The Beach and the Tooth

An old friend of Ben's got married in September. She was getting married at the Beach in North Carolina. We took this as an opportunity for another family vacation. It was the kid's first trip to the beach and the first time for Ben and I to go to the beach since our Honeymoon. It was an amazing trip. The kids loved every minute of it. We started in North Carolina and ended up at Myrtle Beach. We spent some time at a civil war museum and at a battleship (the USS North Carolina), but their favorite part was the sand! I think we spent hours and hours building walls, castles and holes. The weather could not have been better. It was sunny but cool and the water was just right. Matthew was more of a water baby than Emma was. He would go into the water with Ben and let the waves splash over him. I could only get Emma up to her shins before she would want to run back to the sand.

All was absolutely perfect until our last day. It started normal and exciting. We had checked into a fancy hotel for the last part of our trip and were extremely content in their comfy beds and 10 swimming pools. We decided to start out at the beach for the day. Unfortunately I had a run-in with a jelly fish - Ouch!! It was pretty painful but I tried to tough it out for the kids. I didn't want them to be afraid of getting into the ocean. So all was well after that....until we headed toward the pool. Emma had asked to be wrapped up all tight in her towel and then began dancing around and being too silly. She tripped over her feet and since her arms were restrained she fell face first on the concrete. Blood everywhere, a busted lip, and when she looked up her tooth was knocked inward. I was already drained from the jellyfish and seeing her like this made me sick to my stomach. But once again as a Mom, I stayed as calm as I could. It turned out her lip wasn't so bad and the bleeding quickly stopped. Since it was her baby tooth we didn't feel it necessary to rush her to the hospital although her tooth was obviously out of place. I didn't know what to do with her so we ended up going for ice cream. I couldn't think of anything else she could eat! She thought it was fantastic - "this is the best night ever" she told us as she ate her ice cream dinner. Then later that night as I was getting Matthew in his pajamas I heard her squeal "OUCH!". I turned to see what happened and she said "Mommy! I put my tooth back into place all by myself!" And she grinned a big bloody grin! She was right though, her teeth looked straight once again.

We spent one extra day at the beach and it truly was perfect. It was so hard to leave but we had school days and work waiting for us in Georgia. I think we might do this beach thing again next year - minus the bloody tooth and jelly fish of course.

(Ben took lots of pictures but hasn't sent them to me yet- I will post as soon as I can)