Florida

We have had this trip planned for several months.  Lance's sister from Utah (who we hadn't seen for nearly 4 years) was coming into town (Georgia) and we weren't going to miss seeing her.  Lance and his brother found us a nice hotel in Panama City Beach, Florida (13 hour drive) were we all planned on meeting up Monday afternoon.

We decided to leave Saturday night and get at least a few hours under our belt. We made it passed Nashville, Tn and stopped at the most amazing hotel in Alabama.  We had 8-9 hours left Sunday, which wasn't too bad.   We pulled into Panama City Beach and got dinner. We made a quick drive by the beach and then headed to our hotel so we could get a good nights rest so we could play hard Monday morning.

Lance went for a run on the beach Monday morning and scouted out places for us to go.  He came back raving about this certain location he found. We knew we had a few hours before his family would arrive so we wanted to set up our spot on the beach.


We were a little worried because there were some thunder storms in the forecast. WE didn't let it stop us though.  Just moments after we arrived and set up our things (which sounds so easy but IT WAS NOT) the kids started playing in the ocean. We noticed the red flag flying which indicates that the ocean water is a bit rough.  We were determined to have a good time regardless. We just told the kids to stay close by and be careful. 

After being there for 30 minutes a surfer guy came up to me and started expressing his concern for the condition of the water. He explained that there were rip currents which pull swimmers out and they can be very dangerous.  He seemed very distressed and strongly cautioned us. Not sure of his motive (we were kind of in the surfers way and knew they probably wanted us to move to give them more room) we continued.

Probably 30 minutes after that I noticed a young boy, who was maybe 11 or 12 years old, yelling "HELP, DAD, HELP!" I quickly grabbed Lance and pointed to the boy. Several of us watched as the young boy's dad started to swim out to him. The dad was struggling to get out to his son who was being pulled out by the rip current.  It was so scary seeing dad trying to get to his boy but not being able to move fast enough against the waves.

Lance had swam out half way but had started to slow down as the dad got closer to his son. Only once the dad met the son they started to drift apart because of the current. The dad began to panic and started yelling "Help me! Help me!" You could see the fear in his face as he struggled to stay afloat.  The boy was screaming also. Lance started to swim out to help. He turned back to Abby and yelled for her to grab her floaty, she had thankfully already blown up.  He tossed the floaty to the boy and started swimming to the dad. Once he got to the dad he noticed he was exhausted.

Lance kept shouting, "You have got to swim!"

"I can't" the man would say.

"Yes you can. You have to." Lance said.  Listening to Lance explain what happend was surreal. He said he just knew what to do.  It was like he didn't even have to think. (Definitely the Holy Ghost guiding him here.) He got under the man and tried to plant his feet so he could shove the man up and over to the side of the current.  Luckily it didn't take long and before we knew it Lance was helping this poor man back to shore.   The man kept saying, " You just saved my life. Thank you."

This poor man and his family were stunned at what had just happend.  The son just sat alone on the shore and cried. He was so shaken up. We all were. We watched as the paramedics came and carried him away. (The paramedic that worked with the man came back later and told Lance that he saved that mans life.)

After all of this happened the life guards closed down the beaches because they had already made 9 rescues that morning due to bad water conditions.

It is very humbling to think about all the decisions we made that morning that led us to that spot on the beach, that led Abby to blow up her floaty right when we arrived, or led me to hear the young boy screaming (no one else around us heard him, they didn't even know what happend until the paramedics were arriving), or what led Lance to know how to respond quickly to help.

I am so grateful that Lance was able to get out of there without getting caught in the current. So many things could have happen differently that morning. Heck, we were only 50 feet from this spot. It could have been my kids in the water. YIKES!

I think about the sweet prayer Emma offered for our family that morning as we sat in our car about to head off to the beach.  You know sometimes your kids pray and you wonder if they even thought about what they were saying.  This was not one of those prayers.  This was a very thoughtful prayer where you feel that warm feeling come over you as you hear it.  After she prayed I remember Lance commenting to our family about how he felt good about the day because of Emma's prayer.

Thank goodness for peace that comes from knowing Heavenly Father is aware of us and is guiding us.  Even when the results don't end in a positive way, I believe He is in control. I think about some of my dear friends that have had accidents and tragedies in their families.  They may wonder why they weren't directed by the Holy Ghost to do things differently so they could have saved their loved ones. I believe the Lord was directing things just the same way he was this day only the outcome needed to be different. I don't claim to understand it all I just know that I felt directed this day at the beach.

After all this happened we continued to play on the beach and in the very shallow water.  No doubt a little shaky and nervous. Looking at the pictures you would never know that any of this had happened. Kind of funny, huh? We were able to move on and have a fabulous time with family,

Louisville, KY (only 2 hours from Indianapolis)

This is what our car looked like.

Ha, this is outside our hotel in Alabama. Lance is trying to shove all our belonging into the back.

Our first morning at the beach.