Sorry!

i feel i've been shirking my duties as a blogger by not posting in 2 months, so i'm sorry for being neglectful and will try to make sure it doesn't happen again.

not much going on since my last post, just thanksgiving, st. nick, a day trip with the boys to ny, a special visit to our house by santa riding in a firetruck, christmas, both kids getting sick christmas, the giants getting beat in the playoffs, the steelers making it to the super bowl, a new president taking up residency in the white house, a christening, and our household becoming a part of a much larger family - the wii family.

on a monday at the beginning of december, kim, charlie, joey, my mom, and i went into nyc to the museum of natural history and rockefeller center. it was a bitter cold day, but we were unfazed. we took a 5 minute ferry ride to the city, and then jumped on a shuttle bus which dropped us off about 25 blocks from the museum. after our nice, brisk walk, we arrived at the museum and the large dinosaur that greets you in the lobby. charlie loved the museum. we got to see dinosaurs, all kinds of wild animals. we walked through a live butterfly exhibit, and a live reptile exhibit that included lots of snakes and lizards. it was a great experience and even more fascinating to watch charlie soak everything in. once we were done at the museum, we walked another 30 blocks or so to rockefeller center and went to the "top of the rock." it was beautiful up there. there were incredible views of the entire city, made even better by the fact that we were up there at sunset. we then went back down to street level and got a close up view of the beautiful christmas tree, lit up in all its glory. after we took a shuttle bus back to the ferry terminal and rode the ferry back to the jersey side, we got to our car and quickly warmed up inside. as we were driving home, we asked charlie what was his favorite part of today's adventure - the museum with all the dinosaurs, animals, snakes, lizards, and butterflies, or the top of the rock and the big christmas tree? his answer: "i liked the ferry ride and bus ride the best."
unfortunately, the night before our adventure, i took the battery out of the camera to charge it up, but forgot to put it back in before we left in the morning, so we only had our flip video to use for pictures and movies. with the software that comes with the flip, you are able to snap pictures from the movies that were taken. they are not the highest quality pics, but something is better than nothing.






christmas for us this year was a tough one. we woke up christmas morning and found that santa did visit us the night before, but it quickly became apparent that it wasn't going to be like it was in years past - charlie was sick with a fever. he didn't attack opening the presents with as much fervor as in previous christmases, and really only wanted to lay down on the couch, hoping to feel better. joey was unfazed about the whole thing. he just sat in his chair, taking everything in. little did we know that he was coming down with bronchilitis, which we found out the next day.



this past weekend was joey's christening. john, nina, mickey, and alan came out from pa to join in the festivities, as well as our good friends from new hampshire, jessica and larry mcgondel. jess and larry, along with my brother scott and his wife danielle, are joey's godparents. with my family and kim's family at the church, we made up about half of the congregation. after the ceremony at the church, the party continued at the langosta lounge, an eclectic restaurant on the boardwalk in asbury park. it was the perfect setting. with the bloody marys and mimosas flowing, and the food being exceptionally good, everyone had a great time. and to end the day on a high note for all the folks that traveled out to nj from western pa, the steelers won the afc championship game and are headed to the super bowl. i'd like to think that joey becoming a member of god's family that day was in some way connected to the steelers victory. ;)

also this week, we started giving rice cereal to joey this week, and he loves it. our pediatrician told us back in november we could start giving it to him, but with christmas and all the things we've had planned, we wanted to wait until things slowed down a little before we changed his routine. it appears that he's making up for lost time - he has devoured his cereal the past couple days and now thinks he's ready to upgrade to pulled pork, ribs, and chipped ham (which might be hard since he doesn't have any teeth yet.)

and finally, we got a wii and wii fit this weekend. holy cow is it fun. i got it set up yesterday afternoon and "tested" it with a couple games of bowling, but last night was the official wii welcome into the household. charlie, kim, my mother, and i played it for a while after dinner and had an awesome time. charlie bowled a game first, and did pretty well (i think his final score was 87, which is fantastic considering i thought it was going to be difficult for him to understand how to do it.) after his bowling game, he wanted to do something different, so we chose to do boxing. everyone got into the act - my mom, kim, and even charlie. it was so much fun. i can't wait to fire it up again tonight. and we can't wait to unlock all the different games for the wii fit.

many of the pictures of all of the escapades you read about on this blog can now be found at the following website:
www.picasaweb.google.com/douglasraynor

Enjoy!