Car! Car! Car!

Today I ran errands, with a car, while Ryan was at work!!!  From January-May, Ryan was able to take public transit to work, but he moved to a different job and there is no easy public transit to where he needs to go.  Since May he has been driving to work each day and I have been home with no car.  This job is about an hour's drive away (that's how big Houston is) and it's not feasible for me to drive him there.  We don't really want to buy a new car until we have a little more job security, and even then I think we'd just like to move really close to where he would work and continue with one car.

It was a struggle, but I think I did very well not being able to get out during the day.  The heat made it worse, since I couldn't even take Willa for a walk somewhere; however, we traveled a lot during the summer and I just got used to really being STAY-AT-HOME!  Thank goodness for our apartment's swimming pool, I think it kept both Willa and me sane.  One of the hard parts of not having a car during the day meant that I had to do all errands and grocery shopping during the evenings or on Saturdays.  This is not fun because that's the only time to be with Ryan!  It was so great to get things done today without having to crowd our weekend out!  Still, I learned a lot by staying home.  I think our grocery bill went down because I really had to plan out our meals for the week and then just go to the store once.

Ryan's parents got a new car and brought their old car out to Houston for us to use.  Thank you!!!  They drove in on Friday and flew out this morning.  Besides being excited about having a second car, we were thrilled to see them.

We got all kinds of projects done while they were here!  Plus, not only do we have a car, we have a baby gate around the harps, a new carseat, and a box of delicious German chocolate bars that Melinda bought at Aldi and brought down for us.  Does anyone else have Aldi?  I've only gone to it in Ohio and it is amazing, I wish they had it here!  You save so much time at the store by not having to make decisions.  I need ketchup, there's only one brand of ketchup there so there is no dithering about Heinz or Hunt's or Kroger's brand.  Plus, with all those less decisions, the store is small and it doesn't take long to walk through.

Here is Willa playing with a little toy that I found at a garage sale on our morning run last Friday.  I don't normally stop at every garage sale, but we've been in the market for a changing table and we finally had success!  Since I was already buying something, I decided that I might as well get something fun because who can resist that cute face?!  She has fun crawling in and out of the little door.  It was perfect timing for the changing table, too!  Ryan's dad was able to help with a weekend paint job, pictures coming soon!

Grandma Daniels and Willa.  We didn't get many pictures, but I think our Skype chats are doing the trick.  Willa wasn't very shy and had fun playing with grandma and grandpa!  She thought grandma was especially hilarious sometimes.