Fishing With The Family

     I LOVE fishing with my family. My parents, siblings and grandparents used to go camping and fishing together every summer and those were some of the best memories. Even though we were very young, my brother and I remember a lot about those trips. My husband and I don't have kids of our own, but we have nieces and nephews that we can share those times with and hopefully they will have similar memories when they are adults. Last Sunday my brother and I remembered different moments from one trip that I will have to share in a later post.

     I decided to paint my fingernails for the weekend. Thanks to Pinterest I had the perfect design! I also think they were my lucky charm. Before the next family fishing trip, I think the girls need to get together and do our nails.

 

Lucky Rainbow Fish Fingernails

     We had a hard time deciding on a lake to go to because of all of the fires around us. We didn't want to go too far from home in case we needed to rush home and we also wanted to get away from the smoke. We found the perfect lake and there is a chance this will become our regular Father's Day lake. It was a beautiful day, there weren't a lot of people there and the fish were biting. (If Father's Day had been a week later, this lake would have had smoke around it, too.)

 

Beautiful View

Another Beautiful View

      For most of the day we had this entire area to ourselves so our niece and Uncle Kris did some exploring.

Cori and Uncle Kris Exploring

     The fishing started off really slow but nobody got bored because there was plenty of sand castle building sand available.

Sand Castle Building

      My niece loves to reel in her line whether there's a fish on the line or not. I wish she would have caught a fish that day because every fish we caught was a fighter and she would have had a blast!

Checking Her Bait

      My brother started off the day with a little catfish. This little guy was set free to get a little bigger.

Cole and Catch #1

      My niece borrowed Papa's hat for a few cute pictures.

Isn't She Cute?

      When we broke out the sandwich stuff for lunch, the fish all of a sudden decided they were hungry, too. My brother caught this nice Wiper.

Cole and His Wiper

      Then my dad caught a nice sized catfish and when I went to grab my camera, my rod almost went into the lake. My Wiper fought hard and I had a blast fighting it to shore. My sister-in-law was able to grab my camera and get a picture of Dad and I's double header.

Like Father, Like Daughter

      After lunch the fishing got a little slow until we started talking about packing up to move to another spot. All of a sudden my dad said "Cole, my pole! Cole, my pole!" and my brother had to grab the rod so Dad could reel in his carp. That carp went back into the lake.



Dad's Carp

      After that excitement, we sat to rest and enjoy the view a little while.

In Person, This Looked Like The Color Of Ocean Water

     My niece is 4 years old and she has decided she wants to cast her rod by herself this year. Her first try she almost caught her Papa so she let Uncle Kris help her on her next cast.

Learning To Cast From Her Uncle Kris

      There is a very good possibility she will outcast her Aunt Hilary some day.

Long Cast

      Before we packed up, I caught one last carp. I almost lost him. When he came to shore my leader line loop snapped and my carp bounced off my brother.

Last catch for the day.

     We were all so tired that we didn't fry up the keepers that night for dinner, but they will be dinner one of these nights very soon.

The Keepers

     Be careful outside everybody! Colorado wildfires have gotten very scary these past 2 weeks. Even if you aren't in a fire area, you are probably in heavy smoke if you love in or are visiting Colorado.