Noelle and I have had fun playing around with CGH hairstyles this summer—I just wish we had time to try them all!

 

 

 

 

  

These are the sweetest days I have ever known.

Thank you, Brother Man, for this beautiful family picture!  You are such an awesome bro!

 

 

 

 

  

  

 

 

 

 

Here’s all the Banks cousins in birth order at the pool.  Considering 8 kids were going in 8 different directions, this was a miracle pic!

Go Noelle!

 

Harper and Saylor twinning!

Almost nap time for the littles!

Someone’s jelly, lol!

 

Love this silly little monkey!

Rose helping Harper figure out a game.  Love seeing them work together!

 

Noelle is just as sweet as ever!  Love these beach bums!

Our lovely little ladies were ready for a day full of shopping with their little purses ready! Poor SaySay!

 

Our first stop was the Alys Beach play ground!  We’ve had several friends recommend this fun little spot, so we had to check it out!

 

 

I’d say it was a hit!  The girls loooved this funky play ground.

 

Our next stop was souvenir shopping in Seacrest Beach!  The Sweet Peddler candy shop was so colorful and fun!

 

 

Anna Kate picked out all my favorite candy.  She’s so sweet!

 

 

I don’t think there is a candy on earth that they don’t have!

 

The snow cone stand was such a rip off in Seacrest!  $5 for a small snow cone.  If you’re in the area and want a snow cone, wait to get it at Frost Bites in Seaside! 

 

Gigi’s toy store in Rosemary Beach is amazing, and they have a little house shop in Seacrest Beach for girls called Gigi’s STELLAR tweens.  We looooved it!  They even had this ongoing garland all the kids that come can tie on ribbons and when each strand is finished, they hang it from the chandelier inside.  So cool!

 

Mike tried this lobster roll for lunch.  He thought it was delicious!

Eyelashes for dayz and an adoring father admiring his baby!

Next stop, Rosemary Beach!  We’ve been dying to explore this area of 30A ever since my mom visited and told us all about it!

 

Anna Kate and I checked everything out while the other girls fell asleep in the car on the way over.  First stop, Gigi’s toy store!  This toy store is everything you dream as a kid that a toy store would be!  The owner was so passionate about all of her products.  She excitedly took us all over the store showing us her favorite things.  I love that!

  

Anna Kate bought a sand dollar at a furniture store and ran into the cutest puppy ever!  She got her super cute flip flop necklace at Gigi’s!

 

After Anna Kate and I walked down to the beach and back up the famous Main Street of Rosemary Beach, Noelle joined us to check out The Sugar Shak!

 

We were all sugared out!

 

Anna Kate couldn’t wait to bring sissy back to Gigi’s to show her everything and play!

 

Headed back to the car for the last stop on our 30A tour…

 

(first we had to look for my missing sunglasses at the play ground from this morning)

Last stop, the food trucks in Seaside!  We could not wait to try all of the delicious food we’ve heard so much about!

Picture taken by Noelle near The Melt Down waiting for her grilled cheese sandwich.  Beautiful!

 

Rose was just waking up from her long nap in the car and super hungry!

 

Noelle asked if she could take this picture of Mike and me.  She’s always thinking about all of us and so so sweet!

 

Here’s the last of her grilled cheese on top of my bar-b-que sandwich which was amazing!!!  I also got tomato soup from The Melt Down, which made my mouth just water thinking about it.  Everything we ate at the food trucks was the best in its class!  I’m so glad we got to eat here!

We got to hear a little bit of an outdoor concert on our way back to the car.  We would’ve stayed longer, but we wanted to get back to our resort for fireworks.  This is what summer is all about!

 

Bye Seaside!  You were lovely!!!

 

Awesome way to end a super fun day along 30A!

We love Florida and family time hanging out on the beach!

 

 

 

 

“I’m the queen of the world!”

 

Rose contemplating kissing this frog to see if he would turn into a prince.  I love this picture!

 

She almost built up her courage and then quickly went for it.  She said, “He didn’t turn into a prince. Oh well!”

 

Harper and Rose looove to match!  It’s the cutest thing.  After I took their picture, they kept hugging and hugging, squeezing their little cheeks together.  They are so cute!

  

 

 

Even Saylor got in on the action!  She’s almost a big girl, but if you ask her if she’s a big girl or a baby, she’ll say in the sweetest little voice, “A baby!” 

I was sitting on a pool chair watching everyone go off to play in this picture and my heart was so full.  Vacations are good for the soul!

 

Lazy river time!  I scored big on finding a condo with tons of pools, hot tubs and a lazy river, but it back fired!  It was so much fun, the girls wanted to stay at the pool the whole time, so we had to take turns going to the beach in between pool times.   

 

I’ve already written about this night on Instagram, but I’ll briefly describe what happened this night when we went out to catch some waves.

For us, it looked like a calm evening on the beach, no double red flags or anything suspicious.  Mike, John, Noelle and I decided to go boogie boarding.  Mike stayed back on the shoreline watching us, while the three of us went out to board.  I had a weird gut feeling about Noelle needing to stay close to the shore.  I’m not sure why, but I treaded water back and told Mike not to let her go past her waist.  That was right after the picture below was taken. 

If you look closely, you can see near the right of this picture, two waves going perpendicular to the shore.  That was where a rip current was located, just yards away from our girl.  Not sure why I had a weird feeling about Noelle and not myself, but it is what it is.  I went out just past these three waves to ride a wave in, but I got stuck in the rip current that we didn’t know was there at the time.  It kept swirling me around, and I couldn’t make any headway.  I knew to swim sideways but that didn’t help.  Mike saw me struggling and swam out to help me, but he got stuck too.  I flagged down my brother, and he came to pull me out.  I threw him my board, which was connected to my wrist and tried to kick as hard as I could to help him while he was pulling me.  As soon as I made it out, I looked back, and Mike was out too.  To say it freaked us out is an understatement.  It really stinks because we love to boogie board and have done it a lot through the years.  This really messed us up.   

Fortunately, Noelle was building this sand castle and didn’t know what was happening in the ocean in front of her.  We think Tropical Storm Bill had churned everything up, but it never rained once and lots of people were in the water, no warning signs whatsoever, so it didn’t even cross our minds.  The next day, they had red flags on the shoreline and a life guard in the water directing people away from the rip area.  Wish they had found it before we did.  That all said, we were okay and thankful for absolutely everything.  Life is so short, and we were truly reminded of that this night.

They had this flag and a life guard on the shoreline right where we were boarding the next day, but it was a day too late for us!

 

 

Thankful for our beautiful little girls!

 

Our condo had the cutest little kids cave with built in bunk beds, which were a huge hit!

Whew!  I’ve got to admit, I was glad this day was over.  The following day, we took a break from the water, and explored all over 30-A!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

  

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

Awesome day 2 at the beach!

Our big summer vacation happened sooner rather than later this summer, and I’ve got lots of pictures to show for it!  I think my very favorite part of vacation is when we arrive at our destination.  The girls think the condo/hotel/house is totally amazing each time we go somewhere, even though it’s usually super simple!  You should see the way they run through each room jumping and squealing!  The cousins reuniting was the cherry on top, I mean, look at these happy girls!

 

See what I did right there with their shirts?  Sometimes the middle child needs something to call her own, God love her!  The girls couldn’t wait to check out the pools at the condo.  It was like a water park right on the beach! 

 

These two crack me up!  #adorable

 

 

 

Mike took this random selfie with Saylor.  I think she’s going to love it someday!

 

The beautiful Banks girls!  xoxo

 

Anna Kate and Saylor are big buddies!  They always gravitate to each other, and it’s so cute, especially since they are such different ages.

*This was several weeks ago!  I’m soooo behind on absolutely everything and summer is go time for Mommies… workin’ the list! 

 

Happy birthday, Shelby!

 

We love summer and awesome friends to share it with us!