Sunshine...please? and the fun job of car buying.

After 5 days straight of rain (which I won't complain about...really) I'm ready for the sun to work it's magic right along with the nice nitrogen that the rain brought. I won't have to water for a week. I worked half a day yesterday and then literally booked it out the door at noon because Brian and I went car shopping with the boys.

I am not great at negotiating. We weren't really ready to BUY a car yesterday, but wanting to test drive the Mazda CX9. There's a car down in Centennial that seemed to have everything we wanted (gadgets are FUN!) so we all piled in the truck and headed down. The boys loved the car and were, uh, very loud about it. Cardinal rule #1 killed: Never let the dealer know you LIKE the car. Brian had sent an email to the credit union to figure out what kind of loan we're approved for. Cardinal rule #2 killed: Have cash in hand so they can't bug you about financing!

We were so wrecked from trying to keep the boys on good behavior that I didn't get to use my stone face while talking to the dealer. I was pretty much obvious that I wanted the car, but wasn't ready to buy.

In the meantime...we found another CX9 in Longmont that is a year newer and has a lot fewer miles. Now we get to make another trip with the boys and check that one out. I'm working Tuesday, Thursday AND Friday of this week, so I'm not sure when we'll be able to go out, but at least we're really aware of the ins and outs of this car (thank you intrawebs!) and are prepared to give the dealer everything we've got.

In the meantime, last night I cleaned my van for everything it's worth and it's looks pretty good. I'll enjoy it being clean for, oh, a day...until the boys step back into it!