Organizing Sheets & Bedding

Another vintage tip found in Here’s How The Farm Weekly Serves You, this one on organizing sheets for quick identification:

When patching sheets, I sew a colored thread in the hem. This way I instantly recognize patched sheets without unfolding them. I also use this method to mark various sizes for beds.

Get Ready To Save & Sell With NerdWallet Indie Shopping

Have you heard about NerdWallet? It's a site to help consumers save money and make smarter decisions about their personal finances, travel plans, higher education, and shopping -- and now, it's got a new service to help people find and promote indie shops while helping people save money while supporting mom and pop shops online!

In order to give you all the scoop, I interviewed Rita Chu, Community Manager for NerdWallet Shopping.

Hi, Rita, give us an overview of the site and the new indie shop opportunity.

Our mission at NerdWallet is to help consumers save money and make better-informed decisions. All of our tools help empower people to make better decisions about their personal finances and more through clear and unbiased recommendations and thorough research. NerdWallet Indie was created out of the desire to help consumers save money on online shopping while also supporting handmade artists and independent retailers.

NerdWallet Indie is the best place to discover products and gifts from handmade artists and local small businesses. Everyone needs a little help to save money and hoppers can find great discounts on items like jewelry, toys, housewares, vintage and more that are all made and/or sold by independent artists and small businesses. Furthermore, Etsy sellers and small businesses can share their coupons on our site to promote their work and drive more traffic to their shops.

When did the site start? Why was it started?

NerdWallet Indie officially launched on November 27th of 2012 to help holiday shoppers save money on handmade gifts. I love shopping for unique handmade finds on Etsy and supporting small businesses so we created a way to help shoppers find great deals on handmade products which also promotes Etsy sellers and other small businesses at the same time.

How does a person use NerdWallet Indie -- as a seller and as a buyer? Do folks need to join to participate?

Any small business and Etsy seller can join our community and sign up their shops for free to submit their coupons on NerdWallet Indie and also share their social media links, blog and website links too to promote their shops to our thousands of visitors.

As a shopper, anyone can browse our beautiful website full of inspiring pictures of lovely handmade products and find that perfect gift for everyone on your holiday shopping list. Just click the "Redeem" button on a coupon and enter the coupon code at checkout to claim your discounts on great holiday presents.

How does NerdWallet differ from all the other coupon and sales alert sites?

We focus on the independent retailer and small businesses that may have a harder time competing for customers next to big name stores and department stores especially during the holidays. Artists who sell on Etsy can make their products shine with our user-friendly website that features fun Pinterest-style browsing is not flooded with advertisements. Shoppers can find the perfect gift that they are looking for while also finding great discounts to save the money and time. Furthermore, I care deeply about the success of the sellers in our community and work hard to promote all the shops and coupons on social media and news sites all day long.

What are the benefits from supporting indie shops, especially at holiday and gift giving time?

According to the Small Business Administration (SBA), 97% of all businesses are considered small businesses. Supporting indie artists and your local small businesses is crucial to improving the economy because small businesses have a big economic impact and enrich local communities. Shopping from indie shops, instead of helping big corporations get richer, you will feel good that you're helping people like you support their families and give back to the community which is especially important during the holiday season.

If a person has more than one shop, can they manage them under one NerdWallet account? Or must they make individual accounts -- and are multiple accounts by one person even allowed?

Yes, one person can manage coupons for multiple stores and each store will have it's own personal coupons page.

I see the focus of the site is in Etsy, and that two other sites/platforms/marketplaces (Art Fire and Big Cartel) are also listed. Are any other sales sites allowed? What about places such as eBay, and even individual shops using PayPal, etc.? Can sellers there use NerdWallet? If not, are there any plans to do so?

Yes, any online store on any platform can add coupons to our site. Etsy, ArtFire, and Big Cartel are the biggest handmade marketplaces. eBay stores and PayPal stores can sign up too although we currently do not have any eBay or PayPal stores sharing coupons in our coupon tool

There is mention of offering listings on the site's homepage, prime category listings, and other priority features; how do these work? Is there a fee for that?

If a seller adds a link to their store's coupons from their shop or website to promote their coupons, we offer additional features for free that help promote their stores. The seller's coupons will then be displayed on the homepage and at the top of category pages plus the seller can add product images and tags to their coupons to make their coupons stand out and draw customers to their shops. These are all great benefits to online indie retailers which we offer all for free.

Thank you, Rita, I'm off to give NerdWallet Shopping a try!

A Reminder At Wedding Season

Another tip from the "Women Who Make Sense" section of the Workbasket (June 1956 issue), this one about using the leftover materials from your wedding dress for making a matching miniature dress for a doll. Again, this was an idea for making money, but it's a cute keepsake idea for a bride.

Remember Grandma's Apron?

In 1963, Mollie Dowdle wrote this piece which sounds a lot like my post on aprons. It's kind of funny to read that in 1963 aprons were already becoming a thing of the past!

You can click the image below to read the larger scan. (As published in Kitchen-Klatter Magazine, May 1963.)

Brown Sugar Substitute

This vintage tip was found in Here’s How The Farm Weekly Serves You. (More info on the publication here.)

Making Donut Animals

The following advice on getting children to play with their food is from How To Run A Successful Party: Party Ideas, Games, Fun, For Children & Grown Ups!, written by Elizabeth King (Fun Editor of Parents' Magazine), copyright 1945, Doughnut Corporation of America.(More from this vintage booklet here.)

How To Clean Black Out Of Aluminum Coffee Pots

If you collect or use aluminum kitchenalia, this tip from Good Ideas: An Interesting Collection Made By Eddy's may be of interest to you:

To clean inside, slice a lemon and put the slices in an aluminum coffee-pot with plenty of cold water. Let come to boil and keep boiling until the inside surface can be cleaned with a cloth and made to look like new.

Mysterious Holes In Laundry

As published in the May 1961 issue of Good Housekeeping...

Of the many laundering problems that come may way, the most baffling are tiny holes in cotton clothing, sheets, pillowcases, and other items. They're usually notices soon after laundering and most often appear in white rather than in colored goods. When a number of pieces are affected, the matter is understandably distressing!

The Good Housekeeping Institute laundry laboratories have studied this problem through the years as readers have reported it. By examining representative damaged articles and by chemical tests and other means of laboratory detection, we've searched for the answer. While even with laboratory equipment it is difficult -- sometimes impossible -- to pinpoint the exact cause, there are several possibilities that merit exploration by any homemaker who discovers mysterious holes in a wash load.

The specifics are contained in the scan below, but note that the big three reasons listed are bleach, the washer and dryer, and "the great unknown".

Save Up to 50% On Magazines -- Plus Win Subscriptions! (Enter My Giveaway!)

Zinio has top magazines from around the world from which you can browse and purchase subscriptions or single issues instantly and read on your computer or mobile device. Right now, they have a sale, where you can save 30% on Better Homes & Gardens publications and 50% off other magazines. There are a lot of titles to choose from (some of my favorites are shown here), so you'll probably find some you like for yourself -- and a few to gift to others as well!

The kind folks at Zinio have also given me nine magazines to give away!

That means there will be nine winners!

Entries must be received before December 23, 2012 (midnight, central time, on December 22, 2012). Only entries listed below, with email address for contact, will be included in the random draw on December 23, 2012. Winners will be notified by email on December 23 -- and will have 24 hours to reply or another name will be drawn.

There are three ways to enter -- use one or all, everyday!

Enter by leaving a comment stating which magazine subscription you'd get -- and be sure to leave your email address, so I can contact you regarding you should you win.

and/or

Post your entry at your blog -- if you do this you must include in your post both a link to this post and to Zinio and email your link, or post it as a comment, so that I don't miss your post. (Be sure I have your email address!)

and/or

Tweet your entry -- to do this, you must include a link to this post -- here's a cut and paste tweet you can use:

I entered @DPopTart's contest because I want to win a magazine subscription from @zinio! Enter here http://bit.ly/UEVHWJ

(Follow me on Twitter, or leave a comment with your Tweet and email address so that I can contact you should you win!)

Full disclosure: I was given a digital magazine subscription in exchange for posting this contest.

Baste Your Roasts With 7-UP

From a 1957 Cooking With Seven-Up booklet. (I've got a copy for sale at Exit 55 Antiques; you can see more of the stuff we've got there on our Facebook page.)

Tough Cocoanuts To Crack?

Have a lovely pair of cocoanuts, but you're having a hard time opening them?  The 1967 American Farm & Home Almanac suggests placing them in a hot oven for a few minutes.