Cars

Like most boys, Kieron likes cars. Not just any cars, but the muscle cars on Top Gear: Aston Martin Vantage springs to mind. All the cars Kieron wants are either black, red or silver.

When my dad was still alive and would babysit Kieron, he sat him on his lap in his car and Kieron 'drove' it. He shared his car books with Kieron and when my dad died, I gave Kieron all of my dads books on cars, boats, steam trains and the like. Kieron valued these even though he was too young to have started reading, but he still talked me through the various cars etc in the books. They took pride of place in his room and many of them are still there now.

Early 2010 I decided that my aging Mondeo wouldn't last much longer so I started looking for a replacement.

I decided that I wanted a Puma. I took Jade and Kieron with me when I went to test drive it. We had a bit of a drive to get to the dealer and before we arrived, Kieron was fast asleep, so Jade sat in my car with him while I took the Puma out. I decided against it and was in my car and halfway home before Kieron woke up, demanding to know if we were nearly at the garage as he wanted to see the car.

 I then fell for a yellow Saab convertible, much to the disgust of all the kids. I thought it was gorgeous but Kieron especially was horrified. It was 'gay', it was 'ugly', it was 'YELLOW'!!!

So I reluctantly admitted defeat, without telling him that the boot was too small anyway as throughout summer I carry all the beach stuff in my boot and there was no chance of fitting all our holiday luggage in either.

Kieron also likes BMWs. The fact that Jade's boyfriends really likes them and has had 3 in the time he's been with Jade comes as no surprise. Jade and Mike often took Kieron out with them until Kieron moaned that Mike drives too fast and he doesn't like going over the bumps. As Mike's cars are usually old enough too be classed as classics, they don't have much suspension, so Kieron bumped about on the back seat.

I've still got my old Mondeo and have no intention of replacing it now until it falls apart. It has Kieron's muddy footprints on the back of the front seats and juice stains on the back seats. Fingerprint marks from pictures drawn on the back windows when they're misted up are still there. how can I NOT keep it?