Saying Goodbye

It has been awhile since I wrote anything here. During my pregnancies with Dash and Jackson, I generally used daycare naptime to put my thoughts in order but with Dash getting older and being on a different nap schedule than everyone else, it has been nearly impossible to sit down for a few minutes.

I have missed writing. These journal entries are a way for me to sort of take stock of my life both short term and in a longer arc. 

We spent Christmas at home again. There is a small part of me that misses traveling for the holidays but things just aren’t the same as they were when my girls were younger. . . and when I was younger!

My husband and I said goodbye to a long-time companion over the holidays. Our first “together” car was donated to Vehicles for Change. They’re a local non-profit that accepts donations and fixes the cars when they can then gives them to local needy families with a 6 month/6,000 mile warranty. We had given ourselves a budget for the year and. If repairs for the car went over that, we were going to get rid of it. We hit our maximum and then the car refused to start again.

Enough was enough!

The local mechanics aren’t interested in long term repairs but I knew from researching VC that they could put our car to use and another family could have the opportunity to better provide for themselves with the Taurus. Since the donation comes with a warranty, I also felt more comfortable than if we had sold it and then it just kept breaking!

The Taurus was our first major purchase together. We shared her for almost 5 years before getting a second vehicle. I labored with my first baby on our way to the hospital in her and we brought our first baby home in her, too. I travelled across the country twice with her: once alone with one of my sisters and the other time while caravanning with all our worldly possessions in a moving truck after my husband graduated from BYU with my other sister as an alternate driver.

Once I even decided to drive to the other end of the state with our one year old since my husband had a job interview. Day trip!

My husband drove her to the bar exam. He got pulled over on the way, too, because we’d forgotten to update the registration. Oops! I was visiting my parents in California and got an early wake up call for that one.

When we bought the Taurus, we chose it because of the wide back seat. At the time we anticipated growing our family rather quickly and wanted a car that would fit 3 car seats but as it turned out, our family has grown at a significantly lower rate than either of us had planned. I didn’t drive the Taurus often, but I will miss her.