End of an Era

In 2003 Troy bought a car that if you would have asked me at the time was OK. It was a 93 Subaru Impreza. There is hardly anything fancy about it, it doesn't even have AWD. We met later that year and the car has been apart of us since then. About 3 years ago the car hit 200,000 miles. I told Troy we should sell it, and by something else that was newer and would be reliable. We have been a one car family for a number of years so having a reliable car is important. After I thought about it awhile we decided that since our Subaru had only been in the shop 3 times since owning it we would just keep driving it until it needed something serious, and then we would just sell it. In the mean time we have been saving for our next car. Well we finally decided the car was NEVER going to die so we decided that we would replace it when we needed something bigger then we would get a van or something like that. Well a few weeks ago we had a family member that was in need of a cheap yet reliable car, so we decided it was as good a time as any to sell our trusty little Subaru.

I'm really going to miss:

*The gas mileage

*Virtually repair free

*Bragging rights that we are driving a car with over 225,000 miles

Upon looking at cars I feel we were blessed to find a good deal on a 2006 Chrysler Town and Country. It has a lot of bells and whistles, and low miles. It was also less then we had saved up so now we have some money in our next car fund. I'm still getting used to the fact that I am now a van mom. We had a little over a week overlap where we owned both cars, and I kept finding reasons to drive the Subaru around. After we brought it home Troy said we sure do have a thing with going from having little to no space to an abundance of space. When we bought our home almost 3 years ago we went from a little, 700 sq/ft, 1 bedroom apartment to our 2000 sq/ft 4 bedroom home. Well now we have gone from our cramped little compact car to our spacious mini van.

When we got done looking at vans we ended up going to a Big Lots and bought a large storage container, and a full size ironing board. When Troy went out to put them in the car he came back to tell me he was afraid they weren't going to fit in our car. They were too long for the trunk and with both kids in the back there wasn't room in the little 1/2 space left. We finally got creative and put the storage container in front passenger seat. I got the 1/2 space in the back, and the ironing board was carefully placed running the length of the car, between me and the door. I though it was ironic how we had been looking at vehicles where we could have easily carried this load times 3, and here we were smashed in our little Subaru.

We are really going to miss our Subaru, and I'm still thrown off when I look in the garage and don't see our trusty Subaru. It will however be nice to have more space when we go camping or even just get groceries. Hopefully in 9 years I will like this van as much as I've grown to love our Subaru.