So . . . October 28th began what ended up being 3 months of vehicle-related stress. First off, Aly got into her first accident by following too closely in stop and go traffic and rear-ending another vehicle. There were just scratches on the other car's bumper, but as the car went underneath the other car, it did quite a bit of damage to the civic and, as we later found out, some internal damage as well. Aly was just weeks short of adulthood - a right of passage? 😏 A costly learning experience, I'd say. Anyway, although we were originally promised the car back by the 2nd week in November, we did not actually get it back until mid-December. 😒 Luckily our insurance covered a rental car, but only I was authorized to drive it, so Aly was put on the minivan. . .
Next up . . . the truck. A couple weeks into this rental car fiasco, Chris was noticing that the truck was losing power as he was driving back and forth to Montgomery. He would take it in to a service station only to have it start working perfectly and they could never find anything wrong. Finally, they told him it was the spark plugs. So he replaced the spark plugs (one of which was hard to get to and had clearly never been changed during scheduled maintenance.) So we thought the problem was fixed, disaster averted - phew! But NO! The very next week the same thing started happening. This time when Chris took it in we found out that one of the cylinders was not firing, so there was no compression, hence a lack of power. Hooray for finally figuring out the problem. Bad news? You can't just replace one cylinder. You basically have to replace the entire engine . . . for around $4000.
So . . . this brought on a lot of angst while we tried to figure out what to do. The truck was already 12 years old and we weren't really willing to give it a whole new engine. At the same time, we did not have the means nor the time to purchase another vehicle at the moment. After much discussion, we decided that since Aly would be off to college in a month and a half and Lise would not have her full license until this summer, we would revert to a 2 car family for the foreseeable future. This meant that Chris now got the minivan, as we kept thinking we were getting back the car any day. This also meant that Stacy was now on duty for chauffering Aly in her busy schedule of college, work, and babysitting. (Yeah, remember that whole, Aly couldn't drive the rental car thing?) Aly was very resourceful and would often have friends bring her home from seminary, work, and school. But still. It was rough.
Afterword: So, eventually we got the civic back, Stacy got the minivan back, Chris started driving the Civic to Montgomery, and the minivan got a much-needed tune-up - we didn't need problems with one more vehicle! Chris was also able to eventually sell the truck online and take it off of our insurance. Phew! It's just crazy because we had so many other things going on at the same time - getting ready for Christmas/flying out to Utah/taking Aly to college and Chris trying to write a thesis paper. I'm not sure why we needed to have a whole bunch of car drama going on at exactly the same time, but I'm glad it worked out the way it did. And I am a little sad we had to let the truck go. Lots of good memories of taking it to go camping with the family, going on dates with Chris, and just pulling onto our street, seeing it in the driveway and knowing that meant Chris was home. 😊
Okay, so enough of that. Some good things happened in November as well. Aly, through her wheeling and dealing resourcefulness, arranged to have her BFF from Kentucky, Sarah, Fly down to visit so they could go to the AJR concert in Tampa. And guess who got to chauffer? Me! My friend in Orlando let us crash with her for the night, and I actually dropped off the girls at the concert and spent the evening in a restaurant catching up with Kami! The concert sounded like a blast, but I think we each spent the evening the way we would enjoy it most.
The next day on our way out Aly wanted to stop by the Orlando temple for a quick pic. So gorgeous.
November was also the month that . . . Aly became an official adult! 😲 The funny thing about being an adult is, now all your presents are practical things like warm clothes for college. 😅 She is so ready though. Warm clothes mean moving out and moving on. We're excited for her to start her new adventure. We also went out to dinner as a family to celebrate and Aly chose none other than . . . Olive Garden. A family fave.
Proud of you Aly! It's been an exciting adventure having the privilege of raising you. And I can't wait to see all the wonderful things you do with your life. You got this!
Some random stuff . . .
So Kate has become quite the Perler master. She will just print out a picture from the internet and create Perler pictures without a pattern. Super amazing! (Above: a character from Kate's favorite book series: Keeper of the Lost Cities. Below: two characters from one of Kate's favorite Netflix series: Ladybug and Cat Noir.)
And finally, one of the good things about Aly going to the community college is that I get to see her during the day sometimes. I love the times I get to joke around, chat, and have serious discussions with her. It's also fun when we go surprise Kylie and go running with her at mile club!
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