How to amuse yourself and others

CHAPTER XVIII.
NATURE’S FALL DECORATIONS, AND HOW TO USE THEM.

THESE beautiful decorations are free to all who care to possess them. Every autumn comes to us laden with ornaments which no skilled workman can rival. The graceful golden-rod, so rich in color, sways and bends over the low stone walls, and in the fields wild flowers of all kinds grow in great profusion. White, spreading wild carrot, yellow and white daisies, light and dark purple asters, and sumach, with its varied hues, give color to the landscape on our bright fall days. There are also the queer-shaped pods and feathery, silky seeds peculiar to some wild plants; among others the poor “vagabond thistle,” which has donned its robe of glistening white, although some of its tribe still wear their faded purple gowns. The latter may be gathered for thistle-puffs, and all the objects mentioned can be used in home decorations.

We cannot pass by unnoticed the brown milk-weed pods, for within the shells, full well we know, are hidden the silvery, downy seeds which make such pretty milk-weed balls. Here, too, we notice the rich coloring of bark as well as foliage, the bright scarlet berries contrasting with the brown, yellow, and green leaves. The vine, once a fresh green, is now changed to deep crimson; even the tiny leaves of the wild strawberry and some grasses have touches of red on their edges.

How the rich coloring of autumn differs from the delicate tints of spring, when the promise was made in bud and leaf, which is now realized in the bountiful harvests!

Having such a wealth to glean from, we scarcely know what to take first; but for decorations to last only a few hours it would be difficult to imagine anything more brilliantly appropriate than

Fresh Autumn Wild Flowers

and small branches of brilliant fall leaves. At the time of this writing wild flowers are very popular; one of our daily papers records a wedding which recently took place, where the display of wild flowers was beautiful in the extreme. Curtains of wood-ferns were caught back with golden-rod, and a bower of holly and oak was fringed with clusters of scarlet bitter-sweet berries. Daisies were also used in abundance, while the beauty of the little church was enhanced by the masses of white blossoms and oak-branches.

This idea can be used advantageously in decorating the house for evening parties and receptions, or afternoon teas and coffees. Have the flowers and foliage in masses, the effect is much better; and if you gather very large, hardy ferns with their roots attached they will make exceedingly graceful decorations, and placed in water or wet sand they will remain fresh for days.

When golden-rod is gathered in its prime it will keep nearly all winter without fading. Do not put it in water; all that is necessary is to keep it dry. The rich brown cat-tails should be treated in the same manner; these must be gathered at their best, before they are too ripe. Bitter-sweet berries will last for months and retain a bright red. The old-fashioned honesty, with its white, satiny pods, keeps perfectly for any length of time. The wild rose-bush in the fall is decked with seed-coverings, which closely resemble scarlet berries; these will last for many weeks. The wild clematis, with its festoons of hazy fluff, will keep for a long time, and always looks well when thrown over and on the top corner of a portière and allowed to hang naturally down a little on one side, or arranged in a similar manner over the tops of windows, doors, pictures, or wherever it will look graceful. It should hang out of harm’s way, as it is brittle and easily broken when dry.

For entertainments, the more elaborate and bountiful the decorations of fresh wild flowers the more beautiful will the house appear; but for every-day life during the cold weather, when we have only the dried fall plants, we may almost make up for the lack of fresh flowers by using judgment and taste in arranging the dried ones. Though wild flowers are beautiful, you must use taste in their arrangement and not mingle them together promiscuously, but make a judicious selection, for where a light bunch of golden-rod would be the very thing needed to give color to a particular spot, should the dark cat-tails be placed there the effect might be lost. There are places where some high, stiff decoration would look best, and others where the soft, swaying clematis seems to belong. As with everything else, so with our decorations, we must seek to have harmony.

Who has not admired the dark-brown, glossy buckeyes and horse-chestnuts, and wondered what use could be made of them? Children love to gather them and come home with their pockets and baskets full, only to play with them for awhile, and then the pretty dark balls, each marked with a spot of light cream-color, are thrown away or lost.

Now, the next time the buckeyes are collected save every one and make a

Buckeye Portière.

The writer assures you that you will find it much easier to do this than she did to make a picture of the curtain, for it is difficult with a pen-and-ink drawing to give an idea of the richness of color in the handsome hangings these horse-chestnuts make when properly fashioned into a portière for hall or doorway. Two full bushels of buckeyes will be needed to make a curtain two yards and a half long and one yard and a quarter wide.

Take a very large, long needle and a strong, waxed thread a little longer than you desire to have your curtain, make a large knot in the end of the thread, and commence to string your buckeyes in the same way as stringing beads or buttons. Continue until the thread in the needle is exhausted, then tie the thread in a large knot close to the last buckeye, leaving a length of three inches of thread. Make your other strands in the same way. When all are finished, fasten as many small screw-eyes in a straight line on a curtain-pole, or a rustic pole if desired, as there are strands of buckeyes, and tie securely to each screw-eye one string of buckeyes. When all are fastened on, your portière is finished and ready to be hung. This is easily accomplished if the pole used is a regular curtain-pole, as they always come with brackets; but should your pole be rustic, it must be supported by bands of strong birch-bark, or leather, as in Fig. 131. Our illustration shows over the portière a

Panel of Fall Decorations.

These also look handsome over windows and doors, and you are at liberty to use ornaments of all styles, for the panels are placed where there is no danger of anything coming in contact with them to break off the decorations or mar their beauty. Any kind of board will do for the panel, rough or smooth, as you like. Paint the board a pure white, then decide on your ornaments, which may be a chestnut-branch with bursting burs attached, sprays of common wayside velvet-leaf with clusters of pods clinging to them, a piece of black-berry vine with its twigs, thorns, and dried berries, or branches of buckeyes with some of the nuts falling from their horned shells.

Select according to your fancy, and gild the decorations chosen, then tack them on the panel. It is best to place the ornaments on the board while the paint is soft and wet, for then it will help to fasten the decoration more securely; if the paint be put on thick where the ornaments are to be placed, they will lie partially embedded in the paint, and when it dries they will appear as if carved from the wood.[D]

A white and gold panel made in this way is very pretty and inexpensive.

The fall decorations also enable us to make a very effective

Louis Quinze Screen.

For this it is necessary to have two small wooden hoops, such as children roll along the streets; fasten these together with a strong piece of white tape, two or three inches wide, cut the end of the tape bias, tack this on the side of one of the hoops, bring it around between and over the other hoop, and tack it again, repeat the operation and the hinge will be finished (Fig. 132). If you look at the hinge on a wooden clothes-horse you will understand how to make one. Fig. 133 shows the hoops fastened together. Now cut two pieces of coarse, strong cotton cloth, a little larger around than the hoops, and place one of the pieces smoothly over one of the hoops; tack it down, driving the tacks in far apart, and so that they can be easily extracted; if the cloth wrinkles, keep changing it until the surface is perfectly even; when this is accomplished carefully tack the covering securely down, keeping it smooth and without wrinkles. In like manner tack the remaining piece of cloth on the other hoop. Next get four broomsticks and cut a notch on each one, at exactly the same distance from the top, for the hoops to fit in. Then measure where you wish the hoops to be placed and cut another notch on each stick a certain distance from the bottom; all the sticks must be of the same length and have the notches cut in the same places, so each one may be a duplicate of the others. Mark the hoops where the sticks are to fit, and then fasten them firmly on with small screws. Make the screen strong, so that there will not be any danger of its coming apart. Give each cloth a sizing of common flour-paste on both sides, then scrape off all the paste with a knife; in this way the cloth will be starched and prepared to receive the paint. When the screen is thoroughly dry, sew a branch across one of the disks and some waxed fall leaves in the places where they would naturally lie on the branch; when these are securely attached, decorate the other disk with something different; acorns can be used if cut in halves; but never place any ornaments on the screen which will not lie flat, for if they stand out they will be broken off or injured by persons passing and brushing against them. Now give the screen a coat of white paint all over, including the branch and leaves, but do not paint the hinge. Set the screen away until it is perfectly dry, then gild the branches and leaves, connecting the latter with the twigs by painting a line of gold between the two. Gild a ring around each pole near the top and another near the bottom, and cover the edges of the hoops where the cloth has been fastened on by tacking white gimp around each one, using fancy brass-headed tacks and placing them at equal distances apart; this completes the ornamental screen.

Should you desire it, the screen can be painted black or any other color, and the decorations bronzed instead of gilded. The bronzes come in different shades, and the color of real bronze can be easily copied.

A Panel of Field-Corn

As an ornament for the dining-room is very decorative and easy to make. When the corn ripens, select some nice, firm, golden ears, with husks and without; then break off pieces of cornstalk and group them together, as in the illustration; cover a board of requisite size with a piece of old black velvet; if you have no velvet, paint the board black, and after tying the corn firmly together, tack it securely on the board, and the dark background will bring out the many yellow tints of the decoration beautifully; fasten two screw-eyes in the back of the board, by which to attach the wire, and the panel will be ready to hang on the wall.

The corn can also be fastened to a rough board of the desired size and the panel and decoration bronzed, using green bronze for the background and portions of the group, while all the edges and prominent points should be of copper-colored bronze.

Early in November the many varieties of gourds ripen, and their odd and fantastic forms seem like nature’s suggestions of the unique in ornamentation. So suggestive are they that it needs but little originality to make them into many useful and beautiful articles. As a decoration for looping over the poles of portières, and for holding back draperies, these

Ornamental Gourds

are convenient. They must first be allowed to become perfectly dry; then they can be made into tasselled festoons. Take six mock-oranges, which imitate so closely our real oranges in color, size, and form, and cut a hole about the size of a silver dime in the top and bottom of each one; then shake out the seeds. To make the openings in the gourds, first bore a small hole with the point of a large needle, then twist the needle around and around until it will easily pass through. Next, carefully enlarge the opening with a sharp penknife until it is of the stated size. Make a rope two yards and a half long of Persian colored wools or worsted; on the end fasten a slender tassel, six or seven inches long, made of the same worsted; now string one of the bright orange-gourds on the rope down against the tassel, which should be large enough to prevent the gourd from slipping off; make another similar tassel, and attach it to the rope about twelve inches from the first one, and thread another gourd on the rope, bringing it down against the second tassel; proceed in like manner with the remaining gourds, making a tassel for each one, and you will have a decoration unlike any to be found elsewhere.

We are all more or less familiar with the

Gourd-Dippers

so common in the South, where, in olden times, scarcely a spring bubbled in a rustic nook that was not supplied with its drinking-gourd. These dippers are made by sawing an opening in the large part of the gourd, scraping out the contents, and making the inside as smooth as possible with sand-paper. They need no ornamentation.

The kind of gourds resembling flattened globes can be made into graceful and unique

Bowls.

The gourds must be sawed into two parts, with the inside of each sand-papered, and flowers painted, with oil-colors, on the outside. After they have thoroughly dried, give a coat of white varnish to both the inside and outside. A pretty

Bonbon-Box

can be fashioned of one of these gourds. Saw off the top, which will serve as a lid, and fasten it to the bowl with narrow ribbons tied through holes at the back of each; line both lid and box with satin by gluing it along the edges with stiff glue put on sparingly, and cover the raw edge of the satin with chenille; this is also put on with a little glue. Do not allow the chenille to interfere with the closing of the box, but place it along the inside edge of the box and lid.

Another form is the

Bottle-Gourd.

Ornament this with ivy-leaves painted as if twined around bowl and neck, and when the paint is dry varnish the gourd all over; if you wish it for use as well as decoration, saw off the top about two or three inches deep, shake out the seeds, then fit a cork in the piece cut off, and so glue it in that the cork may extend an inch downward to fit in the bottle.

The large egg-shaped gourds look well as

Vases.

Select a deep-colored gourd, saw off the top and scrape out the inside; then varnish the vase and mount it on feet of twisted wire, made according to Fig. 134; bend down the feet, as in Fig. 135, when the wire will be formed into Fig. 136. To fasten this on the vase, first bore holes in the bottom of the gourd, then sew the feet firmly on, passing the needle through the holes previously made and bending the wire a little to fit to the gourd. Gild the wire feet, and your vase is finished. Another way is to save the top sawed off, fasten an ornament of twisted wire on the top of it, and then, after making the vase as the one just described, add bands of gilded cardboard made to fit the gourd, fastening them to the vase with glue. Handles can also be fashioned of cardboard and sewed to the upper band before it is glued to the vase, as in the illustration.

There are many other ways of utilizing gourds, but we will leave it to your ingenuity to think up new and pretty conceits.

Pine-cones, large and small, acorns, and balls from the sweet-gum tree, can be used as

Small Decorations.

Never try to fasten them by the natural stems, for these will soon break off, but place in each one a small screw-eye, and when tied in groups they form ornaments for waste-baskets and fancy baskets of all kinds. We have seen chandeliers with gilded cones hanging from the different points, and being the identical color of the chandelier, they seemed of the same metal, and added novelty and grace to its appearance.

There are some varieties of the tree-fungi which make dark, rich-colored

Brackets.

Use heavy cardboard or thin board as a covering for the back; have this fit the fungus perfectly, and fasten it securely in position with very stiff glue or nails. Paint the back the same color as the fungus, and on either side of the upper edge place screw-eyes by which to fasten up the bracket.

Many of the curiously formed galls and oak-apples to be found on different trees can also be employed as ornaments.

Nothing can be finer than our brilliant autumn season, which is said to be more beautiful in this than in other countries, with its crisp mornings and bright sunny afternoons.

When the weather is too lovely to remain in-doors, and all nature invites us out, then is the time to gather our fall decorations.