bigger & better

Kelley was cuddling Sierra once and whispered: You might get a lot of hand-me-downs but know that you are special because you got us a new car!

The girls going through the car wash in Jasmine (the Honda Civic Hybrid that I drove every day)… before they moved up into the new ride.

Remember how Sierra came early? Well, I hadn’t taken the time yet to figure out the car seat situation. The plan was to put all three car seats in Kelley’s car (standard Honda Civic). So once we got home and wanted to go somewhere as a family without taking two cars I tried stuffing them in the back seat. I researched online and people had their stories of how they did it. [After thinking about all the things I read, most people did it with Toyotas. They must have flatter seats because Kelley’s car had the cushy contoured seats in the back so none of the car seats sat flat.] With all the different configurations, I figured out I could do it if we didn’t use the infant car seat base. I didn’t love the idea but perhaps it would do until we found a better solution. We even went to Babies R Us and took a lot of their floor models out to the car to try and find the narrowest combinations. New car seat costs far less than a new car, right? Well, no bueno. First trip out to Portland and we almost got rear-ended… ding ding ding! We weren’t properly protecting our children.

So, the car shopping began. Kelley was anti-minivan, and we both liked the Honda Pilot. So here we are…

Good-bye Sharkbait Ooo-Ha-Ha! We love you but we had to move on.

2008 Honda Pilot with all the features. The fave, of course, is the built in DVD system. Seats 8 so we can take friends and family now!

Don’t mind our creepy eyes… taken on the iPhone at dusk.

Totally zoning to the movie. You can’t see it in the picture but Seoul was holding both Sydney and Sierra’s hands. Cute! I’ve learned they don’t go to sleep when there is a movie on no matter how tired they are.

Built in mirror/sunglass holder… fun to see the kids! They love to ask, “See me waving in the mirror??”

Now I drive the Pilot with the girls. Seoul calls it a minivan. She loves to sit in the 3rd row, which she calls the trunk. She is now in a high-back booster seat and can do the seat belt herself (when she wants to), which is helpful.

Kelley drives Jasmine, which will save us gas money so that is a plus! It is definitely strange to drive a bigger vehicle. Now we play the game: I’m bigger than you so move over! Haha!

We love the Pilot. We don't love the cost of filling the tank. Life goes on.

{April 2013}