"How do you put the top and the sole together?"
"The edge of the sole is soft enough to sew through. You turn the top inside out over the sole and sew the binding of the chintz on to the edge of the sole over and over and when you turn it right side out there you are with gay shoes."
"They"ll fill up a bag, though," commented Ethel Blue. "I should think you might make a pair just like that only make the sole of something that would double up. Then they"d go into a case and be more compact."
"That"s a good idea, too," agreed Ethel Brown. "What could you use for a sole?"
"Soft leather would be best. I imagine you could get a piece from the cobbler down town. Or you could get the very thin leather that they used at Chautauqua for cardcases and pocket books--the kind Roger uses--and st.i.tch two pieces together."
"Why wouldn"t a heavy duck sole do?" suggested Mrs. Emerson.
"If you stepped on a pin it wouldn"t keep it out as well as leather,"
objected her daughter.
"I believe I"ll try a pair with a flowery chintz top and a duck sole covered with chintz like a lining to the shoe," said Ethel Blue slowly as she thought it out. "Then I"ll make the case of two pieces of chintz bound together."
"One piece ought to be longer than the other so that it would be a flap to come over like an envelope."
This was Ethel Brown"s contribution to the slipper building.
"You could fasten it with a glove snapper. I got some the other day for my leather work," said Roger. "I"ll put them on for you."
"Why don"t you Ethels make both kinds?" suggested Dorothy. "She"ll find a use for them."
"If you girls will make it I"ll contribute the silk for a bath wrap that she can throw over her warm one, just for looks, on the boat," said Mrs.
Emerson. "I have one I use on sleeping cars and it rolls up into the smallest s.p.a.ce you can imagine."
[Ill.u.s.tration: Slipper Case
Place section a on section b and sew edges together, leaving c d open
e = Snap fastening]
"Good for Grandmother!" cried a chorus of voices.
"Can we use our famous wrapper pattern?" asked Helen.
"I don"t see why not. Mine has a hood but that isn"t a difficult addition if you merely shape the neck of your kimono a little and then cut a square of the material, sew it across one end and round the lower end a trifle to fit into the neck hole you"ve made."
"How about longer sleeves, Mother?" asked Mrs. Morton.
"I think I would make them longer. And I"d also make an envelope bag of the same silk to carry it in on the return trip from the bath. You"ll be surprised to find into how small an envelope it will go."
"Put a cord from one corner of the envelope to the other so that Mademoiselle may have her hands free for her soap and towel and other needfuls," advised Mrs. Smith, who had been listening to the suggestions.
"Wouldn"t another envelope arrangement of chintz lined with rubber cloth make a good washrag bag or sponge bag?" asked Ethel Brown.
"Nothing better unless you put a rubber-lined pocket in a Pullman ap.r.o.n."
This hint from Grandmother Emerson aroused the curiosity of the young people.
"What is a Pullman ap.r.o.n? Tell us about it," they cried.
"Mine is made of linen crash," said Mrs. Emerson. "Dorothy will insist on your making yours of cotton chintz and it will be just as good and even prettier. Get a yard. Cut off a piece thirty inches long and make it fourteen wide. Bind the lower edge with tape. Turn up six inches across the bottom and st.i.tch the one big pocket it makes into smaller ones of different sizes by rows of up and down st.i.tching. Make a bag of rubber cloth just the right size to fit one of the larger pockets. Take the six inches that you cut off from your yard of material and bind it on both edges with tape. St.i.tch that across your ap.r.o.n about four inches above the top of the lower row of pockets. Divide the strip into as many pockets as you want to for hairpins and pins and neck arrangements, and so on."
"Your ap.r.o.n has two raw edges now," said Helen.
"Bind it on each side with tape. That will finish it and it will also fasten the edges of the pockets securely to the ap.r.o.n. Sew across the top a tape long enough to serve as strings."
[Ill.u.s.tration: Pullman Ap.r.o.n
d b plus the turned up portion, b a, = 30 inches b a = 6 inches b b = 14 inches c c c = pockets d d = strings]
"The idea is to roll all your toilet belongings up together in your bag, eh?"
"Yes, and when you go to the ladies" room on the train you tie the ap.r.o.n around your waist and then you have your brush and comb and hairpins and tooth brush and washrag all where you can lay your fingers on them in a second of time."
"I got my best tortoise-sh.e.l.l hairpin mixed up with another woman"s once, and I never recovered it," said Mrs. Morton meditatively.
"It wouldn"t have happened if you"d been supplied with a bag like this,"
said her mother.
"Mademoiselle"s silk wrap must be grey to match her other Red Cross equipment," said Mrs. Emerson, "but I don"t see why the chintz things shouldn"t be as gay as you like."
"Pink roses would be most becoming to her style of beauty," murmured Roger who had come in.
"I don"t know but pink roses would be becoming enough for slippers,"
agreed Ethel Blue so seriously that every one laughed.
"Let"s get pink flowered chintz," said Ethel Brown. "You make the soft kind and I"ll make the stiff kind and Dorothy"ll make the ap.r.o.n and Helen will make the kimono. Who"s got any more ideas?"
"I have," contributed Roger. "I"ll make a case for her manicure set. I haven"t got time this week unfortunately to tool the leather but I"ll make a plain one that will be useful if it isn"t as pretty as I can do."
"What shape will it be?"
"I got part of my idea from Grandfather Emerson"s spectacle case that I was examining the other day. Ethel Blue"s case for the soft slippers is going to be something like it."
"Two pieces of leather rounded at the lower corners and st.i.tched together at the sides and with a flap to shut in the contents?" guessed Dorothy.
"Correct. I shall make the case about four inches long when it"s closed."
"That means that you"d have one strip four inches long and the other, the one with the flap, six inches long."
"Once more correct, most n.o.ble child. It will be a liberal two inches wide, a bit more in this instance because I"m not much of a sewer and I want to be sure that I"m far enough from the edge to make it secure."
"You don"t try to turn it inside out, do you?"
"No, ma"am. Not that mite of an object. You fit a tiny pasteboard slide into the case. Cover it with velvet or leather or a sc.r.a.p of Ethel Blue"s chintz--"