Our Inspired Journey

After it being posted on Craig's List for a week, we had a buyer for our car! What a blessing! I can't help but share the crazy events that unfolded the day we watched the Bronco drive away for the last time...

Our buyer was a high school boy who had specifically been looking for a Bronco...perfect :) After coming once to look at it and agreeing to buy it, he and his friend drove out a few days later to actually purchase and drive away with the truck. They arrived that afternoon at the agreed time, and John was running a little late getting home from school. They waited for about 15 minutes before John comes driving up to the house in our other car. He races in the house to get the envelope he had made up the night before, with all the necessary paperwork along with the keys to give the new owner. As he is gathering up the paperwork, the keys are not where he left them! He then races through the house checking a few more places before looking in the car, to see them hanging from the ignition...the problem is, the car is locked! Embarrassed, he quickly calls AAA right away to get someone to come unlock the car. Unfortunately, our account with AAA was still registered in CA and it ended taking 30 minutes for them to figure out how to switch our account to an IL branch and contact the right tow truck to come help us! The tow truck was of course late also, so by the time he came, the poor boys who were buying the truck had been waiting over an hour to drive away with their new car. Once the AAA guy came, we figured all our problems were finally over and we could finally give the boys the keys to their truck and see them off...oh, no...it wasn't that easy! When John tried to start up the truck, he realized the stereo had been left on, and so the battery was dead. Thankfully the tow truck hadn't left yet, so he gets his jumper cables out in order to jump start the truck....all as our buyer watches...wonderful. Then, John jumps down from the truck to lift the hood and the hood is stuck...never in all the years we've owned it has this happened, but of course, on the day we're selling it...the hood won't open! It took several tries before John finally got the hood to open, and the car was jump started successfully! Yes...the boys finally got their truck that they still wanted even after waiting all that time! We offered to buy them dinner for their trouble but they wouldn't accept. They really were sweet boys and we're so glad that someone who really wanted it, has it now :) Whew! What a day...

Goodbye Bronco!

After we sold the Bronco, we began looking for a car with a 3rd row that could fit 4 car seats in it. Never in my life would I have thought this would be a search of mine :) Thankfully, God has better plans than I do, because I LOVE my 4 kiddos! We asked my Dad if he would help us look out in CA as well, since prices seemed to be better out in LA than where we were looking here in IL. We spent weeks making lists of cars for my Dad to go see in the LA area. We called on a few and my Dad was ready to go test drive a bunch for us and let us know what he thought of them after seeing them up close.

Then one night, we got a call from my Dad. He said he found the perfect car. We were wondering which one it was off our list! My Dad has a great eye for good buys, so I was so excited one of the cars we'd found met his approval close up...He began describing the car...2003, blue, leather interior, 60,000 miles and in our price range...what??? This was not one of the cars on our list...we didn't find anything that had that low of mileage with leather and in our price range! Now we were getting really excited that Dad had found something we hadn't! "Where did you find this car, Dad???" I asked excitedly...

"Well, he said...I was thinking about my car!"

When I stopped to think about it, what he described WAS his car. My Dad had a 2003 navy blue Ford Excursion that he bought new 7 years ago and he had babied ever since. The reason his car never came up in my mind when he was describing it is because I never, in a million years thought he'd ever part with his car! In fact, in all the years he has owned it, we have taken many family trips together in it but I have never been in the drivers seat, let alone driven it! My Dad takes extremely good care of the things he is blessed to own, making sure they last as long as they can before having to be replaced. He intended to own this truck for as long as it would run. When he said over the phone that after all the searching he'd done on our behalf, he'd decided HIS car would be the best option for us, I was floored. I started crying because I couldn't believe my Dad was saying he'd give us HIS BEST....not his oldest or most used, but his BEST...the car that had never been eaten in or parked in he sun (if at ALL possible) was being offered to our family of 6 with 4 kids under the age of 5. I could hardly believe my ears...

My Dad gave us an incredibly tangible example of giving the way God does and call US to as well...He ALWAYS gives us His BEST and calls us to do the same. There are no hand-me-down, left-over blessings from God. They are always His BEST and perfect for us if we stop long enough to accept and see HIM in the giving. And for those of you still searching...trust me...God's best is the BEST option for us...He gave us His SON so we'd never wonder about His love for us...there is no greater love than THIS, that a man would lay down his life for his friend. This has been done for YOU and me...accept His BEST for you today! I know how tiring searching can be...what a blessing that we can stop searching and rest in the love of the maker of our hearts and the stars today :)

Dad then went on to say that after praying about it, he felt that the Lord had prompted him to offer us his car at the price we were going to pay for the others we had been searching for. You have to know, this was practically a STEAL...The other cars were much older with way more miles on them. He said he felt this was possibly the reason he had bought the car in the first place...

So after the shock wore off (it still hasn't, really) and we accepted this incredible gift with thankful hearts...we made arrangements to have the truck shipped from CA to IL. It arrived right after Rylee was born and right before my Dad came to visit us and the kids, before flying back with my mom to CA.

Being the biggest car ever built (I'm convinced) it fits us all wonderfully and shocking still to me...we fill it up with our new family of 6 :)

Washing it is fun...we have to use a ladder :)

And get all 12 hands to help!

Rylee's not quite there yet, but the others have a blast!

One of the crazy things is, for such a big car, it gets great gas mileage since it is a Diesel engine...yes, this means it will also last us for 20 more years if we take good care of it :) I told Ryder he'll be learning to drive in this car! Kinda like I learned to drive in the Bronco...I guess our family likes to start out big :)

More than anything...John and I have been so blessed by the thought of my Dad giving us his best. May we never hold onto our things so tightly that we miss the blessing God may have for us in the process of giving...

Please trust me as I speak as a recipient of so many blessings, the intangible things I've received from the Lord cannot compare to ANYthing I own that you can see. All these blessings only make me want to give more and hold more loosely to things of this world that for now, I call my own. My Dad is always the first one in my life to remind me that nothing we own belongs to us anyway...it is all from the Lord for His glory. I can't wait to see what He has up His sleeve for us as we drive through life in a very big truck :)...I can't see the plans now, but they've GOT to be BIG! That's the way we roll....now!