This year, my mom invited us to join her at her PCB condo. I'm going to quickly summarize what all went wrong so I can focus on the good things that happened!
Things that went wrong:
1. Len had to work and ended up having to take the van back on Wednesday only to return Thursday to pick up the girls for checkout on Friday morning, thus not getting a vacation at all. Work is a very necessary thing and we're grateful he has some, but sometimes it's annoying.
2. I hit some kid's Suburban. I didn't actually get to talk to the kid, but his friends were very understanding. As of yet, he graciously hasn't called me back. Our van will need more repairs than his SUV.
3. The girls weren't exactly crazy about the sand on the beach, so the adults didn't get as much beach time as we wanted.
4. 3 out of 5 vacationers got food poisoning. Len's was on Thursday while he was driving back down to pick us up.
5. Didn't get to shop, relax, or eat as much yummy food as we wanted.
6. We were all tired of vacation by the end of the week.
The Good Stuff
Ok, enough bad, let's do the good! We got to eat at our favorite hibachi restaurant, Mikato's and seafood at Capt. Anderson's. Emily enjoyed the dolphin fountains and the amount of pennies she got to throw into them.
We spent most of our time in the pool. Emily finally got the gumption to swim off the steps in her water wings. She loved playing with the older kids and the new babies around us. We purchased a new float for Elizabeth. She gave me palpitations before we stepped out of the room because she would jump into the water as if she could swim. As soon as you'd catch her, she'd wiggle until she was turned around and then kick off of you to swim towards the wall! The float/life jacket kept her well above water. We picked it up for $16 at Walmart. I highly endorse it for your little one that can't swim.
Len took Lizzie out into the surf a couple of times. She was ok with it. She was more fascinated by the birds, para-sailers, helicopters, banner planes, and carrier jets buzzing the beach.
Len and I actually got a great treat! We left the girls with my mom and joined the other parents/party animals for dinner and some clubbing! I forgot how much fun it was to listen to a live band! No, I was the designated driver, so no drinking for me. The band and limited dancing was great! I was prepared to shut down the bar, but alas, the group had planned for an early morning fishing trip the next day. Whoo-hoo!
Lizzie and Len opted out of our Fun-Land night...their loss! Mom found a bucket of old prize tickets. We took them to the prize counter and eventually brought every worker over to see these tickets! Some of them were probably 25 years old. I was told some of the boys took home some of them as souvenirs. Emily spent $10 of tokens on mini-carousel and auto-horse rides. We did get her to enjoy a couple games of Whack-a-Crocodile. Gran-Gran racked up tickets at skee-ball and Mommy polished her gambling skills on 21. All told we came home with a haul of candy, a toy car, a dozen plastic horse figures, some stuffed animals, a mood ring, puzzles, and a crocheted football from the prize counter. We rounded out the night with Fun-Land's signature soft serve twirl ice cream! Emily even picked up a souvenir penny for her book!
Our last day, We took the girls to Pier Park, an outdoor shopping mall with various carnival rides and things to do right in the middle. This is where I got into an accident. We were trying to squeeze into a parking space before someone else. Again, Emily rode the merry-go-round! Six times! We stopped in the candy shop for taffy and fudge.
So there we are. One tired week later after fun and food poisoning, we finally made it back home to look over pictures and dirty laundry and reflect that our next family vacation shouldn't be for awhile...or much shorter and closer to home!
Thanks to our house-sitters, Allyson and Ashley for holding down the fort and keeping care of Hadjers for us!
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