New Wheels

This post has nothing to do with Jax but I snapped this picture (excuse the quality the iphone is not a great quality camera) at 5:35 this morning. How can anyone be this happy this early??

Dave has wanted me to get a new car ever since Jax was born. My Subaru with 2 kids in carseats and the front seats needing to be pushed forward to make room for the kids is not the most comfortable car (or safest) to be driving. When it’s just me and the kids it is fine but when Dave has to ride with us he is miserable (and he looks miserable too I should have taken a picture so you can see just how smashed he was). We have been looking for about 7 months now and we had even test drove a couple (Sienna, Excursion, Tahoe) but it seemed like when it came time to make a decision I always backed out of it because it meant we would have a car payment. We have not had a car payment on my Subaru in almost a year and since we are looking at me taking a year off or going part-time next year I did not want to add to our expenses now. So even though I did fall in love with some of these cars I decided I love my kids more and would rather drive a tiny car with no payments than have a huge car with payments that would require me to keep working so I could afford them.

Then today after school Dave shows up with a blue Tahoe and asks me if I want to test drive it. From the outside it looks fairly nice, it was older (99) but had low miles (less than my Subaru) and was in good condition. He tells me the price and then says “I think we can bargain with them and do a trade straight across with the Subaru.” At this point I am pretty excited because I have always liked the Tahoe’s and it would mean lots of room and best of all NO CAR PAYMENTS!! So I get in the driver side and much to my dismay the entire car is blue! Everything is blue, the carpet, seats, dashboard, steering wheel, it even had blue lights (okay maybe I am making that up) but seriously it was just too much blue for me. I immediately thought of my little sister Marni and knew the minute she got in this car she would start making fun of it (not that I really put that much emphasis on what Marni thinks but I knew she would be the only one to actually tell me she thought it was ugly). I drive it around and even though it drives nice and has lots of room I just could not get past all the blue. So we drive it back to the dealership and when we get out Dave points out a Dodge Durango for sale towards the back of the lot. I know very little about cars and at this point just wanted to go and pick up the kids but Dave insisted that we go and look at it. The first thing I noticed was that there was no blue on it (thank goodness), it is kind of a gold color and when I look inside I notice all the seating is leather (even better), it has a 3rd row seat so if I really wanted to I could fit 6 of my kids in there (or my 3 kids could each have a friend and all fit). It also had low miles and was a 2000 and it was a little cheaper than the Tahoe (and no blue!!). I started to get excited but at this point it was getting later and I really wanted to go and get the kids so we told the salesman we would be back in awhile to test drive.

After returning with the kids, we loaded all of them into the Durango and took it for a drive. I fell in love, it was comfy and there was so much room for the kids and for all of our stuff. The best part (are you ready for this): MY BOB FITS IN THE BACK!! I always hated that with the Subaru because if I wanted to go running or walking with the boys I had to always go right from the house now I can meet my friends downtown and go for a walk or run or whatever. I tell Dave this is the car I want so we go in and meet with the dealer. I hate this part because I get so uncomfortable asking for things, lucky for me Dave is a pro at it. We sit in this tiny room with Colt on my lap and Jax on Dave’s and Dave tells the guy exactly what we want and after a little back and forth between the two men we leave with my new car and still no car payments (and Dave, of course, got exactly what he wanted).

I am now the proud owner of this Dodge Durango:

We are heading over to Lynden for the weekend and are going to take the new car. Hopefully it does not dissapoint but I have a feeling I am going to love it. Its a 6.5 hour drive both ways so it better be comfy!