July 9, 2009

A Birthday and a Fishing Trip

On Tuesday, my husband celebrated his 39th birthday for the third year in a row. Yes, that means he’s really…. can I say how old he is on the blog, because he threatened to tell people I have gray hair at 30. Ooh, I’m scared. Considering I’ve already blogged about my getting gray hair much earlier than I’d like to admit, I figure telling the internet he’s 41 is fair game.

To celebrate Doug’s birthday we went on a family fishing trip. Doug loaded and hitched the boat and we dropped anchor on the Wisconsin River at Galecki Park near our house. After slathering on a ton of sunscreen we settled in for some line fishing. Okay, I didn’t fish, because that whole thing is not my bag. I read a book and took photos while Doug and Dawson waited patiently for the fish to bite.

The weather was gorgeous, around 75 degrees and not too humid. The sun was shining, with a few clouds here and there, and a light breeze swept the air. We had a marvelous time. And three hours later, just before we had decided to go back to the dock, an amazing thing happened:

Dawson caught his first fish, a walleye, and he was beyond excited! He was so happy and so proud of his accomplishment. Doug and I were so proud, too!

Doug helped him cast the line, and showed him how to jig, and after many long moments of waiting and a few snags, suddenly something pulled on his line. Dawson didn’t even realize it was a fish at first. He thought he had another snag. But Doug instructed him to reel in his line, and Dawson was so excited when he realized he had to fight the fish into the boat.

“Daddy! It’s a strong fish! Help!”

Doug told him to keep reeling, and once the fish was out of the water he helped Dawson get him into the boat for a picture. The smile on our son’s face was so magical, and so priceless. I was so happy for him. Dawson couldn’t wait to tell his grandpas about his first catch. We took a little video to remember the occasion:

(Please ignore my husband’s attempt to ignore the camera. He hates pictures, and always looks so crabby on video. He’s really NOT a serial killer, even though he looks like one in this vid.)

More fishing photos here.