Car Shopping

As we can't bring our cars here to Okinawa, the military won't pay for the shipments, most have to try to buy a car or two as soon as possible. First step was to get a SOFA license and then it's up to you if you want to go through a dealer ship or if you want to try to buy one privately. We like the fact that if you have a problem with the car, you can take it back to the dealership and if there is something to complain about, you get it fixed. When you buy it from a private person, it's mostly "buy as is" here, and we didn't want to deal with that, even if you can get some really cheap cars privately as people have to sell when they are leaving the island.

We had some help from one of my husband's friends that has been stationed out here for about 1 1/2 and on the Friday night, while we were still in the hotel (one week after we arrived on the island) we went looking into different cars and he took us to different dealerships. There are many different kind of cars one can get of course, but what is very different to back in the states, is that most of them here are very small! Small narrow roads, very small parking lots bring a need for smaller cars too. As we still have the twins in big car seats that take up a lot of space, we can't fit Cassie in the middle of them in the second row, so we need a car that has three rows of seats. Most of them have then absolutely no space in the back for groceries or other things. Most cars with three rows also have very thin little benches and not real seats in the third row..very frustrating. So we went looking at a lot of different models to get an idea about what we really wanted and needed.

There are some really cute smaller cars here that I never have seen before, but here we see them a lot.

Like a little space ship.

Very typical advertisement of what's included. This was not the one from our car.

So, we looked around a lot, and we soon realized that the one car that we most likely would end up getting would be a Mazda MPV, it had three rows, and had the most space for everyone. We compared the prices and years of the car from a couple of dealerships, and we soon had made our decision.

Chris headed back the next day to complete some paperwork so they could start the process with getting the car ready for us. There were some new things regarding buying a car here in Okinawa, that is very different to back in the States, that we (read my husband...) had to read up on: road taxes, JCI etc and I'm not going into details here what it's all about, but if one is interested you can read some of it here. New laws, new rules and new everything. Lots to keep in mind!

We thought that we made a good choice, and were happy with the car. We got it ready the following Tuesday afternoon. And after running some errands on Wednesday, the engine lights came on!! Not happy, we went back to the dealership, who sent us to their garage. There, we were told that there were three problems showing up in the sensors in the engine! What? How in the world could this car then pass the JCI inspection the day prior? We were not happy to say the least! They kept the car there, parts had to be ordered from the mainland. Meanwhile, we got an old van to borrow from the dealership, as we needed a bigger car to get our things out of the hotel, and moved over to the apartment, as we were supposed to move in on the Thursday!

Chris and I drove over with most things to the new base with the loaner car in the evening, and then we slept one more night in the hotel. On Thursday, March 12, we packed up the rest, and checked out of the hotel. Driving up to our new home with the kids in the loaner car wasn't what we had planned, we got everything out, and Chris had to drive back to give back the car and get our car back in the afternoon.

Not a great start of our new car, but we hope that it will now be alright! We are also a bit spoiled with having had such a great new car back in the States, so we are not used to this "used car" and that some things aren't as great as we would like, but we deal with it! That's just the way it is here, you buy used cars, and sell them again after your tour is over and leave them behind. Too expensive to ship cars here and to ship them back to the States.

We will also buy a second car later on, it's hard to get used to the fact that we only have one car, when you are used to have your own and be able to go places at all times, not having to plan around my husband's work schedule. The weekends have been less relaxation and exploring so far, but more running errands and grocery shopping...

Hello March

March, already?! Sure, February is a short month, but still, where does time go? To say that I'm looking forward to March because it's a spring month, would be strange, as we've had spring for a long time, or if you consider temperatures, we've had summer already for awhile. Summer will for sure be here to stay here in March, so the picture is accurate for my climate and the weather is beautiful, warm, some days hot, but not as bad as in the "true" summer months, June, July, August, and September. October is then beautiful as March again, where it's nicer to spend the days outside.
We've had a busy weekend, or the whole last week was busy to say the least. The normal stuff going on, but also I've been without computer as Cassie has been working hard on her presentation and final Science Report that was due on Monday. For you that don't really know about these Science Projects, it's a big deal, and the final grade depends on it a lot. The project I think is worth about 200 points, and there are many factors to consider and to keep in mind. It's a lot of work, and our printer has not been working were well, and now decided to not work at all, which added more stress as we had to go to the library and when we didn't finish in time to go there, we had to go to Staples and print it out on Sunday. More about her project in a separate post.

 Here the preparations to put the board together, before printing all the pictures.

If the weekend was stressful, then yesterday for sure didn't start any different. First I spent the most of the morning with cleaning away the leftovers from the science project here at home, as our kitchen looked much like a chemistry lab, and there were jars, solutions and material everywhere. The dining room was filled with paper scraps from cutting and taping the index cards etc onto the Presentation Board, so the house was a mess. Add the normal messes that comes after a weekend that you haven't had time to clean up all the time. Having two soon 4 year old's turning the house up side down everyday, doesn't help..

Cleaning away our chemistry lab..

Copper Sulfate solution made this glass into a blue sculpture. At the bottom of this glass a surprise was hiding! These two crystals had grown at the bottom without us knowing, as we had finished the experiment with this solution.

When Cassie came home in the afternoon, I had to take the girls into town for Cassie's allergy shot and thereafter straight to the dermatologist with them. This was all in the same area, so I was sure that we'd be able to get to both appointments without a problem. Well, it wouldn't have been, if the car didn't decide to give up on me! I have had no problems with my car at all, and as I know next to nothing about cars, I freaked out a bit wanting to turn the car on, and all I heard was a scratching sound and all red lights went on!! What?! Tried again, and again but nothing.. Called Chris, that luckily was off work and home with Ben, what it could be, and he thought that it's the battery for sure, which also would make all the other lamps turn on. He went to drop Ben off at our friends house, and then came to help me out. Meanwhile, I had to cancel the dermatology for the girls, and call the Honda Dealership in town to see if they were still able to help me out and get me a new battery, as we were close to 5pm at this time. Also called a towing truck that came to help jump start the car, which was needed to get to the dealership. Chris had meanwhile gotten there, and he drove the Honda and I took the VW to the dealer ship to get a new battery. Luckily they were able to give good help fast, and even if we were there 5 minutes before closingtime, he was still very helpful and fixed the battery. From there, Chris went home with the girls to pick Ben up, and I took the VW to go directly to my Citizenship class. I didn't have time to eat anything as I was just in time for the class, so I was pretty starving when I came home at 9.45pm.

Ben had a big meltdown, with too much happening in a short time with everything being stressful, and he was wanting me, and luckily he was alright and had stopped crying when I came home, and was sitting with Chris on the sofa reading a book when I came. After a little snuggle, he soon went to sleep, and Isabella as well.

I was pretty beat myself at this time, and after watching some news I soon was off to bed myself. So, now I hope that the rest of the week will go smoothly and with less stress!

Approved!

Yes- the car seats are now installed with a small adjustment, and are now completely approved from the police department! Here in town it's where they check the car seats and help you if needed.

I'm so happy that we didn't have to return them and go through the stress of finding new ones! Chris went to the police department around noon, (yes he has vacation from September 1-September 12, and so far he has only worked 3 days out of them...) and came back with the good news. I'm so relieved, and feel very happy that the kids now are safe and comfy in the back!!

Our new car!!

2011 Honda Odyssey

It's here!! The first entry about our car shopping plans were in January, then in Spring we started  researching different vans, over the Summer there has been more and more researching, you can read about this journey here and here and a lot of negotiation to lots of different dealerships, where it looked very difficult for a while to get the one we wanted, they just now recently, called Chris and said that they were able to do a trade and get the one we wanted shipped to the dealership here in town. (We had looked into dealerships in other cities and also a few different states, because it was so hard to get one without waiting about 3 Months..so getting it here in town was a great almost not expected surprise!) With just a few days notice, Chris got everything organized and all the paperwork taken care of, and the car was getting shipped new off the truck to the dealership here in Hutchinson yesterday.

I had just put the twins down for their afternoon nap, and Pearl came over to stay with the kids while I dropped Chris off at the dealership, so he could bring the new car home. We are still missing a few accessories that we have already purchased, but as they only received the car yesterday, there was no time to install it all. So we had the choice to leave the car there and pick it up with everything on Tuesday or Wednesday (due to Labor Day on Monday), or we could have it without right away, and bring it back to add the rest next week. Well, as we of course wanted to use the car now over the weekend, it was an easy choice.

After the twins woke up, we put everyone in and went for a test drive in the country. I drove home, and it does feel so different from our VW Sedan, but I'm so happy with the car. So are the kids, the twins were so funny, being able to look outside, sitting higher in this car, and Cassandra having lots of room in the very back. We took out the 8th seat in the middle, second row, to have more space to move around in between the twins, and it worked great. Tried out the stroller in the back, and even if it does take up a lot of room, we are still able to fit a lot next to it like this, but when we go for a trip and bring luggage, we will of course fold down the 2 seat bench in the very back next to Cassie, to have much more storage room! But for every day use this will work just fine! When I go shopping, I'll leave the stroller at home anyway. I'm so excited, as this is the first car that we have really bought together and we have put in a lot of research into it. Chris has done an outstanding job with it all, and now I get to enjoy being mobile with the kids, where before we only had one car which of course made it more difficult to be spontaneous and we had to plan everything all the time. Not anymore! We are now able to travel all of us as a family without any problem, and we are all very comfortable! We are very happy to finally have it!

Cassie trying out the second row, here with the 8th seat in the middle still installed.

Looking good in the very front and in the very back!

Of course I had to check it out too! 

Here with the car seat bases installed and the 8th seat taken out...

Isabella and Benjamin enjoying the ride.

You are so far away sis!

What's up?

Labor Day Weekend

This weekend there is many people that has a 4 day weekend, as Monday is Labor Day. Well, most people...Chris as the boss has to give his recruiters a 96 (military term for a 4-day weekend or 96 hours...), so he is at work today anyway. Monday is treated as Sunday, which is the normal day when his guys get shipped to boot camp, so as his recruiters have off work, he has to work then as well....

Nothing new that he has to work even if most people has off - still frustrating as we never can plan for anything or do long weekend things that other people do.. AND he actually has holiday again! He had to take leave to reduce days on his account before October, and he is now supposed to be off from September 1-19, we'll see how many of those days he actually will have off! Needless to say, he already worked yesterday on his day off..

We don't have any big plans for the time when he has leave, Cassie will be in school anyway, but the Kansas State Fair will start on September 9, so we will for sure spend some days there with the family, as it's here in town, just around the corner from where we live. It will be fun and I'm very excited to take the kids. There is so much animals to see, shows, music and lots and lots of rides. Cassie will even have the Wednesday off School, so that all the kids can go and enjoy the Fair. Every night there is a big show with mostly Country Music stars. Lots to see! That will be fun for sure!

Something else that will be very fun and exciting is that we're getting our new car shipped to the dealership tomorrow, and we will be able to pick it up in the afternoon! That will be so great to finally have it, we have waited now for while and it was very difficult to find one as the dealerships had to trade cars with each other, as the production of these cars did run behind due to the earthquake and tsunami in Japan earlier this year.  Chris has done a great job talking to the dealers and finding and working out the best deal possible for us! Can't wait for tomorrow!!

Colors...

Sitting here with the color chart in front of me and have to make an decision. At least have a favorite one so that we can try to agree on which one to go with this weekend. We have to go forward with the process of buying the car, and there are so many choices, combinations and little nicknacks that one have to decide on. They are all nice - it's not an easy decisions!

Alabaster Silver Metallic / gray leather interior

Polished Metal Metallic / gray leather interior

Taffeta White / beige or truffle leather interior

Smoky Topaz Metallic / truffle leather interior

 Dark Red Cherry Pearl / beige leather interior

Chrystal Black Pearl / gray or truffle leather interior

 Celestial Blue Metallic / gray leather interior

Mocha Metallic / beige leather interior

Test drive

On July 2, me and Chris went to check out the two cars that we are looking into buying, see previous post about that and detailed pictures here. We wanted to compare and to test drive them, to get a better feeling in which one we like better. Luckily Pearl was able to come over and stay with Cassie and the twins so we could go to the dealerships here in town. Before they didn't have the cars that we wanted, and we would have to go to Wichita to be able to test drive them, but luckily now Chris had seen that they actually had gotten them in here in town, great, not having to go to Wichita with the kids, and to leave them half a day with the neighbor wouldn't work.

Honda Odyssey 2011

Toyota Sienna 2011

We both drove them, and we both felt good about both of the cars. There is things that we like about both of them and there is things we dislike (or like less) about both of them. Now we just have to sit down and really go through the lists of pro and cons and see what we come up with.