At the Car Wash
At the Car Wash

At the Car Wash

Cleaning the Family Car

Cleaning our vehicles, it’s what we all do at one time or another, some do it more, some less with differing results, the resulting clean is relative. Yesterday, I drove a 150 mile loop down through Pullman WA, into Moscow ID and out into the Palouse beyond. I was specifically looking for Cordelia Lutheran Church, the oldest Luteran church in Idaho (which I found, did a shoot there and ate my picnic lunch in the quiet beside the church). Then found and shot four one-room school houses. Lastly a plethora of barns (love that) and a LOT of dust.

Is there anyway to drive on gravel/dirt roads without accumulating a thick coat of dust on the car? Speed doesn’t seem to make a difference, I’ve tried that. Coming back into Moscow about 18:00, spotting a self-serve car wash I pulled in. Sitting there reading the instructions for the automatic wash bay and the cautions, I was thinking that’s a good place to get my car scratched up, the dust can just live on my paint a couple more days. Looking to my left, a family was pulled up in front of the next bay, mom and dad bent over cleaning and two little boys still in their car seats placed on the ground behind the car for safe keeping. Noticing that mom and dad were cleaning the back seat, I had to wonder what happened in there? I remember the myriad of things that I’ve cleaned up when my kids were that age, a year apart and riding in car seats or boosters. The scene was too cute and typical, I couldn’t resist taking a shot or two.

Thanks for joining me today, for the view that is right here! ~ Madge

Sharing with ‘Sweet Shot Tuesday,’ and ‘Tuesday Around the World,’ and ‘Photo-Heart Connection: April.’

To learn about me for Party Purposes visit my ‘About Page,’ it probably tells you all you want to know and more! :-)

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29 Comments

  1. MadSnapper

    it is a wonderful picture and would be a great funny memory for them if they had a copy. the babies don’t look to happy and i bet the parents weren’t either. i don’t even want to know what they were cleaning out. great idea to contain them while the parents were busy

  2. My thought was I hope they don’t forget and leave the kids behind!

    We have red dirt here and two ways into town, one of which is on a 5-mile stretch of dirt road before hitting pavement for the last 20 miles. The dirt gets in the keyholes of your doors, around the rubber sealing on your windows, in every crack and cranny. Even though it’s a couple miles shorter that way, I have finally decided I will not drive on that road – unless I want to take a picture of something in the woods!

  3. Kay

    This is great! I’m picturing a funny conversation between the man and the woman. “Well, here are two kids. Anything else back here we haven’t seen in a while?”

    Nothing has matched the dust on our car after driving the red dirt roads in Monument Valley. The car was no longer blue. We’ve tried slow and fast on dirt roads. There’s no way around the grit so we’ve just decided to drive at whatever speed is least teeth gnashing.

  4. I have vague recollections of similar stints at the car wash when the kids were little. The only thing that would get me to pull over to do that was chocolate milk or well, we won’t go into that. Lol! Looks like it may have been the latter judging by the worried looks on the kid’s faces! Great shot, Madge! You really need to publish a book! xx

  5. I don’t know why, Madge, but this photo really struck me as funny!!! Maybe it is the looks of bewilderment on the young kids’ faces and the intense work of the parents cleaning away. Excellent capture!

  6. older boy: “I told you not to…”
    younger boy: “well, I didn’t think it was all that bad…”
    mom: “how is this even humanly possible?”
    dad: “I’m not going in there!”

    love it!

  7. The last page of the New Yorker magazine prints cartoons with no captions, the idea being that readers will supply their own to be selected by popular vote. The results are very amusing. I am imagining suggestions for dialog between the to children. This has wonderful possibilities. Nicki’s suggestion is a fine example.

  8. What a fabulous capture! Having two little girls myself, I can only imagine the mess that could have been back there. I often frequent the car wash…not to wash my car but for the heavy duty vacuums..lol Stopping by and following from UBP12, lovely to meet you!

  9. I love this pic. I feel like the two little dudes strapped in their seats are like, “well, this is awkward”.

    Aloha,
    Just popping in from the UBP to visit/ follow. I’d love it if you’d visit us at localsugarhawaii.com and “join the ride”. I can’t wait to come back and see more of Portland through your lens.

    xo,
    Nicole
    localsugarhawaii.com

  10. This made me smile!! This past week I was with my daughter who has three boys, two are still in booster seats. We had to remove the seats and had a good laugh at what was underneath!! I can just imagine some type of catastrophe happened in that back seat!! Great image! Your day trip sounds wonderful. It’s about time I take one!

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