In The Hartland: Another One Bites the Dust!

Well, it happened again. Twelve days after Logan ended up in Urgent Care from a bike accident, Ella did the same thing. We are not on a good roll these days thanks to the Coronavirus. Since my kids are not in school getting their exercise during recess and P.E. and during their after school activities that are all currently cancelled, I have made a point of getting out of the house once a day for some sort of exercise. Today was no different. After lunch, the four kids and I jumped on our bikes and rode up to the top of the hill. After discovering a new and much easier way into the junior high grounds, we found ourselves at the top of the large hill that Logan normally likes to ride down. Since this was a spontaneous discovery, we all happily decided to go down the hill. Logan went first, Ella second, Emmett and I next, and Lia last. Although Ella has gotten very comfortable riding down hills at fast speeds these past weeks without her training wheels, she is still a beginner at all of this. At the bottom of this hill, the path makes a sharp, left turn which leads onto the school track. If Ella had been allowed to ride down this hill onto a flat, straight section of the path, she would have been fine. Unfortunately, she started to lose control towards the bottom of the hill as she tried to make the left turn going too fast. My stomach dropped as I saw her swerve back and forth several times before crashing really hard. I knew that it was going to be bad the second I saw it happened. Within a matter of seconds, I was next to her. Ella was screaming and crying really hard and I had to wait until Lia reached us so that she could hold my bike with Emmett sitting on the back before I was able to assess Ella's situation.
She immediately showed me the large scrape on her knee and then pointed to her elbow that she said really hurt. It was at this point that I saw an excessive amount of blood on her arm. I immediately checked her face and that is when I saw the big gash in her chin. Blood was pouring out of it and I had nothing to wipe it up with. After using my hand to clear away a bunch of the blood, I decided that we needed to get home as soon as possible to take her to the doctor to see if she needed stitches. After encouraging Ella to get back on her bike so that we could make the ride home, she announced between sobs that she just couldn't do it and that she would need to walk her bike back home. Knowing that this would take forever for her to do, I made the split second decision to leave a crying and injured Ella sitting on the ground with Lia while Logan, Emmett, and I raced home as fast as we could on our bikes. It felt so strange to leave my injured girl behind, but I knew that this was the fastest way to take care of her. Logan and I pedaled our hearts out and got home about five minutes later. After pulling into the garage and getting Emmett out of his bike seat, I came bursting into the house yelling to Ron that I thought Ella needed stitches. He rushed out of his office in unbelief as I quickly told him what had happened while I grabbed my purse, car keys, and a pack of wet wipes. Within in a minute or two, I was back at the school yelling to Lia and Ella that I was there (since I wasn't able to drive the car past the barricade at the front of the parking lot). After rushing out to meet them, I pushed Ella's bike back to the car and loaded her up before telling Lia to ride her bike back home since I couldn't fit hers in the car, too. After wiping off a lot of the blood, I quickly drove Ella home where Ron and I were able to give her chin a thorough look. We both decided that we wanted to err on the side of caution and take her to Urgent Care to give her chin the best chance possible to heal with the smallest scar possible.
After bringing Ella inside to take off her bloody jacket and wash her arms and hands, I put her in Ron's car with a hug and a kiss and a fresh wet wipe for her bleeding chin. Luckily like last time, Ron and Ella were able to be seen relatively quickly at our Urgent Care. The doctor decided that Ella's cut was not deep enough for stitches. Instead, after numbing it and washing it thoroughly, the doctor glued up the cut on her chin and then covered it thoroughly with multiple Steri-Strips. We now need to keep Ella's chin completely dry until the Steri-Strips fall off in about a week or so. After a trip to McDonald's to reward Ella with a McFlurry for being so brave and strong, a very quiet and subdued Ella returned home later today. My poor, little girl looks so sad with her big Band-Aid on her chin, but once again, I am just so grateful that her injuries didn't include broken bones or a concussion or deeper cuts anywhere on her body. I hope and pray that we will make it through the rest of this quarantine without any more serious injuries. I don't think that my nerves or our pocketbook can take much more!