Accessorizing the Altima...

Neither Shannon or I have ever owned a "new" car before. The Altima, being a 2008 model, is the newest car either one of us has owned. Since I want it to last for a few years and it is new enough where the dealerships still carry accessories for it, I figured I need to add a couple things to it.

The first thing I added were splash guards. I don't think I will ever own a vehicle with out some kind of splash guard, mud flaps, ect. The Suburban is the first vehicle I have owned and NOT put them on and the amount of rust on the doors and rear quarter panels makes me sick. My dad has a 1999 GMC Yukon (the same year as my Suburban) and he has factory installed running boards and has NO rust on his vehicle! My old pickup (which had mud flaps) had rust on it, but not along the doors, rockers, and quarter panels! I picked up a set of 4 splash guards for the Altima at the dealer. They came painted to match the vehicle and cost about $100. The installation took about an hours and was very simple. Overall, I think they look great and hopefully will protect the paint from rusting over the years!

The next thing I added to the Altima was a trunk net. I also got this from the dealer and it ran about $20. My Mom has had one on her 1997 Ford Taurus SHO for many years and loves it. It works great for keeping groceries upright, prevents smaller items from rolling around in the trunk, and if the trunk was every stuffed full, it would keeps items from falling out when the trunk was opened. The installation just involved clipping it in!

The last thing I got for the car were new floor mats. For some reason, they had been removed before we bought it. I also bought these from the dealer and they ran about $100 also. I didn't want to get a cheap aftermarket set because I wanted to fit to the contours of the floor and clip into the factory floor mat clips that help hold them in place. The one I bought are obviously the black mats (back set in the picture) so they match the interior. They also have "Altima" stitched into the mat in grey. Very nice looking!

That is about takes car of accessorizing the Altima for now. We have talked about getting a slight tint on the windows, but other than that, we don't have many plans for it, other than driving it!

The Trans Am's New Identity

Well, if you have been following my many posts about the license plates on the Trans Am (HERE, HERE, and HERE) you know I apply for and was waiting for my new license plates. They finally came about two weeks ago!

I think they look pretty nice, considering they ARE NOT embossed and I am not a big fan of the flat, digitally printed license plates! So, for as long as this vehicle is used as a "collector" car, these will be the license plates it has. The best part is, I never have to pay registration tax again!

Bob-cap! Bob-cap!

Keeping with the forward momentum of getting summer projects done, we managed to get a couple more checked off the list over the last week or so!

First, we hired a service that does stump grinding and got the stumps removed. We had a total of four stumps, the large one from the willow tree and three smaller stumps in the northwest corner of the yard that were there when we moved in. The first quote we got was for about $1000 to do all three, so once again, I was seriously considering doing it myself. I was referred to another service in town and he charged $2.50 per inch of diameter of the stumps. So in total, it cost us $300 to have all three stumps taken out! Much better price in my mind. As you can see in the pictures below, I have a little bit of cleaning up to do, and a little work with an axe since they could only grind so close to the fence.

The next project we got done was the removal of the rock in the front of the house. The area in the front of the house had been overgrown with many bushes and filled with rock. We have managed to cut down most of the bushes over the last three years we have lived here, but we still needed to get rid of the rock. I wasn't about to hand shovel it, plus I needed a place to get rid of it. A friend at work recommend a guy who does landscaping and has always been good to him, so I called him up. He came out and said it would be an easy job. He would just get his skid loader and haul it down to the local landscaping dump. He estimated that I had about four yards of dirt and rock and figured it would only take him about 3 hours to do! He charged me $275! I couldn't say no! Maeve had a blast watching him haul the rock away. We told her he was using a Bobcat (which is a brand name for a type of skid loader and an often generalized term for all of them). She did her best to say it on her own and said Bob-cap! Very cute! She has since reformed the term and is saying Bob-cat!

So, now that the destruction is done, we have to start making things nicer! Over the next few weeks, we are going to get the stump areas cleaned out, graded, and grass plated. In the front, we are going to figure out what we are going to do for edging and get that installed, along with a weed barrier, mulch, and grass. I'm not sure if we will get anything new planted this year, but we might depending on time!

A New Horse in the Stable...

Shannon and I are officially no longer Jeep owners! Last Saturday (after a couple weeks of looking) we became the owners of a 2008 Nissan Altima 2.5S.

We had been looking to replace the Jeep for about a year, but only seriously for the last few weeks. We wanted to have an actual car again, instead of two SUV's. Something that would get better gas mileage and be more comfortable on road trips. We had narrowed our search down to four vehicles: 2007-2008 Nissan Altima, 2006-2008 Chevrolet Impalas, 2006-2008 Ford Fusion, and the 2006 Lincoln Zepher. We both didn't like the Fusion or the Zepher, so it was now between the Impala and the Altima. After a few test drives and some number crunching the Altima came out on top.

As I mentioned before it is a 2008 Nissan Altima 2.5S. It has a 2.5L, 4 cylinder engine, a CVT automatic transmission, and a nice power equipped interior. Really the only options it doesn't have are power seats, leather, a sunroof, and the navigation system. The paint it called "Sonoma Sunset" which is fancy for maroon and the interior is charcoal. It is supposed to get between 19-27 mpg in the city and 26-36 mpg on the highway. This vehicle rides great, is VERY quick, and very comfortable.

I'm sure a lot of you are thinking that you would never see that day when I owned a foreign car. To be honest, I never thought it would come either. However, the one saving grace with this car is its high quality and it was made here in the United States in Smyrna, Tennessee. Ironically enough, my Chevrolet Suburban which is looked at as a true classic American truck, was made in Silao, Mexico!

We will be taking the Altima on a few road trips this summer. The first in a couple of weeks to Michigan to visit some of Shannon's family. I am really excited to see what kind of gas mileage I can get with it!

The dealership we bought the Altima from gave us a fair amount for trade in on the Jeep, so we went ahead and traded it in. We had the Jeep for 4 years and 4 days and put about 52,000 miles on it. I had to snap a couple pictures as it sat on the lot after we traded it in. It was a great vehicle!