THE DINING ROOM Besides the regular dining-room fur niture, tables, chairs, sideboard, and serving table, the addition of a plate rail or rack for plates, pitchers, and other decorative china objects, and of a china cabinet with glass doors for displaying the best china, help to give a room character and beauty. The effect of these articles will be very much heightened if the wall coverings are in solid or double-toned colors, and, as in other living rooms, hard wood floors or floor coverings in solid colors, with a large rug or drugget coming within a few feet of the wall all around, make perhaps the most effective treatment. The color scheme of the dining room should preferably be in cheerful tones, as blues, yel lows, or reds, according to the amount of light the room receives.
China Closet.—The china cabinet is a useful and beautiful article of fur niture, but in the absence of such a cabinet any ordinary closet opening into a dining room may be utilized as a china closet by removing the door and replacing it with a deco rative door with diamond panes of glass, and lining the interior with denim to correspond in color with the furnishings of the room.
Or the door may be removed and replaced by a suitable drapery hang ing from a rod, and drawn aside when the dining room is in use. Screw hooks on the inside of the shelves of the china cabinet or closet from which to hang cups to display them, save space, and prevent breakage. Tack a
narrow strip of board two or three inches from the back of each shelf, as a rim to hold up the plates. Or put in a row of brass tacks standing an eighth of an inch above the shelf for this purpose.
Table Pad.—A pad of table felt sold for the purpose should be laid over the dining-room table, both to protect the polish and to save the linen tablecloth. But an old blanket or thick cotton flannel may be used for this purpose, or clean carpet lin ing can be utilized by covering it with white muslin smoothly pasted on. This will last for months and can be read ily replaced.
To Store Table Leaves.—Fasten un der the lower shelf of the pantry the frame in which the extra boards of the extension dining table come, and slide the boards in. Thus they take up no extra space and are always at hand.
China.—Select a stock pattern when buying china, and preferably a stand ard design of some sort, as the well known willow or onion design, or some other that can be readily replaced as pieces are broken. When possible it is, of course, a good plan to have two sets of china, one for best, to be dis played in the china cabinet and only used upon special occasions, and an other for ordinary wear, which may be less delicate and expensive.