What's Up Woodwards: A Family Beach Trip

The beach trip planning began when the Odom family invited the Bradfords to their condos in Gulf Shores. Jared wasn’t able to drive with us on Saturday so he left Saturday morning to head home to study, he had to work Monday and Tuesday. :(

Saturday morning we loaded up the cars and headed to the beach, I drove Nonnie in her car following my parents and 2 youngest brothers. We got to the Odom’s condo and found it super nice and in a great location. After unloaded the cars, Mom and I set out to stock up for a week supply of food, it took a good three hours and we still forgot stuff.

Our days at the beach were full of sun bathing and fun in the ocean, and each night I played a lot of cards (mostly STOP) with Mom, Nonnie, Colton, Clint, Jordan (Alex’s brother) and Emily (Alex’s sister). The cooking was superb; Papa and Nonnie made breakfast every morning and a mixture of all the adults would make dinner.

On an eventful Monday a baby shark swam between Clint and my legs as we awaited a wave to ride into shore. I thought it looked like a shark but didn’t want to say it out load then an older man who was standing near us saw it too… he said “did you see that shark.” Later on that day someone spotted a much larger shark and even later that day we heard of a shark attack that happened right down the beach from us, scary! -but I love the ocean so it's worth the risk:)
Jared arrived on Tuesday night, I was so happy to see him!! Wednesday Jared and I set out to the beach early, he road waves in with me and then we relaxed and just enjoyed being together. Poor Papa was laid up all week with a hurt knee so he came out to the beach and sat with us for a couple of hours but it was the only day he saw the ocean. :(

Thursday Jared went golfing with Alex while I took Colton and Clint to Waterville, a water park about 15 minutes away from our condo. The boys and I had a lot of fun. While I was checking our stuff in at the Waterville entrance Colton and Clint went ahead to the slides. When they got back I was ready to join them. I asked if they went down the blue one which of course was the one that shot straight down like a bullet. Clint avoided eye contact and an aggravated Colton said, “NO, Clint wouldn’t let me, we went down the pink one.” Defensively, Clint proceeded to tell me that Mom would not let him go down the bullet the last time they went to a water park and he didn’t know if they were “allowed to”. So we went back up the line, Clint went down the pink one again and Colton and I went down the blue one… it was SO FUN! Our next time up the stairs to get to the slides we met a nice man and his five year old son. I asked the little boy which slide he was going down and he confidently said the blue one. Colton and I looked at Clint who had turned a dark pink shade and we giggled a little, I said, “no pressure Clint you can keep going down the pink one.” At the top he gathered up the courage and went down the blue one and had a BLAST! :) He got me back on the ride home for laughing at him- Being 15 years old Clint is now an “expert” driver and purposefully got on my ever lovin’ nerves by warning me about red lights coming up half a mile away, told me what the speed limit was over and over, and acted like he was going to die the entire trip back to the condo whenever a car would change lanes in front of us… I should have made him WALK… I’m getting a little red faced just thinking about that awful drive.

Jared and I went out to eat that night to celebrate our anniversary then Friday morning we headed home to Trussville, AL. What a fun relaxing trip!