The Rollins Ruckus: Summer Vacation: 2011

So I'm FINALLY making post about our summer vacation to Panama City Beach, Florida. Wow! What a vacation it was! I guess I'll start by explaining why we went to PCB in the first place. Two years ago we went to Destin and we absolutely LOVED it...loved the beaches, loved the water, loved the town...so we really wanted to go back. We decided to stay in Panama City this year (only about 30 minutes away from Destin) because my brother was spending the summer there working at a oyster bar. Kassidy went down to Florida with the OU Student Ministries group to work for the summer and do discipleship training. Panama City Beach was amazing! We rented a 5 bedroom beach house with my parents and my mom's sister and her family that was absolutely gorgeous! Getting to the beach house, however, was a bit of a problem...actually "a bit" is an understatement!

Here's the story. Well, actually the bottom line is that Jeb and I have terrible luck when it comes to air travel. We missed out connecting flight on our honeymoon because of delays related to weather and had to find a hotel to spend the night in Puerto Rico (that in itself is quite the story). Then two years ago when we flew to Destin, we arrived at the airport three hours early, only to miss our flight because we were making Reid a bottle. They hadn't even finished loading all of the passengers yet, but went ahead and gave our ticket to a stand-by passenger! That again, is a whole other story! So why did we think this time would be different? I'm not sure, but it was worse...MUCH WORSE! I'll give you the short version. We arrived at the airport three hours early again, as to be sure not to miss our flight. The flight was delayed an hour and then after we finally boarded we had to sit on the runway with the airplane OFF (no air conditioning) for an hour because Atlanta airport was shut down related to weather. I have terrible flight anxiety and the flight attendant said she couldn't serve wine until we were "in the air." Ugh! It was a hot, miserable mess and I had two toddlers climbing all over me - one of which kept trying to breastfeed, which made me even hotter! After an hour they told us we would have to de-plane until Atlanta gave us the "ok." When we got back into the airport, all the places to eat were closing...not good when you have two hungry children and the snacks are gone because you've been at the airport 7 hours! Thankfully, the nice lady at the sandwich place opened back up to make the kids a turkey sandwich. God is good!

The airline personnel told us we could either wait on the delayed flight to Atlanta, or try and take another flight the next night. We chose to go ahead and wait that night. Delta told us that our flight from Atlanta to Panama had also been delayed and that we should be able to make our connecting (we even received a confirmation email AND phone call), but when we finally made it to Atlanta we found out that our flight had left at its original time and that we missed it! There were no more flights until the next night going to PCB and NO we were NOT going to stay at the airport for 12 hours with a one year old and a three year old! Atlanta is the busiest airports in the country and with it being shut down for three hours because of severe weather, you can only imagine the mad house that it was! So there we were...12:30 in the morning, and we were walking around the busiest airport in the country with two tired, hungry, cranky children...no stroller and no flight. I had huge blisters on my feet and my shoulders felt like they were going to fall off. I stayed up the night before finishing charts and packing, so I was now running on less than three hours of sleep. What do we decide to do? Drive the 5 hours to Panama City Beach in the middle of the night! Finding a rental car was another huge mess. There were no rentals because of all the flight delays, especially no one way rentals. I was willing to pay the penalty for returning at a different location...at that point I would have paid thousands of dollars!!! Thankfully, my mom ended up reserving us a car online that wasn't supposed to be ready until 7 a.m., but the nice guy at the rental car booth went ahead and got it for us after he saw how desperate I was! Next problem...NO car seats. I tipped the guy that pulled our car around $20 hoping he wouldn't notice. Desperate times call for desperate measures! We loaded up the kids in our Volvo and headed to Florida. We had planned on stopping at the first Walmart/Target we saw to buy some car seats, but navigating our way through Atlanta at 3 o'clock in the morning with one dead phone, one phone about to go dead, and no phone charger was craziness! Both kids fell asleep in the back seat and we thought about stopping at a hotel, but after all that we had been through we decided to get in as much driving as we could. Jeb and I agreed that he would drive and I would help keep him awake. Those five hours went by in a flash! Thankfully, the kids slept until about 30 minutes from the beach and we arrived safely in Panama City! That was something that we never should have done, but it was one of the worst nights of my life and honestly, I was ready to see my mom and dad. The minute we saw the ocean, I realized that my migraine was gone and a fever blister on my lip had taken its place. Great...but at least we were finally at the beach!

Jeb and I were able to sneak in about two hours of sleep before mom and dad had to check out of their hotel. We had some time to kill before it was time to check in to our beach house, so we decided to take the kids to St. Andrews National Park to play in the tide pools and let LilliAnn take a dip in the ocean for the very first time! We were exhausted, but the excitement of being on vacation kept us going.

.....

The boys checking out "Gator Lake" at St. Andrews National Park.

.....

St. Andrews hiking trails

.....

The kids were looking for alligators in the lake. They kept throwing in sticks to "scare the gators" and LilliAnn would say, "OOOoooooo!"

.....

The scenery was absolutely GORGEOUS!

.....

They've spotted a gator! On our way to St. Andrews Park, we stopped at the pier to buy tickets for the pirate show and, of course, we loaded up on lots of pirate gear - notice the sword in this picture.

.....

Still in love after all these years! :)

.....

I didn't have my zoom lens on so it's hard to see, but that little hump in the middle of this picture is a Florida gator!

.....

It was so much fun walking around all of the park trails with my family and admiring all of the Florida landscape. Reid had fun hanging on the trees!

.....

LilliAnn's first taste of salt water!

.....

"Whatcha doin' Papa?"

.....

"It's tun (fun) playin' at the beach, mama!"

St. Andrews beach is perfect for little ones because the kids can play in the tide pools and enjoy the ocean without having to worry about the big waves taking them under. The water is shallow and Reid loved that he could "touch" really far out.

.....

Chillin' on the boogie board that Reid's Papa bought him in the gift shop.

.....

Trying to feed Nana a seashell. She loved picking up seashells and putting them in her bucket.

.....

My little bathing beauty ready to walk down to the beach from our beach house.

.....

Reid and Grayson had so much fun together. They spent most days down at the water with their boogie boards.

.....

Time for some Putt Putt Golf! This was one of Reid's favorite things that we did on vacation!

.....

Kass even joined us for a game!

.....

Reid took his golf game very serious. And he was actually very good at it!

.....

His mother, on the other hand, not so much! And I used to be such a good putt putt golfer!

.....

It was so nice to see Kassidy! We had really been missing him this summer!

.....

Sissy loved going for walks on the beach and I loved taking pictures of her walking on the beach!

.....

We went to Alvin's beach souvenir shop and LOADED UP on beach gear! Reid and Grayson got nets, shovels, more boogie boards, and water shoes!

.....

The boys had so much fun catching crabs and little fish.

.....

Silly Sissy!

.....

The third day we went out to St. Andrews again.

.....

Kass met us there for a fun, family day at the beach!

.....

Silly daddy!

.....

The boys wanted to be buried in the sand...and they gave Reid some boobies, lol!

.....

He was over it once he realized how hard it was going to be to get out of that hole!

.....

My sweet little family at the beach!

.....

This is one of my favorite pictures from our trip. LilliAnn was rubbing water on her daddy's back.

.....

A few pictures on the beach before heading down to Pier Park...

.....

This is my favorite! How cute are my two beach babies?

.....

Pier Park is a big, outdoor mall in Panama City that has great shopping, restaurants and even an outdoor carnival for the kids. They have games, rides, inflatables, and face painting. As soon as we walked over to the carnival area Reid spotted the face painting. He wanted his face painted like a "blue spiderman!"

.....

Grayson got a dragon design.

.....

We didn't think LilliAnn would be still enough to get her face painted, so we bought her a pair of light-up butterfly wings. She looked adorable walking around in those little wings. Everyone that walked by her would stop and tell us how cute she looked.

.....

Sissy was only big enough to ride the merry-go-round and she LOVED it!

.....

Reid and Grayson rode all of the rides several times. All of the rides were for younger children, so Reid just had a blast! There were only about seven rides at Pier Park, but we stayed at the carnival section for several hours!

.....

Reid's favorite thing to do right now...WAKEBOARD!

.....

The next morning all of the guys went out on an eight-hour deep sea fishing trip and us girls hung out on the beach.

.....

When the guys came in from their fishing trip, we met them at the pier to check out their loot! They caught red snapper and mackerel and we took it back to the beach house and cooked it for dinner. It was delicious! We had tons of fish left that we hadn't cooked, so we took it back to Oklahoma with us and had a Fourth of July fish fry!

.....

We had a gorgeous deck overlooking the ocean on the back of our beach house. The kids were constantly looking out at the waves or going out on the deck to play.

.....

We had a little afternoon shower one of the days and the kids decided to dance in the rain!

.....

We would rinse off after coming from the beach and sissy loved playing in the water hose. That girl would play with a water hose for hours!

....

Beach life is tough!

.....

Mom & I

.....

......

Kisses from daddy

.....

Sissy going down her very first water slide at Shipwreck Island water park!

.....

Next, it's daddy's turn!

.....

Now, Reid's turn!

.....

And Mommy's turn!

....

.....

I absolutely LOVED this water park! Reid was big enough to ride almost every ride and he had an absolute blast! I think this was probably one of the highlights of Reid's vacation! This is the slide that we did the most. They are racing slides and the little boys could not get enough of it!

.....

Reid wasn't scared at all!

.....

Here he comes!

.....

"let's do it again, mama!"

.....

Next up...another favorite...the zip line! Here goes Grayson!

.....

Reid didn't want to wear his lifejacket and the water was really deep under the zip line. I was so worried about the lifeguard getting to him in time if need be, but Reid was swimming so good without his lifejacket and could almost make it to the ladder all by himself.

.....

There was one time when he let go too early and the lifeguard had to swim really fast to get to Reid. Reid kept swimming towards the ladder, but I could tell he was getting tired. I thought I was going to have to jump in and save him!

.....

Daddy's cool flip!

.....

Look at that form!

.....

Sissy on the kiddie slides

.....

This is what happens when I try and get a picture with both kids!

.....

Tuesday evening we took a family walk on the beach. I love this shot of Jeb and Reid.

.....

My loves

.....

Running on the beach...there's just nothing like it!

.....

"but I don't wanna take a picture, mom."

.....

Reid found a dead fish and a stick and he looked like a little Huck Fin trying to pick up that fish.

.....

This nice man on the beach tried to take a family picture of us, but the sun was too bright and the kids were not cooperating :)

.....

Relaxing at the beach house

.....

Papa's girl

.....

Playing on the beach

.....

Another one of my favorite shots...

.....

She loved playing in the ocean with daddy.

.....

Look out...we may have another wakeboarder on our hands!

.....

Kids love playing in the sand!

.....

Wednesday night we went on the pirate cruise. Reid is really into pirates right now, so I knew he was going to love the show. He watches Jake and the Neverland Pirates on the Disney Chanel and walks around saying, "matey" and "arrrg!" Sissy even got into the pirate theme!

.....

The pirate cruise was interactive and all about the kids. They got to dance, sword fight, shoot cannons, have water gun fights, get tattoos, and get their faces painted!

.....

Pirate Reid!

.....

We even saw a group of dolphins playing. I didn't get any pictures of them, but it was amazing to see them in their natural environment.

.....

Sissy pointing at the dolphins!

.....

Lovin' Nana's glasses!

.....

Towards the end of the cruise, they told the kids a pirate tale and then pulled a treasure chest out of the water.

.....

Reid loved picking out his treasure!

.....

Reid and Grayson with the Captain of our ship!

.....

A photo with my "matey" :)

.....

LilliAnn fell asleep on her Papa while listening to Pandora radio on his iPhone. It had been a big day!

.....

Thursday was more fun at the beach!

.....

Reid did some extreme boogie boarding!

.....

Sissy got to boogie board too!

.....

Little sandy butt :)

.....

Fun in the sand and sun!

.....

Lil was perfectly content sitting in this hole and playing with a bulldozer.

.....

Beach babe!

.....

Attempting a family photo

.....

This one is a little better...

.....

Thursday afternoon Jeb, Reid, and Grayson went on a helicopter ride over the ocean. They even got to see a few sharks out in the water! Reid thought this was soooo cool and still talks about seeing sharks from the helicopter!

.....

....

.....

Sweet baby girl watching the helicopter take off

.....

There they go!

.....

Reid couldn't wait to tell me about the sharks!

.....

Thursday night we went over to Destin to spend the evening at Baytowne at the Sandestin Resort. The Wharf at Baytowne is an AWESOME little "town" in the middle of the resort that is right on the bay at Destin. There is great shopping, restaurants, games, and tons for the kids to do. There's even an icecream shop, zipline/tree house activity, hamster balls, bullriding, and live music! We came to Baytowne a couple of years ago and I couldn't wait to go back this year.

.....

These "hamster balls" were quite the event. There was a long line of kids waiting to get inside the balls, and tons of people were lined up watching. The guy unzips this big plastic ball and lets the kid inside. Then zips it back up, fills it up with air, then the ball floats on the water with the kid inside of it. I was so scared that Reid would breathe in too much carbon dioxide and get dizzy or sick, but he insisted on getting inside one of these balls.

.....

I'll admit...it was SOOOO cool!

.....

Next was bullriding!

.....

Reid and I in the big chair at Baytowne

.....

Watching the hamster balls was just too much excitement for sis!

.....

On our last day at Panama City Beach, we went to Gulf World so that I could live out one of my dreams...swimming with the dolphins! The kids loved seeing all of the sea animals...sissy's favorite were the pink flamingos!

.....

I have to tell the dolphin story :) I did the dolphin encounter/swim with my two cousins, Trey and Grayson. At the beginning of the classroom portion of the dolphin encounter, the lady was telling us how dolphins use echolocation as their main sense and how this is an extremely accurate way of locating things in the water. Well, my cousin Trey, who is 16, decided to test out this sense when we got in the water with the dolphins. While the trainer was trying to make the dolphin do one of its tricks, Trey starts snapping his fingers under the water. This makes the dolphin go crazy and the dolphin then becomes rebellious and isn't doing any of the tricks right. Of course, because to its amazing echolocation, the dolphin was able to identify that the snaps were coming from Trey and would not give him a dorsal fin ride when it was his turn. It was hilarious....but I was soooo stressed out because the trainer didn't know that Trey had done this, and she kept trying to justify why the dolphin was being so stubborn. We even had to get a new dolphin...and I think that that dolphin, which was just gated off but in the same pool, also knew that Trey was the one that made the strange sounds (once again, very accurate echolocation skills), because when it swam over to us it went straight for Trey and knocked Trey and I down with it's giant dorsal fin!!! I really hurt the back of my legs! Dolphins really do have a great amount of strength!

.....

Aside from the craziness of Trey's snapping, the dolphin experience was AMAZING! To me, it was by far the very best thing we did on our vacation. I absolutely LOVED being in the water with the dolphins and the dolphin kiss was the cherry on top!

.....

My dorsal fin ride

.....

How cool is this sea turtle? It looks exactly like the ones on Finding Nemo :)

.....

LilliAnn LOVED petting the sting rays! We couldn't get her to leave this exhibit!

.....

She would get so excited and squeal every time they would swim by.

.....

I had to include this picture because this type of dolphin is rarely seen by humans. There are only two places in the world that have this type of dolphin in captivity...one is here at Gulf World and the other is somewhere in Asia. This type of dolphins live far off of the coast in very deep waters. This is why they are much darker than the dolphins that we usually see.