Gulf Shores-Day 6

Today we did some fishing and just hung around the pool and beach.  Pretty low key day.

 That evening around 6 we went back down to the beach because the people were going to dig up the rest of the sea turtle nest, so I wanted the boys to be able to see one...maybe...luckily, out of all the rest of the eggs we were able to see one hatch and make his way, very slowly, to the ocean.  He had a little bit of a lazy little flipper, so he had a hard time making it.  I was so glad the boys and Josh got to see it though.

So adorable!!

The view from our balcony



View of the pool directly below our balcony



Also that evening we decided to try and get some family pictures on the beach.  With the whole sea turtle thing, we kinda got behind and ended up getting down to the beach too close to sunset, so it was difficult to get many good shots.  Plus, when you have Carter around, you are bound to get some silly faces....see below.....



Gulf Shores-Day 5

We decided to go on a drive and drove an hour and a half over to Pensacola, Florida.  We were driving down the highway by the Santa Rosa beach area and I told Josh, "We have to stop!  This beach is gorgeous!"  It's right next to a national park, so there was hardly anyone there.  We stopped and played at the beach for a while.  We then went back into town, had lunch, and decided to change into our swim attire and head back to that beautiful beach.  It had such turquoise colored water and beautiful white sand.  We saw a ton of dolphins and found some of the neatest shells there.  SO glad we made the drive over there!

Dolphins

Me and my sweet boys.

We headed back to our condo at Gulf Shores and Collin wanted to go fishing.  We were so excited when he actually caught a fish!!!  His very first "ocean fish" (as he put it).  He was so excited and proud that he had caught one before daddy!  He reeled it in all by himself!  We found out later that it was a "ladyfish" that he caught.  He was so excited and thinks he's a professional fisherman now for sure!

Gulf Shores-Day 4

We got up early and caught a ferry from Fort Morgan to Dauphin Island.  It was a very hot 30 minute ride.  We just walked on and didn't take our car thinking that things would be fairly close and it would be ok just to walk.....wrong.  We walked down to the Estruary Sea Lab.  The boys liked seeing all the sea life in the aquariums, but it wasn't exactly what we were expecting.  Not really worth the trip over.  We then decided to grab some lunch, but the closest restaurants were on the other side of the island.  We were blessed to find a sweet shuttle driver who only charged us $2 to drive us there.  He recommended a restaurant on the golf course, so we did that. 

The ferry boat

On the ferry

Saw lots of oil rigs in the gulf.....this one was in Mobile Bay

This old boat was outside the Estruary Sea Lab.  Boys loved it.

Checking out the sea turtles

Collin measuring up to a dolphin

Carter measuring up to a dolphin.

 

 

Collin with a diver's helmet on

And Carter....

And....wait a minute...me....ok...maybe josh made me do it. :-)

We then decided to grab some lunch, but the closest restaurants were on the other side of the island. We were blessed to find a sweet shuttle driver who only charged us $2 to drive us there. He recommended a restaurant on the golf course, so we did that.

                                       

The same sweet shuttle driver came back to pick us up at the restaurant in time for us to make it back for the next ferry back to Fort Morgan.  While we were waiting on the ferry to arrive we found a ton of hermit crabs right there on the beach.  That kept the boys well occupied.  They wanted to bring them home, but I made sure they realized that they were taking them from their home and they probably wouldn't be too happy about that.  They were neat and we found some really big ones.

On the ferry ride back we saw some dolphins and pelicans (the boys loved all the pelicans).  Carter fell asleep on the ferry ride over.  We then went back to the condo and all took naps.  The heat had just zapped us.  We went for our evening walk at the beach and a late night swim in the pool.  Did I mention I could get used to this?? :-)



Gulf Shores-Day 3

We were absolute beach bums today.  We looked for shells, watched a lot of dolphins swimming from the beach and hung out at the pool.  After a full morning of "beaching" it, we went back up to the condo for naps.  Mommy snuck back down to the pool though for some relaxation and reading the book I brought with me (thanks Rachel and Lindsey!), "The Help".  Loved the book and the free time I had at the pool to read it!  Everyone was always stopping by to talk to me about the book while I was at the pool.  It was a great conversation piece. :-)

After naps, we went back to the pool and the beach at sunset and built sandcastles.  We saw several jellyfish that evening.

Daddy and a tired Carter

We had some excitement around 10:00 that night.  Remember the sea turtles I wrote about from Day 2?  Well, they started hatching!!  I was out on the balcony that night reading my book and saw some flashlights and commotion down on the beach.  Josh stayed with the boys and I ran my little heart out to get there in time.  I was able to see several of them making it to the ocean surf to begin their big journey.  About 60 hatched that night and they made it to the ocean in about 15 minutes.  It was one of the neatest things I've ever seen.  So exciting!!  They told me that there would probably be more hatch later since the nests usually have around 100 eggs.  They said that on Thursday evening they would dig up the nest to see if there were any more if they didn't hatch before then.

ABC....123

One of my friends posted a video of her little guy tonight and it reminded me that I had totally forgotten to video Carter saying his ABC's and 123's.  Here are two videos of him.  So proud of him and can't believe how big my "baby" is getting!  Love you Carter!!

Gulf Shores-Day 2

We got up for an early morning walk on the beach....man I could really get used to this.  We then hit the pool and went back to the beach.  We watched really large schools of fish swim back and forth.  We later heard that they were probably being pushed around by bull sharks.....not what I wanted to hear. ha!

We then headed into town for groceries and ended up getting the boys some big shovels and boogie boards....big score.

Daddy did a little fishing from the beach.  He caught a crab with the net, but no fish.

There is a group here from Save The Planet that is watching a nest of sea turtles that should hatch any day!  They have listening devices so they listen under the sand to see if they hear any movement coming from the eggs.  They told me there could be up to 100 eggs in the nest!

One of my favorite things to do after the boys go to bed in the evenings is to sit on the balcony, drinking a cup of hot tea and reading the book "The Help".  Love sitting out there reading and listening to the waves crash on the beach.  Do I ever have to leave???

Funny Friday!

Happy Friday everyone!  Not much to share today.

This is a video of Collin and Lexi, our dog.  Lexi has really gotten into howling whenever she hears the boys cry, or sing, or even when prompted, as you will see in this video.  My mom has a really funny video of her howling while Collin is singing.  I need to get that from her.  Anyways, here it is.