Read about all of my Fishing Adventures!
Follow my Fish of 2015
Follow my Fish of 2014
I don't know about my fellow parents, but I get into bad ruts. I get up, take the kids to day care, go to work, go the gym, pick them up, and crash on the couch when I get home. Some days I am extra ambitious and get some honey-dos done. So many times my kids ask me to do things and I brush them off. I send my daughter to the shop to work on her hitting, but I don't go with her. Griffn wants me to play legos with him, but I am watching the news. We all know how things go.
Every morning, I stop at a local gas station and buy a sausage biscuit for me and the kids. The man that owns it, in his thick Indian accent, reminds me to use every second with my kids. Don't let anything slip away.
We've heard that kind of thing from various places since we all became parents, yet we ignore them. Not only should we enjoy the time with our kids, but this is the time that we teach them values.
I've been made keenly aware that fact lately. When, as a parent, it's about mememe, it can't be about the kids. While I have probably learned about all I am going to learn in my life and my values are set, me being idle hampers the development of my kids.
Over the last few days, the kids have wanted to go fishing. But, something kept getting in the way. I'm not saying that cutting the grass isn't important, or the garden doesn't need to be weeded, or the toilet doesn't need to be fixed RIGHT NOW(which it REALLY does. As we learned yesterday: putting the back lid on top of the toilet bowl to warn others that the toilet isn't working doesn't really work for a 6 year old). But, I got tired of saying "no." The only people getting hurt by me doing chores is really the kids.
So, even though I was tired and had things to do and Alyse had a headache, we packed the Yukon up and grabbed the thing can of worms that I bought a few days prior at Walmart. I texted my dad and let him know we were headed out towards the family pond.
We unloaded the car to find that the middle kid was snoring and the baby had peed his pants. Awesome start.
I had left all of the kid's poles at my grandparents, so I was forced to make do with 2 of my spinning reel combos. I started to cut a wacky rigged sick stick, a plastic worm from PTL, off of one when Aubree said "leave it on."
I have tried to get her to start fishing with artificial baits, but I have had bad luck and tough days. By her younger brothers age, I was already fishing solely with artificial baits. But, fishing habits are based on confidence, which are based on success. The last thing I wanted was for her to have another tough day throwing artificial baits.
As she started down towards the bank with the worm, I noticed that the water was really low and that the vegetation had really begun to get matted up. I figured that she would quickly tire from working that worm through the grass. It would just continually foul up and she wouldn't catch anything. But, it got her out of the way for me to rig up a frog for Alyse and one of the other rods with real worms.
I made it down to the water about the time Aubree started yelling for me to show her how to work the reel.
Yep. Going to be a long afternoon.
But, I gave her a crash course on how to cast the spinning reel. I made a cast and handed it to her. I told her to work the worm slowly over the matted grass and let if fall in the holes.
On the first cast, a fish EXPLODED on the worm but missed it. It sure got my heart pumping and I know it did the same for her.
I watched her make her first cast and was surprised that she did a fine job. I watched a few more to ensure that she had it down and I moved on to watching Alyse throw a frog.
Alyse hasn't caught anything of note on a frog, but she has wanted to learn. So, I gave her a few tips and watched her miss several hits.
I took Gavin (the baby) and tried to catch something on live bait. Turns out, I have no talent for live bait fishing. I kept getting robbed.
Luckily, my dad got there just in time. Not only did he start catching fish, but he was able to get Griffin out of the car and had him excited to fish.
Speaking of catching fish and being excited, Aubree wore the bass OUT with the sick stick. She caught around 5 bass on her very own! Other than getting them unhooked, she did all the work. She wouldn't share her tips, either.
Now my job was to get Alyse to catch some fish. Aubree had tired herself out on catching all those bass, so I convinced Alyse to put the frog down and try the worm. She quickly caught a couple on her own.
As the kids tired out and made their way back to the car, I picked up the frog and tried to see if I could make them bite. After all, I had all the tips to frog fishing, which I wrote down last week.
Best5Zach's Basics to Frog Fishing
No takers. Eventually a commotion on the other side of the pond caught my eye. There was at least 1 active bass that was feeding on top water. I worked the frog over him and he pounded it. As always, you should quit on a high note, which is exactly what I did.
Yeah, it was 9pm by the time we got home. Yeah, I have a lot of chores I didn't do.
But it was worth it!
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