Mini Van Mom

I always swore growing up that I would never be a Mini Van mom. I guess I was young enough and spoiled enough to believe I was above and better than a Mini Van. When I bought my first car I was 17 and I had saved up 9000 waitressing to buy a car. I bought a black brand new 2002 Nissan Sentra and it has been a great car. But I have driven it for the last eight years and she is old and too tiny for our family. When I got my permit 10 years ago I learned how to drive a stick shift and I have never driven anything else. The few times I would borrow my moms car which was an automatic I almost didn't know how to drive it, I would occasionally hit the brake thinking it was the clutch. But I was so tired of driving a stick, I kept telling David how excited I would be for the day that I wouldn't have to drive a stick, 10 years was long enough. For about the last year Dutch has really out grown our car. When we put him in his car seat, if the passenger seat wasn't scooted up far enough his feet would get stuck between his seat and the front seat and it would make him cry. So for about a year now, every time David was in the car with us I would have to sit with my knees touching the dash so that there was enough room for Dutch and both Davids knees touched the dash while he was driving to make room for Maylee behind him. It's pretty much been miserable. But we have happily endured. Then at the end of last July the A/C in my car went out. We didn't have the money to fix it, but winter was coming so again we just endured. We drove everywhere with the windows down, not a great thing for hair do's on a Sunday. But no big deal, the heater still works so once winter came we were fine. But for about the last 2 weeks it has been warm enough that the inside of the car is hot when it's been sitting in the parking lot for a couple of hours, so we've been back to having the windows down. Like I said it's been a great car, we have never had any big problems with it beside the A/C going out. But we have definitely been itching for a bigger car. And with a third baby on the way it was the perfect excuse to finally make it work. Because there is absolutely no way on earth that three car seats can buckle in the back seat. I know you can put three in there, but one can't buckle and you have to slam the door really hard to get it to close with three back there. So I knew that without a bigger car I would be home bound after the baby came. Not something I'm good at. So we have been anxiously awaiting our tax returns to finally get a bigger car. They came last week and on Friday we went car shopping. We found the perfect car for us at only the second dealership we went to. They were able to get us a great deal. So we are now proud owners of a 2009 Toyota Sienna. The room in it is amazing. There is plenty of room for Dutch's feet with out my knee's being anywhere close to the dash. And the storage space is amazing. I'm in love. Dutch's favorite feature about the van is pushing the button that makes the door shut, he loves it. And my favorite thing, is the space, the sliding downs, it's an automatic, the working A/C and not only does the A/C work but is has rear A/C so I now longer have to give up all the vents for the kids. I actually get two to myself. We are so super excited. It is used so there are a couple of dings on it. But it's new to us and that's all that matters. The only problem I see with buying used is you don't get to pick out the color. Our van is tan, not my favorite color, but David promised and crossed his heart that one day I'll be able to buy a car and pick out whatever color I want, (I'm lame I know). But for now I am so grateful that we were finally able to afford a bigger car before baby number three arrives and that we can all be a lot more comfortable.

And not only did I get a major upgrade on a car but so did David. For almost the last four years David has been driving a 1994 Honda Civic hatchback. We are so grateful for David's brother in law Jeremy and his sister Dawn in giving us the car so that we would be able to make ends meet during college life after we had Dutch. But the car is old and it has definitely seen better days. It never had power steering, no A/C, the gauges only worked when they wanted to. And talk about horrible profiling in that car. People were so rude when you drove that car just because of the way it looked. David had a gun pulled on him once while driving down the freeway, he was pulled over several times just from the look of the car, but once the officer got to the window and saw a (and I hate saying it) but saw a white guy, he would tell him to have a good day and be on his way. He was just assumed to be illegal. So now David got to upgrade from his car to my car. Still old and still without A/C, which I feel really bad about. But he is excited for his "new" car. He got to upgrade 8 years from the two cars, while I only upgraded 7 years (at least that's what I tease him about). So we are both happy with our "new" cars. It's been a good week for us.