Van progress and the loss of Monday nights

Today was another day of running around like crazy. Imagine that.

After I forgot to take the boys to school (yes, you read that right) I made a mad dash to get them there - luckily, they were only 18 minutes late, but still....it wasn't the best way to start the day.

Anyway, I took them to school and then took The Dude to work and then took his mom to the doctor and then got Daniel from school....and then came home and started trying to locate my kitchen - I have really slacked in there and it was a disaster. But, I got it cleaned up enough and then started crunching numbers.

As I started gathering money for the Transmission Fund, it went into 3 different accounts. Some of it went directly into my PayPal account, while some of it went into my savings and my checking accounts. Not a big deal, right?

Ha.

My plan, once I knew that I had enough money last week, was to transfer the money from my savings and checking into my PayPal account so that it would all be in the same place and I could just use my PayPal debit card to pay the garage. Easy, right?

Wrong.

I transferred the money from the checking to the PayPal account late last week, and on the same day went and talked to the guy at the garage and told him that I had the money and was ready to rock. As we were discussing it, he mentioned that due to the exorbitant fees charged by credit card companies, he doesn't take them. At all.

Oops.

Anyone who has used PayPal knows that it takes 3-5 days to complete a transfer. So I came back home and transferred the money that was already in my PayPal to my checking - he told me that if I handed him $800, he'd order the part and get started on it, and then I could pay for the rest when I picked up the van.

Anyway, as of today, the money that I transferred from PayPal to my checking was there. But the money that I had initially transferred from my checking to my PayPal is still in limbo until tomorrow. Regardless, I had enough to get started....

So Daniel and I walked up to the garage and handed him the check - he was going to order the transmission right then, and then get this - he is going to bring his trailer to my house, load up my van, and take it and fix it. I don't have to get it to him - he's coming to get it.

In the meantime, as soon as the money from my checking lands in my PayPal account tomorrow, I'm going to transfer it back to my checking, and then when he has the van done (possibly as early as this Friday) I can write him another check for the remaining $624.50 and be done with it.

And I will have my very own van back in my possession.

And I can give The Dude's van back to him.

We've been dealing with having only one van between the two houses for almost 2 months now, and it's been difficult. We've been lucky in that there haven't been many scheduling conflicts, but it's been stressful on all of us. Having two functional vehicles again will do wonders for our sanity - not that we really had any at the beginning!

I know that I've said it before, but I just can't thank everyone enough for their help in getting us to this point. Whether it was a donation, or spreading the word, or saying a prayer or saying a word or two of encouragement - it means so much to both of us. Knowing that there are still people out there who are willing to help a friend - or even a stranger - is amazing. I will continue to pay it forward in any way that I possibly can for as long as I possibly can!

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On to other fun and exciting news....

Alex is now a Cub Scout. Because you know, I didn't have enough on my plate already. Seriously though, I've been looking into getting him into something and had hoped to get him into flag football this year - but our schedules just will not allow that. But, I think we can handle one night a week. And of course I had to sign up to volunteer for a few things, but luckily those won't take much time (I hope).

So we'll see how this goes...