It was a presentable beginning for their collection. Two parcels in addition to Mrs. Ames"s had gone into the packing case in the corner, but three shelves of the new set were filled with tight rolls, each with its tag forward so that no time would be lost in examining the contents, again.
"That"s what I call a good beginning," announced Helen after the boys had swept up their shavings and had taken them and their hammers and the remaining nails down stairs.
"What next, Madam President?" inquired James when they returned. The girls were already spreading out the pink and blue flannelette on a plank table that had been left in the attic by the carpenters who had built the house.
"We are going to cut some little wrappers out of this material. I think you boys had better fix up some sort of table over on that side of the room and get your pasting equipment ready, for we"ll need oodles of boxes of all sizes and you might as well begin right off to make them."
"Right-o," agreed Roger. "Methinks I saw an aged table top minus legs leaning against the wall in the cellar. Couldn"t we anchor it on to this wall with a couple of hinges and then its two legs will be a good enough prop?"
"If they"re both on the same side."
"It seems to me they are."
"Any superfluous hinges around the house, Dorothy?"
"I"m afraid not."
"Never mind, I"ll get a pair when I go after the pasteboard and the flour for the paste and a bowl for a pastepot, and a--no, _three_ brushes for us three boys to smear the paste with and some coa.r.s.e cotton cloth for binders."
"Don"t forget the oil of cloves to keep your paste from turning sour,"
Dorothy cried after them.
"And mind you boil it thoroughly," said Margaret.
The boys started again towards the cellar when Roger"s eye happened to fall on the cutting operations of the girls.
"Pshaw!" he cried in scorn. "You are time-wasters! Why don"t you cut out several garments at once and not have to go through all that spreading out and pinning down process every time? I saw a tailor the other day cutting a pile of trousers two feet high."
"What with, I should like to know?" inquired Della mystified.
"He did have a knife run by electricity," admitted Roger, "but there"s no reason why you can"t cut four or five of those things just as easily as one."
"We"ll go on down and get the table top," said James, and he and Tom departed.
"Now, then, watch your Uncle Roger. Is this tissue paper affair your pattern? All you need to do is to fasten your cloth tightly down on to your table four thicknesses instead of one. Thumb tacks, Dorothy? Good child! Now lay your pattern on it--yes, thumb-tack it down if you want to--and go ahead. You"ve got new, sharp shears. Don"t be in a hurry.
There you are--and you"ve saved yourself the fuss of doing that three times more."
[Ill.u.s.tration: Pattern for Wrapper
e c e = twice the length from floor to neck a b = slit Fold cloth on line c b d Sew together sides f to e Insert sleeves c to f]
"Roger really has a lot of sense at times," admitted Ethel Brown, after her brother had leaped down the attic stairs in pursuit of the boys.
"He is good about helping," added Della.
"What is this garment--a wrapper?" asked Margaret as Helen held up the soft flannelette.
"Yes, it"s the simplest ever, and we can adapt one pattern to children of all sizes or to grown people," explained Helen.
"I never heard of anything so convenient!"
"First, you measure the child from the floor to his neck--I measured this on d.i.c.ky. Then you cut a piece of material twice that length. That is, if the kiddy is thirty inches from the floor to the chin you cut your flannelette sixty inches long."
[Ill.u.s.tration: Wrapper Completed]
"Exactly. Then cut a lengthwise slit thirty inches long. Then fold the whole thing in halves across the width of the cloth and sew up the sides to within four and a half inches of the top and you have a wrapper all but the sleeves."
"How do you make those?"
"It takes half a yard for a grown person--a quarter of a yard for a youngster. Cut the width in halves and double it and sew it straight into the holes you"ve left at the tops."
"Will that be the right length?"
"You can shorten it if you like or lengthen it by a band. You finish the slit up the front by putting on a band of some different color. It looks pretty on the ends of the sleeves, too. We can use blue on this pink and pink on the blue."
"It"s easy enough, isn"t it? I think I"ll make myself one when we get through with the Ship."
"All you need to know is the length from the person"s chin to the floor and you can make it do for anybody. And all you need to do to make a short sacque is to know the length from the person"s chin to his waist.
I have a notion we"ll have some wee bits left that we can make into cunning little jackets for babies."
"I don"t see why this pattern wouldn"t do for an outdoor coat if you made it of thicker cloth--eider-down, for instance."
"It would. Gather the ends of the sleeves about an inch down so as to make a ruffle, and put frogs or b.u.t.tons and loops on the front and there you have it!"
"Did you bring a petticoat pattern, Margaret?" asked Ethel Blue.
"Haven"t you seen the pictures of European peasant women and little girls with awfully full skirts? I believe they"d like them if we just cut two widths of the same length, hemmed them at the bottom, and ran a draw-string in the top. We can feather-st.i.tch the top of the hem if we want to make it look pretty, or we can cut it a little longer and run one or two tucks."
"Or we might b.u.t.tonhole a scallop around the edge instead of hemming it," suggested Ethel Brown.
"You know I believe in doing one thing well," said Dorothy. "How would it do if we Club girls made just coats and wrappers and sacques from that pattern of Helen"s, and petticoats? We can make them of all sorts of colors and a variety of materials and we can trim them differently.
We"d be making some mighty pretty ones before we got through."
"I don"t see why not," agreed Margaret thoughtfully. "Let"s do it."
"I brought the Red Cross knitting directions," said Delia. "I didn"t get them till this morning."
"Grandmother will be delighted with those. She"s going to take them to the Old Ladies" Home and start them all to work there."
"Are you sure they"ll knit for the children?"
"She"s going to ask them to knit for the children now, with bright-colored yarns. Afterwards they can knit for the soldiers, and then they must use dark blue or grey or khaki color--not even a stripe that will make any poor fellow conspicuous."
As they finished reading the instructions they heard the boys tramping upstairs with their paraphernalia.
"It looks to me, Dorothy," said Tom, "as if you had us on your hands for most of these club meetings, to do our work here. Are you sure Mrs.
Smith doesn"t mind?"
"Mother is delighted," Dorothy rea.s.sured him. "And she wants you all to come down and have some chocolate."