The Newest Addition to Our Family

We are happy to announce we have a new addition to our family. His name is Tom and he's our virtual cat!!

About a week ago was looking to add a couple of apps on my phone that Abigail could play with.  I remembered this one that I had seen on a friend's iPad.  So, I decided to look for it.  It started with Abigail just playing with it and now Abigail seems to think Tom is just another member of our family. The other morning she was laying on my bed with me playing and she turned on the Talking Tom app.  She started singing, because anything you say while the app is on Tom repeats in the same way that you said it.  So, she started singing Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star so that Tom would sing Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star to her.  Then she started asking Tom questions about his likes and dislikes.  Tom would in turn ask her the exact same question.  Then Abigail would answer and Tom would repeat the answer.  Abigail would respond something like, "Oh, yeah.  Hmmm.... really?" Then she would move onto the next question.  It was hilarious!! She even insisted that Tom needed to eat lunch with us and proceeded to try to feed Tom spaghetti.  The fun and games ended there.  I explained that Tom didn't need human food, because he's a cat and the way that he gets energy is by being plugged into the wall charger. (Which is pretty true.  Eventually Tom doesn't work any more if he's not charged up.) Abigail hasn't insisted on feeding Tom, but he is still an integral part of our family. "60 Minutes" about African Antelope on Texan ranches.  They were talking about how they are endangered and how Texan ranchers are breeding them and allowing hunting of them.  This woman was fighting to get them off ranchers' land so that they wouldn't be hunted, even though the total population of the species was increasing.  Anyhow, Abigail was watching with us and she would point to the antelope and say, "Mom can I take care of the animals?" She is obviously really interested in having an animal of her own to take care of. I wish that we could have a pet for Abigail, but as long as we live here that simply won't be an option.  Tom is the next best thing I suppose.