VAN
First thought, "YAY!!! We’re pregnant again!!!!" (Timeline is 2014 ish and baby number three ) The thought immediately following that - “POOP (seems to be a theme word around our house), we don’t have a car big enough to hold our current kids AND the new baby”. Three car seats just don’t fit into the back of a little Honda Civic, believe me, we’d tried. . So, option one: strap a carseat to the roof(not ideal), or option two: get a bigger car. You’d be pleased to know we went with option two and started researching and looking for mini vans . After a few seconds of looking, we came to the conclusion that a car payment wasn’t much of an option for us. We needed a large vehicle, preferably a van, and something that was in our budget. So I thought, “we should start praying for this, cause, well, that’s just IMPOSSIBLE.”
Life went on, and I kept praying every so often when I thought about it. I’d see a van while driving on the road and do one of those half prayers half just talking out loud like a crazy person, “ oh ya, by the way, we still need one of those….”
I decided at some point to post that we needed a van on social media (why hadn’t I thought about this before?) just to put it out there. We got a call - from Joe’s Aunt Jenny. It just so happened that they had a van that she had used for her 4 kids. It was a 2000 model, needed some work, but was great for kids ( which meant for me that bottles, diapers, spilled juice, and smashed fruit snacks wouldn’t stress me out!. ) Thank you Jesus because the thought of trying to keep a new van clean with three little ones made me feel the need to take long deep breaths into a brown paper bag.
Aunt Jenny and her husband, James, offered us the van, and without hesitation joe and I screamed(on the inside of course) , “YES!!!! WE’LL TAKE IT!!!” Joe’s grandparents graciously drove the van up to us a month or so before our Ailey girl was born.
And just like that, we were proud owners of a mini van.
Li’l joe ( my oldest) and I were talking about naming the van (Cause, ya know, ya got name your transportation …) and when I asked what he thought we should call it, he said in the most profound tone , “Van”. Talk about calling it like it is. We have a van, so its name is Van. We needed a van, God gave us one, plain and simple.
I originally wrote this post months ago. Since then our dearly beloved van has pooped permanently and has since been replaced by miracle van number two. (Another blog post soon!)
No matter what season we’re in or how many vans we go through, my point is, God is in the business of doing what we see as pretty impossible. So keep your eyes open - and be ready for what He’s got !