make it this size if any other would suit your purpose better. For instance, if it is to hold handkerchiefs, a box that is square would be a better shape. But whatever size you decide on, see that each piece is cut and joined evenly, as this is most essential if the box is to be really a success.

The Lambkin Bag.

Doesn’t this make a pretty Shoe-bag!

This pretty bag is made just big enough to take a pair of little girl’s shoes, and would be just the very thing for you to keep at school to put your slippers in when you change them to come home; or you might like to use it to carry your slippers in when you go out to tea.

Do you see the two frisky lambs gambolling on the grass, worked across the bottom of the bag? Don’t you wish that you were like them, and didn’t have to wear shoes that are always wearing out? This little bag was made of dark red sateen, and embroidered with white “Star Sylko” embroidery thread. The bag should be about 7½ inches wide and 10 inches deep, when finished, and to allow for seams and a nice wide hem at the top, you will want to cut a strip of material 8 inches wide and 24 inches long.

It will be best to do your embroidery before you make up the bag, so that you can get at the work better. First fold your strip of material right across the centre, put a tacking line on this fold, and work your lambs just above this.

If you turn to page 30 you will see how to work the cross-stitch designs, by placing canvas over your material first, and you have the lambs all drawn out for you in this article. Also you will find a whole alphabet of initials for working in cross-stitch on another page.

From the outline designs on this page, you will be able to count the crosses.

When you have finished the embroidery, fold the strip of material in half, with the right side inside, and sew it together at each side with a run and back stitch, leaving about 4 inches open at each side at the top of the back. When you have joined the seams, you must oversew them along the edges on the wrong side as well, so that they will not fray.

Now turn down a 2-inch hem at the top, on both sides of the bag, turning in the side edges of the hems; you can tack down the sides of the hems, so as to keep the edges in, but don’t sew them together just yet.

When you have hemmed the hems, you must put a row of running stitches along each hem, about half-an-inch above your hemming line, to make a runner, so that when you thread your ribbons through they will be held down at the bottom of the hem and not come right up to the top of the bag. Now you can oversew the ends of the hems together, leaving the little space between the running line and the hemming line open, so that you can thread your ribbon through. This part of the work must be done with fine sewing cotton the same colour as your material, as you do not want the stitches to show too much.

If you like you can embroider an even row of white crosses over the stitches on the right side of the bag; this makes a pretty finish.

You can either use red cord or a narrow red ribbon for threading through your bag, and you will want a yard and a half. Cut this into two even lengths.

Then thread a bodkin with one piece, and starting from the left hand side of the bag, thread it right round the bag through the runner you made at the bottom of the hems. When you have got it right through, sew the two ends of the ribbon together, and pull it round from the right side so that the join does not show; this will leave you with a long loop of ribbon hanging from the right side of the bag. Now take the other piece of ribbon and do exactly the same from the left side of the bag.

Now when you pull the loops at each side the bag will draw up nice and evenly at the top.

Here you see what the lambs look like worked on Penelope Canvas. Aren’t they frisky!