Well, I suppose it is high time to write my next entry. I never intended to take a two month lapse in writing, but then again, when does anyone plan to leave their blog unmanned for that length of time? Holidays, children and work all combined over the new year to make for a rather hectic time. I’ll address each of these throughout this post, so if it gets to be a rather lengthy read, I apologize in advance.

Where do I begin? I suppose that the children topic should come first, since that is from where the bulk of the time deficiency stems. As of late November, my wife was great with child, and we were anticipating the arrival of our third little cherub. Over the course of the next two weeks, things progressed, and eventually (on December 14, to be exact), we welcomed our little Rachel into the world. Now, as any parent can tell you, life is never the same after a birth. I will attest that the third has been easier thus far than the previous two, but difficult nonetheless. The adjustment to having an infant in the house once again has been a challenge, but things have been flowing smoothly and, save for last night, I have actually been able to get a full night’s sleep each night. One huge break I had was the flexibility shown by my office in letting me work from home for the two

Now, for the holidays: as holidays go, it was wonderful. Where the challenge came in was the series of company we had over the course of the break. First, my mother in law came to spend a week or so with us preparing for the birth. this was a huge help since I was able to still concentrate on work and know that my wife had the much needed assistance at home dealing with the other children. Then, on the 14th, my father in law was able to fly in and surprise the older two with a visit. He was only planning on staying for two days, so it worked out perfectly with the birth for him to see the baby as well. My in laws left on Tuesday, and we had three days respite before my parents came. They were able to be with us just over a week as well, so we had a wonderful visit for our first Christmas together in several years. After our visit, we had yet another short break – three days in this case – before my brother in law and his family arrived. We had a great visit with them as well, and when they left, it was after the new year already!

Concerning work, though, we get into a fun topic. Work in this setting may be more appropriately defined as self inflicted voluntary labor, but either way, it involves some very interesting and entertaining projects I have had the opportunity of taking on in the last couple months. Perhaps the greatest challenge I have faced since starting web development has been that my professional jobs have primarily entailed work on internal applications, and therefore, my portfolio is quite slim, even though I have done extensive development over the years. So, to counteract that, I have begun taking on a few projects that are not only entertaining to me due to the content and people I work with but also because they are challenging in scope.

First off, I have had the privilege of helping a competitive gaming group (The Ultimate Gamers) to redefine their web presense. This is an ongoing project, but their new website has given me an opportunity to express myself creatively and give them a product that, at least in my opinion, is quite a step up from their old one. The flash banner and slider are both rehashed projects that I had begun several months back and had never completed due to lack of need. With this, though, I felt compelled to finish them and see what I could come up with. They both load the images via an XML document in order to aid with ease of use. The nice thing about this is that it allows me to develop an administration panel where the user can upload and manage their own banners and images via a web interface.

The other project worth noting is one about which I am extremely excited. Through my work with The Ultimate Gamers, I have met another developer and we have been passing information and ideas back and forth for weeks now. Between the two of us, we have devised a gameplan to attack a very interesting domain he purchased some time ago and begin work on Games In Beta. Our goal is simple: this site will become the single most comprehensive resource online for game beta information and registration links. I don’t want to post too many details as of yet due to constant changes and copyright issues, but suffice to say that between our joint contacts and interest of outside parties, I believe this goal is not only obtainable but very realistic.

One other note is on a more personal level. I am not the type of person to buy up domain names; however, I discovered a domain a few weeks ago that I was absolutely astounded that it was not registered. After thinking it over for about a day and a half, I pounced on the domain http://www.whatgamerswant.com. The beauty of this domain is that it is not restrictive to electronic or video gaming, although this is the primary assumption I’m sure the average user will make. It will most likely be quite some time before I can get to work on this site, but my goal is to incorporate board gaming and miniatures as well. This will not only expand my base of clientele, but it will also afford me the flexibility to improve upon the lack of professionalism in specific gaming markets.

So, there you have it. You are now caught up to date with my development life. I will attempt to be more faithful this year at keeping up with my postings. I would like to post an entry at least once per week, but I may be shooting a bit high in my aspirations. Only time will tell. Until next time, happy coding!