Car buying - the good and the bad

Tuesday morning we were busy putting all our ducks in a row to finally finalize the purchase of our first family-sized vehicle. After months of researching and searching and making contacts and negotiating prices and having nightmares about not being able to bring our baby girl home from the hospital because we didn't have a car big enough, we finally found something that we felt good about.

The main problem, or perhaps the biggest inconvenience was that it was being sold by a dealership three hours away. But, that was also a stroke of good fortune since my super awesome friend, Annie, lives in the same city. So, we made plans to meet up and the two little boys and me to stay the night and spend part of the next day with her and her two boys, while Marc would make his way home with one of our cars on Tuesday and I'd come home the next day in our other car.

Without going into all the nitty-gritty details, the whole process ended up taking longer than we anticipated and the purchase wasn't finalized on Tuesday and we all stayed the night.

As long of a day as it was and with everything taking much longer than expected, it actually felt kind of like vacation. While the car was being checked out by a mechanic, we met up with Annie and Jack at a train park, where the boys had tons of fun running around and exploring. I'm pretty sure the very best part, though, was that Daddy was there running around with them. And, when their faces were red and energy mostly spent, we went to the cool and comfort of Annie's home. As we left to go test drive the car, the boys were so happy to be playing with Jack and Scotty again, and of course all of their cool toys, that they didn't even notice when we left.

And, even though the day ended without new car keys in hand, it did end with yummy pizza and salad and helium balloons, making us really wish our local Round Table had the same buffet deal here. I'm pretty sure the boys wouldn't mind at all. They were in heaven!

Fortunately, Wednesday morning came and everything came together smoothly to make the purchase final and by noon-ish we were caravaning back home with Marc and Ben in our new Sienna and Hugh and me in our Honda. Hugh slept for most of the drive home, but woke up at different intervals and would start crying out "new car" and "Daddy", clearly not happy that he was missing out. Poor kid! I had no idea it was going to be so traumatic.

It was such a relief to finally have everything come together and eliminate that extra little burden of stress from our minds. And, even though the entire process and being three hours away was a huge hassle, having such great friends to spend the extra time with made it fun and relaxing. It was a huge blessing to have ended up in their city under such unexpected car-buying circumstances. We have really been blessed with some of the greatest of friends!