Lets Try Again!

Following the disastrous episode with the Previa, which I am now selling on Ebay (3 watchers so hopefully will go tomorrow) for as much as I can get for it, we are trying again, but this time we have bought a 9 seater Tourneo. Paul is going down to Gt Yarmouth to collect and pay for it on Friday and staying over with some friends in Kings Lynn. It'll be good for him to catch up with them too as we haven't seen them in WAY too long.

It's very scary buying another car from Ebay, but is really our only choice with the money we had (our savings) and the fact that we are unable to get credit (past history) and therefore finance is not an option - not that we want it anyway. We would rather not have debt hanging over our heads these days. God willing this will be a great car for us and as it has been 6 monthly MOT'd I can't see why it wouldn't be. We won't have any money left for repairs for a while so I pray it doesn't go wrong or need anything at all until we have built up a little fund for it - which is what we have to do.

It'll be lovely to travel as a whole family and will save the added expense of me and train fares. The added bonus for us is the roof rack of course :) That was something we were thinking we might have to add for our camping trips anyway, so we are saved that expense. No tow bar, so, unless we had one fitted, a trailer is not an option, but we will wait and see how much we can pack into the bus itself! We have hired a Tourneo before (about 6 years ago my Mum drove us to Chester Zoo for the day) and it was a comfortable drive with lots of boot space, so I'm hoping for many happy holidays in this one. P says it will be a little odd to go back to manual again, but he has been using Mum's car this last week so I think he is back in the swing of it. Shame it's not an auto though - I was more keen to learn with the Previa because it was. Maybe I will just stick to letting P do the ferrying and I will stick to walking with the kids when I need to. I have no desire to drive really and the thought of driving a bus, well, it's just a bit too much for me!

On another note (and probably more important in many ways)...
JI turned 10 on Friday! It wasn't the most exciting BD for him because he didn't get much in the way of pressies. He wants a drum kit, so the deal was that all his BD and Christmas money would go towards getting one. As we don't have all the money in yet and what with the car... we didn't have the money to put up front for a kit before Christmas (as we had hoped to) :( He is mad into Gogos atm, so his day was made with a gogos sticker book and several packs of the same from various corners of his world + a 'Stig sticker book' that Paul got him as a little something to open. He was chuffed with that so generally happy enough and then today P took him and his 3 best 'mates' to see High School Musical 3 followed by a MacDonalds. So he's a satisfied lad, although the sooner the drums are purchased the better in his eyes - of course!

On my part - I can't believe I have two sons in double figures already! Where did that time go?! before I blink N will be 10 too - and I will be grey (although thankfully no signs of that yet)!