AYYAT, Lebanon — A family of nine crouched on a sunbaked plain here in the Bekaa Valley, the wind whipping the plastic awning that was their only shelter. The children’s faces were smudged with dirt, the baby girl’s pale pink patent-leather shoes caked with mud.

But the mother, Nasra Youssef Akkash, could not stop smiling. She and her children had finally reached Lebanon seven months after fleeing their bombed-out house in Aleppo, in northern Syria. Their journey zigzagged through Islamist-ruled rebel areas and towns wracked by fighting, finally taking them through the outskirts of Damascus, where people were seized with new fears of impending American missile strikes. All along the way there was never enough food or decent shelter.

On Thursday, she told visitors that she and her family had slept peacefully for the first time in months after crossing the border on Wednesday, finally free from the sounds of shelling — frightened only briefly by a barrage of wedding fireworks that sent them diving to the ground for cover. Even without blankets, they had barely noticed the chilly nighttime wind.

“You look here and see a body, you look there and see another one,” Mrs. Akkash said, describing the landscapes where she had sought shelter with her children, ranging in age from Moussa, 30, to Narmeen, 1. “This house is flattened, that house is destroyed.”