So I've been having this horrible internal struggle ever since I got pregnant and realized that my beloved Volvo doesn't have LATCH all the way across the second row of seats. IT'S TIME FOR A MINIVAN. I realize that most of us just shrug and enjoy the luxury features now standard in the top models of minivans today, but every time I've driven past one over the last seven months, I have seriously started misting up.
I LOVE my car. I have loved it since the moment I found it on CarSoup when I was just about this pregnant with Lillian. It was my favorite shade of my favorite color. It had a dvd player for my future brats to watch 101 Dalmatians on and leather seats for them to spill McDonald's french fries and goldfish everywhere. It had the flip up 3rd row so I could conceivably have two of them, and still get my step daughter, and my much younger siblings all in at once to go do family things. It was my dream car, and I have loved it every moment.
Luckily for me, my dad owns a car repair shop. So every time my 'little things' have gone wrong, I can literally go crying to dad to fix my car, and it gets done. On the upside, it's allowed Lillian to spend lots of time with grampa over the past four years while we're waiting for the car to be ready. On the down side, as my dad likes to say to me 'If you had a Ford, this would have cost you $30. Since it's a Volvo...." You kind of get tired of hearing that, family discount or not.
So I have resigned myself to the fact that I'm getting a van (even though secretly I'm hoping Bob's Highlander - which is creeping up towards 200k miles -blows up and he gets stuck with it) and pretty much decided that since said Toyota has had virtually nothing but maintenance over the past eight years, I'm getting a Sienna. Yes, automatic doors, leather, wood grain, mp3, blah, blah. VAN. 
Then we went to Boston on vacation a couple of weeks ago, and everything changed.
Bob booked us a standard SUV at Hertz just like he always does. Nothing fancy, just enough to get two adults, a 3 year old, a 12 year old, our luggage and a big stroller (yes I take my BOB there because that's about the only one that can handle the cobbles downtown to the sand on the beach). The website said a Nissan Xterra or the equivalent. We showed up, and what we got was a 7 passenger Chevy Traverse. Never heard of it, but it may have changed my life.
It had a walk-through second row, so you could climb in front of the seats and walk to the back row (like a minivan, huh?) without having to flip down one of the side seats. This would allow me to put both kids in their car seats using LATCH, and my step daughter could still get into the car, around the front of the seats, and into the 3rd row easily. Dare I dream this could be my answer??
So you know the minute we got to the hotel, I got on the computer and started hunting. If this car has this feature, what are the odds there are others out there? I hate to say I wasn't satisfied with settling for the American version of the answer to my prayers, but though my dad says 'if this were a Ford it would only cost $30...' well, that's because that $30 part breaks twice a year.
Lo and behold (thank you for existing, Google) I discovered that none other than the Toyota Highlander boasts a similar feature and for even less money with all the bells and whistles. So we got home, ran over to Bob's buddy at Toyota, gave one a spin, stuck the car seats in, walked around in it (I seriously can't believe I did that, but I did) and signed the papers on a vehicle that is NOT a minivan.... at least for now. If all works out well with this new vehicle when it arrives in a couple of weeks, maybe Bob can take it over when his bites the dust, and I can get my 1967 Jaguar XKE 2+2.... or maybe not.
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