The Week From H-E- Double Hockey Sticks

Let's start with the basic facts~

-We signed a contract the week before this to have some of our flooring redone starting Wednesday of last week.
-Our AC broke on the Friday before last week and we couldn't get a repairman until Tuesday.

-Nate's car died that same Friday. We found out Monday that the repair cost could exceed the value of the car.

So that's how we ended up at my parent's house on Saturday night waiting for our AC to be fixed and then, subsequently, keeping the kids out of the way of the flooring guys. We were there until the next Saturday night and they were AMAZING hosts/helps during a rough week of car shopping and workmen supervising.

The car shopping was.... well, a bit of a nightmare. The car market is insane right now with super high prices on used cars and very limited inventory. After hours of online searching, we thought we had found the car for us and were on our way to purchase before Nate spoke to his mechanic who said, "Why would you do that to yourself?". Apparently maintenance and repairs on that particular car are VERY expensive..... so that was out.

This let down was followed by endless hours of searching, calling dealers and individual owners and being told over and over that the car just sold. But then we found it! We found a car being sold by owner that looked perfect and was the right cost. The owner was a bit slow to set up a meeting, but eventually we test drove the car and put a deposit on it. We agreed to meet to have it inspected and find out why the check engine light had come on. Well, the check engine light ended up NOT being a minor thing and the owner was all of the sudden in a hurry to get the car back and wanted to sell it to someone else who didn't plan on inspecting it first. Fine by us... car gone, deposit returned, back to square one on Saturday at noon.

Man were we tired of looking for cars! We decided to make a trip to a local dealer that had a good selection of cars online in our price range.... and we found our car! We sat down with the salesman and submitted our offer. Well, it turns out that while we were discussing price, someone else was putting a deposit down on the car. They now had until 6pm to show up with financing (this was 3:30 pm....they couldn't afford to pay cash and possibly didn't qualify for in house financing) and if they didn't make the deadline, the car was ours. We went home to sweat it out and came back to the dealership at 6.... they weren't there! But they wanted to contact them first just to make sure. Turns out they were on their way, they had the financing and were just running a half hour behind. BLAH!!!

Anyhoo, we made one last stop at another dealership and found.... the same car! One year newer, a lower trim level, but 35,000 LESS miles. It was a bit more expensive, but it was still a great deal and we're DONE. Ahhhh, deep breath. So I would like to introduce you to the newest member of our family....

Isn't he cute? He is SPOTLESS inside and out and has been kept in great condition. I'm so glad to have him (even though it wasn't what we thought we were looking for) and I'm so glad to be done shopping.