Page:Family receipt book.pdf/5

5 GRATES.

In choosing grates for your rooms, do not buy those which have burnished steel fronts, as they require more care in cleaning, and are liable to rust during summer when not in use. The best and neatest, as well as the cheapest, grates, are those which are made of cast iron, and of an ornamental pattern. Let the grates which you select be small or of moderate size in the fire-place. Wide, open grates, by admitting cold air iuto the chimney, are exceedingly liable to smoke.

GILDING.

Order all the gilding of your picture frames and other articles to be done in oil : it infinitely more durable, and will wash when soiled.

HOUSEKEEPING AND CLEANING.

Every good housewife should keep a regular and continuous account of her income and expenditure. This is a very essen-tial part of domestic duty, and should not be neglected. When properly set about, there is little or no trouble in keep-ing the household accounts; and for the guidance of young housewives, with whom frugality should be an object, we beg to suggest the following simple plan of keeping them :-Pro-cure a small slate-book--that is, a little book composed of three slates, bound in a plain cover. This, which you write upon with a slate pencil, is your day-book; it is always at hand for you to scroll down any note of outlay, and will keep several days' or a week's accounts at a time. At any leisure moment, you carry the entries of outlay from the slates to a small ruled paper book, which is your ledger. One page of this is devoted to money reeeived, and the opposite page to money paid out. By doing this regularly, and comparing the entries of sums received with the entries of sums ex-pended, so as to see that they square with each other, you will find that you possess a complete record of family ex-penses, satisfactory alike to yourself and to your husband, should he make any inquiry into the subject. The keeping of an account of receipts and disbursements, in this or any other convenient manner, is calculated to check the tendency to over-expenditure, or living beyond the means. Guard against the practice of buying on credit, and running up bills with tradesmen. If you can at all avoid taking credit, do so; for by paying for every article with ready money, you possess two decided advantages-you get every thing cheaper as yon want it, and you can go anywhere to seek out the best markets.