That stupid deer

Last week started out as a normal week.  Gymnastics, dance, school and work the first part of the week, and then we were all taking off Thursday night to take the pop-up camping for the weekend.  

I picked up the kids after work Wednesday night and headed to Wal-Mart to stock up on the camping essentials - marshmellows (these are sometime called smarlaytos or marshmennows), graham crackers, chocolate, oatmeal cream pies, pop-tarts, gummies and a bag of apples (you like how I threw that one in there?  makes me feel better.)

Alan met us at Wal-Mart after his work meeting and EK decided to ride home with him in the truck.  Alden and I loaded up the van and headed home.  About a mile from our house, on a main road, at about 6:40 pm, with lots of cars on the road a stupid, stupid deer jumps out of the woods and attempts to leap over my van. 

She didn't make it.

The entire event literally happened so fast I didn't even have time to react.  I didn't see the deer until her eyeball was just outside my windshield.  In hindsight, it's probably a blessing I didn't see her because I didn't swerve or slam my brakes causing another accident.

I saw a flash of leaping deer, felt glass fly everywhere and then it was over.  I don't even remember much of a strong impact (I was driving about 40-45 mph).  I just remember thinking "Okay, there is glass everywhere but we are okay."

Alden was screaming and when I looked back there was blood pouring down his face.  When I tell this part of the story most people say, "You must have freaked out!"  Honestly, I really didn't.  I was shaken and concerned, but I knew he was okay.  We didn't impact hard enough for me to be concerned about a lot of trauma or broken bones.  The blood was scary, but I could tell it wasn't too severe.

I pulled over on a side road and the man driving behind me pulled over too.  He called 911 while I checked out Alden and called Alan (who was just a few minutes behind me).  There was glass and deer fur EVERYWHERE.  We cut Alden's shirt off of him (you can see it in one of the above pictures) because I didn't want to risk scraping glass over him. 

The cut that was causing so much blood was kind of deep and gushing a little (hope I'm not grossing anyone out).  But it was small.  The EMT agreed that it probably needed a few stitches.  A few hours later we left the ER with 4 stitches!

My kid is such a trooper!  He was awesome during this entire ordeal.  Naturally, he hated getting stitched up, but as soon as it was over he was fine.  Personally, I liked watching the process and would have enjoyed it more if it weren't my 2 year old screaming.

The next day it was like nothing ever happened.  My sweet family kept calling and texting to check on us, but we were really fine.  Alden asked for a pop-tart the next morning and to watch a movie.  Ha!

We headed up the mountain the next day and ate our weight in smarlaytos!