"Can you find four extra hours in your day?" a voice came over the speaker on my office phone, first telemarketer call of the day. I chuckled and answered, "Not this week."

"But Mom, you aren't VERY busy." My daughter adlibs as I turn back to the project at hand. A business plan due the next day, and I'm just at that moment formating the design and working on the font choices for the final print out. I click on the last button and look at the final layout, her comment is favorable, and I accept the selections. "I'm making dinner." She turns away from the computer and walks to the kitchen, pulling pasta and sauce from the shelf, and chicken planks from the fridge. The salad I made earlier will serve well as a vegetable, and desert is the yogurt pops we bought at the grocery. Life is working well, for the moment. I finish up my project, and go help finish dinner.

"Mom, what would you do with four extra hours a day?" She asks as we sit down to dinner.

"I think I'd spend some of it just sitting on the porch with you and the boys. It would be a nice change to just sit and watch the world go by." I answered considering the options. "What would you do with four extra hours in your day?" I asked her, as she sprinkled cheese on the pasta.

"I think I'd learn something new." She answered, thoughtfully. "Just spend the time doing something new, like putting some new project together."

"What kind of project?" I asked watching her sort through the meal she was eating on her plate.

"I think I'd learn to crochet or something like that." She answered.

I thought about it for a bit, and decided it was time to teach her that new something. We finished dinner and I asked if she wanted to go to the store. We picked out rich blues and purples and some pale aqua greens and a pattern with variations of stars on a mellow striped background. It was going to be an afghan to remember. I picked pastels in the same color tones, and selected needles to work with. There were some nice large baskets in the aisle, and I chose two of them, one for her project and one for mine.

We grabbed some bottles of soda for drinking later, a few boxes of flavored teas, some cream, and a selection of delicate cookies for eating when we took a break later and left the store to start our craft projects. An adventure that was bound to make memories was about to start, and we were both excited about starting it.

Once at home, we turned on a movie and settled on opposite ends of the couch start our projects. She already knew the basics, so I wouldn't need to teach her much for the first several rows. We chattered about the movie, listened to the songs playing in the bacground, discussed each stitch as we came to it, and hummed along our own pleasant tunes during any lulls in the noise level. I watched the world go by, while I enjoyed the company of my daughter. Several hours later, long after we should have been in bed, we stopped stitching and prepared our tea with cream and delicate cookies. The night was more than pleasant, and we had an adventure I hope to have again.

Copyright (c) 2005 - Jan Verhoeff - Printed in the USA

Jan Verhoeff's perpetual desire to learn originally focused her writing in the Business Industries, where she writes motivational and marketing articles for a variety of publications. Her first book publication, self-published in 1991, sold more than a thousand copies in a local business market. Later publications include: