Patio..

I decided to just go ahead and put in a patio last Wednesday, so it was my weekend project :)

My car was fully loaded with supplies on Friday:



It was pretty easy as I put them all on my flat cart at Menards, one guy asked if I needed help, oh no I had it just fine.......until I tried pushing it after it was FULL. I made it to the check out, but it was probably pretty comical to see me pushing it, it took me forever to get to the check out.

Here is the area I did before. Our backyard doesn't have the best grass coverage, something I'm trying to fix. The new patio of course takes care of a decent size chunk of the yard :)



I decided to do a mulch patio because we didn't have a big budget for this, I already had 19 big tiles to use, not enough to do an entire tile patio but enough to have them in the middle. It was actually super easy, the hardest part was digging the trenches for the landscaping timber, but even that got done pretty quickly. My little sis Mindy came over and helped, we had a lot of fun doing it :)



No patio furniture yet, but we'll get some eventually. I actually ran out of mulch, need to get more to finish up next to the deck. But I really love it, a 3 hour project that really added a nice space to our backyard.

Kidney Stone..

So at about 1pm on Sunday as I was packing up my car to leave Wisconsin I got a phonecall from Kyle. I figured it would be him just checking on me to see if I had headed out yet. When I answered I knew something was terribly wrong, first of all he was crying and secondly he just sounded completely distraught.

He told me that he hurt his back, then explained to me that it happened when he was laying in bed, doing nothing. I thought that seemed odd and was totally freaking out. I called my parents and my dad took Kyle to the ER while my mom stayed at our house with Bella. My mom called me after they picked up Kyle because she did not think it was his back. She told me Kyle was on his hands and knees when they got there and sweating profusely. She thought it was a kidney stone.

Turns out my mom was right, it was a damn kidney stone! My drive from Wisconsin was the longest 5 hour drive of my life, I didn't know until about 3.5 hours into it that it was not his back. My dad was relieved when they knew it was that but also told me he was glad I wasn't there to see Kyle. For three hours he was in the emergency room without pain killers and having convulsions because he was in so much pain.

By the time I got there at 8pm they still didn't have his pain under control. He had to stay one night in the hospital. He did pass the stone on Tuesday afternoon and he has an appointment next week. The bad thing is that we found out when they did the CT scan they saw more stones in his other kidney, we don't know how many yet.

My poor Kyle, he already deals with his damn back pain and now he knows he will pass more kidney stones at some point :( He's tough but he said he had never experienced this kind of pain in his life, poor guy.

Wisconsin Fun

I went up to Wisconsin for my yearly trip to visit my cousins Angie and Stacy. It was the first I've gone by myself, usually Laura is up there at the same time. Also Angie and Stacy now live apart, so we all stayed at Angie's place, it was so much fun :)


We HAD to partake in some shopping, no I didn't find any shoes. Ok now pick yourself up off the floor after reading that statement ;) I did come across this amazing store called Katmandu, my new favorite store that is only up there and doesn't sell online :( It's a total hippy store, they have adult and childrens clothing. I found a dress for Bella (pics to come later), I couldn't resist it. So of course the manager then bartered with me and I found myself a dress also and got them both very cheaply :) I so wish we had this store in Iowa!!!

We of course headed out to the bar on Saturday, we went to Whiskey Dick's. They had an outdoor Tiki bar and the seats at the bar were swings, that got interesting as the night went on ;) They also had bean bags and darts so we played bean bags of course. At the end of the night inside the bar turns into a "dance" club. Oh my, it was interesting seeing the crowd that goes there. We had a blast dancing and people watching :)


I was sad to leave Stacy and Angie, I wish they still lived here. Then of course I had the most stressful drive home which I will discuss in my next post. But in ending, here are a few pictures from Saturday night.



My lovely girls and I.... Me & Angie



At least I already had cute shoes :) Me & Stacy

Bud the bartender was awesome... Nika is just the sweetest...

Bloody Ear

The phone call I received from LaPetite yesterday afternoon:

"Stephanie this is Jessica at LaPetite, um Bella woke up from her nap and has blood draining out of her right ear. Not to shock you but it was quite a bit."

Me - WTF!?!

I got there to pick her up and Jessica forewarned me yet again about the amount of blood. My poor Bella, she had blood in her hair and there was a lot in her little ear. It didn't help that she was wearing black leggings with print and a black shirt, so she looked super tiny and extra pale along with blood in her blonde hair. I was doing so good until I saw her :(

We went to our family doctor and she couldn't tell what was going on due to the amount of blood, she couldn't see! So we went to our ENT today and found out that it was just the tube moving and it irritated a blood vessel! So thankfully it was nothing serious :) Just drops over the next 10 days and a check up appointment in a month.

Bella was AMAZING through it all, she is such a brave little girl when she goes to the doctor. I guess that's a blessing in disguise with all the doctor visits we've had to make so far in her 3 1/2 years. They took her weight, she did have clothes and shoes on but she is up to 27.2 pounds, such a big girl :)

Mommy, Peyton is my boyfriend...

WHAT!?!

This is what Bella told me last night before she got in her bath. Peyton is this adorable little boy in her class, he is slightly taller than Bella but pretty little like she is. He also has blonde hair and blue eyes, he is such a sweetie!

So I'm glad she and Peyton seem to have bonded so well, but the word "boyfriend", where did that come from??? She also told me that she loves Peyton. Now I know it's just my 3 1/2 year old expressing her strong feelings of friendship for a very good friend, I just couldn't believe she told me that!

Of course I had to get Kyle so she could tell him, I couldn't resist seeing that reaction ;) Kyle just rolled his eyes and asked when mommy had her first boyfriend. I said, oh I was much older, my first boyfriend was in preschool.

Bella says, "Oh mommy, what was his name??"

Kyle, "Mommy won't remember that."

Me, "Actually his name was Casey VanDuesen, I totally remember him."

Bella, "Oh mommy, that's so cute!!"

Kyle really rolled his eyes at that one ;) It's not like the boy is engraved in my mind forever, it's just a rare sweet memory that for some reason has stayed with me always. Probably because my mom constantly reminded me how cute I was in preschool with my little boyfriend Casey.

Mommy, "Bella you are too young to have a boyfriend, I know Peyton is your very good friend but not your boyfriend."

Bella, "Ok mommy, Peyton is my BEST friend."

That was the end of it then. I can see now that every aspect of myself has been passed along to my beautiful daughter. I am TERRIFIED, a true mini me so far, ay yay yay.

Twilight

Out of my rut and re-reading the Twilight books.

Finished Twilight in two days, I'm sure I will be done with Eclipse tonight, I just can't put them down at night after Bella goes to bed!

The teen love angst seems to be the thing for me right now ;) I mean seriously, remember being a teenager and having you first love and the actual PAIN you could feel?? Man do I remember that and these books hit those feelings right on the head! You would think of every single second of your day, looking forward to the seconds you got to see your love in the hallway and praying for the end of the day to come quickly to spend time with them.

I think to myself, my god someday Bella will have these same pains and feelings. I think I would KILL any teenage boy if Bella's heart was broken like in the beginning of Eclipse. What am I saying, it's inevitable right? Her heart will be broken at some point I'm sure, I wish I could shield her from that :) Maybe she will just be the heart breaker ;)