SURGERY

October 16, 2013

A year and a half later, I finally got my toe fixed.

I'll back track . . .

I moved from Florida to WI in June of 2011. I was only there for 4 months but during those 4 months, I joined a Co-Ed Soccer league for a couple of months in Madison, WI. I ended up breaking my right big toe in the game before our last. I always play forward, and I was, BUT the other team was about to score so I ran back to boot the ball out and just as I was going to kick the ball (with every ounce of muscle in my leg), the guy kicked it a second before I did so I end up kicking him in the foot. I kicked him so hard that my toe bone just split. 

It didn't break on the joint, which was a good thing. I didn't have insurance at the time therefore I couldn't take care of it properly. LONG story short, it didn't heal right so I had surgery on it today. I didn't personally speak to the doctor after since I had anesthesia but he told my mom that they had to do more than anticipated but all in all, everything turned out fine. I go for my follow up on Tuesday :)

My baby girl knew I had surgery this morning. 

 She was extra lovey.

My mom flew in for the surgery. She's here two weeks so we got to spend a week together already (before surgery) which was nice so we went to the pumpkin patch, saw a show, etc.

Surgery was at 10am so we got there around 8:45am.

Wake me up when it's all over.

The IV was cold in my veins.

The drawing my doctor put on my foot as he walked by and then left, ahah.

The surgery took about 40 minutes. I didn't go in until 11am and we ended up leaving around noon so it wasn't too bad.

I was pretty drugged up when I woke so I don't remember a lot or what I said. I do remember asking for a recliner that I saw in the room though.

Then I proceeded to crawl in my back seat.

 All situated.

My friend, Alicia, brought me a care package and a balloon with the bandage on the right leg! haha

My position for the next week . . . or weeks.

My hand is bruised where my IV was. 

Nothing Ariel can't fix! HASHTAG (I like saying that) #littlekid

She won't stop staring at my balloons. Good thing she doesn't have claws!

I look like a pill popper! HAHA Well, I will be for a week or so but then back to work I go!

I can't thank my mom enough for taking time out of her schedule to fly out here. 

LOVE YOU, mama

THANK YOU ALL, for your prayers! Surgery went well and was a success. Couldn't have asked for a better procedure. Now, it's time for recovery. I will do my part and stay off of my foot :) This means a lot of movies, reading, sudoku and puzzle making!

VISITORS ARE WELCOMED!

UPDATE:

I had my first appointment on 10/22 (a week after surgery) and the doctor said it's healing great! It kinda doesn't look like it (LOL) but he said that the swelling is way down for what was done to the toe.

YAY!

Road to recovery . . .

Live. Life. Out. Loud.

MINNEAPOLIS, MN - DAY 4

October 6, 2013

I was pretty tired this morning and finally got out of bed around 11:15am.
Check out was at noon.

We left around 11:50am and made our way to Granite City, once again, and ended up having Brunch!

I was carrying the bags so we didn't have to make two trips to and from the car.

I'm in my airport wear, if you will.

KK style.

You already know!

This is where we stayed.
PERFECT location being literally, 15 minutes from everywhere.

The very delicious breakfast we had!

Peggy wanted to be on the road by 1pm so that she could get back to Wisconsin around 7pm.
I didn't have any other place that I wanted to see so I said I'd sit at the airport for 7 hours. Since my flight wasn't until 9:30pm.

My seat for the next 7 hours.

It's now 6:45pm and I've been here since 1:30pm. Time has flown, seriously.
My goal was to get the entire Minnesota blog done, which I'm finishing up this very moment, and read some.

I feel accomplished.

I bought a one way flight back to Vegas with Spirit. The flight was $94 BUT you have to pay $10 for your seat AND $35 for a carry on. All in all, it was still cheaper with Spirit than a different airline so I bought it. We shall see if the aircraft is worth all of these little charges.

My cousin and I were originally going to meet in Portland and explore there buuuuut she found out that she was pregnant. So we modified the plans because she didn't want to fly and I simply didn't want to go to WI (where I'm from and where she lives) SO she said she'd drive to the Twin Cities and I was all for it!

I'm so happy we made this trip work because now that she is going to start a family, we all know it's a little tougher to travel.

Love you too much, Peggy and SUPER excited for the baby on its way :)

MINNEAPOLIS, MN - DAY 3

October 5, 2013

We were getting ready around 9am, whilst listening to Michael Jackson (you can see his fro on the TV). Now that my hair is getting longer, I can barely stand it to blow dry it.

I'm clearly done getting ready therefore taking pictures seems to be appropriate.

We were on our way to Shakopee, MN for the Corn Maze. As we were driving, I was telling Peggy how I have to mail my postcards. And my German friends, I'll just save the postcard for when I get back to Florida to mail. Then I said, "Wait, not Florida. Um, wherever I live." 

I always say Florida when I mean Vegas! 

And when I first moved to Vegas, I would mail stuff and put for my return address, "Las Vegas, FL"

HAHA

Corn Maze Address:
1100 Canterbury Road
Shakopee, MN 55379

The Corn Maze map!

Hug a pumpkin!

I was all about getting a corn dog! But the cheese curds were no good.

Disappointed. Needed Saz's cheese curds.

Map

There was a lot to do!

As we were looking at the corn maze map, Peggy asks, "Doesn't it creep you out that there was a maze in prisoners? It's like, if you don't find all of the letters (for the maze), YOU WILL DIE!"

We laughed.

We made our way to the Pig Races at 12:30pm

The pig races were my FAVORITE!

They were so cute and fast!

We then made our way to the petting zoo that they had there.

The camel was my favorite animal to feed because its lips were so big and you could feel them on your hand when he went to eat the food.

Loved him.

We found another endangered species . . . 

Llamas always remind me of the Emperor's New Groove!

Peg loved feeding the baby goats

You could put cheerios down that white tube and the monkey would eat them.

 These guys were pretty entertaining as well.

About to start the corn maze!

Overview of the maze

As we were walking through the maze, Peggy says, "I wish there were food and shop stations in here"

HAHA

It was a bad idea to where my new shoes and they got dirty :(

If you really didn't pay attention to the map, you get lost so easily but if you do pay attention and follow the lines along with where we were going, it was pretty simply.

What you had to do was go through the maze and there were going to be 6 out of 26 signs that would have this guy on them and then you had to put those letters together to make a word. We got through 18 letters then got tired so I just looked for the exit - LOL.

I wanted to try this cool diner in St. Paul so we went . . .

36 W 7th Street
Saint Paul, MN

And it's super tiny. It's old fashioned and really cramped up. Luckily Peggy had the idea to go for malts, after the corn maze, so that we could go to downtown Minneapolis at night (since this place was in St. Paul). It would not have been fun to eat dinner there.

It was a fun experience though.

I loved my vanilla malt!

We went back to the hotel and planned on napping for an hour BUT I napped for two hours. I was exhausted from the corn maze extravaganza.

We got ready and we make it to downtown around 7pm. 

Peggy was doing her stretches before we left the parking lot.

How about . . . EVERYTHING WAS CLOSED!

I'm not kidding.

I spotted a Barnes and Noble and it was open but closing in 5 minutes!

I did not understand how downtown could possibly be closed by 6pm on a Saturday night.

Ridiculous.

We stopped at Target and I so badly wanted to get this for my cat but she's too big to fit in anything!

We asked this employee at Target where to go for Sushi so she recommended Tiger Sushi in Uptown.

As soon as she said, "Uptown" we got excited because that was somewhere we wanted to visit.

I had some eel and dynamite rolls.

They had the best throwback music from the 90's playing. We sat for a while, after we were finished eating, talking and jamming out.

YUMMY

We made it home.

Like my shirt?!

HAHA

It's okay, those are not my sexy eyes. I can't reveal those just yet. 

We ended our night playing rummy while watching, "How to Lose a Guy in Ten Days."

We were both pretty tired and went to sleep shortly after.

 A somewhat successful day though we were disappointed in Mickey's dining car and that downtown Minneapolis was closed when we got there.

Minneapolis is definitely a place to visit!