A Pirate and Thomas, the Blue Kangaroo

So, Travis came home yesterday from TX where he was presenting his thesis defense. Yep, he can now officially sign his name with the letters PhD afterwards. (And, no, for anyone out there wondering, I will NOT be calling him "Doctor" anytime soon, even though that's the title for those with PhD's. Gotta keep him on the same level as the rest of us humans.) But, that's enough talk of Trav's trifling accomplishments. :) After all, this blog is about Brianna....

And, she did miss him over the 3 and 1/2 days he was gone. She asked for him several times and kept saying "Daddy's at work. Daddy's in Texas. I wanna go to Texas with Daddy!" She missed him most though when she got into trouble with me. She would start wailing "I want my Daddy!" (Since I'm just mean old Mommy!) Of course, when we picked him up at the airport it was a different story. Oh, she was pretty glad to see him. She looked over and said "Daddy! Hey it's my daddy!" Trav gave her a hug and said, "Hi! Did you miss me?" And Bree told him "Nope!" (Although a few minutes later she did say, "I missed you Daddy!" so...) But she spent quite a while looking all around to see who else had come. See, usually when we go to the airport we are picking up a relative we don't see very often and much present-giving and fun ensue. So she was a little confused that it was just plain old Daddy we were picking up. Finally, she looked around and asked, "Daddy, where's Thomas?"

(For those of you who might not know, Thomas is one of Trav's really good friends in TX. While her daddy was gone Bree and I had talked about him being in Texas to work and to see his friend, Thomas. I guess she had decided she really wanted to meet this friend of Daddy's and had gotten the idea he would be coming to our place. She was really quite taken with the idea of Daddy's friend Thomas. Actually, she has met him once but she was too little to remember it so I'm not quite sure why it is exactly she's so enthusiastic about him, although he is a great guy.)

Anyways, so Travis had to explain to Bree that Thomas wasn't coming to visit right now. But, her daddy told her, Thomas and Meg had sent Brianna a present that was in his suitcase and she could have it when we got home. We all piled into the car and Bree waited excitedly to get home and see what she'd get. Finally, we got inside and she ran over to her daddy and said, "Daddy, open your suitcase! Those are the choices!" At long last the suitcase was opened to reveal...a big blue kangaroo! Brianna was so excited. She grabbed ahold of the kangaroo and was saying "boing, boing" and making him jump around the room. It was only a few minutes later that the she started calling the kangaroo Thomas. And so, we now own a blue kangaroo named Thomas, after Daddy's friend whom Bree apparently adores sight unseen.

Of course, being the thougtful Daddy he is Travis had also bought her a little present of his own...a little pirate dress-up kit. Brianna is really big into the dressing up these days. So, needless to say this was a huge success. Soon she was wearing a skull and crossbones bandana and an eye-patch and reading the book about pirates that came with it. The rest the evening we had one tiny pirate running around causing mischief hand in hand with a blue kangaroo. Isn't life interesting? I mean, really, who would have guessed that I would have spent last night with a pirate and a blue kangaroo name Thomas?? Not me that's for sure...