Growing Family

I have some very important news that I’ve been dying to announce. Our family is growing. Not in the way you think. This new member doesn’t have two legs, or even four. Instead he has 4 wheels, leather seats, and the ability to drive up a snow covered mountain. I’d like you to meet Fyvie, our new Land Rover Defender (aka Jonathan’s Christmas, Anniversary, Valentine’s Day, and Birthday presents for the next 3 years of his life).

I totally announced this development in the wrong way to my mother-in-law. She called right after we brought the Defender home and in my excitement I said “We have big news!”, and immediately realized that once you are 29 years old and have been married 4+ years, you cannot lead with that sort of statement. So I tried to rush out the next sentence of “I’m not pregnant!” but in my hasty speech it came out all marbled and could have easily been understood as “I AM pregnant”. So after a quick clarification, the announcement that we had just bought a second vehicle was not so exciting to her. Speaking of which, I feel like I've reached an age where everytime I call someone I have to open with: “Hey, I’m not pregnant. What’s up?’. Anyone else have that problem?

Anyway, back to Fyvie, whom Jonathan loves so much that he may as well have housed it in his tummy for nine months...

About a week ago, Jonathan finally wore me down and I consented to getting a second vehicle. At first I thought, ‘Yay I can get a fun vehicle like a mini-cooper’, while Jonathan was thinking ‘Yay I can get a fun vehicle like an army tank!’
He easily wore me down since my little BMW X1 is everything that I could ever want in a car, and he made the point that the Defender would be better for the dogs.

Since the entire back end is rubberized, the dogs can get as muddy as they please without us worrying about getting the car dirty. I’ve had the Beamer detailed several times, and within days it looks like it has never been washed in it’s entire life. Now, we can just use the Defender when we take road trips to forest hikes and not have to think twice about putting the pups in the back when we’re done. So that was the selling point for me.

For Jonathan, it was love at first sight. He’s always been a fan of the Land Rover line, but Defenders specifically aren’t available in the US. If he ever wanted to own one, now was his chance. Back in Midland, he owned a classic Jeep as his fun vehicle and it made him so happy.

He was very upset (I'm talking all 5 stages of grief upset) when he had to sell it when we moved to Houston so I’m really glad that he finally has a toy that replaces his Jeep.  

Fyvie isn't just a pretty face; he has an interesting history as well. He started his life as a UK army vehicle until he retired into civilian life. He was then sold to us by a man who was also retiring and therefore replaced his Defender with the more posh Land Rover Disovery.

So far the purchase has been a bit anti-climactic since we weren’t able to secure car insurance on it until today. Poor little guy just sat in our driveway all weekend long getting no love. I’m sure we’ll take him out for a spin this afternoon, though it will be pitch black by the time Jonathan gets home at 4:30.

The cutest part about it is that Jonathan's buddy Ryan bought his own Defender the very next day, so now he has a friend that he can obsess over cars with. Which also means that I don't have to hear his non-sensical rantings about light racks and lift packages and such. That's what I call a win-win situation!

Ryan's Defender...It has a snorkel...for going under water...Jon's doesn't have this feature, which is quite a sore subject so please don't bring it up!