New wheels!!! (and some unsolicited credit advice for you)

The day I kicked my car to the curb was among the happiest of my life.

Here's a little back story on why I hated it so:

In 2008, my (first) husband and I split up. The year prior to that, I had gotten in a wreck and had to get a different car. I picked a yellow PT Cruiser, which I absolutely adored. Seriously tied for first place with the teal Geo Metro Convertible (that looked like a roller skate) that I drove between the ages of 18-25 {1995-2001 - yes, I'm old}). I adored, adored, adored the PT Cruiser. They re not everyone's cup of tea, but I like kind of odd looking cars, and I sure don't mind the odd colors, either. It sat up higher than a regular car, I loved the yellow dash and the fact that I had only ever seen one other one that color! I had the best time in that dang car.

However, I made a grave error when we purchased ol' PT. I was between jobs, and chose not to put my name on the loan, just my husband's. BE YE NOT SO IGNORANT.

When we split, he chose to decide to take that car (and his existing vehicle) and trade them both in for something new. Never mind that I was gainfully employed by that time and making the payments. Given the circumstances, I can't really blame him. I was left with a short window of time with which to purchase something on my own.

After going to the first dealership, I made a startling discovery. My credit score was 0. Yes, ZERO. I didn't even know it was possible, but it turns out when you have no forward-moving credit in 3 years, that is what happens. Since I had not had a car loan in my name in some years, never had a credit card and we had sold our house 3+ years ago, that left yours truly with no forward-moving credit and no credit score whatsoever. I shopped around, but could not get a loan anywhere without a co-signer.

In a last-ditch effort, I went to JD Byrider. Please don't ever go there unless your situation is as desperate as mine was. I had to buy a car THAT DAY or I would be without transportation. My ex-husband was trading the PT Cruiser in the next day.

They didn't have much to choose from, so I picked the least "look at me" car with the lowest mileage I could find. A black 2004 Cavalier that looked like every other black 4-door car to me. With the 19.99999% interest I had to pay (the highest allowed by law), I was paying $400 a month for the damn thing. $100 more a month than the PT Cruiser. And on only MY salary, which was stretched to the limit as is, even though I was working 2 jobs.

I will never forget the night I drove it home from the dealership. I was on the interstate and glanced down at my spedometer to see how fast I was going and was met by a shock - it only said 10MPH. The damn dash was broken. I cried all the way home.

After that, the dash worked part time for a while before deciding to crap out altogether. I never knew how fast I was going or how much fuel I had (had to set the trip odometer and estimate). Josh broke the visor on the driver's side. I spilled bleach on the back floorboard when I moved. The trunk light was hanging by a wire and set Josh's suitcase on fire when he was packing the trunk for an out of town trip. The paint started chunking off. And I was upside down on the stupid thing. The brakes needed fixed twice in six months. It died on me in the middle of a busy road two weeks ago.

Finally, finally, finally, we got the car paid down enough (and it started costing us too much money to fix things to keep it) to trade it in. They no longer make PT Cruisers and Josh hates them anyway.

We agreed on a Chevy HHR. They don't make them anymore, either, but the 2011's were very reasonably priced.

We went to the dealership Saturday and drove one. It was fairly standard. Cloth seats and such, but XM radio, low miles, etc. We really liked it and were going to buy it when the salesman walked us around to look at others in different colors. That's when we fell in love. The one we fell hard for was the same color as the one we had just driven, but we opened the door to find leather interior. Heated seats. A sunroof. 10,000 less miles and only $1500 more. Hello. We bought her.

Meet Helena Helena Rodriguez (HHR):





It was a very good day.

Another one for the "better late than never" file.

I think I am still suffering from a post-holiday hangover! The holidays were definitely hectic, to say the least.

We traveled to Ohio for the Christmas holiday. We drove up the evening of the 22nd. The drive just seems to get more and more brutal each time. Eight hours, at night, with three dogs? Bru-tal! And once you pass Cincinnati, there is pretty much nothing until you get to Toledo. So you're tired and cranky, and sick of everything that is on the radio already, and you still have 3 more hours to go. Arrgh!



Of course, somehow on the 23rd we managed to rally and head to IKEA!







Until we get one close to Nashville, it will never cease to be exciting to me! I don't even remember what all we bought. Not much. Some flowerpots, frames and little things like that. We were going to get new couch and ottoman covers, but we backed out at the last minute (Josh wanted red and I wanted grey). Good thing we chose not to purchase them (over a $300 purchase for the colors I wanted and we've had some car repairs to take care of since then).

Christmas was good. Went to Mom's church, which always has a great Christmas service, even though I am not particularly a church person.

My sister made these lovely cookies:



Pablo greatly enjoyed all the fat squirrels up north and tried to climb my mom's trees in hopes of getting them.



We drank a lot of Tim Horton's Iced Capps (and ate a lot of sandwiches, bagels and donut holes there, too):



Oh, how I wish we had a Tim's down here!

My Dad got a giant sock monkey:



It will look nice under his sock monkey tree:



I got a record player, which I am really excited about. It was fun to drag out my old records from the garage and give them a listen this past weekend. Josh got a kindle, which he really loves, and we also got a convection oven that he is really loving and using for everything - even toast! I haven't quite mastered it yet.



Once we came back to Nashville, we had two more Christmases. The first was with Josh's mom. She always buys us Christmas jammies and it's a lot of fun. See?







I love my sweet seester-in-law:



And my precious brother-in-law, too. Soglad they came in from Colorado!



The next day (or maybe 2 days after that, I can't remember), we hosted another Christmas at our little house, this time with his dad and siblings (I haven't uploaded the photos yet). I was really proud of myself because I actually DELEGATED for once in my life. Usually when I host something, I am all about making it as complicated as possible and doing it all myself. Not this time. I went with easy recipes (a cilantro-ranch-jalapeno dip, cream cheese chicken cili in the crockpot and hot chocolate also in the crockpot), and I asked Josh's dad to bring the rice to put the chili over and the garlic bread, and his siblings to bring wine. It all turned out great and was pretty low stress! I didn't even bust out the cloth napkins.

I hope everyone had wonderful holidays and may you have a wonderful 2012!