Looking Good

Mom's greatest feature is that she's always smiling when you walk into the room. But Mom outdid herself today, when I walked into the family room to see her upright in an easy chair, legs up on the ottoman, just kickin' it and reading a book. As relaxed as ever, with a large grin across her face. You look good, Mom. Love you. See you in the morning.

Time to make the donuts!

Mom certainly knows how to wake up. 7 am, papa jake's donuts (which for the record, are both the best and cheapest donuts in this world - get a bigger tip jar!). Cake donuts with sugar are her current favorite. Some quality chat time, surf on the iPad, earmark a couple recipes that we'll cook this weekend, shower, nap, then dinner and Idol. All in a days's work. Thank you again for all of the visits from friends and the inundation of so much delicious food - we have certainly needed it and enjoyed it as the cooking genes have yet to fully evolve in the Wuellner boys. There's literally only so much frosted mini wheats and Mac & Cheese in the pantry. Mom is soundly asleep on the couch next to me, so I think I'll turn in as well. sweet dreams, Mom, and to everyone else as well. Goodnight.

Home with Mom

Kathy, thank you so much. Very touching, and I look forward to praying with Mom every day. The reason I get to say this amazing sentence is that due to Deloitte's and my project team's virtual/flexible work environment, I will now be living and working from home in Sedalia for the next 6-8 weeks. Mom and I have already spent a great 24 hours together, she is as lucid as I've seen her in weeks - a credit to her, first of all, and to the second chemo treatment called Avastin that she began last Wednesday. She is walking more nimbly, awake more hours of the day, and doing just great. So incredibly happy to now get to see her smile everyday for a long period of time. We love you, Mom.

Nine Days

The following message was written by one of our wonderful friends in Sedalia. It boggles my mind to think of just how many people are praying for Mom ... though it can never be too many! We'll post an actual update in the next few days (all is well!) -- but in the meantime, please join in the Novena, and share with anyone ... and everyone.

Dear Friends,

This Sunday, at Sacred Heart Church, a nun from the "Little Sister of the Poor" Order spoke to our parish. Their organization was begun by Sister Jeanne Jugan in the 1800's and the order is devoted to serving the elderly. Jeanne Jugan was recently canized a saint in 2009. To be named a saint in the Catholic Church, miracles must be tied between the person who is up for sainthood and situations on earth. Sister Jugan's last miracle proven was the healing of a medical doctor in Omaha, Nebraska. He had an inoperable tumor and had traveled to leading cancer centers in the US but the message was clear nothing could be done for him. He had resigned himself to death but his wife refused to give up. She contacted the "Little Sister" Order in Omaha and they gave her a novena (prayer) to recite daily. They joined her in this prayer. The doctor was miraculously cured and Jeanne Jugan was on the road to sainthood. This order of nuns has promised to begin this novena for Shelley and I would like to ask you to do the same. With all of us saying the same prayer daily, we hope another miracle will occur.

NOVENA PRAYER: Jesus, You rejoiced and praised Your Father for having revealed to little ones the mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven. We thank You for the graces granted to Your humble servant, Jeanne Jugan, to whom we confide our petitions and needs. Father of the Poor, You have never refused the prayer of the lowly. We ask You, therefore, to hear the petitions that she presents to You on our behalf. Jesus, through Mary, your Mother and ours, we ask this of You, who live and reign with the Father and the Holy Spirit now and forever. Amen.

For those of you who aren't Catholics, in our faith, we not only pray to God but also to those special people he chose to be examples on earth. Just like we ask friends to pray for each other; Catholics ask Saints to share in our prayer requests to God. Shelley is praying this novena with us and I hope you will join in too. Many thanks, Kathy Beykirch

March Madness

It was a long weekend for all of us, but for all the right reasons. Sad to say, all of our teams, AND I MEAN ALL OF OUR TEAMS, lost in the NCAA tourney this weekend. First Vandy (Dad), next Nova (Luke), quickly thereafter Xavier (Mark, Maggie), and then tonight, Notre Dame (Dad, Abigail, Adam, Carrie). Makes me convinced that if St. Catherine (Mom) were in the tourney, they would definitely have moved on to the Sweet 16.

Yet, this weekend was still as fun as ever. On Friday night, Abigail and Aunt Kate drove into town, while Carrie and I took a train, bus, and train. Needless to say, lots of good food and lots of "good" basketball was had. Mom is looking great, always greeting us with a smile in the morning and some good commentary during the day. Most notably, in response to a conversation about Ben Hansbrough (ND) and Kemba Walker (UConn) between Dad and me - Mom steps in, "Oh, Kemba, yeah, if I had a dog in this fight, he would be it". Right again, Mom. Ben is on a bus back to South Bend, but Kemba will still be fighting for you next weekend.

But before that, we have a big week ahead of us. First, Luke flies in on Tuesday to hang with Mom for over a week. And then, Wednesday marks the most important day of this month to date. Mom will be heading to Sedalia Bothwell to receive a second type of chemo medicine that she can receive concurrently with the pill she is already taking. "If 1 is good, 2 is better." So please keep her in your prayers extra hard as we look forward to the mid-week and beyond.

And with that, it's time to head to bed as I'm sure Mom is already off and dreaming. Love you so much. Excited to see you in about a week. Goodnight.

Waiting out the storm

Another fun weekend with Mom, Abigail, and Dad. Abigail and I drove home late Friday night, narrowly avoiding some random hail storms amid Tornado warnings. Don't worry, Mom taught us well, we pulled over and hung out at a Bread Co. and waited it out.

Mom looks great, all smiles as we walked in the door, before we went to bed, and as soon as we all woke up. She is in great spirits. We spent most of the day hanging out in the family room, occasionally (often) hitting the kitchen and eating the many pounds of food provided by our many thoughtful and loving friends. Thanks again. And of course, when we're not eating food, we're watching food. Food Network during the day, and then when Mom asked for a list of relatively new movies from which to choose for our evening movie night, she obviously perked up at Eat, Pray, Love. She also didn't mind the idea of a "Chocolate Pizza" that we bought ingredients for and baked up. Pizza Dough, Chocolate, Peanut Butter, Nutella, Marshmallows, and more Chocolate. So, we ate and watched.

Sunday. Abigail and Dad roasted some pork shoulder in the oven (actually, it was pork butt, and yes, we learned that we are all as mature as we thought we were - cue the multiple one-liners and half of the Sir Mix-a-Lot lyrics). After all that fun and food, Abigail and I had to say our goodbyes, and now we're back in St. Louis and Chicago.

Clearly, the point of the weekend re-telling and my train of thought were lost on the last paragraph. But to bring it back, like Mom taught us, we are all waiting out the storm. And while we wait, we are still having fun and laughing as a family. What's better than that. Miss you, Mom. Can't wait til we get to see you again.

How was your weekend?

“How was your weekend?”

“Not long enough.”

I have either said or heard this Monday morning dialogue hundreds of times in my life, but it has never rang truer than in these past few months. Train rides, plane flights, and car trips may be nuisances, but it’s always worth the commute to get home and see Mom. Abigail and I arrived back home late Friday night, to Dad offering us almost a dozen different food items immediately after we hugged hello. Mom was napping on the couch, with the faint comfortable hum of “Diners, Drive Ins, and Dives” in the background. She woke up for a quick catch-up about our work weeks, and then it’s upstairs to bed.

Saturday, I think Mom and Dad were the first to rise by more than 5 hours (needless to say, both napped later in the day). Mom and I got a chance to talk wedding for a bit, knocking out a couple of my groom tasks while I am home. And while we watched a couple food network shows, Abigail was putting on a culinary show of her own as was evidenced by the pasta with Bolognese sauce dinner. During our family movie night of “Secretariat”, she put on an encore performance with some delicious chocolate chip cookies and chocolate dipped strawberries. Mom, Dad, and I were full and happy.

Sundays are travel days and are always over before I want them to be. But we made the most of it, Mass in the morning, another hour of wedding talk around lunch, quick pseudo-fashion show as Abigail returned from the store with some “gala-type” outfits for Mom who is excitedly preparing for a charity “Dancing with the Stars” event in Sedalia in a few weeks, and some quality mother-son bonding time over NCAA basketball and searching online for some good magazines to read. Shocker, guess who is the proud new owner of a subscription to the “Food Network” magazine?

And then we arrive back in our cars, back in airport terminals, and back sitting on trains to our homes away from Home. I have to admit, I do look forward to going to work and seeing friends on Mondays. But tomorrow morning, when they ask, “How was your weekend?”, I’ll politely, but sincerely respond, “Not long enough.”

Love and miss you already, Mom. See you in a couple weeks.