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Show LEAVES' rojT!--;' Paint It Yourself There is no great trick to putting on paint. Almost anyone can do it, with a little practice, and few things add so much to the appearance of the home, inside or out, as does a coat or two of fresh paint You can give your house and other buildings new life with a few simple strokes of the brush. Here are some pointers on how to begin. If the surface which is to be painted paint-ed is of new wood, it will need little preparation to receive the paint. It should be brushed to remove dust or loose dirt, or, if speckled with mortar mor-tar or cement or similar material, it should be scraped until it Is clean. If, however, it contains pitchy knots, such knots should be charred to kill the pitch. Yellow pine or other very resinous wood should be brushed with turpentine just before painting; cypress, with naphtha or benzol. If the surface to be painted has . been painted before and has begun to scale, all old paint must be removed. re-moved. This is usually done with a wire brush. If nail holes show loose putty, this, too, must be removed. The holes may be refilled with putty after the first coat of paint has been applied. A surface that has been enameled enam-eled or varnished should be rubbed with an abrasive until the gloss is removed. Painted or varnished walls in kitchen or bathroom must be washed in soapy water, thoroughly thorough-ly rinsed, and dried before applying paint. A shingled roof or outside wall that has been creosoted can not be painted unless it has been weathered weath-ered for several seasons, nor can a whitewashed surface be painted until un-til the whitewash has been completely com-pletely removed. Any brick surface that has once been painted can be repainted if the surface is gone over carefully to remove any loose paint, but if the bricks have never had a coat of paint it is advisable to apply an undercoat un-dercoat of some sort either a prepared pre-pared undercoat or kettle-boiled linseed lin-seed oil to close the pores before painting. Before applying either oil or water wa-ter paints to a plastered surface, all old coats of calcimine, cold-water cold-water paint or whitewash, or wall paper must be removed. Unless a surface has previously been coated with oil paint or sized, such coverage cover-age must be made before applying calcimine or cold-water paint ESTIMATING THE AMOUNT A recent government bulletin offers of-fers the following general estimate: "For a two-coat repainting job on a house of moderate size and in good condition, it is fairly safe to get as many gallons of paint as there are rooms in t'.ie house. For a three-coat job, about half again as many gallons may be required. For a three-coat job two-thirds of a pint of turpentine and 2 pints of linseed oil for every gallon of paint bought, will be required for thinner." MIXING YOUR OWN PAINT Mixing one's own paint is not a very difficult job, provided one has time to do it and the necessary containers con-tainers and utensils. Home-mixed paint is, naturally, considerably cheaper than prepared paint. In the bulletin to which reference is made at the end of this article, will be found careful recipes for mixing inside and outside paints, for whitewashes, for implement paints and shingle stains. NECESSARY BRUSHES Amateur painters often try to "get along" with cheap brushes. This is a mistake, since cheap brushes usually usu-ally make cheap work. On the other hand, good brushes are expensive and when bought must be given good care. Professionals use a 4-inch flat bristle brush for applying oil paints to flat surfaces; the beginner will find it easier to use a slightly smaller small-er one say, 3 inches. For trimming trim-ming and small surfaces, it is advisable ad-visable to have a flat brush from 2 to 2V4 inches wide. A flat or oval sash brush, 1 to 1V4 inches wide is also necessary. Paint should never be allowed to dry on a brush. When painting ii halted for an hour or more, put the brush in raw linseed oil; a brush that has been used in flat-finish paint should be put in kerosene. During long intervals between painting jobs, brushes should be suspended in raw linseed oil, in closed containers. If the brushes are not supported, they will get out of shape. j Calcimine or whitewash brushes should be washed thoroughly in water, wa-ter, after each day's use, and hung up to dry, bristles downward. For further information, send five cents to Superintendent of Documents. Washington, Washing-ton, 1). C, asking lor Farmers' Bulletin No. 14S2. MOLES AS LAWN PEST Sometimes a large portion of the lawn is undermined with mole runways, run-ways, the grass above such runways run-ways turning brown because of the cutting of its roots. Often repellents are used successfully to combat moles, the runs being opened with a stick at intervals of 10 to 15 feet, and insertions made of moth balls, flake naphtha, or lye. The holts should then be carefully closed with soil. Sometimes the molc-s may be drowned by inserting the garden aose in their runways. |