Mother's Cook Book: Containing Recipes for Every Day in the Week, Including ..

Dress goods cut up into little bits and sewed together into fantastical shapes called trimmings, are apt if too freely used to give an air of fussiness to the dress, and be withal a source of endless annoyance in catching dust and dirt. The former ideas of a border or hem to finish has become the greater part of the garment Nothing is gained in grace by making any outside garment skin-tight, while much is lost in comfort by so doing. A sleeve, for instance, to be serviceable and look well, should be loose and adapt itself somewhat to the curve of the arm. Likewise a dress waist looks far better a little loose, as well as being more healthful and wearing better. Large, stout persons can add to their appearance much by wearing all outside skirts buttoned on to fitted undergarments below the hips several inches, for gathers about the waist only add to their stoutness of look, and are uncomfortable to carry about. A yoked petticoat answers the purpose very well in lieu of the buttoned skirts. • A wrapper for a tall slim person can have a Spanish flounce, while a slashed skirt with kilt inserts is more becoming to a short figure. Large folds are always more graceful than small pleats and puckers. One very great fault of our dressmaking lies in not allowing the goods to fall in large and natural folds, but in bunching and pleating it in folding, and pressing the goods down into fantastic and inartistic shapes. Added-to this, paniers, and padding, bustles, and hoops, until an ordinary woman is forced to appear like a stuffed figure instead of a living human being. Every woman can modify, and arrange, and simplify, and that without becoming either ultra or conspicuous. It will Motheb's Cook Book. 291 take time. That cannot be helped, yet possibly the saving in comfort and expense may fully compensate for the few hours spent in studying her own dress with the mirror before her and with the determination to make the very best and most of herself. HOME DRESSMAKING. The art of dressmaking in America has been of late years so simplified that almost anyone with a reasonable degree of executive ability can manufacture a fashionable costume by using an approved pattern and following the directions printed upon it, selecting a new pattern for each distinct style; while in Europe many ladies adhere to the old plan of cutting one model and using it for everything, trusting to personal skill or luck to gain the desired formation. However, some useful hints are given which are well worth offering after the paper pattern has been chosen. The best dressmakers here and abroad use silk for lining, but nothing is so durable or preserves the material as well as a firm slate twill. This is sold double width and should be laid out thus folded: place the pattern upon it with the upper part towards the out end, the selvedge for the fronts. The side pieces for the back will most probably be got out of the width, while the top of the back will fit in the intersect of the frost. A yard of good stuff may be often saved by laying the pattern out and well considering how one part cuts into another. Prick the outline on to the lining'; these marks serve as a guide for the tacking. In forming the front side plaits be careful and do not allow a fold or crease to be apparent on the bodice beyond where the stitching commences. To avoid this, before beginning stick a pin through what is to be the top of the plait The head will be on the right side, and holding the point, one can begin pinning the seam without touching 292 Motkeh'b Cook Book.