Spring Cleaning
To mop up a spill on a rug, take a cloth and do this.
What is blot (the spill)?
Blotting a spill is usually better than rubbing because it absorbs the liquid while helping prevent the stain from spreading or damaging the rug fibres.
This colour is strongly associated with Ireland.
What is green?
The colour represents the lush greenery that is characteristic of Ireland.
In 2010, a handmade set of this popular real estate game sold for $146,500 to the Strong National Museum of Play in Rochester, New York.
What is Monopoly?
The set was made in 1933 by Charles Darrow, the game’s creator.
You don’t want to miss this museum founded by Pope Julius II.
What is the Vatican Museum?
If you visit every room in the museum, you will walk nine miles, and you will see an extraordinary variety of art.
This is the term for using long stitches to hold material together temporarily before permanent sewing.
What is basting?
You want to use the fewest number of stitches to hold the material in place, minimizing needle holes in the fabric.
Test these mandatory lifesaving home features to see if you need to replace the battery.
What are smoke detectors/alarms?
Many modern smoke alarms use sealed, long-life lithium batteries that last for 10 years. Other alarms use standard, replaceable alkaline or lithium batteries that you must change every year.
On March 17, we all have a touch of this nationality in our blood.
What is Irish?
March 17 is St. Patrick’s Day. An old tradition is to pinch people who are not wearing green on this day.
This Canadian one-cent coin was discontinued in 2012 after more than 150 years of production.
What is the penny?
The Royal Canadian Mint stopped producing the penny because it cost more than one cent to make.
This is Italy’s largest island.
What is Sicily?
The island’s capital city is Palermo. Sicily has its own language, not a dialect of Italian.
In the store, it’s a length of fabric wound around a cardboard tube; in nature, it’s a unit of lightning.
What is a bolt?
Lengths of bolts vary widely based on manufacturer and fabric type, but many bolts contain between 30 and 100 yards of fabric.
If you’re drowning in bric-a-brac, this is the very first thing on your spring cleaning task list.
What is decluttering?
The word “bric-a-brac” refers to a collection of small decorative objects and has been used in English since the 1800s.
A shamrock has this number of leaves.
What is three?
To the Irish, the three-leaf clover is associated with Saint Patrick and the Holy Trinity. A four-leaf clover symbolizes good luck.
Once found in many Canadian homes, this machine made copies using a strong-smelling purple ink before photocopiers took over.
What is a mimeograph machine?
Mimeograph machines were common in schools and offices from the early to mid-1900s. Many people remember the distinctive smell of freshly copied worksheets.
This Italian city is the city of canals.
What is Venice?
The city is comprised of 118 islands, all linked by the canals. When the high tide, known as acqua alta, comes in, the streets flood.
When you purchase a mercerized sewing necessity, you are buying this.
What is thread?
Mercerized thread is a chemically treated cotton thread with enhanced strength and colour durability.
Martha Stewart’s trick for cleaning coffee grinders is to run this food item through them.
What is bread?
Just add a few pieces of bread to the grinder and grind as you would coffee. It will soak up the coffee grinds and the oil.
Keep a close eye on this mischievous little man dressed in green, and he might reveal where he keeps his treasure.
What is a leprechaun?
The lucky leprechauns are part of Irish folklore. You’ll often see them standing beside a pot of gold.
Before digital cameras and smartphones, people took film to be developed at places called this.
What is a photo lab?
Film development could take days, and photographers had to wait to see their pictures. Today, billions of photos are taken and viewed instantly on digital devices.
This city is the birthplace of the Renaissance.
What is Florence?
In addition to its many museums, the city itself serves as an outdoor art gallery. You can see paintings, sculptures, and magnificent architecture.
These structured folds are named after a box-shaped German musical instrument.
What are accordion pleats?
This is an advanced technique, not suitable for those without patience. Some fabrics, such as polyester and satin, enable you to create permanent pleats.
This natural abrasive can help clean a cast-iron skillet.
What is salt?
Coarse salt is often used to scrub cast-iron skillets because it helps remove stuck-on food without harsh chemicals.
St. Patrick was born here.
What is (Roman) Britain?
Though he is the patron saint of Ireland, Saint Patrick was born in Roman Britain, in what is now Scotland, around the year 385.
Car dashboards made of this material have all but disappeared from modern vehicles.
What is wood?
Like most things, wooden dashboards have been replaced with plastic. Real wood dashboards were once a sign of luxury in many cars, especially in the mid-20th century.
This lake area is a celebrity magnet, with George Clooney owning a vacation home there, and it has about 100 miles (160 kilometres) of coastline.
What is Lake Como?
The Romans built the first villas (what we call mansions) on the lake. You can travel between the lakeside cities by ferry to see the splendid architecture.
A gusset is either a diamond-shaped piece of fabric or this shape of fabric.
What is a triangle?
A gusset is a small piece of fabric added to a garment to provide extra room, strength, or flexibility. Gussets are commonly found in areas that need more movement.