Happy Birthday Dear Blog

It's hard to believe one year ago today I started this blog. The year has flown by quickly although a lot has taken place. I'm glad I've had somewhere to record it all. It's amazing how much Calleigh has grown. Check out this link to my first blog entry to see her picture.

We've had a busy but fairly productive weekend. On Friday morning we did our usual yard sale-ing but Elaine came along with us since Ron went to Plant City to visit his dad. I got quite a few new outfits for the new baby at our first stop (which prompted Duncan to jokingly say "I thought the advantage of having another girl was that we didn't need to buy any clothes??). At our last stop, Calleigh scored a new grocery cart for $1 and Elaine picked up a stroller like that one we bought new for $50 for only $10 so that was a nice deal. She wants it to have in the van. So I considered it a successful outing.

We skipped waffle night so that we could go and look at mini-vans. Yes, we're finally seriously considering getting one. It's difficult in a way for me to do this since our cars have been paid off for a long time and I hate the thought of forking over a bunch of money and taking on a monthly payment. My car is nearly 10 years old and only has 77,000 miles on it so in all likelihood, it still has at least several more good years in it but realistically, trying to get around with two small children in an Alero is not the most pleasant thought. I don't even know if I could fit a double stroller in the trunk. We've though about getting a used one but right now the deals on new ones are so good that it appears that's what we're going to end up doing. So late Friday afternoon, we went over to Kia and looked at the Sedona. I know a Kia is probably not the first thing you think of when you say "Let's get a new car" but it does have the best crash test rating for a mini-van and the warranty is excellent. We didn't test drive one but we sat in several and liked what we saw. And at 40% off, we were liking what we were hearing too. But we needed to comparison shop.

We had a nice Sabbath and caught up with a friend in Sabbath School whose wife had a baby boy on March 6. They have a 3-year old Lindsey and the dad, Chris, was there with her while Mom stayed at home with baby. I say baby because he doesn't have a name! I'm afraid this will be us. Chris says they put a name on the birth certificate but they're just trying it out and they really can't make up their minds. Hopefully we'll be able to make a decision and it won't come to this. Incidentally, it turned out that Duncan and Allen were wearing almost identical outfits at Sabbath School so we had to snap a picture of them, of course. They could be twins, huh??

After our naps, Shannon came over and then Toni and Terry arrived from Avon Park on the motorcycle. We had supper and then Toni, Terry, and Duncan went to the movies to see "Duplicity" while I stayed behind at the old homestead. Shannon didn't stay long because she had to work today. I cleaned up our guest room for T&T which has become quite messy with all of our moving stuff around. It's still in the process of being converted into the baby room. A very slow process you could say. Anywho, they liked the movie but apparently it was a little hard to follow at times.

This morning we hit up a Dodge dealership before meeting at First Watch. As we were looking at what turned out to be a used Caravan, a sales person came over and started talking to us. Duncan had me come sit in the driver's seat and as he did, he loudly warned me that I wasn't going to like it because clearly the previous owner had been a smoker. But as I sat there, I didn't smell anything. So that was strange. The salesman then had us go inside and take a look at a 2009 Caravan. As we stood there looking at the van, I noticed that it smelled terribly of cigarettes but then I quickly realized that the salesman was standing right next to me. It turns out that HE was the one the stunk to high heaven of cigarettes. I kidded Duncan about that one afterwards! Sadly, I now associate the Caravan with this stinky smell and I don't want to buy one. I'm only half kidding on that. But seriously, the deals aren't as good so I don't think we're going to go the Dodge route.

At First Watch, Calleigh decided she wanted to try a booster seat instead of the highchair so we let her have a go at it. It didn't go that well. She kept trying to get out and at one point, I thought she was about to tip back in the chair so I made a dive for her only to have my fork go flying and butter to land all down my sweater. It turns out Duncan had his foot on the chair the whole time so she was fine. After that, I then proceeded to dribble blueberry syrup down the front of my white shirt and Duncan proclaimed that I would leave messier than Calleigh. I would blame it on being distracted by my toddler but truth be told, I've never been a neat eater!

After nap time, we went out on another jaunt to a different Kia dealership. This time we took the Sedona for a spin around the block and pretty much concluded that this is what we wanted. We weren't necessarily going to buy it since we had Calleigh in tow and it was nearing suppertime but we did have our salesman (who looked like he was about 20 years old) run the numbers. We were curious to see if they would have the 40% off like the other place. After some technical difficulties (in which Calleigh kept running up to another table and telling the people "hi" like 20 times) he lays out a piece of paper with the price that says in giant handwritten letters "40% Off Sale" followed by a big smiley face. Calleigh saw the smiley face and even commented on it. As we look it over, we noticed that they had started off with a number that was about $2,000 more than we thought they should have. And then, as we talk to them about that and as we calculate what the 40% off should be, the manager admits to us that "No, these Sedonas are only 35% off, not 40%." I was distracted with Calleigh but afterwards, we were really kicking ourselves as to why we didn't call them on that. Why would they hand write "40% off" if it was only "35%?" Did they think we were too dumb to do the math? Duncan asked them if this was their best offer and they said it was. So he says that if they can lower the price by the $2,000 and give us the 40%, we would be interested. And with that, we got up and left. I was very proud of ourselves. We have the upper hand in this economy, right? As we walk through the parking lot, out comes the 20-year old chasing after us asking us what he can do. We told him that if he could get us what we wanted, we were ready to do the deal right now. He said he would work on it. So that's where it stands. We'll see if we get a call. If not, we may go back to the place on Friday although the vehicle there doesn't quite have all the features we want but that's okay. We have other dealerships to check out too.

That about sums up the weekend. Now it's on to another week.