Exciting Palm Beach Pictures and Stories by Holly

Ok my loyal blog readers I have returned from my wonderful and relaxing vacation that was Palm Beach. My parents have a time share that is an ocean view so my entire family (minus Ben who had to stay in Abilene and work) came out to Florida for a ligit vacation. It seems "vacations" are mostly spent going to see family so this was a nice change of pace to vacation like normal red-blooded Americans. Also, you should know that Taylor and I have been challenged by loyal reader Heather Sommerville (big shout out to ya, my sista)to see who can post the better Palm Beach blog. I have linked you to Taylor's blog so you can give Heather (via my blog) your feedback should you choose. I think Taylor's post was, how shall I put this...lacking. But some might say I'm biased and I would never want to sway your vote so I will move on. I shared a condo with Paul (my brother) and his family while Heather (my sister) and company shared with my parents. This was to split up the 5 kids because that would have been CRAZY to have them all in one condo but I personally could have cared less and thought the better option was to put my parents and me in a condo (pure tranquility) and everyone else should be left to deal with their wild spawns but no one asked me. The first night, Kate and Nathan decided they wanted to take a bath in the big jacuzzi tub in my room. Paul was filling the tub and asked me if I thought the water looked yellow. Yes. The water was indeed yellow and there was even a sign on the counter saying that the city of Palm Beach recognizes the water is a little off but it is not hazardous to your health and is just the natural "humidic and tannic" something or another of the water.
Yellow water? Who cares, we're in Palm Beach!!
Basically, everyday was the same. Beach in the morning, pool late morning, back to the condo for lunch, back out to the pool or beach in the afternoon. Thankfully, I didn't have kids waying me down so I was able to spend all the time I wanted at the beach/pool. View of the condo from my permanent lounge chair at the pool View of Palm Beach from my balcony View of the ocean from my balcony
We all decided that we needed to try out the hip-hop dance class. I never knew how white we were until I saw this. Seriously though, everyone was a good sport and we had a good time laughing at ourselves! You can see Taylor in the background and Mitchell and Nathan.
Paul (Vanilla Ice)
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As you know, I am not above showing myself dancing on this blog but Taylor has the only copy of my skills during the hip hop class so I cannot post it and for some reason, he decided not to so that's everyones loss...
Taylor and Anna(Go White Boy, Go White Boy, Go!)

We also performed tricks at the pool. We truly are a family of talant.

Anna in her acrobatic debut

Nathan as the human water fountain

Anna mysteriously floating on her back


Paul, Mitchell, Taylor and myself got up early and went deep sea fishing. It was a lot of fun.

Mitchell and I before the boat took off.


My catch. Actually I didn't catch anything, that was my bait. Pitiful, I know


Paul's catch. Jerk...


Taylor's promise:

That little fish is going to look great on his calf. I know a good, ehh, decent tattoo artist named Willow who I can hook him up with.

Pregnetto and me

Mom and Dad relaxing at the pool

All the kids (minus Ben). I love Anna's goggles. Everytime I saw her I would think of Elton John.






I have more videos but I will post those another time since this is getting long. I have some great karoeke videos of Paul, Susan and I but Paul has the video of my singing so when I get that from him, I will post it. It's really funny let me tell you!

Now I will end this post with a story from the end of my trip. When I boarded my plane to come back to Georgia, there was not a space above my seat for my carry on so I had to go to the middle of the plane (I was up front) to store my bag. I was thinking the whole time back to Atlanta about what a pain it was going to be to have to go against the traffic to the back of the plane in order to pick up my bag. When we landed and the pilot said we could get up, I jumped out of my seat and head butted my way to my bag. Of course, I had to stand there and wait for the people ahead to move off the plane once I got the bag and I, unfortunately, was stuck in front of these two small children who did not know the words "personal space." They were kind of bumping into me but I really didn't mind since I understand that is just how kids are. Then, I feel something on my butt. I didn't turn around because I thought maybe the kid was just bumping into me again. Then I feel a small child's finger tracing a circle on my left butt cheek. My eyes go wide but I didn't want to draw attention to this because of how awkward I felt. Then, he starts to do it again and his mother sees it and says "Adam, don't touch the lady. You are in her personal space." The little heathen proceeds to poke my butt cheek while saying "This lady?? This lady?? This lady?? Momma, this lady???" I kind of wanted to laugh but I was so uncomfortable I didn't know if I should acknowledge it or ignore it. I chose to ignore it which might have made the situation even more awkward for everyone involved.
Oh, yeah one more short story from the airport in Ft. Lauderdale. I was sitting by my gate waiting for my flight reading. I had to get there early since everyone else's flights left before mine so the only people at the gate at this point was me and then some girl who sat in the row behind me. All of a sudden I hear her say "Toto, Toto, Toto, Toto, Toto, Toto!!! She sounded like she was trying to get someone's attention and just kept saying "Toto!" I kid you not, for a split second I actually thought to myself, "Am I Toto? Is she talking to me?" That just seemed like the only rational explanation but then I remembered that I didn't know anyone in the airport or in Ft. Lauderdale and, oh yeah, my name isn't now nor has it ever been Toto. I turn around slowly and see she is on the phone. I then hear her say very loudly "Toto, Toto, Toto, Toto, Toto, TONESE!!!! Listen to me!" Apparently Toto was not listening to her so she was getting annoyed. Still, I thought it was weird.
Ok, fine, one more VERY short story. There were these stray cats that we would see from our balcony wondering around the property. Heather and Paul saw a cat one night from the balcony and swore it was a Puma. A puma?? Why a puma? Why not a cougar or a wildcat? Can any one of you look at a cat and know that it's a puma as opposed to some other cat? Turns out, it was just a small stray house cat which made their claim that much more ridiculous, in a funny way.