Reflections. . .

This week has definately been a week to look back and reflect for me and it all came to the surface while watching President Obama be sworn in yesterday morning. Putting political party affiliation aside you have to admit that history was made yesterday. I couldn't help but get chills watching and thinking about our country and what it has been through. It's kinda what I have been thinking about with my life this past week. 

It all started with Craig's List. I listed our Sentra and a dining room table and sold both.

And while I am excited about the money earned and the new found space in our garage it was a little sad to say goodbye to them. 

This table was the first "real" furniture purchase that we made. The $29.99 entertainment center from Walmart or the "free" couches from some guy in provo don't count. We paid real money for this table. We bought it when we moved from Provo to Ogden because our house in Ogden had a little dining room and there was no way the card table given to us at our wedding which we had been using as a kitchen table was going in a dining room.

It served it's purpose well, but when we bought this house it just didn't go. I was willing to deal with it until I found the perfect table at Costco.

 So it has taken up space in our garage for over a year and I decided it was time to sell it.

This was the first car that Kyle and I bought together. I still remember sitting at the table in the dealership (and the pushy salesman). We drove that car home with about 2,500 miles on it and it was being driven away by a new owner with 208,000 miles on it. 

Those miles are memories to me.

(here's where it gets long - feel free to opt out now)

I remember when it was our only car for quite a while - like years. I remember that I worked 8:00 - 5:00 and Kyle worked 3:00pm  - 11:00pm. So I remember I would go to work at 8:00am then I would take my lunch at 2:30 pm and I would pick Kyle up and take him to work (it was 1/2 hour from our house) at 3:00 pm  - get back from lunch at 3:30 - leave work at 5:00 and wait until 10:30 pm when I would leave to go and pick him up at 11:00. We made it work - somehow.

I remember bringing our first baby home from the hospital in that car.

(I even remember my friend Lyndsey coming over to visit and we had already put the car seat in the car and when she saw the seat through the window she thought we had already had the baby)

I remember driving that car from California to Idaho when we got the phone call that my mom wouldn't make it through the night. 

I remember driving that car home from Thanksgiving once and going through a really bad snow storm and sliding all over the road, but it kept us safe.

I remember a Sunday drive when we got a flat tire (I was driving).

I remember somehow getting Christmas trees on top of it and back home to our little house.

I remember we took a vacation to Morro Bay, California for a family reunion and we had just bought bikes and we strapped those bikes to a bike rack on the back of that little car and for the 13+ hour drive we were both so nervous that the bikes were going to fall off. I stared out the back window the entire trip.

I remember once when we lived in Ogden, we stayed out late at friends house playing games and when it was time to go home the ground was covered with snow. Any way you took to our house you had to go up a hill. It was after midnight and we had to try at least 4 different streets to get home because our little car would not make it up the hills without slipping back down. 

I remember soon after we moved to California - Kyle was in law school at night on the weekdays and then worked graveyards on the weekends. I got a job nannying for a family all day on the weekdays. The only time I saw Kyle was when he was picking me up and dropping me off to work. (this job only lasted a about 6 months) but almost every ounce of communication between us for those 6 months took place in that car.

Soon after I took another nannying job for a family who needed a sitter in the evenings. So Kyle would drop me off at 5:00 pm then he would go to school and around 10:30 every night he would come by to pick Kale and I up again. There were some nights I would just sit by the window waiting for that little white car to pull up because it meant my night was almost over.

I remember date nights and drives for no reason.

 

I remember taking Kale to the hospital for stitches when he cracked his head open and him being worried about getting blood on "daddy's car" (Kyle did take really, really good care of that car).

I remember late night runs to the store for things such as diapers or ice cream.

I remember early Saturday morning trips to the Oakland Temple.

I just remember that car.

I should be excited that we are moving on to bigger and better things. I LOVE my new dining room table. I can't imagine the room without it and Kyle's new truck is AMAZING. 

So while it's exciting to have the NEW, I can't help but reflect on the OLD.