The Many Adventures of Garffs at Thanksgiving

Last week was quite the week.

We picked up a new couch (which, due to the dimensions of our Explorer, entailed William and I running home in the jogging stroller).

I had to sell my car to convince Steven to get a new one, and boy am I glad. This replaces the broken Ikea couch we got when we were first married. It’s so soft and cushy (though we do seem to get attacked by the pillows from time to time).

We then loaded up the car to head up to St. George to meet the rest of the Garffs for Thanksgiving.

We had dinner at the lodge in Zion’s National Park.

Dinner went off without a hitch unless you count the fiasco of no highchair (which entailed a baby eating on my lap for most of the dinner until we could get a booster and an obvious need for both of us to change our clothes).

and a slight fall on the wagon while we were taking pictures of these two cute cousins.

We enjoyed the stuffed animals in the museum.

But Daniel was a little scared

And so was Grandma Karen.

William was so excited at first, because he thought the polar bear was Kiki,

But slightly disappointed when it turned out that the arctic foxes weren’t Kiki either.

The boys took a real liking to old Cousin Joe.The rest of the weekend was lots of fun.

We swam, read, slept, watched movies (including the new Harry Potter, thanks to Grandma and Grandpa), and had lots of fun with our family.

Bill and Billy enjoyed hanging out together.

And the little boys couldn’t get enough of the dogs.And the dogs couldn’t get enough of them. But the way home was less fun than the rest of the trip. My dad and brothers had come through St. George on their way to Kanab point to go hiking and towed down my grandpa’s 1968 Plymouth Satellite (which had been passed around the children in my family and was my car in high school) to bring back to my uncle here in SoCal. Being the nice people we are, we offered to tow the car the rest of the way, since we would pass by my uncle’s home on the way back.

That’s when things got interesting. After dropping off the Explorer at the dealer to get trailer lights installed, this “favor” for my uncle was getting less and less enticing.

We had trouble getting the lights to all work, and things seemed foreboding already.

Even though we drove below the speed limit through the Virgin River Gorge, the weight of the Satellite, steep/winding roads, and slight wind were too much. The Satellite turned us around 180*, we all hit the median, and the the Explorer crashed into the Satellite as it flipped over.

It was a terrifying experience. As we swerved through the canyon, William was screaming, luggage went flying, and I was worried if we would make it home alive.

Luckily, we were all buckled up and I think the Satellite and the median took the brunt of the hit, which probably saved our lives.

We are very thankful for all the emergency crew that was working on Sunday and the kindness of strangers who kept us company, gave us blankets, and held the baby as we tried to sort out the wreckage. My dad even offered to drive down from SLC to drive us home, but we decided it would be better to take the cars to a tow yard in St. George and rent a car to get home.

We all made it out with minor injuries. William’s side-impact protecting car seat prevented him from anything other than a very minor bloody nose and a lack of sleep, and Steven and I just got some slight whiplash and some scrapes and bruising. We are very thankful the accident happened when and where it did, because it made everything work out better than we could have expected. We are very grateful for family and friends who care about us and are concerned for our safety.

And VERY thankful for collision insurance.

Next order of business: buying another car. Anyone have any recommendations for a small, slightly used SUV?