The sun. [volume] (Morris, Stevens County, Minn.) 1882-1895, 1886-11-18
Autumn Leaves and Ferns.

Well, dear lady friends, shall you
press any autumn leaves? You doubt
less know of many ways with which to
beautify your homes with them, but
perhaps l can tell you of one that you
have not thought Of
Now, fair readers, you who are sur
rounded by indulgent husbands and
fathers, and have everything to make
your homes cosy and delightful, who
can crafty your love of the beautiful to
your hearts content, who have your
pictures, and your bay windows with
their wealth of graceful vines and pet
ted plants-.please don't stay and listen
to our confidential talk with your less
favored sisters. And you, whose very
souls hunger for the beautiful, are your
homes humble, your rooms small, and
your ceilings low? Do you look at your
stinted windows with their stiff rolled
shades, and wish they were large and
draped with something airy and grace
full? Let me help you plan little.
BY some honest strategy Gf need be)
secure a full set of muslin, or even
cheap lace curtains-very beautiful
patterns can be bought for a few dol
lars. any light white drapery around
window is SO delightfully."- graceful, and
the beauty of trees against the sky is
heightened by being seen even through
cheap lace. Then measure your win
dow frames-if the windows are very
small, allow two or three inches more
and have some pieces of board made
like shelf, with a back piece under
meath to nail it up by. This shelf should
be from five to six inches deep in the
centre, and gradually rounded off to
the ends, as though it were clipped off
from the edge of circle. Nail it to
the top of your easement, gather your
curtains-two breadths, so they will
part in the middle and be very full
and tack them around the edge of your
shelf or whatever you call it Have
ready some stiff pasted strips made of
paper and old cloth, two or three in
ches wide, and the length of the edge
of your shelf or cornice. Make mark
for the center, and have ready a stout
needle and thread, and some paste to
which some glue has been added.
Now, begin at the ends and work up to
the centre with your ferns, autumn
leaves, etc. If you have pressed whole
sprays, it will be still more beautiful.
These will have to be tackled on with
needle and thread. while the single
leaves can be put on with paste-one
little patch near the stem is sufficient.
Do not crowd them down in a stiff,
straight line, but let them be arranged
as daintily and as naturally as you
would boquet of flowers. Begin at
the ends, and the tips will keep cover
lug the stems where they are fastened.
Then put on your beautiful wreath for
heading to your curtains, smuggling
the tack under the leaves at the ends.
After the centre one is driven, take
snowy mottled leaf, or spray of scar
let sumach, OF fern, and stick it over
the tack with paste. If the wreaths are
long enough so that in putting up they
are little loose, so as to hang in slight
festoons, all the better. Then part
your curtains and loop them back
loosely in graceful festoons with small
er bands made like the other. Now
your windows appear greatly enlarged,
and you need never tire of their beauty.
These leaves are also beautiful among
boquets of grasses and everlasting flow
ers. And thus we can have glimpse
of ''Indian summer" through ali the
dreary winter days.-Sylra Wildsag in
st. Louis Magazine.