A Trip to Madison and Toenail Drama

Last weekend we drove up to spend a few days with some of our favorite people, Ben and Stephanie Rogers. We have been friends for seven years now! You may remember that we visited them last fall. Last time we were there for one day, which was way too short, so this time we were there from Friday night until Sunday evening. Still too short, but better than nothing!

Backtracking a little – I was dreading the drive through Chicago traffic on a Friday evening (our original plan was to pick Ben up from the train after work and head north… but I figured if we were driving in that direction already, I would leave in the early afternoon to avoid the worst of the traffic, drive to my parents’ house for a quick visit, then pick Ben up from a train station about 40 minutes northwest of their house, which was right on the scenic route to get to Madison, avoiding the major highways and hopefully avoiding traffic too.

The scenic route took FOREVER. And felt even longer as we got stuck behind slow trucks, drove through tiny towns and past lots of corn fields. Four hours is way too long to get to Madison (it normally should take three). But it was definitely scenic! The farms were so pretty in the sunset.

We arrived at 9:30 p.m., ready to be out of the car and have some fun. We quickly put the kids to bed and settled in for a game of Dominion. We love this game and the Rogers were fast learners, so it was a lot of fun. By the way – that game is normally $44 and is $26 at Amazon (at time of posting). That’s a good deal for a Rio Grande brand game.

Now – we not only brought Dominion and one of the companion sets, Dominion Intrigue, but we also threw our new blender in the car (I recently got the Blendtec and LOVE it!! We’ve had spinach/green smoothies every day and my kids are actually consuming veggies) and our whirlypop to make some homemade kettle corn… I used both that first night and we were laughing about how the Seversons like to travel with small appliances…    

Soooo. Here comes the toenail drama.

Around 11 p.m. or so, we were finishing up the game and I stood up to clean up the kettle corn remains and wash out the spinach drink glasses. I accidentally hit my right foot into my left heel – HARD. (I am such a klutz) The upper left quadrant of my big toenail split and bent, so there was almost an inch of nail sticking straight up, still attached (by a very small part), bent into the toe and it absolutely was killing me. I was in SO MUCH PAIN. It gives me the willies just thinking about it.

I was trying not to freak out (I wasn’t sure how we were going to fix this because of the crazy pain). It was late at night. We were all tired and needed to go to bed. But I couldn’t go to sleep with my toenail sticking up (and it was throbbbbbbbbbbbbing). Part of me wanted to go to the ER so they could give me a shot and then clip it. But Ben wanted nothing to do with that.

“We’re not going to the ER over a toenail.”

I kept looking at him like, hey, it’s my toe and it is KILLING ME… and I am such a chicken with stuff like this.

Somehow after lots of convincing, I agreed to let Ben clip the toenail off and bandage it. Keep in mind, any slight movement of the toenail caused major pain. And with clipping that much toenail that was formerly curved over my toe… it had to flatten as it was trimmed off. That flattening motion was going to cause even more pain.

I took some tylenol, closed my eyes and squeezed a pillow, and Ben clipped off the part of the toenail that was sticking up, then wrapped my toe in gauze and a bunch of band-aids. I barely slept that night because my toe was throbbing so much. There was still part of the bent toenail that was pushing into the nail bed and causing pain.

Life had to go on the next day, despite my hurting toe. On Saturday morning, the Bens and the Rogers’ oldest son, Ellis, went fishing for a good chunk of the day. Stephanie and I took the four remaining children to a nearby splash park since it was a humid 90-degree day. I didn’t want to get my toe wet, so I stayed on the perimeter. Stephanie and her kids did too – they weren’t too interested in going through the fountains of water – especially little Lea. Jackson ventured into it after a little while.

Eli was all about the water and raced in as soon as we arrived.

His swimsuits never seem to stay on his little bum :)

Charlie was more interested in eating watermelon than running in the water. I think he would have loved it if I had gone in with him, but since I wasn’t going in the water, he stuck with me too.

Here’s Eli with watermelon oozing out of his mouth -

In the late afternoon, Stephanie and I escaped for a few hours to go antique shopping (this place pictured below was enormous – I have never been in such a large antique store). It was a little on the pricey end for most things and I resisted the urge to buy anything, but Steph found a really fun old bench that would be perfect for their entryway. Now she needs to convince her Ben that it really is perfect :)

On Saturday night, we put all of the kids to bed and left them with a babysitter so the four adults could go out. Here we are in front of the Rogers beautiful new house that they moved into two weeks ago. I especially love their huge planters and chairs on the front porch. Their house has lots of big windows and great amounts of natural light streaming in. It’s wonderful and smells new, with large open spaces, a beautiful kitchen, wonderful pantry and mudroom area, pretty view in the back yard…

We ate dinner at a fun place in Madison, Bluephies. We even splurged on dessert and were stuffed by the time we got back. We squeezed in one more game of Dominion afterward and managed to go to bed earlier than the night before.

On Sunday morning, we went to church with the Rogers. We got there a little late and sat in the back. My drama king Eli burst into tears and said, “I want to go to MY church!!” Apparently he prefers to sit on the benches, not the chairs in the overflow – I think he missed seeing familiar faces too. But he was happy to have Ben sitting with us! He also cheered right up when it was time for nursery and saw that there was a bathroom attached to the nursery room, complete with a little toilet and sink! He kept saying, “They have a potty just my size!!”

After church, the Rogers introduced me to a dermatologist in the ward who is a good friend of theirs – I wanted to ask him about my eczema (and Charlie’s too – he has quite a bit on the back of his knees), but I also peeled off the band-aids and showed him my nasty toe since it was still hurting quite a bit. He offered to have me follow him and his family home, where he could numb up my toe and clip the rest of the nail off so it would stop pushing into the nail bed.

So I followed Dave and Caroline and their two kids back to their house. Dave pulled out his supplies, gave me five shots in my big toe (those shots did NOT feel good, by the way), and went to town cleaning up my nasty toenail. I was so grateful to be numb – there is no way I could have sat still otherwise.

Now a few days later, my toe is starting to feel better (not constantly throbbing like it was in the beginning), though it will probably be a while before that part of the toenail grows back. My boys have only stepped on the toe twice since it happened, and now I’m extra careful about moving my foot if they’re close to me. Thanks for hosting us Rogers! We can’t wait to do it again sometime soon. Next time I’ll bring my steel boots :)