Fall in Florida...

...is beautiful, sunny, and 80+ degrees! Hello convertible weather!

And un-luckily there was a very convincing saleswoman at the Avis counter in the airport so we that's exactly what we ended up with.  A bright red 2013 Ford Mustang Convertible.  Look how shiny.  We kept the top down the entire time.

I guess I should take a step back here.  This past week Eric has a week long break from school so we decided to go on a another trip.  My brother, Alex, is currently stationed at Eglin Air Force Base in Fort Walton, Florida - right on the Gulf of Mexico by Pensacola.  We packed up and headed down for some fun in the sun with Alex.

As soon as we got to Florida all I wanted to do was get to the beach.  As quickly as humanly possible.  And with a beach that is as gorgeous as this can you really blame me?

We stayed directly in Fort Walton but we spent all of our beach time over on Okaloosa Island.

I totally fell in love with all of the birds hanging out around us on our first day there.  It was fun taking pictures of them.

And while I was having fun with the birds Eric was spending his time just as enjoyably with his DS3 and  rocking some Mario.

Check out this sand.  It was like a fine, white sugar.

I convinced Eric to play around in the sand with me.  We dug tunnels and made a little turtle.  His name is Timothy.

One of the days we went over to Destin Beach.  They have a little area with shops and restaurants called Harborwalk Village. While there I had the best Starbucks Vanilla Steamer I've ever had and we spent an hour on a wave runner out in the Gulf of Mexico.  The wave runner was probably the coolest experience of the entire trip.  We went out into the gulf where the water was completely clear and incredibly warm.  While we were riding around we came up on a full pod of dolphins - about 12 in total.  There was even a baby dolphin.  It was so cool!  We got to idle up right next to them and ride along in the middle of them.  We were able to stay within 3-5 feet of them for about 10 minutes. Amazing!

On Saturday we met up with Alex and went back to the beach. This is the only picture I could get with him.

He then took us to an armament museum and he taught us about the planes he's jumped out of and the mines/bombs that he is learning to dis-arm.  And Eric got to sit in a flight simulator for an F-15!

As a perfect ending to our vacation Alex took us to play indoor volleyball with some people he knows from church.  We ended up playing for 3 hours.  It was fabulous.  We had a great trip.  We loved the beach, the food, and seeing Alex.  Can't wait to go back!!

xo,
Carly