My Real Daddy

          Over the past several days, Audrey has again started asking when her Daddy is coming back.  Now that the newness of being at Gram and Pa's house has worn off, I think she thinks it is time for us to go back to South Carolina so that Daddy will come home.  In order to give her a visual idea of how much longer Daddy is gone, I made a construction paper chain, with one link representing each day left of the deployment (I over estimated and will adjust as I need to when the end of the deployment gets closer).  We hung it in her room around the ceiling ("It looks like a party in my room, Mommy!!") and take off one link each night before bed.  Cute little Audrey asks to take a link down in the morning and at nap time, too, because she wants the chain to get smaller as fast as possible!
          As I tucked Audrey in to bed tonight, she asked, "Mommy, when is Daddy coming home?"
          "He'll be home when we get to the end of your Daddy chain and have pulled down all the links," I replied.
          She got this cute, excited look on her face and asked, "When we get to the black link, my REAL Daddy will be home?"
          "Yes," I said.
          "My real Daddy?  Not my pretend Daddy?"  Audrey asks again.
          "Yes, your Daddy.  Not your daddy doll or daddy story CD."
          Audrey cried, "YEAH!! Then I won't have to miss my Daddy anymore!"
          And as I left her room, I remembered that when I was leaving her room last night, she told me she was pretending Daddy was in the room with her.  So, I think she's been imagining that Daddy is right there with her at bed time.  It's just so sweet and tender.  She loves her Daddy so much.  And who can blame her?