Scouting For Girls, Official Handbook of the Girl Scouts Part 21

The Iceless Refrigerator

An "iceless refrigerator" sounds like a "fireless cooker." This is an arrangement made to keep food cool in the summer when there is no ice. A wooden cage with shelves is covered with a cloth cover and placed near a window or out of doors. If in the house it should stand in a large pan to prevent the dripping of water on the shelf or floor.

A piece of the cloth cover should rest in a pan of water. If this is not convenient a strip of cloth can be sewed to the cover endwise and this piece should be placed in a pan or bowl of water which should be set on top of the cage. This water will be sucked throughout the cloth cover of the refrigerator until it is wholly wet. As the water evaporates from the cover the air inside the refrigerator is cooled.

The iceless refrigerator works well on days when dry air is moving about. It does not do well on damp, quiet days.

Another simple refrigerator which does very well for a little milk or a pat of b.u.t.ter is a clean, earthen flower pot, turned upside down in a shallow pan of water. This will keep very cool the food which it covers.

The Kitchen Sink

Next to the stove, the sink is the most important piece of kitchen furniture.

The best sinks are of enamel or are made of porcelain. They have a fine wire drainer so that nothing solid will go into the trap and plug the pipes. The Girl Scout uses boiling water, and plenty of it, to flush the sink. She takes pains that no grease gets into the drain to harden there. When grease is accidentally collected, soda and hot water will wash it away, but it should never collect in the pipes.

The Keeper of the House takes pride in a perfectly clean sink.

Taking Care of the House and the Things in It

Taking care of a house and its furniture means keeping the house clean, neat, and orderly, and keeping everything in good repair. This means a great deal of thought on the part of the Keeper of the House. For there are many sorts of work to be done, and there is a right way of doing every bit of it. By paying attention a Girl Scout may learn very fast, and become very helpful and competent.

First, there's the Dish Was.h.i.+ng.

Dish Was.h.i.+ng

In making ready for dish was.h.i.+ng sc.r.a.pe every plate carefully to remove crumbs that would get into the dish water. Try using crumpled tissue paper to remove milk, grease, or crumbs before the dishes are put into the pan. Save tissue paper, and paper napkins for this.

Pile in separate piles, all dishes of each sort; wash first gla.s.s, then silver, then cups, saucers, plates, then the rest; do not put bone, ivory or wooden handles of knives into the water. Use hot water and soap for dish was.h.i.+ng, then rinse with clean hot water.

Dish towels should be cleansed after every dish was.h.i.+ng; wash clean in hot soapy water, then rinse all the soap away in clean water. Cooking utensils should soak in cold water until time for dish was.h.i.+ng, unless they can be washed as soon as used.

Use a tray for carrying dishes to the closet or pantry instead of travelling with a handful back and forth. Strain the dish water before pouring it down the sink. Be sure that no greasy water is put into the sink. Let the grease rise and cool; skim it off and dispose of it after the dishes are washed.

Taking Care of Rooms

Keeping a house in order means having everything in its place in every room. It means sweet, fresh air in every room; it means removal of dust and litter. A good housekeeper "tidies" her rooms as she goes along, always picking up anything that is out of place and putting it where it belongs. But she also has a method in doing things. Perhaps she sweeps the entire house every day or every other day, or perhaps she puts one room in order on one day and another on another and so on. The important thing is to have a regular plan.

[Ill.u.s.tration: HEIGHT OF SINK]

The Living Room

Taking care of a living room means cleaning the floor and the rugs; dusting the walls, the pictures; cleaning, dusting, and sometimes polis.h.i.+ng the furniture. Open the windows top and bottom, dust and brush them inside and out; use a soft brush or a dust mop to take the dust from the floor. Use a carpet sweeper for the rugs unless you have electricity and can use a vacuum cleaner; collect the sweepings and burn them.

Dampen one quarter of your cheese-cloth duster and roll it inside the rest of the duster, then wring. This makes a dampish cloth for dusting the base-boards, window sills, and other woodwork as well as the furniture. Where the furniture is highly polished, or would be injured by water, use oil on the duster instead. Dust after the dust has settled, not when it has been stirred into the air. Shake and replace doilies or covers.

Be sure that the pictures hang straight after dusting and that every piece of furniture is put in its right place. See how long it takes to clean the room; then study to find out how the time can be shortened.

Do not keep useless furniture nor have too many things in your room.

_The Bathroom_ and the bath tub require daily cleansing. In the ordinary family every one who uses the tub should leave it perfectly clean for the next one who needs it. All the furnis.h.i.+ngs of the bathroom should be kept sweet and clean. Use a flush closet brush daily, scalding it after using it. And remember that fresh air and suns.h.i.+ne are cleansing agents.

Get them to work for you.

_The Bedroom._ Your bedroom needs all the fresh air it can get. The Girl Scout sleeps with her windows open. As soon as you have dressed in the morning throw the windows wide open again, if they have been closed.

Open the bed, so that both sheets may be reached by the fresh air. Shake up your pillows and put them on a chair near the window. Leave your night clothing spread or hung where it will be well aired. Let your room have a fresh air bath!

You know already how to make a bed. You will remember that all the bedclothing must be smooth and even, when the bed is made. You are lucky if you have a sister to help you make your bed, for this piece of work is easier for two than for one. You will see that the mattress is lying straight. Once a week you (the two of you) will turn the mattress, end over end one week, and side over side the next week. Then your mattress will wear evenly, and not have a hollow in the middle where you sleep all the time. Then you two will lay the mattress cover straight, and tuck it in firmly, so that you will have no hard wrinkles to sleep on.

The under sheet, smooth and straight, must be tucked in all around. You will make the bed as smooth as the table. Now the upper sheet, which is the hardest thing to manage in bed making, must be neatly tucked in at the foot. But you must allow eight inches at the top to be turned over the blankets and spread. Now the blankets, straight and smooth, and evenly tucked in at the foot. Then you may choose between tucking in the sides after folding the top sheet down over the blankets, and afterwards covering the whole bed with the spread, letting the sides and ends hang down; and laying the spread even with the blankets, tucking in the sides, and turning down the sheet over all. Try both ways.

Now, shake and pat the pillows, making them very smooth and quite square-cornered; then lay them or stand them neatly at the head of the bed, meeting exactly in the middle; and your bed is fit for a queen, or a tired Girl Scout after a tramp!

With the bed neatly made, everything must be put in its proper place.

The furniture and window sills must be dusted with a clean cheese-cloth duster; and the bare floors must be nicely dusted with a dry floor-mop, or a cloth pinned over a broom. If there are rugs, use a carpet sweeper, if you have one, or a broom. If you do any broom sweeping, however, you will do it before you dust.

Now a last look to see that the room is tidy, every chair in place and the shades even at the windows, and your room is ready for the day. Of course any Girl Scout who wants a Homemaker's badge will _do_ all these things;--not guess or suppose how others do them and how long it takes.

That is the honest way to learn. So find out how long it takes to put your room in order. There is only one way to find out.

Fighting Germs

Keeping clean in these days means keeping free from troublesome germs as well as visible dirt. Germs thrive in dampness and darkness. They can be overcome by suns.h.i.+ne. For thorough cleanness, the house needs fresh air and suns.h.i.+ne as well as sweeping and dusting. The Girl Scout must remember to let the fresh air blow through every room in the house every day. She should sleep with her windows open. She is fortunate if she can sleep out of doors.

Of course she is in honor bound to have no dark, damp, hidden, dirt-filled corners in any part of her house, not even in shed or cellar. Let in the light and clean out the dirt.

Fighting the House Fly and Mosquito

House flies carry disease. They breed in filth, human waste, animal droppings, decayed animal or vegetable matter, and are so made that they carry filth wherever they go. Since the fly alights wherever it pleases, it carries dirt from outside and distributes it wherever it CHOOSES.

Clean up all heaps of rubbish where flies may breed. Keep your garbage pail _absolutely clean_. Disinfect outdoor water-closets and cover with gravel or slacked lime. Get fly traps to set on your porches. Kill all flies that come into the house, especially the early ones, in the spring. Keep your windows and doors screened.

Fight mosquitoes just as you fight flies. Leave no still water even in an old tin can, for the eggs of mosquitoes are deposited in still water and hatch there. The mosquito, like many other insects, has an intermediate stage between the egg and the grown mosquito. During this stage it swims about in quiet water. Mosquitoes in great numbers may be growing in old cans or bottles, rain-filled and hidden away under the bushes in your yard. Watch for such breeding places; clean up your yard and banish the mosquito.

Taking Care of Waste

All waste must be carefully disposed of. It should never acc.u.mulate in the kitchen; but the important thing is to have _no real waste_. See that everything is put to the utmost use. If you live in the country, chickens and pigs will take the parings, the outer leaves of vegetables, etc., and you can bury or burn waste. If you live in the city the garbage man will collect all waste.

The garbage can must be kept thoroughly clean. It should be rinsed and scalded whenever it is empty, so that there will be no bad odors about the kitchen. Find out how garbage is taken care of in your town. How can you help to keep your neighborhood clean? What should be done if there is carelessness about garbage?

Taking Care of Woolen Things

Housekeepers must fight moths as well as flies. The clothes moth loves to lay its eggs in wool. It is very keen in searching out bits of wool and finding a place for its baby to thrive. Unless you have a care it will lay its eggs in your best winter dress which you forgot and left hanging in the hot summer days.