Fishin' with Grandpa

The last half of the weekend that we were in Hog Country we spent with Brian's family.  It was Natalie's first official fishing trip and Grandpa was so excited!
So was she=)  The kids also enjoyed playing with the wagon around Grandpa's place, hauling rocks, pushing it, etc.

But it was the fishin' that we came for!

So we geared up and headed to the pond. We had two goals: Help NJ catch a fish and keep JZ from plunging into the water=)

Grandpa showed Natalie the box of worms and tried to get her to hold one. As you can see she wasn't convinced at first. She finally came around and let it wiggle in her hand for a bit.

Then it was time to cast the line and wait.

And she did it. She caught her first fish! She was giddy.

Then she did it again and again and again. I think she caught a total of 10 or so fish! The catfish pictured above was by far her biggest! We were all quite impressed and she just loved it. Meanwhile her mother caught this.....

It's literally a minnow. I thought it best to release this one.

It at least gave us a pretty hearty laugh!

JZ did pretty well, but we were all trading off to keep him happy...and dry.  Grandpa shouldered most of the work in keeping him occupied. He looks pretty content to me=)

Once Natalie got bored with the fishing, she and I looked for crawdads. I love the picture of her hand on my shoulder. My buddy.

We had such a wonderful weekend and thankful for the nice weather so NJ could fish!  Great memories