New Ride!

So I mentioned that we were in the market for an upgrade from the Subaru.  Mostly, I was sick of cramming 4 adults, a car seat, a 75 lb dog and a stroller into the car anytime anyone visited.  It generally resulted in me basically sitting on Andy's mom's (or my mom's) lap in the backseat while Olivia kicked one of us for sitting too close, Ripley moped because he was crammed in the back, and the men rode in style in the front.  No more! I demanded a third row.  Once we paid off the Subaru we started looking around, but not too seriously.  

One Saturday a few weeks ago, Andy took the Subaru in for routine service at the dealership.  While he was there, he popped over to the Volvo dealership next door to "check things out" and maybe take the new XC90 for a spin.  We'd always been interested in the Volvo since they're incredibly safe and great in the snow and the XC90 had received rave reviews from my sister after she bought one around the same time we got the Subaru.  Oh, did I mention it's a super attractive car, too?

I think so anyway...though this is kind of a mom color

So I went to take Ripley and Olive for a walk when he was gone, and when I got back, there was a Volvo in my driveway waiting for me to take it on my own test drive.  I fell in love immediately (because it's SO EXPENSIVE), but hated the colors/interior of the two they had left on the lot.  So we decided to think about it and drive some other cars.  We tried the Honda Pilot (dislike) and the Acura MDX (loved it! Almost bought it!) and also the Toyota Highlander (also liked it).  You should never drive the MOST expensive car you're thinking about buying first though.

After a whirlwind weekend of driving around, we decided to put a refundable deposit down on an XC90 that was en route from Sweden or somewhere and wait patiently until it arrived.  This is probably weird to most of you, who are probably in a state where there is more than one Volvo dealership within 1,000 miles, so if they didn't have what you wanted you could just go somewhere else or have a dealer from nearby transfer a car to your closest location. After being in Alaska for almost four years, I am totally used to delayed (or no) gratification when I want to buy something (oh, online merchant, you do free shipping "throughout the U.S." but you don't ship to Alaska? TOTALLY REASONABLE. Please take my money).  After a few weeks, we finally got the call and we picked up our new car on Friday! 

Olive immediately climbed all over it while we checked it out.  Black leather SHOULD be more kid friendly than the gray cloth interior in the Subaru, right? 

Buying a car, as you probably know, is a ridiculously time consuming paperwork-intensive process which should never, under any circumstances involve a toddler.  Unfortunately, we have one of those.

Thankfully, they had some cars in the show room to play with.  She was trying to sell us hard on the Miata.

In...Out...In...Out!

She had a change of heart when she saw the little blue wagon.  A little more family friendly, Olive, good choice.

Then I realized the sheer brilliance of buying a tiny sports car.  Andy takes the kid places and I stay home because there's no room for me.  SIGN ME UP.

After about three hours and an epic, totally embarrassing, toddler meltdown in the lobby of the dealership (not pictured), we took our car home!! I didn't take any pictures of the momentous occasion because by the time we got the car seat in the car and got the tutorial on the "command center," Olive was beyond over it.  Poor kid.  Fortunately for her, we won't be able to afford another car anytime soon, so she's fine.  In fact, she'll probably end up driving this car in 14 years.

On Sunday, the weather was absolutely spectacular so we decided to take a mini road trip out to Portage to enjoy the scenery and the sun.

She's more interested in her mittens than me.  Figures.

 There she is!

We took the short, easy hike up to Byron Glacier.  As you can see, the weather was pretty awesome.  About 40 degrees (hey that's warm for this time of year!) and gorgeous.

Olivia was grouchy the whole time.  When we got back to the parking lot, she kicked off her boot and when I picked it up, I saw that she had a GOLFBALL-sized plastic ladybug inside her boot the entire time.  No wonder she was uncomfortable.  I'm still not sure how I got the boot on her foot with that in there. (or how it got there in the first place)

The glacier was in fine form.

And the ice was really blue and beautiful.

Just like the sky...

I had boots on, so I could walk around in the stream and get close to the glacier.  Just like all the warning signs tell you not to do.

Awesome!

Ripley also enjoyed himself, the hike, and the fact that he has about twice as much space in the new car.

So that's the story of the new car.  Goodbye little 'ru! We bought you two days after we got married and we took you on all of our adventures.  You were a trooper hauling a bunch of our stuff (and two cats!) up the ALCAN and you brought our baby home! You held up well to everything Olivia threw at you (literally...mostly things that stained) these last several months.  You're a great car and you're going to make another family very happy very soon.  See you around town!

The 'ru in her element...somewhere in Northern B.C. on the ALCAN - April 2012