HELPFUL HINTS

Thursday, December 19, 2013

DEAR HELOISE: I have a hint to add regarding preventing TVs from toppling on children. This same danger applies to aquariums. Never let small children near an aquarium without close-by adult supervision. Unfortunately, my small niece ran excitedly to my aquarium, grabbed the top edge and pulled it over onto herself. Broken glass, water and fish went everywhere! Thankfully, she was uninjured, other than being terribly frightened.

DEAR HELOISE: Do you have a recipe for a low-calorie salad dressing?

DEAR READER: It is simple to make. Here is what you need:

1 cup low-fat cottage cheese

1/4 cup skim or low-fat milk

1 teaspoon wine or apple-cider vinegar

Herbs and salt and pepper to taste

Mix the ingredients in a blender for one minute or so and you’ll have an easy, made at-home, low-calorie dressing for all your salads. To make a tangy cucumber snack, soak cucumbers in apple-cider vinegar and water 10-15 minutes.

DEAR HELOISE: My family and I have a large get-together during the holidays where we exchange presents. With so many people, and the gift wrap flying, the presents often get mixed up in the process. I have found it helpful to write on the present who it is for and who it is from. I write it somewhere small and out of the way, like the bottom. This helps get the presents to the right person at the end of the night.

DEAR HELOISE: I have two dogs that I take for a walk every night. To help us be more visible to traffic, I purchased red blinking lights at a pet store for about $5 each. The other day, I found children’s blinking necklaces. I bought a couple and found that they work just as well as the more expensive ones from the pet store.

DEAR HELOISE: I repainted my outdoor chairs, and I was thinking of things to put under them so I wouldn’t leave a mess. My husband suggested that I use the plastic shower-curtain liner. We needed a new liner anyway, but saved the old one for painting in the future.

Send a money- or time-saving hint to Heloise, P.O. Box 795000, San Antonio, Texas 78279-5000; fax to (210) 435-6473; or email [email protected]

Weekend, Pages 37 on 12/19/2013