Viva Las Vegas

Long time no update.  Been a busy few weeks... took a trip down to Orlando for work, managed to go see a TNA show and check out Universal Studios one evening thanks to my friend Vince.  Was a blast.  Would really like to go back sometime with Mel and check out the Harry Potter ride there.  Checked out the area, but didn't have enough time to actually ride the rides.  They did an amazing job, though.  For fans of the books/movie, I suggest checking it out.

Also, turned 30 last weekend... Mel and I celebrated in Las Vegas with my friend Josh and his girlfriend Lindsey.  Was a very good time.  I think I've gotten my fill of Vegas, however... imagine it'll be a good while before I go back.  This was my 5th trip ever, and maybe I'm outgrowing it. :)  I think I'm stuck in that weird period when I'm too old to party there and too young to have enough money to spend. :)  Josh had an amazingly lucky unlucky time there, breaking his luggage, losing his wallet, going swimming with his new iPhone 4, and losing his car keys.  However, the Las Vegas airport found his keys, the New York, New York security found his wallet (and cash!), and Apple replaced his iPhone.  Sounds like he needed to gamble and lose like $1,000, he probably would've turned around and won $5,000.

Otherwise, with help from Mel's mom, Katie is finally on the road to being potty trained!  She's only wearing a diaper at night, and to be safe while we are out and about, but at home, she's completely diaper-less during the day.  She's letting us know when she needs to go potty, and she's pretty much handling it all by herself.  Awesome!

Not much else new!

long time, no update...

Been awhile since I've posted an update... a lot to catch up on.  First off, Mel, me, both kids, and Mel's mom took a trip up to Iowa at the end of June, rented a van and drove the whole way... we decided to drive through the night so the kids would sleep a good bit of the way and make the drive a bit more tolerable. :)  About 5 hours into the trip, the low-pressure sensor on the van went off, and we stopped at the next service station and filled up the tires.  I checked for leaks/nail/etc and didn't see anything, so we continued on our way.  About 10 minutes down the road, the sensor fired off again, and we stopped in the lovely little town of Marion, Illinois.  We'd dropped nearly 20psi since the last stop in one tire, so I got under the car and found a screw on the inside just inches from the tire wall.  We decided to just call it a night, as it was 2am at this point, and stayed at a hotel in Marion.  Luckily we were able to get the kids back down with minimal issues.  Woke up the next morning and threw the doughnut on and drove to the local Wal-Mart who was able to plug/patch it.  Exciting stuff. :)

The actual trip in Iowa was great... got to see nearly all of Mel's family at the reunion (the main reason for going), but also got to see my friends Josh and Scott, hang out with my sister/niece/nephew and mom/step dad and, of course, make stops at Pizza Ranch, Taco Tico, Taco John's, Baker's Square, and Fazoli's... all places we don't have down here in Atlanta. :)  Great trip overall!  Unfortunately we didn't take many non-iPhone pics, but Mel's mom got quite a few, my sister got a bunch, and I'll be sure to upload what we do have to Flickr.

Both kids are doing great, Josh is really starting to begin communicating, saying 'ba-ba' when he's hungry, carrying around his little blanket when he's tired, even doing the 'more' and 'all done' (sort of) sign language motions when eating, etc.  This weekend we finally decided it was time for Katie to give up her pacies, so we told her the 'pacie fairy' was coming Sunday night to take all of her pacies away to little girls who need them, and would leave her a great present in return.  So we took her to Toys R' Us and had her look around and find what toy she REALLY wanted, and she picked out a really good Thomas the Train wooden train set.  So last night, we got her to put all of her pacies in a bucket, and, after a bit of a fight getting her to bed, she finally crashed.  When she woke up, she looked in the bucket, and all the pacies were gone, but in the kitchen she found her new present... 

So far, she's done really well, and is really happy with the train set.  We'll see how nap and bedtime goes. :)  I'll keep everyone posted.

Not much else new... upgraded Mel and I to the new iPhone 4, fantastic, and can't recommend doing it enough.  Managed to sell our old iPhone 3GS's for a $200 profit on top of the new phone costs... love it. :)

Everything else is good! 

Updates...

A few things have happened since my last post.  We got to go to Boston and NYC, and had a total blast.  Really spent some time looking around Boston, (Mel especially).  We got to walk around Harvard, eat on Newbury Street, check out Copley Square, and yes, go to PAX for 5 hours or so. :)  Was a great 2 days... if I was going to move up north, Boston would be my first choice.  Great area.  Great public transportation, easy to get around, etc.  

On Saturday we took a bus to NYC, and got to spend Saturday - Tuesday morning there.  Since we'd done most of the 'touristy' stuff on our 2005 trip, we mostly got to see some of the more 'local' stuff this time.  (Got to tour Google with my friend John, Rockstar Games with my friend Ramon, eat some great local places, etc).  Of course we still went to Times Square, 5th Avenue (Apple Store and FAO Schwartz of course), Central Park, etc.  Managed to also get a picture in front of the townhouse used as Pierce Brosnan's home in my favorite movie "The Thomas Crown Affair". :)   It was really a blast, but by the end of the trip we were both going through some serious children withdrawls. :P

And of course, I did pick up an iPad when they went on sale 2 weeks ago.  While it's far from a regular computer, and will never replace the computer for 'work' or high level stuff, It's pretty much the best way to browse the web that exists.  It also has replaced my Kindle as my eBook reader... ended up selling that on eBay to pay for about 1/2 the cost of the iPad, so that worked nicely.

In other news, I managed to get all the old comments imported from Squarespace, which is great news, as a lot of them were from friends and family about the kid's births, etc.

Not much else is new!  Hope everyone is well!

boston/nyc...

Well, Mel and I are leaving to go to Boston and then New York City tomorrow afternoon.  Mel's mom and grandma are down here house-sitting and watching the kids for us.  First, we are flying into Boston and meeting my friend Ramon for a day at PAX East, which is basically a video game conference.  We'll take a bus Saturday afternoon into NYC, and stay there at Ramon's place until Tuesday.  Got all the 'touristy' stuff planned... should be a blast. :)  I've updated the little 'where i'm at' widget here to be more accurate for this trip, so it'll show pretty accurately where we are, rather than just a city-level... should be kinda neat to see it as we move around.

Anyways, this will be hands-down the longest we've been away from the kids, so it'll be interesting to see how we handle it.  At least we know they are in good hands, but I think it's going to be really tough for both of us, but at least we'll get a little break.

I'll be sure to post some pics on Flickr and Facebook while we are there, and plenty when we get back!