tracing paper held over the picture,
or on ordinary thin paper held over the picture against the window
pane.
Pricking Pictures
Pictures can also be pricked with a pin, but in this case some one
must draw it first. You follow the outline with little pin pricks
close together, holding the paper on a cushion while you prick it.
Then the picture is held up to the window for the light to shine
through the holes.
Easter Eggs
Home-made Easter eggs are made by painting pictures or messages on
eggs that have been hard-boiled, or by merely boiling them in water
containing cochineal or some other coloring material. In Germany it is
the custom for Easter eggs to be hidden about in the house and garden,
and for the family to hunt for them before breakfast--a plan that
might very well be taken up by us.
Spatter-Work
Paper and cardboard articles can be prettily decorated by
spatter-work. Ferns are the favorite shapes to use. You first pin them
on whatever it is that is to be ornamented in this way, arranging them
as prettily as possible. Then rub some Indian ink in water on a saucer
until it is quite thick. Dip an old tooth-brush lightly into the ink,
and, holding it over the cardboard, rub the bristles gently across a
fine tooth comb. This will send a spray of ink over the cardboard. Do
this again and again until the tone is deep enough, and try also to
graduate it. It must be remembered that the ink when dry is much
darker than when wet. Then remove the ferns, when under each there
will be a white space exactly reproducing their beautiful shape. If
you like you can paint in their veins and shade them; but this is not
really necessary. Colored paints can be used instead of Indian ink.
Scrapbooks
Making scrapbooks is always a pleasant and useful employment, whether
for yourself or for children in hospitals or districts, and there was
never so good an opportunity as now of getting interesting pictures.
These you select from odd numbers of magazines, Christmas numbers,
illustrated papers, and advertisements. Scraps are very useful to fill
up odd corners. In choosing pictures for your own scrapbook it is
better to select only those that you really believe in and can find a
reason for using, than to take everything that seems likely to fit. By
choosing the pictures with this care you make the work more
interesting and the book peculiarly your own. But in making a
scrapbook as a present for some one that you know, you will, of
course, in choosing pictures, try to put yourself in his place and
choose as you think that he would.
Empty scrapbooks can be bought; or you can make one by taking (for a
large one) an old business ledger, which some one whom you know is
certain to be able to give you, or (for a small one) an ordinary old
exercise-book, and then cutting out every other page about half an
inch from the stitching. This is to allow room for the extra thickness
which the pictures will give to the book. Or you can sew sheets of
brown paper together.
For sticking on the pictures, use paste rather than gum; and when it
is done, press the book under quite a light weight, with sheets of
paper between the pages.
Scrapbooks for Hospitals
Children that are ill are often too weak to hold up a large book and
turn over the leaves. There are two ways of saving them this exertion
and yet giving them pleasure from pictures. One is to get several
large sheets of cardboard and cover them with pictures and scraps on
both sides, and bind them round with ribbon. These can be enclosed in
a box and sent to the matron. She will distribute the cards among the
children, and when they have looked at each thoroughly they can
exchange it for another. Another way is to use folding books which are
more easy to hold than ordinary turning-over ones, and you can make
them at home very simply by covering half a dozen or more cards of the
same size (post-cards make capital _little_ books) with red linen, and
then sewing them edge to edge so as to get them all in a row. In
covering the cards with the linen--red is not compulsory, but it is a
good color to choose--it is better to paste it on as well as to sew it
round the three edges (a fold will come on one side), because then
when you stick on the pictures they will not cockle up. Pictures for
hospital scrapbooks should be bright and gay. Colored ones are best,
but if you cannot get them already colored you can paint them.
Painting a scrapbook is one of the best of employments.
Composite Scrapbooks
Sometimes it happens that you get very tired of one of the pictures in
your scrapbook. A good way to make it fresh and interesting again is
to introduce new people or things. You will easily find among your
store of loose pictures a horse and cart, or a dog, or a man, or a
giraffe, which, when cut out, will fit in amusingly somewhere in the
old picture. If you like, a whole book can be altered reasonably in
this way, or made ridiculous throughout.
Scrap-Covered Screens
A screen is an even more interesting thing to make than a scrapbook.
The first thing to get is the framework of the screen, which will
either be an old one the covering of which needs renewing, or a new
one made by the carpenter. The next thing is to cover it with canvas,
which you must stretch on tightly and fasten with small tacks; and
over this should be pasted another covering of stout paper, of
whatever color you want for a background to the pictures. Paste mixed
with size should be used in sticking it. After the pictures are all
arranged they should be stuck with the same material, and a coat of
paper varnish given to the whole, so that it can be cleaned
occasionally.
Collecting Stamps
Stamp-collecting is more interesting if money is kept out of it and
you get your stamps by gift or exchange. The best way to begin is to
know some one who has plenty of foreign correspondence and to ask for
all his old envelopes. Nothing but time and patience can make a good
collection. To buy it, is to have little of the collector's joy.
Postage-Stamp Snakes
Old American stamps can be used for making snakes. There is no need to
soak the stamps off the envelope paper: they must merely be cut out
cleanly and threaded together. A big snake takes about 4,000 stamps.
The head is made of black velvet stuffed with cotton wool, and beads
serve for eyes. A tongue of red flannel can be added.
Puzzles
If you have a fret saw, and can use it cleverly, you can make at home
as good a puzzle as any that can be bought. The first thing to do is
to select a good colored picture, and then to procure from a carpenter
a thin mahogany board of the same size. Mahogany is not absolutely
necessary, but it must be some wood that is both soft and tough. Deal,
for instance, is useless because it is not tough, and oak is useless
because it is not soft. On this wood you stick the picture very
firmly, using weak glue in preference to paste or gum. When it is
quite dry you cut it up into the most difficult fragments that you
can. It is best to cut out the border so that each piece locks into
the next. This will then be put together first by the player and will
serve to hold the picture together. After the puzzle is cut up it is
well to varnish each piece with paper varnish, which keeps it clean
and preserves it.
A simple puzzle can be made by pasting the picture on cardboard and
cutting it up with scissors or a sharp knife.
Soap Bubbles
For blowing bubbles the long clay pipes are best. Before using them,
the end of the mouthpiece ought to be covered with sealing-wax for
about an inch, or it may tear your lips. Common yellow soap is better
than scented soap, and rainwater than ordinary water. A little
glycerine added to the soap-suds helps to make the bubbles more
lasting. On a still summer day, bubble-blowing out-of-doors is a
fascinating and very pretty occupation.
Shadows on the Wall