Fishing frustrations and the fishing derby

Luke has been wanting to go fishing for some time. He never fished as a kid, but for some reason he decided that he wanted to take it up as a hobby. As luck has it, several guys at Luke's work are really into fishing and one of them offered to take Luke out fishing one night. They went out on his coworkers boat on Lake Boyd and fished for over 5 hours... well past midnight. They caught several fish and his coworker was generous enough to share the bounty with us. Luke cooked us a tasty meal of several kinds of fish... I think they were salmon, trout and bass (but I could be wrong). Luke was immediately hooked on fishing. 

 That weekend Luke went out and bought fishing poles for the whole family and set out to fish right in our backyard. Amazingly Jack pulled in a huge white bass. The excitement was unbelievable!

Jack's first catch

The kids were mesmerized by the fish as it sat in the sink

 And then it was time to clean the fish.

 I couldn't watch, but I heard the kids from the other room saying "eww" "oh, that is so gross" "ewww" over and over again.

Since then our luck has run out... but Luke won't give up.

We have spent countless hours and days and nights trying to catch another fish. Jack loves spending the entire day outside with his dad but it is always disappointing for Luke when nothing bites. Jack doesn't seem to mind and is always happy to try again.

 Then, we heard about the Loveland fishing derby where they stock the pond with 800 trout. We were sure to catch something! Luke and Jack headed out at 8am and Lily and I met them around noon. We fished all day... and into the evening.

 People were catching fish left and right all day long, but we caught nothing.

Well, except for Lily who caught two tiny little guys that we had to throw back



The highlight of the day was when Jack won one of the door prize raffles. The prize included a nice fishing pole, life vest and a tackle box filled with all sorts of goodies.

 For me, fishing is incredibly boring. I cannot sit around all day like Luke and Jack casting and recasting over and over and over. Lily and I usually just goof off for a while

 And finally we headed to the park for a bit

And then we went home and left Luke and Jack to keep at it well into the evening. 

Our fishing luck really needs to come back.