In the Land of Milk and Hondas

We got a van last month.  I find that I say that to people almost as if I'm sitting on the guilty side of the confession booth when really, I feel like shouting it to the rooftops!  We got a VAN!!!  And not just any van, but a Honda Odyssey.  This thing is bananas--enough room for a small country (exaggeration..maybe a city-state).  Tons of leg room with storage under the floor and a completely removable eighth seat.  Eight seats?!  Hellooo luxury!

I'd like to be cool enough to say that it pained me to get a van.  That I just couldn't bring myself to admit that we were now "van people".  That I yearned for my younger days, rattling around in a manual transmission white Toyota Camry.  Yeah, I do miss that little car, and am nostalgic about that time in our lives, but not enough to deny my true feelings about van-dom and to embrace the evolution of my wheels.  Perhaps this is because, growing up, we almost always had a van.  Four kids and a dog? You'd be crazy not to.  To up the "rad" quotient and impress you mightily, I'll share that it was this van.  Or, one almost exactly like it--and yes, we did kick-A stunts in it like this guy in the photos (not true--we drove it to basketball games, the grocery store, and Pittsburgh).

If it wasn't my early introduction to the convenience and comfort of the party bus, then it was definitely this video that got me fully on board.  I'm such an easy sell.  Swagger Wagon?!  Come on, who doesn't love that?

In addition to the Odyssey, we also rock out in our silver CR-V.  Jealous much?  We quickly realized that these two vehicles are among the most popular driven, at least in our area, and in order to always easily identify ours, we've left our mark on them by way of the Vermont peace sign magnet:

  

We bought these when we lived up north during the great ribbon magnet craze (2005-2007) and have held onto them ever since.  A reminder of our life before kids, I guess.  If you told me 4 years ago (when I bought this magnet) that I'd be slapping one of these babies onto a sweet-A mini-van, hustling around town with a sassy-mouthed preschooler and a chunky-thighed baby girl, I would have shaken my head in disbelief...but in secret, I'd be high-fiving myself for getting to van status.  Where my mother-fathers at?!