Hello new car

So I've been a bit slow in posting about this, but we finally bought a car. Not to replace Claude, but yes to replace Claude. We knew we would have had to up size from the Peugeot, which was only a three door (because the boot strangely counts as a door) to make room for the baby, but we said goodbye to Claude much earlier than we would have liked.

You may have noticed that the last few blogposts haven't included any photos. That's because my computer is currently having repairs done and I've been posting from my phone. Photos are much easier to do on the computer, but I will try and include a photo of our car somewhere in this post (to be honest, I'm not sure where in the post it'll turn up, but it'll be in here somewhere!).

The new car is a 2006 Mazda 3 sedan. 
Features include:

• black paint (wonderful in Aussie summers!),
• 6-speed manual (so you get into reverse by pushing the gear-stick down and to the left, very strange),
• red interior lights (so it feels like we're on an imperial ship),
• temperature control air-conditioning (no more too cold with air-con and too hot without it),
• 6 disk CD player (we could fit more than half of our Sherlock audiobook disks in at once if we wanted to!),
• Cruise control (which I really enjoyed using on our drive down to Melbourne yesterday),
• A sneaky aux plug (at first we thought there wasn't one, but I found it in the centre console with a little gap in the lid for the cable to poke out, how clever!),
• and the indicator is on the right side (the right side) because it's not a European car (sorry Claude).

We haven't named the car yet. Naming is tricky, and we've also got a far more important naming to think through at the moment. Any ideas for the name of our car?

Overall, we're very pleased with the car and thankful for God's provision: both in the money to buy it, and in our finding this car.

Thankful Thursday

Oops.  It’s Thursday again.  I had at least two posts that I wanted to write before we got here.  One was about the space thing I mentioned last time.  I guess that will have to wait, sorry. 

Here are some of the things I am thankful for this week:

Breakfast date and good advice
J and I went out for a breakfast date on Saturday.  We were already up early because our community had its annual photo that morning.  We had heard about a nice cafe just down the road and decided this was a great opportunity to check it out.  When we got there I saw that the menu had Nutella bombs! 

Now I understand if you don’t know what a Nutella bomb is; I myself only learnt about them a couple of months ago.  It is basically a Nutella milkshake, usually with a jam (or Nutella?) filled doughnut sitting on top of the glass with the straw pushed through it.  I’ve never had one before, so all this is just what I’ve heard from others.  The Nutella bomb at this cafe had a chocolate brownie on the top. 

I really wanted to get one, I’ve never tried it before and I LOVE Nutella.  But J convinced me that I wouldn’t be able to fit it in with breakfast as well.  So I made him promise that we’d come back some other time for a Nutella bomb.  Actually, I don’t think I made him promise, I just told him that we had to come back another time. 

This is what they look like.  When I tried to search online for Nutella bomb I couldn’t find it but it turns out the rest of the world (or just Sydney?) calls them Tella Ball Shakes.  If you click on the picture you can get the story about how they were created/invented. 

At the end of breakfast I realised J was right.  I’d only had a bowl of toasted museli with berries and yoghurt, with a glass of fresh juice, but I knew I definitely couldn’t have fit a Nutella bomb in as well.  Sorry I don’t have a picture of the food (it was delicious), but I’ve never been in the habit of taking photos of my food.  But when I have a Nutella bomb or Tella Ball Shake I’ll try to remember to take a photo!

A driver swap
As you know, our community organises a car pool to get to and from college each day.  This week I’m thankful for the driver who was willing to swap times with J and I so that we could get home a little bit earlier for an appointment we had to get to. 

Final assignment done!
Last night I submitted my final assignment (ever! J said, but I told him to never say never, or ever).  As far as final assignments go it was a pretty easy one to finish on.  It was the second of a two part research assignment where we had to reflect upon an application of our research and what we have learnt through the process.  And as maybe you can tell by the name of this blog, I don’t mind reflecting much at all. 

What are you thankful for this week?

Goodbye Claude

Last week, we were driving home from our anniversary dinner.  I was driving because J doesn’t like to drive when he’s had some alcohol.  Part of the drive home involved a long left-turning lane, at an intersection, with a stop sign at the end.  J reminded me of the stop sign so I pressed on the brake.  And then we were jolted forward. 

The car behind us had hit us.  Perhaps he wasn’t expecting me to stop, maybe I did stop too suddenly.  He was following too close behind and maybe he was looking for oncoming traffic like I was, instead of looking at the car in front of him.

I’ve never been in a car accident so I had no idea what to do.  I'm so glad J was with me. The man in the car behind me got out and apologised, and asked me to pull over on the road we were intending to turn onto.  We exchanged details about insurance and license and then went our separate ways.  

After taking the car to the insurance-approved smash repairer it turns out that our car wasn’t worth the money it would cost to fix it.  Or to put it another way, the cost to fix it was more than the car was insured for.  So that means it has been written off, not deemed worth driving anymore.  

Our car was a Peugeot.  J bought it as his first car when he started full-time work.  Since it was French he wanted to name it with a French name and "Claude" was chosen.  We prayed over the car, that it would be used for ministry and its seats shared with friends.  It got us between state capital cities a number of times.  I learnt how to drive a manual in that car.  We’ve used it to help a stranded stranger and to car-pool colleagues.  

We handed Claude in on Wednesday.  It was only fitting that we also had a bit of a wake.  J wanted to buy a croissant or baguette in memoriam, but we couldn’t find any in the bakery we walked into.  So we settled for a crème brûlée and a macaroon.  We ate them at home in Claude’s now empty car space.  

But despite the sadness over losing our car, there are a number of things we are thankful for.  Firstly, we’re glad that this happened during the holidays while the college car-pool isn’t operating.  We’re thankful that it was only a small crash (we were stationary and it was only a small bump) and we weren’t injured.  We’re also thankful for the friends who have let us borrow their car while they are away on holidays.  Another friend has offered us his dad’s old car to use until the registration runs out.  We'll be looking to buy a new car but we’re thankful that we don’t have to rush about it.  

Farewell Claude.  We have many happy memories with you.