Well, we had quite the vacation this time. It wasn't what we planned on, but we are still happy to have been able to visit with so many friends and family. We arrived in Michigan early Friday morning, the 21st. We were invited to have dinner with some friends that had been in the Flint ward, but moved to Howell just before we moved to Wisconsin. Before we left, it had started to snow. It hadn't been snowing for very long and hadn't accumulated much so we decided to go to dinner. We've driven in snow before, after all. So we were getting onto I-96 to go to Howell and as Charlie was accelerating to get on the highway, he lost control and the back end of the van slid forward making us slide sideways down the highway. Before he could gain control again, a Dodge Ram hit the backside of the van right by the back driver's side tire. That hit pushed us into the Ranger that was on our other side. So we hit their front end with the back passenger side tire. Then we kind of pinched the Ranger into the median and we both stopped. Merrit hit his head on something and was bleeding and swelled up pretty bad and Makayla had hit her head on something and had a bump. We called 911 and someone who witnessed stopped and called Onstar. She was very concerned and was a great comfort to the kids. She was God sent. So the ambulence arrived and took Merrit, Makayla and I to the hospital (I was O.K. though, just going for the kids) and Charlie stayed to tie things up with the police. No one in the other vehicles was hurt and they were both able to drive their trucks away. We had to have ours towed. Charlie also got a ticket because it was his fault. It was the scariest things that has ever happened to me!!! I'm just so thankful that no one was seriously injured. It could've been so much worse. Merrit's face and head are healing well. He has a green colored black eye right now. I'm going to take him to the doctor here to get him checked out again. A friend of mine's dad is a nurse and he told me that close head injuries can take up to 90 days to show signs so I need to keep an eye on Merrit to make sure nothing happens. I don't feel like it will, but I figure it's better to be safe.

So we spent the rest of our vacation looking for a new van to take us home. Mom and Dad let us borrow their van to get around in while we looked. I was thankful to have had the whole week to look. If the accident had happened any closer to the time we had to leave it would've made searching a lot more stressful. I was so disappointed in the vans we looked at, mostly because they just aren't as big as the Aerostars are. We almost went with a Safari because they are still on the big side of mini vans, but in the end, Mom and Dad offered us their van (Windstar) at a very good price that we couldn't refuse. So we bought that one and were able to squish everything we had into it. Let me tell you that was a little miracle in itself. It got super good gas mileage on the way home yesterday too, which was nice. It was probably better that we bought Mom and Dad's van anyway because we put over 1000 miles on it while we borrowed it last week. We couldn't believe it, but with all the driving we did to visit people, it added up.

Here are some pictures of our van and Merrit's face. We still aren't sure what he hit his head on. At first we thought it was the window next to him because it was busted out, but the side of his head that was actually next to the window was not touched, it was the other side of his head that was injured. I think he hit the back of Jaxson's car seat, which was right in front of him, but we aren't sure and probably never will be - not that it matters. I'm just so thankful that he wasn't more seriously hurt. These ones are him in the emergency room just after the accident:

These pictures were taken Wednesday, the 26th, five days after the accident:

He looks so much better now than he did in these pictures, I just don't have any current pictures of him yet.