Engleberts in Missouri [miz-er-ree]

This time it was Jon’s last meal.

If you wanted to be here but couldn’t, here you go…

More pictures here. Backstory here or here.

We had a birthday this week. Our middlish child turned 21 on Wednesday.

She’s completely legal and free to do whatever she wants. Free I say!

Completely independent in fact. Doesn’t need anyone or anything.

Well… except for the tuition money. But hey! She’d be crazy to turn that down!

Vicki and her boyfriend, Jaymes, stopped over on Wednesday night to get her birthday loot, have some birthday cake and share a drink with her father and I.

It’s been somewhat of a tradition to have a champagne toast with each of our kids as they turn 21.

I should never have let Vicki open the champagne bottle though! She (and the kitchen window) ended up wearing more than she drank.

She wasn’t a big fan of the champagne either. All those years of waiting to be legal and the taste - not so yummy to her.

Although the rest of us enjoyed the faces she made :-)

Happy Birthday Victoria - you’re all growed up!

More birthday pictures here.

Holy beejeesus this post is late!

We took a flying trip to Georgia over the 4th of July weekend. We went to Ft. Stewart where Eric is stationed to see the kids and hug a grandchild. That was the most important part of the weekend but we also got some bonus stuff tossed in as well.

First, we celebrated Independence Day with a Post full of soldiers.

I was happy to see that the community as well as a large number of corporate sponsors were really focused on showing their appreciation for the sacrifices that these soldiers and their families make all the time.

There was a huge carnival, burger/dog cookout, concert and fireworks - all free for soldiers and their families.

We had a great time - I particularly enjoyed the concert, which was 6 hours of non-stop music including a 2 hour Montgomery Gentry performance. Steph was really excited to see one the groups she idolized in her teen-hood: Boys II Men, although now they are known as Men II Old Men.

Saturday, we were honored to stand up as godparents for our grandson at his baptism.

Operation Iraqi Freedom is to blame for the bunchkin’s delayed baptism. Eric left for Iraq very soon after Alex was born and then was gone for nearly 15 months.

So, Alex is nearly 2 and too big for one of those cute baptism gowns. He was still handsome and adorable. And pretty patient with the whole thing - and just so you know, he didn’t cry when the water was poured over his head like babies usually do. Bonus!

We also spent some time at the Warrior’s Walk - Ft. Stewart’s Iraqi Freedom War Memorial. I had visited it before but unfortunately it has gotten much larger.

One of the memorials that we specifically looked for was Spc. Alex Rosa’s. Alex Rosa was the soldier (and friend) from Eric’s platoon who was killed in Iraq during Eric’s tour.

I remember the day the news was leaked that several soldiers in Eric’s unit had been injured and one had been killed. The waiting to hear the official news was horrible. I remember feeling so relieved that Eric was safe. Spc. Rosa’s family was not so lucky. He had a wife and a newborn daughter who was only a couple of months old. Very sad.

We also took the kids to Savannah for a celebration dinner. I wanted to go to Paula Deen’s restaurant, The Lady and Sons, but apparently it is so popular that you have to get in line at 9:30 AM (!) in order to get reservations for that evening.

We ended up going to a really tasty place. The Moon River Brewing Company is located in the old City Hotel Building, a historic building famous for it’s guests like James Audobon.

It is Savannah’s only brew pub and they make their own micro-brews right there. They offer a sampler that has a 4oz shot of each of the brews they are currently making. Steve and Eric each got the sampler - it came with 9 samples!

They liked almost all of them - there was one that was called Swamp Water something-or-other that neither of them liked. I give them cudos just for trying something with the name Swamp Water at a brewery in Georgia. Georgia has about 460 named swamps - who knows where that water came from!

One of the interesting things about the restaurant was it’s beer can collection. Steve and his brother had a pretty large beer can collection as kids. He remembers it fondly. Steve was pointing out all of the cans that had been in his collection (which was sold a number of years ago) and the brewery’s collection was a pretty close match to his. There was one can in particular that he wanted to check for a certain mark or dent or something just to see if it was his can but I wouldn’t let him climb up on the bar. I’m a spoil-sport like that sometimes.

It was a great trip. There’s a lot more of Savannah that I’d like to see. Maybe next summer we can vacation on Hilton Head and stay for awhile. More pictures on my Flickr site here and here.

My dad had more fluid drawn off his left lung today. He says he’s feeling better after all that fluid from yesterday and today was removed. Still in the ICU though. And still on oxygen.

My mother is exhausted. 10 days now and no end in sight. Today she asked if I could come down. So, I have a ticket and will be flying down Sunday morning.

My brother John called this afternoon to confirm my trip details. He’ll be picking me up at the airport on Sunday. He had some wonderful news to share. He and Crystal have been trying to get preggo (iloverabbits iloverabbits) ever since they got married. It’s been a difficult and disappointing year and a half for them but now they are expecting a baby! It’s early days yet so I don’t know the exact due date but I should have a new niece or nephew in November.

I’m having trouble writing about anything except my dad. It’s not like there aren’t good things going on around here. Still, the only thing I can think about lately is my dad.

How is he this morning? Any improvement this afternoon? I obsessively wait for my mom’s phone call and when she doesn’t call as soon as I’d like I call the ICU desk to get an update on his condition. I’m constantly thinking about whether I should be flying down there right. this. minute.

I really don’t want to see my dad in the hospital. I’m sure he’s quite a sight right now. I try not to imagine all of the bandages on his head, tubes in his chest, machines and wires and gizmos attached to him. I want to see him and reassure myself that all this medical drama is not so bad but I’d rather fly down there when he gets home and is feeling better so we can talk and laugh and do stupid computer stuff.

I spend a lot of time on the internet looking up his symptoms and procedures. Then worrying about them obsessively and calling my sister Wanda who is doing the same thing. We share our internet finds and then discuss in detail exactly what they might mean. Today is Day 9 in the ICU and there are still problems. This morning the doctors removed 760 cc of fluid from his right lung. I googled all kinds of combinations of words regarding fluid and lungs, trying to figure out exactly how bad that is. Now I’m trying to convince myself that he doesn’t have congestive heart failure. Even though I know his heart is damaged from the 2 heart attacks.

It also doesn’t help that the last 2 episodes of House (my favorite show) have featured problems my dad has experienced. On Sunday night, the gal had a collapsed lung and nearly died. Last night, the girl’s blood oxygen levels dropped to 85 and everyone went into a controlled panic as she struggled to breathe. 85 - meh. That’s nothing. My dad’s dropped to 73 just the other day.

My mom has stopped telling me that he’s doing really good - I’m not sure if that’s in response to me or whether it’s because she’s realized that he’s really not doing good. Today my dad sent me a message to stop obsessing and to “get off the flipping internet!”

So in an effort to not write about my dad today, I scoured my brain for happy news. And realized that I never even mentioned Violet’s birthday the other day and didn’t share any of her pictures. So…Violet’s 10. Here’s her pictures. (how’s that for happy and chipper ?)