Epic Saga of Awesomeness (with pictures)

OK, not really. But it's still a pretty crazy story.

I'm talking, of course, about replacing the dead battery in the minivan. Sounds simple enough, right? Take off a couple screws, loosen a couple nuts, pull out the old one, put in the new one. easy peasy.

As. If.

First off, the battery was dead, which precipitated this entire process to begin with. Unfortunately, the battery died while the van was in the garage. If you've seen our teeny tiny one car garage, you'll realize how crazy this was. Sometimes it's amazing the van fits in the garage in the first place.

So then we (and by we i mean Dan because i tend to just stay out of the way) attempts to detach the cable from the battery. only to have one of the battery posts fall off said battery while still attached to the clamps. Aw

esome. No big deal, we'll just unscrew it and it'll fall out. Except apparently the bolt melted somehow and fused itself to the metal of the clamp. How is that even possible? It doesn't get that hot ANYWHERE the van has lived. As far as we know, anyway.

So i went to auto zone and bought new clamps. No big deal, except the new clamps don't look anything like the ones on the van. So...interesting. Wonder how that's gonna work? Meanwhile, we've managed to pop the van into neutral and push it out of the garage. Now at least we can see what we're doing.

Ok, after a lot of work on Dan's part it becomes totally apparent that there's no way the corroded battery post is coming out of the clamp. Time for plan B.

With the help of the hacksaw, the old clamp is removed. Now to figure out how to attach the new one. This should be easy, as long as the wires are all touching the clamp it will work! So says my dad, anyway. Which is true, except Dan had to go buy longer screws because this clamp came with little tiny screws that were totally useless.

Finally we get the new screws attached and the whole battery put back together in the car and the cables attached and HURRAY!!!! The van Runs! We have TWO cars Again! This is super exciting!

See? I told you it would be riveting.

Random Thoughts

1. I can't believe it's august already. Seriously, how did that happen? Wasn't it just all cold and wintery outside? This part of the country doesn't have a spring and a fall. we have summer, and we have winter. and one turns to the other in about a week. it's pretty crazy. I am looking forward to cooler weather, though.

2. The heat this last week has been INSANE. insane as in, it was so hot it killed my car battery. and dan's van has had a dead battery for a couple weeks. Nothing is more awesome than having two dead cars at the same time (insert sarcasm here). however, we did replace the battery in my car (because a) it has air conditioning and b)it was in the driveway and so replacing the battery of the van which is in the garage would have been silly) so now at least we have a car to get us around town. we'll fix dan's car as soon as we can.

3. I woke up the other day and realized that honestly, my house is boring. Just because i rent doesn't mean i can't put stuff on the walls. I can't put holes in the walls, but there's a company that makes these awesome velcro hangy things that come off without even ruining the paint. Which is awesome. I think i'm going to try this tutorial on putting photos onto canvas once i can get my hands on the supplies. And pick pictures I like. which could take a while.

4. How adorable is this guy? He's the biggest

Stuffed animal I've made so far and I'm very proud of him. He's a gift for a friend's little boy who's bday is coming up soon. Feel free to ignore the slightly messy coffee table in the background. Being creative tends to be kinda an explosion in stuff lol.