mom's birthday, Cindy's crafting, and my Guild Wars

My mother's 85th birthday was August 7th, so on August 8th we "sprung" her from the nursing home to celebrate. Tom (my brother) and I had planned to give her a small party at a Longhorn restaurant as it is easy for us to get her there (both her legs were amputated, so any movement is by wheelchair and slideboard), easy for us to get her back to the nursing home by midnight, and we all like the food there. However she asked to go to someplace that had music and the celebration mushroomed from there. Either Tom or Sandy (my step-sister) decided on Capt Hiram's resort (inn/restaurant/sandbar/marina) in Sebastian, FL (http://www.hirams.com/). Sandy picked up mom at the nursing home and drove her to Capt Hiram' along with Sandy's roommate, son, and her son's girlfriend. I drove down to Tom's that morning and soon Linda (a long time family friend and mom's unofficially adopted daughter) met us there. Then I drove Tom, his girlfriend, Linda, and Cindy (my wife) to Capt Hiram's. After we arrived we were first joined by Renee (Tom's daughter) her husband and 2 children. The last group to join us was Debbi (another of my step-sisters, but from a different marriage), her husband, and daughter. It was really great to see everyone there, as I do not get to see Renee's or Debbi's families much.

Capt Hiram's is a great resort with a fairly small inn, open-air restaurant, outdoor sand bar, and a couple of docks. It also has a small beach for kids to play on and the water is shallow enough that many locals just come with their small boats or jet skis and beach them in the water. It is right on the land side of the Indian River, so the constant breeze off the water keeps it cool in the Florida summer. The party started at 4pm and we were all seated at a long table in the back corner of the restaurant. The food prices were reasonable and there was a great variety, so all were happy with their choices. Around 6:30pm when the eating was done we all went out to the sand bar (an outside bar built on a raised, sand covered platform). The kids played in the sand on the beach, while the adults just talked. At 7pm a live (soft rock) band started playing. Debbi's family had to leave earlier, but the rest of the party stayed till around 10pm.
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On a very happy note: Cindy finally found the last blood moss, crafted the last crimson book stand, and completed her quest for the Master Artison badge/title in Wizard101 last evening. It has been a long 4 weeks of very long days to get through the crafting quests, but she persevered and finally completed them. I am very proud of her and will be happy to get her back LOL. Now she can craft anything, but will only have to craft what she wants. I think her plan now is that we both will start following the main storyline quests again until she reaches Grandmaster at lvl 50. At the moment she is at lvl 48.5, I am lvl 49.5, and we both are ready to start the Labyrinth in DragonSpyre.
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Not too surprisingly I have still been playing Guild Wars. I have been playing Cindy's character to get her caught up with our other guildmates. Mostly have been doing the training arenas for spells and Zaisen chest keys, Zaisen missions/bounties when she can do them, and just got her through the primary Eye of the North Ebon Vanguard storyline quests. For her it is now onto the Asura storyline quests. For my character I have been doing the training arenas, Zaisen missions/bounties when I can, and some side quests in Eye of the North. I have also got all the spells needed now to make touch rangers for the Heart of the Shiverpeaks quest in Eye of the North.

Guild Wars updates and Wizard101 !@#$%

- Just a little update on my last post about my Guild Wars Eye of the North dungeon crawling. I did try to complete the Heart of the Shiverpeaks dungeon and failed, but did better than expected. I got all the way to the last boss fairly easily, but it is a bear (actually a fire siege worm) to kill. I only tried it the standard way and could barely affect his health bar. Next time I will try a couple of tricks to arm my rangers and necros with certain life-stealing/poisoning spells to see if that works. Unless I can get 8 players (rather than me with heroes and henchies) that will be my best chance.
- I did get a couple of "master" quests at the same place as the Heart of the Shiverpeaks and finished both of them fairly easily. They gave me some gold, some dwarf and norn reputation points, and some Deldrimor title spells that I will need for later, game-ending quests.
- I also was able to complete 2 Zaisen quests (1 mission and 1 bounty).
- It seems that my Word of Healing Monk build at PvXwiki has fallen off of the "great" hero builds. So now I am trying an Unyielding Aura Monk/Elementalist build.
- I did complete this week's Nicholas the Traveler task. One of the gifts he gave was 5 "Merchant Summoning Stones". It does just what it says in that it adds a merchant to your party for 30 minutes. This will be especially helpful at the end of some dungeons/quests that have a lot of drops. You can sell the drops to the merchant or buy salvage / ID kits from him.
- Last night I was working on my Tyrian Cartography title by exploring the Southern Shiverpeaks. Not sure how much I advanced it, but did get a good amount of ground covered.
- For the first time last night I was told I could not sell anything because it would take my gold over max (100 platinum), so I had to bank some gold to finish clearing my inventory. I have been saving for some Runes of Superior Vigor when their price dropped a bit, so hopefully that will happen soon and I can use most of that gold.
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On the Wizard101 news - After 5 full days of farming Cindy finally got her 50th blood moss last night and made her 5th bookcase. However all her happiness was dashed when she realized she never got the crafting quest and all her work was for naught. She went to bed very upset after this, but is back farming today for cattails, black pearls, and blood moss again. Sometimes she seems more persistent than I am OCD.

and yet more Guild Wars (Dungeon edition)

I have been trying to do some Guild Wars Eye of the North (EotN) dungeons to complete my Dungeon Master Guild - normal mode.

I finished Darkrimes Delves and found it fairly easy - mostly titan enemies. With the confidence I gained there I attempted Shards of Orr with its undead enemies and could not even get past the first level. That was a shame because it also was a Zaisen Bounty quest. After my bad defeat there I thought I would attempt an easier one. I was able to complete Vloxen Excavations and it was not too bad.

All I have to complete now is Shards of Orr, Heart of the Shiverpeaks (this is also the end of the EotN primary story line), and Slavers Exile (the only Elite dungeon in EotN, which can not be done before Heart of the Shiverpeaks). I have traveled through Heart of the Shiverpeaks before, so this will most likely be my next dungeon to try.