A family grateful for a Christmas miracle is looking forward to a quiet, normal routine in the new year.

Six-year-old twins Karlisle and Klausen Madison were injured Dec. 23 in an all-terrain vehicle wreck along rural Campbell Swamp Road in  south Warren County.

After Karlisle stayed at Blair E. Batson Children’s Hospital in Jackson for seven days and Klausen for eight, the daughters of Selena Madison and Chris Madison are home with their family.

“What they really need is rest,” Selena Madison said. “The doctors said it will be very important to get them back into a routine as soon as possible, so we’ll be trying to do that.”

Thursday morning, the girls were enjoying a few favorite television shows, having pancakes and donuts and resting together in a big bed at their grandmother’s home. Nearby, bouquets of helium-filled balloons, stuffed animals and other get-well gifts surrounded the bed.

Nine days ago, the twins, along with 15-year-old Caitlin Rose Lopez, were thrown from a four-wheeler when it skidded along a barbed-wire fence, flipped and hit a tree.

Caitlin, who was 15, was pronounced dead an hour later. Klausen, who suffered head and neck trauma and fractures of bones above her eyes, was airlifted to Batson and placed in the pediatric intensive care unit. Karlisle suffered a broken pelvis and a concussion and was driven from River Region Medical Center to the Jackson hospital later that night.

Kim Nosser, the girls’ grandmother, spoke of some of the memorable, if not funny comments the girls made.

At one point, Klausen awoke in her hospital bed and said, “‘I’ve never done anything like this before.’ I told her, ‘No, you haven’t, and you’re not going to do it again, either!’”

Nosser called the girls’ recovery “a miracle.”

“So far, so good,” Selena Madison said of Karlisle’s progress. The Bowmar Elementary School kindergartner, who has been in a wheelchair and on a walker, probably will head back to school when the new term begins Thursday. “We’ll talk to the physical therapist next week. The school already said they’d accommodate her.”

Klausen’s course is also positive, though a little less clear. She has visits scheduled in the coming weeks with a neurologist, eye specialists and a general surgeon, and has to have an MRI. The bones above her eyes will heal on their own, her mother said, the swelling is down, and she’s reading. “She loves to read,” Madison said.

Klausen also attends Bowmar Elementary, where she is in the first grade.

Christmas came in stages for the girls, and is not over yet.

In the hospital, they had lighted Christmas trees for their rooms in their favorite colors. Their aunt, Laura Dow Madison, took in pink for Klausen and purple for Karlisle.

Each also received a big bag of gifts from Santa Claus, Selena Madison said. NFL quarterback Eli Manning throws a fundraiser every year to raise money for the holiday gifts for the children at Batson, she said. Each of the girls received “a dozen or more” presents, including Barbie dolls, movies, games like Connect 4 and Candyland, Play-Doh kits and socks, gloves and hats.

When they got to their grandmother’s house, another Christmas celebration awaited them because their Uncle Brett Hossley, 29, had driven 20 straight hours from New Jersey to be with Selena and the girls at the hospital.

Among their gifts were Nintendo DS hand-held game systems and games, including two Mario Kart games so they can link to and play each other.

Other Christmas parties remain to be held with their father and grandparents, Selena Madison said.

Madison and Nosser said they were grateful to all who have supported the family and prayed for the girls. “Even people that don’t even know us came to see them at the hospital, brought food and showed support,” Madison said.

Looking at her granddaughters, Nosser added, “It’s amazing what a difference 24 hours can make in someone’s recovery. Each day they improve so much.”

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Contact Pamela Hitchins at phitchins@vicksburgpost.com