Miserable in the Minivan

I’m a lot of things in life.  I’m a wife, I’m a teacher, I’m a sister, I’m a cook, I’m a daughter, I’m a laundress, I’m a friend, I’m a chauffeur, and of course, I’m a mommy.  I’m a dance mommy, I’m a breastfeeding mommy, I’m a gymnastics mommy, I’m a mean mommy, I’m a working mommy, I’m a stay at home mommy and so much more!  But there are two things in live I’ve vowed to NEVER be: a soccer mommy and a minivan mommy.

Luckily my kids have shown no interest in soccer and hubby never wants to be a soccer daddy, either, so that one should be easy enough to avoid.  I did, however, get the opportunity to be a minivan mom during our recent Thanksgiving trip and it made my resolve to never get a minivan even stronger!

Originally we were supposed to get a Honda Civic but hubby was worried about having enough space in the back (even though we have the narrowest car seats available and I assured him it wasn’t a problem) and switched to a minivan instead thinking it would be easier and that way too we would have extra seats for his parents so we could all ride together when we went places.

Everyone thinks: minivan, great for kids!  NOT AT ALL!  We had a Chrysler Town and Country and it took me 3 tries and a crap load of lost sleep to figure out how to get all the seats in and MAYBE have room for the adults too.  Here was my dilemma:

1. I had 3 car seats, 2 rearfacing and 1 forward facing.
2. The car had 2 front seats, 2 captain’s chairs in the middle and a small bench 3^rd row with 3 seats
3. The forward facing seat could only go on one of the captain’s chairs or in the middle back as these were the only seating positions with a top tether
4. The baby needed to be in one of the captain’s chairs since a lot of times we only take him and not the girls and he can’t climb into the back by himself (and I have no interest in doing it every time we go somewhere)
5. The other rearfacing seat could not go outboard next to the forward facing seat (which needed to be in the middle) in the 3^rd row because there was a huge/weird hingey thing where the seats fold down and the seat (a Diono Radian) has little feet that go into the bight between the seat back and seat cushion preventing me from moving the seat towards the edge of the seat. 
6. I couldn’t put the 2 rearfacing seats in the 2^nd row captain’s chairs because then NO ONE could get to the 3^rd row.

 So I ended up with Doodle passenger side captain’s chair, Honeybun forward facing in the driver’s side captain’s chair and Sugarplum by herself in the 3^rd row.

This set up worked, it got us where we needed to go but it was far from convenient.  Poor Little Sugarplum, while she had a nice view out the back, couldn’t see anyone and spent our driving trips yelling “is mommy here?  Who’s driving?” and she had to climb in by herself either around Honeybun’s seat or through the trunk and then we had to buckle her from the trunk.  It was far from convenient or ideal.

We only ended up going all together once in the van and it’s a good thing.  Most of our trip I had Sugarplum in the middle of the 3^rd row (I moved her outboard for our drive to the airport so I could pack the Angle Adjuster which goes under her seat to sit it more upright) and I was able to squeeze around her seat to get to one of the outboard seats and hubby’s dad had to do the same though it was a very tight squeeze and he accidentally knocked Sugarplum’s seat loose a few times.

Maybe minivans are great for families with older kids (or only 2 kids that can each take a captain’s chair?) but I certainly won’t be buying one anytime soon!