Living the Small Town Life: Beach Vacation 2010

June 19-25th we went with my side of the family to Fort Morgan, Alabama for vacation. My family always went every year to Perdido Key, FL from before I was born up until a few years ago. My dad referred patients to Dr. Woody who would let us stay at his condo every year for free. We affectionately called the area "Dr. Woody's", and it was a huge highlight of every year.
So this year most of us missed going the past few years and wanted to return. We decided to rent a little house this time though since our family has grown. Most of the house on the beach were on Ft. Morgan... about 30ish miles from where we used to stay and about 20 miles from civilization. It was nice being secluded, but a pain to drive at night to restaurants, grocery, etc esp since Brieleigh hates being in her carseat at night. We enjoyed much family time squeezed into a car with B screaming her head off.
Us Willers drove from Texas the night before, stopped by David's familys' house for a short visit, then caravaned with my family to the beach. It was an 8 hour (or more like 10 with the Bug) trip to MS and a 5ish hour trip to the coast. Needless to say B was VERY tired of her carseat by the end of this trip! Katie, David, and Peter came for three nights. Peter got burned by a curling iron though so he couldn't swim or be in the sun sadly!
Brieleigh LOVED the beach, ocean, and pool. When I first stood her up to let the waves wash over her feet, her little legs were shaking so bad. I knelt down beside her and after that she warmed up to it. Every time she saw the ocean afterwards she waved her arms and legs and cooed. We bought her a yellow baby float which she rode the waves in and floated in the pool with. She didn't even cry when waves hit her face (though I tried not to let this happen).
We spent most all of our time at the beach. We made sure to get a house with a pool for the babies and because of the oil, but we ended up being able to swim in the ocean. It was so clear most of the trip! The next to last day we saw a tarball washed up on shore here and there but nothing in the water. The last afternoon you could see very small balls in the water and a lot more on shore that you often couldn't help stepping on. Thankfully that was our last day. We went further down the beach 30ish miles in Gulf Shores one night and there was a solid foot of oil washed up on shore and it smelled very strongly of it. Then several miles past that in Perdido Key there was no oil again. It was weird how scattered it was, but thankfully we picked the right area to stay! It was neat to see all the clean up crews and ships and boom everywhere too.
We also did other activities besides swimming. We ate out most nights. Some restuarants were empty because of the oil, others where still hopping. We ate at Tacky Jacks, Calypso Joe's, Lambert's, Grazie, and Louisiana Lagniappe. All pretty yummy food. We had some seafood- shrimp poboy, Mahi-mahi, flounder, shrimp and grits... A couple of mornings we joined Cal in his Insanity workout videos. Wow, intense! I say we, I did two days, Maddy, David, and Katie did a few minutes, Mom did most days, and Cal did everyday- so motivated and determined was he. So proud because it was intense! We shopped at the outlet mall in Foley for about 2 hours. Cal put us on a time limit. We didn't get much- dress for a wedding and shirts for work. I was looking for a new swim suit since most all of my swimsuits are one pieces (which I prefer!) from high school, but everyone made fun of their saggy-ness. Somewhere I lost some weight in there?? I thought they were fine, but David banned me from wearing one of them on the trip anymore. We drove to our old stomping grounds which brought back alot of childhood memories. We went to an old country church Sunday where we heard a Father's Day motivational speech- well he eventually threw in a Bible verse here and there, but we mostly learned about his life and heard a solo on "Daddy's Hands"- quite the experience. We watched alot of the World Cup and some Walker, Texas Ranger (a childhood favorite).
We really enjoyed our trip, and it was so relaxing and so refreshing to be with family and to see such beauty in God's creation. The ocean boggles my mind- so peaceful and breathtaking, yet so huge, deep, endless, and scary. Thanks, Mom, for letting us come on such a fun family vacation!!

First ocean view

Siblings- and they pose alike too!

Overcoming her fearfulness

Mom ("Millie") and Brieleigh chilling on the beach together and holding down the fort

Building sand castles

A merry-go round at Calypso Joe's

Crab hunting and wave riding. The waves got decent later in the week. We caught a seahorse, some silver fish, a half dead long fish (that cut Maddy's tummy), 20 sand dollars, and shells.

Blue crab- he was fiesty

Aunt Maddy with Brieleigh and Peter. The babies had such a great time together. Brieleigh's face would light up and she would smile and laugh everytime she saw Peter.