Mini Van Mama

Well, we bit the bullet and bought a mini van. We have been driving around in my little Honda Civic for the last several months with Chelsea. "Rhonda the Honda" has been good to us. She drives fantastically, she gets great gas mileage and she's been very reliable, however, we have been feeling a little cramped lately. With Brad and I both being so tall, and having to have our seats as far back as they will go, it's been a little snug with a car seat in the back seat, but we've dealt with it. But Chelsea recently out grew her infant car seat and we upgraded her to a "big girl" car seat, which is MUCH bigger and takes up A LOT more room in Rhonda's back seat. Add to that the second car seat we have in the back seat for my nephew, who I babysit during the week, and you pretty much have a sardine can...or at least it feels like it. So we decided that we needed to get an upgraded vehicle to accommodate Chelsea's upgraded car seat. I did a lot of research to get the best mini van we could for the price we could afford (which wasn't much, unfortunately) and we ended up finding a great deal. It's a 2002 Nissan Quest. It's in great condition and has low miles on it. The best part is...it's got all kinds of bells and whistles. Everything from the drop down video screen and DVD player, to heated leather seats, to seats and mirrors that adjust to my preference as soon as I push my key fob and they adjust to Brad's preferences when he pushes his key fob. It's really cool! Our original plan was to sell Rhonda in order to pay for our new family van, but after much discussion Brad and I are going to try to keep both cars. We have been living with one car for about a year now and we've made it work, but I tell you what...it sure would be nice to have TWO vehicles for our household. Not having to get up at the crack of dawn to take Brad to work just so I can take Chelsea to a doctors apt. sounds pretty appealing to me! So we are going to give it a whirl and see how it goes...I will be pinching my pennies! So far we've had "The Quest", as it is lovingly referred to as, for 2 days now and the extra space has been sooo sooo nice! Yahoo for sliding doors, not having to bend down quite as far, and for 6 passenger seating! Man do I love my mini van!