Extra packages must be kept in a covered box or basket at one side, back of the “Blackbird Pie.”

Another original idea for your fair will be

The Express Office

At this table each article must be daintily tied up in white paper and the package labelled with the Christian name of one of the young people. Wrap up a number of articles that your friends may find parcels waiting for them when they call at the express office. The packages should also bear the name of the city from which they are supposed to have been sent. For instance, if you have a friend named Mary, and Mary happens to be acquainted with some young people in Cincinnati, mark the parcel for her with the name Mary and the place Cincinnati, Ohio. The addition of the name of some city will add greatly to the interest and excitement when the package is received.

Though a package may be intended for a certain person, any one with the same Christian name may purchase the article, but it cannot be sold to a buyer bearing another Christian name, and should some one come for an express package and the express agent be unable to find a parcel labelled with the purchaser’s name, the would-be buyer must leave the office empty-handed.

The uncertainty of finding a package at the express office lends a certain charm to this table, for every one will feel some curiosity to ascertain for a surety whether he or she is included with the fortunate ones whose names appear upon packages.

Arrange all your articles for the express office in alphabetical order, those on one side of the table for girls, and on the other side for boys; then the parcel bearing the name called for may be quickly handed out to the inquiring purchaser.

Letters to Girls

and letters to boys are easy to write. Ask as many friends as possible to write one or more letters to any companions they choose whom they think will attend the fair. The letters must be signed by fictitious names, never the writer’s own name or the name of any real person; then those receiving the missives will have the sport of trying to find out which of their friends actually wrote the letters.

Several days before the fair opens all the mail, after being addressed and sealed, should be sent under additional cover to you personally.

The Post-office

must be made very attractive, though it need not occupy much space. A mere corner of the room screened off with dividing drapery of turkey-red cotton cloth or any gay material will answer the purpose. Open the drapery at the centre division and make a three-cornered tent-like window in front between the two curtains with the aid of a chair. Place a box on the chair reaching to the top of the chair-back, set the chair between the two curtains, turn its back toward the people and cover it with the same material used for the curtains; then pin this drapery to the curtains on each side.

The Decorations

must be very simple and inexpensive; something which can be made easily and quickly, and when finished they should be bright and effective.

Have your decorating committee cut a number of flags from different colored tissue paper or low priced muslin varying in length, anywhere from ten to fifteen inches, and in width from five to nine inches (Fig. 238 and Fig. 239). If the ceiling is very high the flags may be larger.

Paste the straight dotted edge of each flag over a strong string long enough to extend in a graceful loop from the centre of the ceiling to the side wall (Fig. 240). Place the flags about twelve inches apart on the string and make four strings to reach to the four corners if the room is small, if large, a dozen or more flag-strings, according to the size of the room. Have a generous supply.

Tie one end of each of the flag-strings close to the ceiling on the chandelier or lamp hook. Wind an extra string tight around and over the string-knots on the chandelier to hold the strings in place and keep them from slipping down. Tie the free ends of the flag-strings to picture-hooks and fasten the hooks on the picture-moulding. In this way you can obtain good results without the slightest injury to the walls. Should there be no picture-moulding, fasten the strings to large, strong tacks or small wire nails driven in on the top ledge of the window and door frames where they will do no harm.

Fasten extra strings from top of window and door frames, and draw them taut along the walls, then tie the intervening flag-strings on these and the effect will be much the same as with picture-moulding, almost like a tent of small flags.

Hang a long, gay tassel on the wall at the end of each flag-string. Make the tassels of bright tissue paper. Take the once folded sheets of the variously-colored tissue paper as they come from the store, and cut them into long fringe, lengthwise of the folded sheets (Fig. 241), making each separate strand of fringe not less than one inch wide. Pinch the twenty-inch-length fringe together at the top, wind and tie it with a string (Fig. 242), allowing one end of the string to extend out at the top; wind farther down and tie again to form the head of the tassel four and one-half inches from the extreme top (Fig. 243).

Cut some of the strips about fourteen inches wide; others wider, a few narrower; and make each strip long enough to reach around the front and two sides of one table. Lay a brilliant red strip eighteen inches wide down on a flat surface and fold crosswise through the centre; fold again and again until the piece is of the desired width, about two and one-half inches; then cut according to dotted lines (Fig. 244). Open out and cut off every other lower ornament and you will have Fig. 245. Attached to a table this decoration gives the effect seen in the first illustration.

Fold and cut a green strip fourteen inches wide like Fig. 246. Open and it will be Fig. 247. Another design of orange color is given in Fig. 248 and Fig. 249.

More important though than anything else will be the large, the small, the useful, the beautiful and the odd articles for sale made by the girls and boys. There should be a lot of original valentines, May baskets, Easter-egg novelties, paper fireworks, Hallowe’en games, funny and instructive toys, tiny log cabins, scenes from Japan, Russia, the Philippines, and many other interesting things, not forgetting the Punch and Judy shows, the circus, the seven wonders of the world, and the home-made rugs, candles and candlesticks.

The post-office entails little or no extra expense and money taken in for letters will be almost clear gain. Expense incurred by the entire fair need be but slight and all the proceeds might be devoted to some charitable purpose.

One of the best of objects for the money obtained by your fair is the “Fresh Air Fund,” which helps the poor little suffering city children to a breath of pure fresh air and saves the lives of many frail girls and boys. Think how glad you can make some of these young people; then, of all the enjoyment your own companions will have in getting up the fair, and how proud and happy your parents and teachers will feel when they see the result of your work. If a “Fresh Air Fund” does not exist in your locality there are other methods of using your profits to good ends. Really there is no telling how much good your fair may accomplish in many ways.

CHAPTER XVII
CAMPING OUT IN YOUR BACK YARD

It is a wild land, full of wild creatures if you choose to believe in them. Cats you will probably meet on the trail, and they are wild ones if you will. Wolves, too, may prowl around, for what else are Tramp and Nipper, your own dearly loved dogs, but descendants of the wild wolf. There will be plenty of sailing, fishing and outdoor sports. Guides can be secured at headquarters and you will not have to travel far, for the camping ground is your own back yard.

You must have your

Camping Outfit,

as all campers do, and it is the proper thing to think, plan and talk much about this same outfit. As the trip is to be made overland and you will have no camping wagon, use bags for carrying the various articles needed in camp. Old flour bags are just the thing. Into these you can put all your things except perhaps the camp kettle. The camping party should be supplied with a tent, a hatchet, a camp kettle, coffee pot, tin plates and cups, old knives, fork and spoons, a tin pail and dipper and a tin wash-basin; all these, as well as provisions must be taken on the journey in true campers’ fashion, for there should be no running back from Make-Believe Land to get forgotten articles. Shawls and blankets to spread on the ground if it seem too damp will be a welcome addition to the outfit, and the party should be provided with sharp pocket knives for whittling stakes and for other needs.

Select the site of your camp and pitch your tent with reference to the clothes line, for the line is to support the tent and act as a ridge pole.

Make the Tent

of two muslin sheets sewed together along two of the edges, one edge on each sheet, which run from the wide hem at the head to the narrow hem at the foot of the sheet. Tie a tape on each of the four corners (Fig. 250) and tie a tape at the centre of the ends of the tent sheet-covering. This will give three tapes on each side of the tent—six tapes in all (Fig. 251).

Make six wooden pegs resembling Fig. 252. You can have them either round, square, three-cornered or irregular; the only essentials are that the pegs be strong and large enough to hold the tent securely. Have a notch cut near the top for the tape and a point whittled at the bottom that the peg may be easily driven into the ground.

Look about carefully and decide exactly where you want the tent placed on the clothesline; then hang the crosswise centre of the covering evenly over the line. Hold the top ridge centre in place with clothespins while you stretch one side out away from the clothesline, and peg it to the ground by tying the tapes around the pegs and pushing the pegs slantingly into the ground, with the peg head running from and the point directed toward the tent (Fig. 253). Remove the clothespins and peg down the other side of the tent in the same way.

Find the best place near the tent for

A Table,

and make the table in true woodsman fashion. Take four strong forked sticks, sharpened on the lower end, and drive two of them into the ground in a straight line about one foot or more apart, and the remaining two in a line with, and two feet from the first sticks (Fig. 254). Have the sticks stand above the ground about two feet, or the height you want the table, and keep the crotch, or angle where the two forks separate, on all the sticks at an equal height from the ground. Lay a stick across each pair of forked sticks. Get a piece of board, rest one end on each of the supports you have just made, and you will have a rustic table, strong and suitable for any camp (Fig. 255). Use wooden boxes for seats. Select one box for your

Safe or Cupboard

in which to keep supplies and camping utensils. Fit one or two shelves, made from a side of another wooden box, in the cupboard. Do this by first nailing strips of wood, for cleats, on the inside of each side of the cupboard at equal distances from the bottom (Fig. 256). Slide in the shelves, resting each on two pieces of wood (Fig. 257). Set a lot of lids of tin cans in the cupboard to serve as camping plates, also a few tin spoons, an old table knife, a kitchen fork or two, three tin cups, and a smooth, clean, folded piece of white paper for a tablecloth.

Ask your mother to let you have a large, clean pail suitable for drinking water. Carry the pail to the opposite side of the yard from your tent. There dig a hole large enough to sink the pail down about half its height (Fig. 258). Bank the loose earth up all around the pail (Fig. 259), and cover the earth with leaves, grass, moss and vines; hiding the pail completely with the greenery; then fill the pail with fresh, cool water, and lo: there is your mountain spring (Fig. 260).

for carrying water. You can make a hole in the tin, near the top on each side of the can, by hammering a good-sized wire nail through, and then form a handle to the pail by threading one end of a piece of twine through each hole and tying a large knot on the outside to prevent the string from sliding out of place (Fig. 261). When you need water in the camp, always go to the spring for it, and carry the water in the little tin pail.

It is not necessary to have a real

Camp Fire,

but you can pretend there is one. Drive two forked sticks in the ground a short distance from each other; lay a stout stick across from one to the other forked stick; then pile up some dry twigs midway between the stakes. Tie a strong cord on the centre of the cross stick, leaving one end long enough to loop down and under the handle of a pail or kettle and reach up and tie to the short end of the cord. You can put various things into the camp kettle and pretend to cook them over the make-believe fire (Fig. 262).

for your camp. Select a rather long, narrow wooden packing-box (Fig. 263), and on each end tack an extra pointed pasteboard end (Fig. 264). To make the pasteboard end you will have to measure the height of the packing-box, and cut from an old pasteboard box a strip of pasteboard wide enough to fit the height of the wooden box and long enough to allow for tacking on the end of the wooden box and extending far enough out beyond the box to form half, or one side, of the pointed end with two inches over. Score the extra two inches and bend (Fig. 265); the bend A forms the extreme end when the pasteboard point is bent in shape. Cut another strip of pasteboard two inches shorter than the first strip, and sew it on the two-inch bent flap of the first strip (Fig. 266). Score the two ends of the long strip and be careful to score them on the side that will cause the pasteboard to bend outward in the right direction, then bend (Fig. 267).

Tack the pasteboard strip on the end of the wooden box and make another pasteboard point for the other end of the box (Fig. 264). Cover both pasteboard ends with stout paper by gumming the paper over and down on the outside top edge of the pasteboard points.

Make the boat seats of short boards laid across from side to side of the wooden box and nailed in place (Fig. 268). Use broom-sticks for oars, and make believe the boat is off on the water, a long distance from the tent.

in the boat, take any kind of long sticks or walking canes for fishing poles, with common string for line and a bit of paper tied to the end of the string for bait. When you want to turn the row-boat into a sail-boat, you can tack a three-cornered piece of white cloth on the end of a pole and rig up a sail (Fig. 269). Cut a hole in the forward centre of the bottom of the boat immediately next to the covered bow, run the pole through the hole down into the earth until it is well planted in the ground and stands straight and steady; then tie a string to the free end of the sail and fasten the string to the boat to keep the sail stretched out, just as if there were truly a good stiff breeze and you were sailing along at a rapid rate with the spray dashing upon, and at times over, the sides of the boat.

If your back yard is large and you need more tents for friends, erect several, one on each stretch of the clothesline. Should the line be fastened to four posts, a tent can be put up on each of the four turns of the clothesline, making a little settlement of tents.

CHAPTER XVIII
OUTDOOR FUN WITH HOME-MADE TETHER-BALL

The Pole

may be a stationary clothesline post, a small, unused flagstaff, an extra long clothesline pole, a long curtain pole, or a very long, straight bean pole, and for smaller children the handle of an old long-handled broom will answer.

Use strong, soft twine to make

The Cover for Your Ball

Cut twelve pieces, each twenty-four inches in length; place all the lengths straight and evenly together; then tie a string around the entire bunch, an inch and one-half from the centre (Fig. 270). In this figure and several other diagrams the single strands of twine are not drawn in detail, because, should every separate thread be outlined, much confusion might ensue.

After tying the lengths of twine together, separate the longest part into three divisions of four strands each (Fig. 271). Braid these strands together in one braid, beginning close to the string tied around the bunch; continue braiding firmly and tightly for the distance of two and a half or three inches (Fig. 272), then untie and remove the string from around the bunch (Fig. 273); bring the two ends of the braid together, and joining all the loose strands into three bunches of eight strands each, braid all into one braid (Fig. 274). When this larger braid is one inch long, with another string tie the loose ends of it firmly together close up to the braid. You will then have a braided ring on a braided stem. Wind the stem with an extra string; then tie a hard knot and cut away the ends of the string (Fig. 275).

Divide the loose strands into bunches of three strands each, making eight bunches (Fig. 275). Pin the stem down to something stationary and firm; then take three strands, or one bunch, in each hand, and pass the first finger of your left hand between the two bunches; hold it there while you carry the bunch in your right hand across the bunch in your left hand; this forms a loop. Do not take your finger out of the loop until the entire double knot is made. Bring the bunch from your right hand under and through the loop formed by the crossing of the bunches; this will give Fig. 276. Pull the strings until the tie is a short distance from the stem; then tie the same strands again to form a firm knot. Fig. 277 shows the method.

Tie together two more bunches, and two more, until all the bunches have been used and you have made four knots (Fig. 278).

Fit the network over your ball (Fig. 279), allowing the covering to remain on the ball while you tie the bunches of strands into another row of four knots below the first row. Look at Fig. 278. The bunches are all numbered, showing how they are to be united. Corresponding numbers must be tied together: 1 with 1, 2 with 2, and so on. The result will be like Fig. 280.

Keep the ball in the net and make another lower row of knots, which will give you Fig. 281.

Now turn the ball over and tie two opposite bunches of strands up tight and firm against the bottom of the ball (Fig. 282 A). Bring together the remaining two bunches, B and C, and tie them over the knot A. Again tie in a hard, firm knot; then bind all the strands together by winding with a separate piece of string. Fasten securely.

It is necessary for the ball to be covered, so that it may have a strong yet harmless ring at the top, for no metal may be used on the ball.

Drive a stick in the earth where you want your pole to stand. On this stick tie a piece of string close to the ground; then sharpen the end of another short stick and tie the other end of the string on the second stick near its top; let the string measure two and one-half feet from one stick to the other stick. Pressing the point of the second stick slantingly against the earth, run it around and around in a circle until a circular line is distinctly marked (Fig. 283), then you can pull out the stake and dig a hole where it stood at the centre, and plant your pole. Mark a straight line across the centre of the circle and extend this straight line beyond the edge of the circle six feet on each side. On opposite sides of each of the straight lines running out from the circle mark a cross about two and one-half feet from the circle and two and one-half feet from the line, F and F (Fig. 284). The cross designates the spot where the player on either side must stand to serve the ball when the game begins. The crosses are called service crosses.

The length of the tether pole you are to use depends upon your height and that of your young friends. Make the pole long enough to allow being planted sufficiently deep to be firm and steady and extend up above the surface of the ground, vertically, to the height of about three feet above your head. Cut a notch near the top of the pole before erecting it (Fig. 285). Tie one end of a long string fast around the notch. The string must be well waxed, twisted and doubled and waxed again, and it must reach within two feet of the ground. Tie the ball on the loose end of the string and erect your pole so firmly that it will not even tremble when you bat the attached ball ever so vigorously (Fig. 286). Fig. 287 gives the first step in tying the ball on the pole string. D is the end attached to the pole, E is the loose end. Pass E under D, then around back again over D and through the loop (Fig. 288); repeat this stitch over and over, drawing the string very tight each time. Finish by tying the E end of the string on the D end in several knots. Examine Fig. 289. It will give you the process of tying, but the knots are drawn loose that you may see how each is made. Paint a red ring around the pole just above the height of your head. Make

A Pattern for the Rackets

of a piece of paper twelve inches long and five and one-half inches wide; fold the paper lengthwise through the centre and cut according to curved line in Fig. 290. Open the pattern and lay it over a shingle, the handle at the thickest part; draw a pencil line around it and carefully whittle out the racket. Smooth down the rough edges with sandpaper (Fig. 291). Make a second racket in the same way. Now let us thoroughly understand the meaning of the divisions of the court before attempting the game. Inside the ground circle no one shall go, for it is not allowable at any time during the game to step on, or within, or reach over the circle line on the ground surrounding the tether pole. The straight line is used to divide the ground into two courts, one on each side of the line, making a separate court for each player.