The One That Almost Got Away

Here is the one! I'll tell the story a little later in the post, so you have to stay tuned through...
the photo shoots and the details of the day!
We decided to head to Myakka River State Park again for a day of fishing. We headed out around 11 am on Saturday with our friends the Johnson's who just moved in down the street! We had the place practically to ourselves! Everyone got in on the action and fished patiently. It was pretty hot when we first arrived and the sun was beating down on us, so it was slow going at first. Now, you may remember when we were here in December, we caught fish every time we threw in a line...so you can imagine the kids got a little bored...thus the photo shoots!

Harvey and Aaron get right to it

While the Prachars continue to make preparations. Lots harder to get 4 kids out fishing than one teenager!
Now we're off!
And looking so excited!

Holden got bored the quickest with his lack of success and realized that the minnows up by the shore would nibble at his worm. He was able to drag them out (still clamped down on his worm) to the shore and capture them for more bait! He ended up catching almost 20 of them that day!

Here are Holden, Alayna and Felicia admiring Holden's catch. Alayna got sort of attached to the little guys, and when the first one got turned into bait, we overheard her telling our guys to "Say sorry to the minnow!!" after hooking him up! We laughed until we cried!

She wasn't so affectionate toward the worms:She thought she was big stuff to cut off a piece of worm with the big fishing knife. I reminded her she should probably say "Sorry!" to the worm whose tail she just shortened by about an inch. She complied!

We caught a few fish and declared it lunch time. Paul and Harvey cooked hamburgers and hot dogs on the grill for us.

Alayna ate her first ever hamburger WITH the bun! I put 2 potato chips on there to convince her to eat the bun since we had no plates or silverware! It did the trick!
The sun was shining on Alayna's hair so beautifully and inspired the beginning of each child's photo shoot:

She was having quite a good hair day if I do say so myself!

Love this one! I can't wait to learn to take pictures for real! I'll have some to compare to soon! I am taking an on line 8 week photography course taught by my friend/photographer Alicia!


Riley is always the reluctant one, I had to settle for the back of his head on this one. I played around with it and discovered this cool Picasa editing trick ( you know, cuz I have nothing better to do with my time!!):

I told Holden to "Look pensive." This is what he did. This kid's a genius! Isn't that camera amazing??? Seriously, if there is a decent picture in this post, its the camera's fault, not mine!

This is one of the first catch of the day. Aaron's catch: (its the little blob on the log)

Alayna wanted to see the little guy. She immediately declared "Oh, you are so cute! I LOVE you!"
Because he was so small, he was tough to get off the hook. Aaron tried, then Riley...
then Holden...
and Gabe...
I am glad to report, he finally made it back to the river! Much more fortunate than this slightly bigger guy (below) who Alayna loved to death...literally! She was not shy about holding them and I think I even saw her sneak him a kiss! She told him, "Hello, my name's Alayna, what's yours??" Harvey had to listen to her incessant chatter all day and her chatting with the fish as he cleaned them. He has nicknamed her "The Weed Eater". I am sure you can imagine why! When we left after 7 pm, Harvey and Felicia were pretty sure she would pass out in 5 minutes in the van. They were shocked to hear she continued to chatter the entire trip home and made it until almost 10 pm. We were not shocked, we know her track record!!

I got in on the action by accident when I was holding Riley's pole for him. The shade was just moving over the water and it was starting to cool off. After this one, I caught another almost immediately! Riley took back his pole after that!

Aaron with his biggest catch of the day

Paul and Aaron pulled in fish at almost exactly the same time. They were almost exactly the same size...tiny!

We had an uninvited guest while we were fishing on and off during the day. After lunch a 15+ foot gator hovered around our fishing site. We had to end the fishing on the bank and just stay up top after his appearance!

He wasn't afraid of us at all...which made us all nervous! After losing a couple fish to the gator that we were trying to throw back , we figured out why he wasn't scared of us. He likely got lots of easy meals this way! He crawled up on shore after we cleaned our fish to gobble up what was left.

Now, without further adu, I give you the story of The One That Almost Got Away! Paul got a good bite on his line, but the fish swam under something and got his line snagged and broke it above the bobber. The fish still had the hook and string and bobber and we could see it swimming around not far from shore. Paul took a big tree branch to see if he could snag the line and drag the whole thing in, fish and all. Here he is with step one of the perfect plan:

The line was difficult to drag in as if the fish is still on it until the last minute and Paul hauls out the branch with the bobber and hook intact, but no fish.
BUT WAIT! See Riley standing next to Paul with his hook in the water??? He got a bite right away and pulled in the biggest catch of the day!I LOVE the look on his face!
Of course Paul insisted that must have been the fish he had that got away, so we called him the one that almost got away! Felicia almost snarfed when Riley explained he was taking the fish back to the river after taking him off the hook "To clean him off." Apparently he got quite dirty in the squirmish to get him off the hook and Riley didn't feel good about putting him in the bucket with the other fish when he was all dirty! Oh, yes, my kids are going to need therapy when they are grown!!

That was how we officially ended our Spring Break here. The kids are back to school today and I am cleaning up the aftermath! Laundry calls, and there is plenty of it after the beach and a fishing trip! I will try to post about our break soon!