**WARNING, some images are slightly graphic and may be upsetting**

One year later (tomorrow) was the scariest night of our lives.

Traveling down a small two lane country road in the rain in Rolesville, NC…a red car was FLYING from the left. I only had a second to tell Mike that it wasn’t stopping before we hit… the red car ran the stop sign, got T-boned by a big SUV and both cars hit us. Sitting in the longest second of my life knowing we were going to hit, I felt so much terror. There was a yellow gray smoke in the air from the dust of the airbags. The screeching and crash of metal. I thought I for sure had lost a part of my face from the pain and the sound of pulling it out of the airbag just to see blood pouring down my shirt. I looked over to see my husband in shock and I had to break him out of it by screaming at him so we could rescue our girls. I still remember fighting to get out of my seat but I would have fought 100 times harder to get to my girls…and I remember checking their bodies and unbuckling them and forcing a smile and in the airiest and most pleasant voice I could force out at the time saying “you’re okay! See!? We’re okay! Mama’s here!” and getting them out of the car. Somehow. How did we physically do that? I still can’t even understand it.

Missing a shoe and with Autumn on my hip I started running through cold wet glass in the worst pain I’ve ever felt screaming at this woman to help us. Screaming at her, yelling so loudly. She must have been so freaked out, I still feel bad about that and bad about blood that was left in her car. My instinct was to immediately take pictures of us to document the state we were in in case something got worse – but my phone was gone. Mike had his thankfully, so we did the best we could while shaking.

I could write so much more but it’s it’s so hard. One moment I want to highlight though, SO brightly, is this:

While we waited for police in the lady’s car… Cammy and I sat in the back and held my cross necklace and said “THANK YOU GOD, thank you for letting us live! We lived!!!!” (This is now on my new wedding band from The Modern Bazaar) I will always remember that moment.

Ellie had severe seat belt burns from wearing a tank top dress. Try to make sure your little ones have their skin protected from the belts in their car seats!

Because despite the darkness and the pain and suffering physically, we saw the LIGHT in getting to live together for longer. It made us also realize we never know how much longer that will be, but for now…we know it’s longer and that’s enough for us.

We are together. We are safe. We have each other. God protected us that night and in the recovery afterward and we are SO thankful!

TOMORROW – we are sooooo excited to perform five acts of kindness (one for each of the Five Waves, us!) to bring sunshine to someone else’s day. Tomorrow won’t be about how scary and bad that accident was. It will be about making others happy. Tomorrow we celebrate that WE LIVED!!!! Can you perform ONE act of kindness tomorrow to celebrate with us!? If so, hashtag #FIVEWAVESCELEBRATE so we can see what you did!!

xoxo,

Want to keep up with an Outer Banks mama of three sweet (and oh so wild!) little girls shooting weddings & small business photography while making time for the things that matter most? Click on the links below and let’s connect!
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xoxo,

Want to keep up with an Outer Banks mama of three sweet (and oh so wild!) little girls shooting weddings & small business photography while making time for the things that matter most? Click on the links below and let’s connect!
Instagram
Facebook