Mary Jane opened the box as it lay on her lap and the inside was even more interesting looking, she found, than the outside had been. The box was divided into three parts by tiny little partitions. In the biggest part was a pile of cards with funny marks and holes that looked as though they were meant to make a picture; and in the middle sized part was a pile of gay colored skeins of thread; and in the littlest part was a paper of needles with nice big eyes.
"Oh, mother!" exclaimed Mary Jane. That was all she could say, she was so surprised and pleased.
"I thought you'd like that," said her mother. "Now, while I get out my sewing, you look over the pictures and see which one you'd rather make first. Then pick out the color thread you want to sew with and I'll show you how to cut the skein and thread your needle."
Mary Jane looked once through the pile of cards and then again before she could make a choice. She finally laid out one that had a picture of a little girl in a big sunbonnet and another of a sunflower growing in a garden. "There, now!" she asked her mother, "which shall I make? I want to do both right away quick and see what they look like when they are sewed."
"Let's make the little girl first," suggested mother, "and make her wear a pink sunbonnet just like yours. Then you can make the sunflower next and the two together will be Mary Jane working in a garden."
That suited Mary Jane exactly; so the thread was cut, the needle threaded (and that wasn't nearly as hard work as Mary Jane had feared it would be, thanks to the needle's big eye) and she set to work.
Such a busy morning as they did have—Mary Jane and her mother! Mary Jane liked sewing even better than she had thought she would and she worked faithfully. So faithfully that by the time the clock said, "time to get lunch"! the little girl with the pink sunbonnet was all finished and the thread was ready to begin the sunflower.
"Ugh!" exclaimed Mary Jane with a big stretch, "we worked hard, didn't we, mother?"
"Indeed we did," laughed Mrs. Merrill, "and now we'd better hurry down and start lunch. I see Alice way down at the corner there and by the way the girls are all talking together—see them, Mary Jane" (and she pointed down the street where a parting between the trees allowed them to see a long way)—"I guess Alice has some plan to talk about. Luckily we'll be ready for her in a jiffy!" And together the sewing ladies hurried down to the kitchen.