Joined the Club

And our coolness factor has declined :)  We are now part of that club.  The club that owns a minivan.  We tried to avoid it...thus the Pilot we have had for the past 5 years...but it's amazing how persuasive a minivan can actually be to a young family.  Kids and car seats and strollers and...well, you get the picture.  So here we are.

Hugging our Pilot that has treated us well.  You will be missed.

And about to drive off in our new van, after a total of 7 hours in 3 different dealerships, in one day!  

Might I add that the boys were in tow this entire time and were amazing troopers!  We were behind the eight ball getting the clearanced 2013 Odyssey's, unbeknownst to us, so it took some work to find one we were happy with (ie, trim and color).  I was in contact with 20+ dealerships online and at least 10 of those over the phone in multiple locations (St.Louis, Cincinnati, Milwaukee and Chicagoland) and acquiring a 2013 seemed to be highly unlikely.  

Yesterday morning we headed to our local Honda dealership to get our Pilot appraised and 1 1/2 hours later we walked out with a proposed bill of sale on a 2014 Odyssey, trade-in included.  The boys did great there, and thankfully there was a kid's room where they could hang out in as well.  We went home for lunch and naps, and I continued calling around and actually came across a dealership by O'Hare airport that had two 2013 vans available.  There was a 3rd (that was actually our first choice of trim level) and it was sold within 30 minutes of my inquiry.  While Christian and I weren't actually planning on buying a minivan this soon, the $4000 benefit to getting the 2013 seemed too good a deal to pass up.  

So - post nap I loaded up the boys again and headed to CarMax to get another appraisal number for the Pilot and another 1 1/2 hours later we were back in the car to pick up Christian from the blue line stop at O'Hare, and then out to the last dealership.  We arrived there at 6pm and didn't leave until 10pm.  Eek!  And this was with our boys, neither of whom decided to sleep until we got home!  They lost it on the way home, but I can't say I blame them.  Poor Reid also came down with a fever while there and was at 101 when we got home.  Loooooooong day, late night, but we are officially the proud owners of a new car!!

We got back in the car this morning, a mere 9 hours after we arrived home last night, and headed out to breakfast.  (Christian had to get to his car, which was left in a parking lot overnight).

Micah chose his seat in the back last night...

 

Back view

Side view

Tired, but happy (enough) boys :)  Enjoying breakfast way more than the dealership...

After breakfast I changed the boys seats and put them in different seating positions, as I'm still trying to decide where I want them to sit in the van.  The jury's still out on this one as well.  At least I was able to get smiles out of each boy for one of the pictures.

Yay!!

I felt like I owed the boys some major running around time, so we went to a new park in Naperville and they definitely were pleased to be out of the car and/or stroller and be able to run free!  Loving these boys soooo much (even when they're slightly whiny and cranky today :) ).