A Week of Fun in the Sun (long post)

Well, the vacation that we planned over a year ago has finally come and gone. It was a long awaited time for us and we had a blast. Of course there were a few speed bumps along the way, but when you put three families (13 people) in a 3 bedroom cabin for a week some bumps are to be expected. We all survived and made some wonderful memories.

The first day that we arrived, we unpacked and headed to the grocery store. We learned last year, that it is cheaper for a large party to NOT go out to eat. Usually, at the beach, there is an 18% gratuity added and the service is NEVER worth it. We planned our menu the weeks before and we planned to eat all of our meals at the cabin.

We stayed at Gulf State Park at the cottages that were by the lake. The kids had a really good time catching little crabs with their nets the first evening.

We enjoyed a great meal of hamburgers, then put the kids to bed in their sleeping bags and the adults slipped out to the porch and enjoyed a nice evening.

The next day we all loaded up and headed to the beach. The kids, well most of the kids, had a great time. The babies (Andrew and Ryan) were not too fond of the sand. I was really surprised to see Todd out in the water. He got stung by something when he was younger and still has the scar on his arm. He ended up having as much fun as the kids. After the beach and an hour of "quiet time, " we loaded up and headed on an adventure (we got lost on the way) to ride on a dolphin cruise. It was really hard to get a good picture of the dolphins, they are so quick and fast! The kids enjoyed seeing the dolphins so close. .

The next day, Ben had wanted to take the little boys inshore fishing, but we woke up to a loud thunderstorm, so the fishing trip was cancelled and rescheduled for the next day. The Mommy's left the kids with the Daddies and we headed to the outlet mall. Boy, I have never been so tired in all my life. That place is huge!! I wish that I had had a lot of money to get the kids some school clothes. All the Daddies had shirts that match for their fishing trip, they say Trollin' with my Homies! So we thought that the little boys needed matching shirts, so we found some shark shirts with matching sun visors for them. They are so cute! When we got back, the guys had been fishing with the kids on the pier, near our cabin. We walked out and talked with them for a bit and then when we were about to head back to start dinner, Savannah caught the biggest fish of the day. She was so excited, but did not want to touch the fish!

The next day, was the big day for the "guys"!! The little boys were so excited to get to go fishing. They all were able to catch some fish and the captain even took them out in the ocean. Zach had the time of his life. They were able to catch Mackerel. When we cooked it, you would have thought that those boys had NEVER had fish before. They thought that they were big stuff since they were able to provide dinner for most of us.

Thanks Mr. Ben, Zach had a WONDERFUL time!

After the boys got back from their fishing trip, we went to Tacky Jacks for lunch. Morgan had been dying to go there! I was not that impressed, but the atmosphere was good.

That afternoon Alicia, Eva, and I took the girl's to the souvenir shops. Morgan picked out a t-shirt and Savannah got a hair wrap. They enjoyed the time without the boys!

The next day was the big boys fishing trip. I have nothing to show for it because they all forgot the cameras. They said that they had an OK time. They had more fun when they took the boys the day before. Funny how your idea of fun changes when you get older and have kids. On this morning, I was woke up to the words "ALLIGATOR!!" Remember the picture up above about not feeding the alligator? Well we all thought it was there just as a warning, you know just in case. Well, my kids had been fishing and swimming in the lake and this is what I saw when Alicia woke me up.

We took the kids to the beach to play for the morning and then we went back to the cabin for lunch and "quiet time!" After the guys got back we all got cleaned up and went to the beach out at Fort Morgan. There was only a few people out there and we got some pretty good pictures. The kids also had a great time catching hermit crabs and finding shells.

On Friday, we went back to Fort Morgan and rode the ferry to Dolphin Island. The kids did not enjoy it as much as we thought that they would. But it was something to do. After the ferry, we went out to Billy's Seafood to get some shrimp for our Low Boil that night. We even got to see some dolphins while we were out there.

This picture shows where the water level from several hurricanes damaged Billy's. The other pic we think is beach mice that we saw on the side of the road near our cabin.

The last day we took it easy. We went to a little park in Orange Beach and grilled hamburgers and then the kids and Daddies went swimming. After the park, we went over to the beach for a little bit to look shells. I didn't really get any good pictures. They all turned out blurry. We had a really nice and relaxing time. It was a nice way to end the trip.

Todd was under the pier playing with Andrew.

On Sunday, after we got everything packed up we stopped at Lu Lu's for lunch. This is our annual close to the vacation.

We had a great time and hope that we can do it again next year. It was nice to get away and not think about the problems of everyday life. We enjoyed the time with our closest friends.