08/22/2026
Sit back, .... Story time!!! 📜
Here is a story about a girl 🎶...who bought a red van just five years ago and named it Clifford. 🐕
Bought it with only 22K miles on it and today, it had just over 172K miles on the odometer.
A beautiful beast that carried countless kids, full-size refrigerators, 20-packs of sawdust (with two kids in carseats!), and many, many, MANY live animals — including, but not limited to, rabbits, chickens, ducks, turkeys… and even baby calves. (Not kidding.)
Bread delivery after bread delivery after bread delivery. Winter craft fairs. Summer farmers markets. Random vendor pop-ups. Farm errands. Kid appointments. Foster care appointments. Daycare transportation. Life.
So much life happened in that van. So many memories. So many hours. So many babies. ...So many kids. We packed that van FULL a few times to send kids back to their parents; I think it held just as much as a mini U-Haul.
A. LOT. Of. Life. Happened. Did I mention the memories it carried? 😭
Well, for the last three weeks, I’ve been trying to find a suitable trade for it. I knew the tires were bald. I had just dumped a bunch of money into brakes. And I know that with winter coming, the miles are only going to keep adding up. But I also knew I needed 8 seats again and that's hard.
Three weeks of searching and I finally found a dealership willing to work with me and not be all "car-man-sales-ee" (Side Note: I emailed Charlie's in Augusta about what I needed. They assured me they had a bunch of Toyota Siennas on the lot with 8 seats but they can't do anything virtually so I need to come in to figure it out. Assured me Multiple times they had 8-passenger vans via email. Oliver and I went one late evening in a rush after work and sure as s**t they didn't have ONE, not A Single One, on the lot that was an 8-passenger. Dealerships are generally so very annoying. But they sure were hopeful that I could purchase....) 🤔🙃
I also have absolutely no time ever to sit in a dealership for hours going back and forth with a salesperson while someone says, “Let me go talk to my manager.”
Also… gross. I hate that s**t.
But Bill Dodge Kia was absolutely beautiful, wonderful, and amazing to work with. They did everything virtually, worked with my schedule, and made the entire process as painless as possible.
We had a deal on a new vehicle.
Oliver went in yesterday and signed half the loan paperwork, and I was supposed to go in today, sign my half, and swap vehicles in the middle of bread deliveries.
Easy enough, right?
WRONG. Always wrong. Never easy.
Last night, after Open House at school, the kids hit the button to open Clifford's sliding door.
And sure as s**t…
The sliding door disconnected the safety line and the door line broke.
The. door. stopped. working.
I PANICKED. 😳
I called Bill Dodge and explained what happened. They told me to still come in and that their appraisal guy would take a look at it.
So I finished putting together bread orders and pretended like everything was totally fine.
Nothing was fine.
But… just keep swimming, right?
I obviously couldn't sleep last night because getting older means I get to spend nights such as these lying awake worrying about awkward situations involving kids, POS equipment, and terrible timing.
So at 5:30 this morning, I got up, did barn chores, loaded everything up, and headed out.
Blinded by my own anxiety and self-inflicted worry, I obviously called my sister and complained for a while. Duh.
After a successful WTF session, I turned on my favorite gospel hymns and basically told God:
“Okay. This one is on You.”
Either we keep the old van until it literally dies…
(It still ran perfectly fine. It was really just the mileage that had me worried — especially considering I'm putting nearly 1,000 miles a week on it.)
Or…
We get a new vehicle and start breaking s**t from the beginning. 😂
And guess what?
Bill Dodge didn't freak out.
They looked at the van, the broken door situation wasn't the disaster I had built it up to be in my head, and they still honored our deal.
WHEW.
Amazing employees. Amazing communication. They worked with me virtually, respected my time, and when my five-year-old van decided to throw one final plot twist into the process, they didn't make it a big deal.
So…
Goodbye, Clifford. ❤️
You were so much more than a vehicle.
You hauled kids.
You hauled animals.
You hauled appliances.
You hauled sawdust.
You hauled bread.
You hauled farm supplies.
You hauled us through five years of absolute chaos.
You carried us through seasons of life that I'll never forget.
And now it's time for the next chapter.
Also, one final note:
The new van apparently did NOT come with floor mats. ...if you didn't know, we live on a working farm, we need plastic under our shoes otherwise I'll be scrubbing for decades.
So after everything else today, we went to Walmart 😬 and bought a set.
They are approximately the size of a postage stamp compared to the actual floor of the van.
So until I find mats that actually fit…
I guess we're putting paper on the floor. 🤦
What did I get for a new van, you ask? Well, if you read this far, ... You should all know by now that I do not bring the circus because we generally don't have tricks BUT I bring the CARNIVAL because we are fun. 👏 (Still working on this line but it's getting better.)😂
Here's to the next 172,000 miles of memories. ❤️
