mother , Lisa Sams , according to police in Paradise , California , a town of 27,000 people about 90 miles north of Sacramento . Watch the family talk about their `` scary '' ordeal '' `` I 'm glad I 'm home . Praise God , '' Dominguez told reporters after exiting a chopper at the search command post . `` It was awful . '' Asked how he survived , he replied , `` Jesus Christ . '' Dominguez said he used branches and sticks to spell out the word `` Help '' near the culvert , where the three slept the last two nights -- at times sleeping with their feet inside each other 's shirts to help stave off frostbite . He said his daughter was the first to hear a California Highway Patrol helicopter overhead . He said he ran though several feet of snow barefooted to wave it down . `` When they turned around , man , I was just praising God and saying , ` Thank you Lord , thank you Lord , ' because I knew we had made it , '' he said . Police vehicles equipped with snow chains
-LRB- CNN -RRB- -- Stranded in the snowy California woods for three days after losing their way while searching for a Christmas tree , a father and his three children fashioned a `` Help '' sign out of twigs on a nearby unpaved road , according to the helicopter pilots who found them . Lexi and Joshua Dominguez exit a helicopter Wednesday , shortly after being found . The four sought shelter from the heavy snow in a culvert and removed their sodden socks in an effort to stay warm and dry while they waited for rescue , the pilots said . Frederick Dominguez said that during the three-day ordeal , he and his children slept inside a log for warmth and ripped apart their shirts to wrap their wet , freezing feet . `` You just go to survival mode , '' he said . `` Every parent would do that . You would do anything , sacrifice yourself , because these are your kids . '' Dominguez and his children -- Christopher , 18 ; Lexi , 14 ; and Joshua , 12 -- were reported missing Monday night by Dominguez 's former wife and the children 's