February 15, 2009

Family Fishing Day

Out for a nice day fishing.

This Saturday in Parker Arizona, (about 35 miles north of our Quartzsite campsite) the Arizona BLM and Fish and Game put on a "take a kid fishing" day. I had never been to anything like it. The day was fantastic. The organizers provided rods, reels, bait and hooks for all of the kids. They stalked two ponds with somewhere between 2000 and 3500 fish; I heard both numbers. They provided free hot dogs and soda pops and held a drawing at the end to give away several fishing poles, tents and camp chairs. The weather was about as good as I have ever experienced. I didn't see a thermometer, but I would guess we were in the high 60's or low 70's. It was very comfortable to be out in a T-Shirt, at least for someone who has lived in Idaho as long as I have. I joked to Lexie that we should have brought coats so we would look like the locals.

Something that was challenging about the event was that it was so popular that people were basically shoulder to shoulder at the fish ponds. That, on it's own, is an issue, compile that with the fact many of the people were 5-10 years old and casting a fishing pole for the first time and you'll get an image of some of the types of problems that might arise. I didn't see it, but I heard that a kid did get hooked in the face. One of Ty's scout buddies hooked his mom in the arm, and Natalyn had firmly hooked Dallin's clothes before the event was over. Something the organizers did that I thought was very smart was they gave out very small hooks. This did minimize what could have been much more severe problems. I was very impressed that almost as soon as the kids lost a hook in a tangle an event person offered them a new hook. They didn't even need to walk back to the main table to be up and fishing again.

In general, I am not a very patient fisherman. Yesterday was pretty much the general. With that said, I do like being outdoors and I do like being near water. I just get frustrated quickly when it comes to dealing with fishing line. After David and Dallin had their lines in and out of the water a couple of times, I realized how logistically tricky things were going to be, I was ready to give up on fishing and go catch a hot dog. Lexie was helping Ty and Natalyn with their rigging. Almost as soon as Natalyn got her line in the water she had a fish hooked. Lexie helped her reel it in. It was fun to watch Natalyn bring the fish in. She was very excited and looked a bit scared of the fish. Natalyn's catch got my interest back into the fishing for a while. I rigged a line for David and got a couple of bites, but wasn't successful in bringing in a fish. Tyrell caught a fish early on. Killing Natalyn's fish had been a bit clumsy. My usual method to kill caught fish is to use a rock. In as much as this event was held on the edge of a park, there weren't any rocks handy. I also hadn't thought ahead to bring pliers for getting the hook out. Having managed mostly dealing with Natalyn's fish and still not knowing how I was going to clean it (I was also short a knife), upon seeing Tyrell having the fish hooked, I know my decision to let Tyrell bring the fish in on his own was biased by my thought that if he did lose the fish, I wouldn't have to clean it. As it was, he didn't lose the fish and I found yet one more reason to be delighted with the event. Just behind where we were fishing there was a booth setup where you could take the fish you caught to be cleaned and bagged for you.

Since Dan and I (Lexie here now) have very different opinions of fishing, it seems appropriate to put in my version of the day. It was one of the very best days I have had since coming to Quartzsite. I love fishing, and have since I was a little girl. I remember fishing as a family in Swan Valley and again as we were camping for three days somewhere that has remained a mystery to me, but seemed to be in the middle of nowhere and the best place in the world to camp. I don't remember if I caught anything on those trips, but I had a ball. I love the feel of casting the line and reeling it in. I love watching the water, seeing it ripple, and watching the sun reflect off it. I did a lot of fishing during college, but since marrying Dan can count on one hand the number of times we have been out. I'm not blaming him for this. He does an amazing amount to please me and help me do what I want to do. There are just other things that we have in common that so we do those things more often. Another reason we haven't been so much is that I really don't like deep-sea or shore fishing in the ocean. After fishing several times in Alaska, I just didn't get back into fishing after moving back home. Anyway, I had a great time Saturday and I am looking forward to taking advantage of living next to the lake in Oregon all summer.

Natalyn Catches a Fish!

After Natalyn and Ty's catches, the fishing slowed down quite a bit. Even though the fish stopped biting, I enjoyed helping the kids get their lines in the water. I enjoyed the enthusiasm the kids had for fishing. At the end of the fishing event they had a drawing using the numbers the kids were given when they registered. With about 500 people participating they gave out somewhere around 50 prizes. We felt fortunate to win two. Both Natalyn and David were drawn to win new fishing poles. David was funny in that he was fast asleep when his number was called. Lexie carried him up to the stage and came back with him without him having any knowledge of what was happening. When the event was over and we were walking away from it, he was finally awake. The look of surprise in his eyes when we told him he won a fishing pole was great. I am sure that it wonderful when life works out that way, take a nap and wake up with a new toy. Lexie and I are both very softened to the idea of getting Oregon fishing licenses this summer based on our positive experience yesterday and owning two new fishing poles.

Didn't everyone make blue bat cookies for Valentine's Day?

Natalyn and David showing off Their Hat Stack

Ty Reading, Jacob Napping

Dallin Reading

 

Get to know the Kids a Little bit Better

I had a good time visiting with a couple of the kids this evening while Dan found pictures for this week's blog. I asked David what his favorite thing was. He got out a book and said, "Read to me." It doesn't surprise me that reading is one of his favorite things. He will listen to anyone that will read to him, or he'll just look at books himself. Nursery leaders have been surprised at how much he wants to just listen to stories instead of playing with the toys that are very abundant.

Tyrell was mentioning how he likes to put himself in the past and think about what life was like a long time ago and pretend he is there. He mentioned pretending he was a Native American hunting with a bow and arrow and a farmer back in the Roman times. When I asked him which section in science he wanted to study next he said he wanted to learn about astronomy. He mentioned wanting to know more about anthropology as well. He didn't know at first what it was called, but that is what he described to me. He really keeps me on my toes in respect to any movie that we have seen. He will randomly ask a question about a movie, or quote a line from it, even if it was three years ago that we saw it! I find myself asking a lot, "What is that from?"

Dallin is interested in chemistry. He has been having fun with our, "Icky Sticky Slime Lab" book and wants to continue doing more experiments from it. This doesn't surprise me at all. He's often wanting to make new recipes also. If I remember correctly, the first recipe he did was back when he was two (with Tyrell as his assistant) was the underwear soup experiment! His latest recipe was a lot like mountain of eggs (also known as German pancakes or Dutch babies), but with more sugar in it and very different ratios. He called it cake and we had it for breakfast one morning. We all decided that the first couple of bites were edible if you were really hungry, but it was too heavy to eat as a meal.

Natalyn's new favorite game is to dress up in a jacket, hat, and backpack and pretend she is going to school. She has been very service oriented and loves going to the church on, "service day." She was able to help glue pictures on card stalk to make picture books. We cut out puppets together, and our next project is to cut out hats. I don't have my sewing machine with me, so we bring home the fabric and cut them out during the week, then someone else sews them up. Natalyn is very persistent in making sure I don't delay on our part. She is so bright and happy helping me pin the pattern on the material. Her favorite service to give to Jacob is cleaning the lint from between his toes. I don't particularly like her doing this, because I worry that she pulls his toes too far apart, but she glows and says, "I'm doing service!" I did see her cleaning between David's toes yesterday. It makes me laugh because I won't touch anyone's feet! (Okay, I do kiss Jacob's, but that's all).