One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish....Slime??

Nanny and Poppy Lodder gave Ashton a fishing pole for Christmas and decided to plan a summer fishing trip to our cousin's pond, the Zundel pond.

When we got there, we had to do a little 4-wheeling to get to our camp site and within minutes had ripped off my dad's front bumper-cover thing and needed a first aid kit! This was not a predictor of how the rest of the trip would go, but being my first adult fishing trip I struggled learning to cast a line properly. I successfully hooked the back of my head, worm and all, and again nearly hooked my own neck. I am pretty sure I scared every last fish away from screaming multiple times. 

Daddy Aaron was not able to make it this trip, and since I was incapable of even baiting a hook, my dad, mom, brothers and cousin were there to step it up. 

In the excitement of having a new fishing pole, Ashton had reeled and reeled and reeled his line making it a total mess inside the spinner thing. Thanks Dad and Chase for getting it back to normal so we could use it!

The pond is private, so it was just our family and my cousin Aaron there. We grabbed some KFC on our way and ate it up there. It was pretty hot so we were glad Nanny brought a cooler full of drinks. Every single drink was gone by the time we left!

My mom told me that all growing up her dad taught her how to fish, and that all my extended Van Tassell relatives including my great grandma were excellent fly fishermen/women. So she felt most qualified to show me how to properly bait my hook with a worm. Disgusting.

While Emma was away for a bit, Aunt Kimmy helped Ash catch his first fish!

Again, my inexperienced-self grabbed the fish (because I like touching and holding live things), but as soon as it started violently wiggling I immediately started violently screaming and dropped the fish, and in turn scared my son to the point of tears. I am a bad mom. Nanny was able to break him of his newly-learned fear, and fortunately it was short lived.

Everyone was able to catch fish, and some of them were huge! Jacob S caught the largest of all! The pond is all catch and release, so we had to quickly snap a photo before the fish started to die.

It was fun to spend the day as a family, and we all vowed to make it back before the summer is over.

As mentioned previously, I like to hold and touch live things. My cousin Aaron noticed a small mud bog with about 8 little colorful frogs in it. We were able to round off one and catch him. He was terrified! Poor, cute, squishy little frog!