April, i g 1 0 
21 
vines were trained to 
screen the end of the 
porch that looked 
upon the highway. 
The outside of the 
house was given two 
coats of white paint, 
and the tin roof one 
coat of red. 
Flower boxes were 
placed at every win¬ 
dow filled with pink 
geraniums and orange 
colored calendulas. 
Over the front door 
she built a small lat¬ 
ticed entrance porch 
and added a lattice 
across the front of the 
roof line in order to 
add width to the 
eaves. Two windows 
on the south side were 
also enclosed with 
the lattice and a lit¬ 
tle red brick walk was 
laid from the roadway 
to the front stoop. 
Two trim little box¬ 
wood trees in red 
pots were set at the 
end of the walk in 
front of the stoop. 
The Gardener’s 
Touch 
A space at the back 
was enclosed in a lat¬ 
tice-work and quick¬ 
growing plants and 
vines were set out to 
screen the drying- 
ground, the rain bar¬ 
rel, and other unor¬ 
namental proper¬ 
ties from public view, 
for the cottage stood 
close to the highway. 
The grape-vine on the 
front of the house 
was pruned, the long 
neglected hedge 
trim m e d, and the 
grass cut. A bed of 
hollyhocks and other 
old-fashioned flowers 
was planted under the 
sitting-room windows, 
and the house that 
was once a desolate 
shell on the South 
Country Road is now 
a dwelling-place of so 
much charm that al¬ 
most every motor car 
that passes the door 
slows down so that 
the occupants may get 
a longer view of the 
quaint little cottage 
which looks exactly like 
Inside the house, the 
lightful effect with very 
The screened veranda at the hack 
was the only architectural addition; 
all the other transformation was 
wrought by the foliage of the old 
grape-vine that draped itself grace¬ 
fully over the windows and doors, 
and by the little ivhite flower-boxes 
filled with salmon-pink geraniums, 
orange-colored calendulas and nas¬ 
turtiums 
Two views of the shabby little 
“ Nutshell ” as it ivas when purchased 
last March 
The south front just three months 
later. Latticing was used as a cor¬ 
nice across the roof to bring the 
line down and as a decoration around, 
the windows and at the side. The 
cheerful little red brick walk, the 
gay painted bird sticks and the riot¬ 
ous hollyhocks made a brilliant mass 
of color against the freshly painted 
white house 
a cross-stitch on a green background, 
same simple taste has produced a de- 
inexpensive furnishings. 
A Solution for Old Walls 
The walls were in bad condition, the plaster so broken and 
cracked that it was hopeless to think of papering them, and 
as the owner was anxious to get in as soon as possible, re¬ 
plastering was out of the question. She solved the problem 
by buying several bolts of white cheesecloth, cutting it into 
(Continued on page 86) 
