Gaming With Baby: Moving Day

No April Fools Day nonsense here. I can safely guess today I'll be unpacking, cleaning up the yard, and/or working on fixing some problem around the home. Mainly because I'll have moved into my first house last Saturday.

Home Buying: the Experience

In the last couple months my wife and I have gone from getting pre-approved for a loan (scarily easy) to house hunting (window shopping fun followed by "race the other buyers" stress) to negotiating a price for a house (frustration solved via psychological tactics). In the end we got a building closer to our vision of our dream house than I think either us thought possible at this point in our lives.

Our Victorian style home is nicely nestled in downtown Sacramento, close to plenty of restaurants, shops, markets, and city based excitement. With just enough room for our current family, it should serve us well for the next several years (though we may need some expansion once Baby 2.0 (now with laser eyes!*) comes around).

* Laser eyes not included.

Geeky Plans

The next step of course is all of the home improvements and projects to make this house not just a home but ours. My wife and I have begun putting together a Pinterest board of ideas. I just want to spotlight a couple of specific projects out of this.

The first of these is the ultimate gaming table. I've seen a lot of these on the web and if I was more handy, I might try to make one myself. As it is, my wife has been giving me Geek Chic gift certificates for the past 3 years. At this point I'm obligated to get something if only not to lose money. I'm not sure exactly which table I want but something we can use for dining and keeping games laid out (and out of reach!) between sessions would be ideal.

I've got a lot of knickknacks, curios, and other strange items. More than I have safe shelf space to show off. My thought is to build a few cabinets of curiosities or shadow boxes to hang up around the house. Something to show off my fossil collection or my assortment of occult themed objects and to complement my ever-expanding library. I may not be handy but I am crafty. I'm looking forward to this project.

Baby Update

In March, Sebastian finally stopped being sick. We had a nice week of happy healthy baby then he got sick again. Then he stopped sleeping for more than an hour at a time. Life sucked. We think he's having (or had) another growth spurt and it is (was) messing with his sleep schedule (again). Only time (and his 9 month doctor's appointment) will tell.

Otherwise he's beginning to become more clever and adventurous. He lunges for things, almost forcing himself to crawl (but not yet). He continues to love clear containers. His babbling is getting more diverse and I'm convinced he's learning to shake his head no (at least to solid food). No new milestones just incremental changes.

Gaming Update

A few new things here but on the whole gaming has been sparse due to life, lack of sleep, and other commitments.

The Online Game (The Climbers)

Still moving forward though we have a 6 week break due to the need to avoid another player's regular D&D game and our own commitments (like moving). I think we are doing better at getting Sebastian to bed. The problem is having him stay asleep.

Things got shook up last session with the Skinner turned Battlebabe getting into a gun fight with the Touchstone. The Touchstone lost badly and was left for dead. She survived but where she will go next is unclear. Meanwhile the Savvyhead is getting creepier and more central to the game while the Gunlugger's past slowly catches up to him. Also I'm having a lot of fun running stuff in people's dreams.

Games at Our House (board games and RPGs)

My game of Worlds in Peril went well overall though I think I failed to satisfy the reluctant player in the group. I hope she gives me a second chance. I know I can deliver a social heavy story given the right premise (right now I'm kicking around Trail of Cthulhu or Mage: the Awakening ideas).

We have just begun a Fate game run by another member of the group. It is set 17th century India as European merchants press into a supernaturally infused subcontinent. I'm a bit wary about playing a character in a time and place I know so little about and so have been doing a lot of research.

I think my main issue is pinning down some basic iconic stories and themes for the setting. I'm much more familiar with the media from East Asia than from India so my viewpoint is not skewed but missing entirely. I'm mostly afraid I'll lean on my knowledge of (admittedly sketchy) knowledge of Muslim civilization to bridge the gap. Thus I'm favoring playing an outsider (i.e. European). We'll see how that works out.