Edisto Island, Day 7: In which my knee is loath to goodbye to the beach

How is it that a week seems like such a long time at the beginning of a week and like a mere blink at the end of the week? We were quite sad to wake up to our last day on the beach. Here's Phoebe enjoying some morning stories and snuggles with Daddy:

 

Here's Phoebe comfy and cozy and ready for her ride into the beach:

Here's Zoë helping Phoebe and I get settled into our "cribs":

This day was a big sand castle day for us. Here you an see the beginnings of a solid sea wall (behind the castle Alexander and I built a little closer to the ocean). Andrew and the older kids were taking the idea of a sturdy and well-designed castle very seriously. Finally.

Benjamin built the large castle in the middle and assigned everyone else to work on making the surrounding village. Unfortunately, I don't have the pictures of the finished village, which was quite extravagant—with a church and a graveyard and farmland, a mine, houses and all sorts of things.

As you can see the tide had started coming in by this point in the afternoon (and while we're talking about tides, let me point out that tides don't actually come in and out...in fact the earth rotates into and out of bulges of water created by the moon's gravitational pull...which I'm still trying to wrap my head around...but it's kind of interesting to think that when you're sitting on the beach watching the tide what you're really watching is the rotation of the planet you're sitting on).

Our sandcastle crew fearlessly protected their castle from the ocean's insatiable fury.

Here's Queen Phoebe on her sandy throne:

"Cover my toes, peon!" she commands. And they obey.

Here's Phoebe giving Daddy some hugs after rinsing off in the ocean (she was a very sandy baby):

We tried to have a few snacks on the beach, but the seagulls were getting a little aggressive about their "sharing": 

Seagulls chasing after snacks always reminds us of Zoë yelling "Numma-numma my nut!" at the seagulls on Kure Beach after they stole one of her pistachios. 

Here's Miriam with these swooping birds

And here are Alexander and Phoebe chasing down a seagull on the beach:

We eventually went back to the beach house for lunch, where Phoebe found this fabulous pair of boots:

These boots were made for walking, so that's just what they'll do...

After lunch we headed back to the beach for a few hours where we splashed in the waves and looked for shells and got all sandy and played paddleball like we'd never get a chance to do any of those things ever again.

Living five hours from the beach is a real hardship sometimes, I think.

Around the time we were ready to call it a day and head in for dinner anyway (at least, that's what I'm telling myself), I was out playing paddleball with Andrew, Rachel, and Miriam. Or maybe with Zoë. She was often playing paddleball with us as well. Grandpa and Darla rotated in and out. Benjamin played a few times. But in this particular scenario, I think it was me and Andrew for sure. And then a couple of other people. 

And, guys, I was running for a ball right there in the surf. It was high, so I reached up on the tip of my toes on my one little foot in what I imagine was a stunningly graceful arabesque (but which in fact probably looked more like a chicken trying to do ballet) and I'm happy to say that I hit that ball.

I'm less happy to say that at that very moment the earth rotated just so and a wave whooshed up against my perilously placed toes and washed the sand right from under them. And I went down. Hard.

I have never felt more like a toddler. 

I was just lying on the beach, spread eagle, so confused about gravity and air and ground. I peeled myself off the beach and my knee was screaming. 

By the time I walked hobbled over to our little beach set-up, I had blood dripping down from me knee all the way to the ground. Darla offered me one of her beautiful beach towels, but I declined. No need to ruin a towel over this mess. Had it been, like, a puncture wound or a laceration...sure. But this was just a flesh wound.

It was like road rash more than anything. I just hobbled my way home, leaving everyone else to carry everything, and then I sprayed it off really well and took a shower and bandaged it up. 

Truth be told, it's now been a week since I fell and I'm still suffering, but it's looking a lot better!

My littler kids were obsessed with how much it looked like a heart (to them; I think it looks like stupidity a triangle). It's like the beach loves me so much (or I love the beach so much) that we had to leave our mark on each other. Or something.

Oh! I insisted on taking a family picture before we went in for dinner:

We staged it so that you can't see my knee (plus I washed it off in the ocean, which I'm sure is 100% sanitary).

After dinner we headed back to the beach for one last sunset walk. I had to take a picture of our beach entrance because Phoebe was obsessed with the golf carts.

The littler kids have all been obsessed with car makes and models recently. They play a game where they call out the brand of every car they see. Honda! Toyota! Kia! Chevy! Ford! Tesla!

When that got too easy they added country of origin as well. 

Kia! Korea!

Honda! Japan!

Tesla! USA!

Volvo! Sweden!

They get more points for every detail they add about the car. No one keeps track of these points. But they claim them anyway. 

So it is that Phoebe has come to randomly yell out things like, "Honda Odyssey Japan!"

She can credibly recognize several car brands but also frequently calls out nonsense because, well, she's still rear-facing and can't see what everyone else sees but still wants to participate.

"Honda-day!" is one thing she screams out a lot (her little mixture of "Honda" and "Hyundai").

On our way out to the beach one day she said, "Golf cart! BMW!"

"That's not a BMW!" Rachel chuckled.

"Looks a little bit like a BMW to meeeeeee!" Phoebe crooned sweetly. 

At this point I should clarify that she can't actually say BMW. She actually says "bee-bubble-woo," which makes the whole thing even better.

"Wooks a wittle bit wike a bee-bubble-woo to meeeee!"

Anyway, the sunset was beautiful. We really had perfect weather the whole week we were at the beach. It wasn't too hot. And it was never too cold. Every single day was perfectly sunny (which was kind of a bummer because we had huge windows facing the sea and I was kind of hoping for a good thunderstorm, but that's okay—I'll take fair weather as well).

Here's Darla and Grandpa walking along holding hands:

Everyone was pleased to learn that our sand castle had out-lasted the tide. Andrew left the message "hubris" behind:

Zoë wrote "victory" and "we beat you," which you can see a little remnant of in this picture:

Darla took several pictures of our little (big?) family together (I'm sure one of them has most people smiling):

And then we switched and I took a picture of Grandpa and Darla with the kids (or at least most of them...Phoebe was absolutely not having it by this point):

And then a fellow sunset seeker stopped by and offered to take a photo of our whole crew, which was kind:

Darla brought out some bubble wands for the kids, which were a huge hit (along with the glow sticks):

And then we just had fun walking along the shore. Here's a turtle nesting area cordoned off:

Here are some beach selfies:

We were having a hard time with this beach trip, not knowing what Rachel's plans will be for next summer...but I guess that's part of growing up!

We get to keep this one around for a few more years at least:

Here's Miriam looking for shells. This girl is always looking for shells!

Here are the youngest three playing around (while Benjamin was off doing something, I'm sure):

Zoë was determined to play Fruit Basket one last time. Here's she's written in the sand: Fruit basket! Please!

And who can say no to that?

So we played Fruit Basket until it was almost too dark to see our way off the beach, then waved goodbye to the ocean, and went in for bed.

*****

Speaking of beds, here are a couple of pictures I have from the kids' bunk room the morning we were getting ready to leave:

There were two bedrooms upstairs like this (with a bunk bed and a double or queen bed), as well as a suite with a queen bedroom (which Reid and Darla used). Andrew and I used the room downstairs, which had a queen-sized bed and a full bed (I slept on the full bed with Phoebe (because it was against the wall and she couldn't fall out) and Andrew had the very squeaky queen bed all to himself)). It was a roomy place and we were sad to say goodbye to it!