Surf fishing

Bright and early on Memorial Day, Patrick convinced us all to do some surf fishing.  We had hoped to beat the sunrise, but this mama was too tired from hosting Caleb's tennis buddies at the house all weekend when the boys were not playing in their tournament (which Caleb played very well in, by the way.)  Anyway, we arrived as the sun was waking up, and Patrick got to work setting up the rods.

 We had nothing biting for a while, but we did have a blue heron who thought he could hang around and try to steal our bait.  We wouldn't let him, though, so he had to fish for food himself.

 Eventually, Madeline managed to catch a catfish.  Caleb's expression is hilarious in the shot below.  He really didn't mind the fish.

 Once Patrick managed to unhook him, we decided to toss him over to the heron instead of back into ocean.  He snatched it right up. It took him a while to eat it, but he did. The kids got a kick out of that.

Then an old colleague of Patrick's spotted our family fishing while he was exercising on the beach and stopped to chat.  We hadn't seen him in a few years, so it was nice to catch up.

On a photography note, I enjoyed shooting the wildlife when we were at the beach but was bummed I didn't have my telephoto lens on me.  I just might have to break my personal rule of one lens only at the beach, at least when we're fishing.

Next weekend is going to be a big one for us.  Madeline has her spring recital for dance, and Caleb has his tennis state championships tournament.  Last year they fell on back-to-back weekends. This year we're not as fortunate.  We will be doing a lot of driving back and forth because Madeline will be performing both Friday night and Saturday night, while Caleb's tournament will be Saturday and Sunday.  Can you say busy?  Ugh.  I wish it wasn't.  But we're going to do our best to get each of our kids to their siblings event because it's just that important to us.  These are the biggest events of the year for them both.  It just plain stinks that it happens to be the same weekend.  It goes without saying that my camera will be seeing a lot of action though.  I better get my memory cards and batteries ready!