Sarah Holley, 11, and Daniella Kae, 9, do everything together. On Tuesday, they found themselves in a lot of trouble. They said they were taking Daniella's dog for a walk and decided to take a walk on a frozen pond. The girls said it became a game of dare. They kept going further and further until Daniella fell in.
"It was so freezing. I couldn't do anything," Daniella said. "I couldn't even feel my feet."
Sarah ended up falling in, too, but she was able to get up on the cement. Sarah kept trying to pull Daniella out of the chest-deep water, but the wet winter clothes weighed her down.
"I was thinking I would have done anything to switch places with her, so she wouldn't have to go through that," she said.
Luckily, a Cary garbage truck with three guardian angels on board was driving by. The sanitation workers pulled the girls to safety by tying their belts to a sled.
"Those men saved her life and I'm so thankful to them," said Clairy Kae, Daniella's mother.
"Obviously, I thought about what could have happened if nobody had been there," said B.J. Sandok, Sarah's mother.
In hindsight, Sarah and Daniella said they know better. They said they learned a lesson the hard way.
"Never to go on ice again. You might fall in," Daniella said.
The girls each wrote a four-page essay about their experience. They said they wanted to do it so they would never forget about how they felt when making a poor decision. Their mothers want to do something special for the workers, but they have not come up with an idea just yet.
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