I looked at him and nodded. “Good idea. Let’s never leave.”

He gave me a kiss then he gently swatted my bottom. “Nope. We’re going shopping. And then we’re gonna have some fun.”

I didn’t know if he was talking about the naked kind of fun that I already loved so much or the kind of fun that involved toys and paints, but I was up for anything.

Every minute I spent with Daddy was the best.

I couldn’t remember ever being inside a craft store in my life. It was basically a toy store for crafty people and I’d never considered myself as particularly crafty or artistic.

Apparently, Daddy thought I was because he took me straight to the paint aisles and let me pick packs of oil paints, watercolors, and fingerpaints. I thought he was just kidding when he said he wanted me to try everything, but then we went down a crayon aisle and got pastels, crayons, coloring books, sketchbooks, and a few other projects I wasn’t even sure about.

Then we went to the grocery store, and he bought ingredients to make lunch and dinner and hopefully some dessert. He gave me an ice cream cone when we walked in so I was too distracted to pay attention to the shopping part. I was determined not to lose a drop of my ice cream, so I had to focus.

For someone just out of college, Daddy was a great cook. He took some culinary classes as high school electives and continued to hone that skill even while living in student apartments. I was beginning to understand why he was so popular in college…not that there was ever any question in my mind.

Between his good looks, kind heart, and brilliant mind, he was the perfect package. Throw in his ability to produce milk and his Daddy tendencies and I couldn’t imagine a more perfect man.

So I told him all that.

He laughed as he held out his hand to take my key so he could unlock the front door. “I’m far from perfect, baby. I definitely make mistakes. We all do.” He pushed open the door and waved me inside before carrying all our bags in behind me.

“I believe that you do make mistakes sometimes, but I also believe you’re perfect. I don’t think anyone could be better than you.”

He put everything down on the table then came to me and gripped both sides of my head with his hands. Daddy tilted my head up to look at him. “I don’t think there could be anybody more perfect than you either.”

“You don’t?” My eyes started to water, which didn’t make any sense. I wasn’t a crier until Daddy came along and seemed to pull these long repressed emotions out of me.

“Nope.” He leaned forward and kissed me, a series of soft little nips and brushes of his tongue before pulling back. “If I could choose anyone in this world to spend my life with, I think I’d choose you.”

My lower lip started to quiver, and one tear dripped down my cheek. “I think I’d choose you too.”

He kissed the tear and licked up my face to make sure no others would escape and then turned back to the bag of goodies. “What do you want to start with?”

Everything looked like fun, and I didn’t know where to start, so I just shrugged.

“Okay, I’ll pick for you. Why don’t you sit on the floor in front of your coffee table so you have lots of room to spread out.”

“Okay.” I let him guide me to the living room and sat where he pointed and then waited for him to tell me what to do next. There was something liberating about just giving up control of all the petty things in life and enjoying the moment fully.

A few minutes later, I had a coloring book and a sketchpad in front of me, with pastels, crayons, and colored pencils scattered on the table. I reached for the coloring book and pencils first and began to carefully outline the shape of a horse running through a field. My movements were slow and precise as I was careful to stay in the lines. But after a while, my movements got faster, jerky. I wasn’t in the lines at all, and it felt really good.

It was nice to play without fear of doing things the wrong way. I’d never been allowed to make a mess or take chances that might end up in failure.

The concept was completely foreign and completely freeing.

“Daddy!” I put down the crayons and waited for him to come out of the kitchen.

“Yes, baby.” He poked his head around the corner.

“I want fingerpaints.”

“You do?” He came and looked at my horse picture. “Nice. Let’s see how painting goes.” He pulled out the containers of fingerpaints and removed several pieces of paper from the sketchpad to make a placemat for me before centering one pieceof paper as my canvas. “Make Daddy a pretty picture while I finish our sandwiches.”

“Okay.” I tentatively placed one finger in the pot of blue paint and inspected it. It felt gooey which made me laugh, and then I put another finger in the red paint. This was fun! I continued to dip my fingers until all five on my right hand were coated in paint.

Then I went to work.

The resulting masterpiece was a brownish mess that didn’t resemble anything good, but Daddy smiled and called itabstract.