How kids destroy our cars

Estimated read time: 3-4 minutes

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SALT LAKE CITY -- “Between all the bits of fries, buns, chunks of nuggets, and toys under our kids' seats in our car, we could probably make about 24 Happy Meals,” a friend of mine joked a couple of weeks ago. We all laughed, because, really, who hasn't been there? I'd like to know whose car hasn't been destroyed by their own children?

A few weeks ago, after vacuuming our car at the local car wash, my husband got out to wash the car. Thinking it was going to be a long 10 minutes with our toddler screaming, “Out! Out! Mommy! Out!” I let him out of his car seat and sat him on the vacant driver's seat. Leaving him to pretend he was driving and play with all the switches, I turned my attention to our baby who was crying. Little did I know while I was soothing our baby, our toddler decided it was a nice time to wash the driver's side window – with his snot and boogers. Needless to say, my husband was not happy the car was a mess before we even left the car wash.

I told my sister this story, and apparently this is such a common occurrence with my sister and her kids that she didn't bat an eye. She went on to tell me some of her own car stories. And, boy, they were doozies.

She has five kids with one on the way, so you can imagine the ordeal if one has to go to the bathroom during a car trip, which happens frequently especially because four of her kids are potty-trained. While running errands with all five of them one day, she ended up in heavy traffic. It was difficult to find a place to stop, and one of her boys had to go to the bathroom. He's about 7, so she told him he would have to hold it. Instead, unbeknownst to her, he unbuckled himself from his seat, took an empty water bottle and started to go. Just as he started to go, so did traffic, and her driving knocked her son off balance.

"Between all the bits of fries, buns, chunks of nuggets, and toys under our kids' seats in our car, we could probably make about 24 Happy Meals."

According to my sister, “Pee went everywhere. I was yelling, 'What are you doing? Get back in your seat!' while pee was going on the floor, the seats, the ceiling, me. And all the while he's going, 'Whoa, stop, Mom! You're making me laugh! Whoa!'” That isn’t the worst thing that has happened to her car.

She told me she and her husband have had to buy leather car seats and a car with leather interior, so they could wash their seats with a hose because their oldest child gets carsick and throws up all the time. Just a few months ago her husband found the words, “Hi Dad!” written with a Sharpie on the backseat. About a year ago the DVD player was ripped off the ceiling because her daughter wanted to see if it could hold her weight. It couldn't. This same poor car also had the paint scratched off the passenger side – with a screwdriver. According to my sister, her son just walked back and forth, scraping it across the car.

Moral of the story? Be grateful it's only boogers because it definitely could be much, much worse.