Over the River and Thru the Woods...

We celebrated Spring Break with an impromptu visit to the Mize Camp in Trinity at the Trinity River.  Way before I joined the family Grandpa Mize bought the camp and moved up there.  He passed away but the camp has stayed in the family.  It's just a little trailer with some out buildings - not an outhouse.  Tommy's cousin Roy brought another trailer up there so they parked them to form a sort of courtyard in between them.  Both of them have covered patios.

The kids absolutely love going up there.  Jake and Luke have been several times, but this was Erin's first trip.  Tommy had been fishing the weekend before so he left his boat up there.  Josh, a family friend, went with us.  We got a late start, but it turned out to be a good thing.  It was pretty cool up there until we got on the water around 11:00.  Once we were out there the sun came out and there wasn't a cloud in the sky.

It's white bass season so they were really biting.  We were out for a total of about 3 hours and caught 32 fish.  28 of them were keepers.  We only had Erin out there on the boat for an hour.  She found out Luke was back at the camp instead of being in the other boat and wanted to go back.  Roy and Mark made a little play area for the kids and I think the thought of Luke having the playground to himself was just too much!

While we were out on the water we had Erin's little pink pole.  She loved reeling it in.  In fact, she refused to leave the lure in the water and just kept reeling it in as fast as I could get it back in the water.  I was afraid she was going to drop it several times, but we managed to come home with it.  The only mishap was when she hooked my foot.  I had on my tennis shoes so it got caught in the shoestring and the mesh on the top.  It took a pair of pliers and about 15 minutes of Tommy's elbow grease to get it free.

Erin loved "petting" the fish.  Our girl loves her pink and glitter, but when it comes down to it she's a tomboy at heart.  It reminds me so much of me at that age.  I would have been all over those fish too.  She "measured" one of the fish we let go and she helped Daddy put it back.

Tommy and I both caught some and let her reel them in.  She loved it.  She wanted to go fast in the boat instead of trolling, but we never really did that.  I got some great pictures of her in the boat and the kids playing outside.  When I tell you Erin was covered head to toe in dirt and fish, I am not lying.  She was filthy, but she had so much fun playing with the boys.  She follows them around like a little puppy dog and tried to do everything they do.

Granny and Peepaw came for the day too.  We went back out on the river after lunch, but Peepaw sat this one out.  Mark and Steph were in Mark's boat and Tommy, Josh and I were in Tom's boat.  Tommy and Steph were having a fishing contest.  It turns out that me and Stephanie caught more fish than the boys!  Girl Power!  Granny and Peepaw offered to stay with all 3 kids when we went back out.  They said the kids were great, but it wasn't long after that that Granny and Peepaw left!  I think the kids wore them out.  Hmmm.

On the way home Tommy asked Erin if she had fun.  She told him yes.  He asked if she liked going in the boat and she told him yes, but she really wanted to go swimming!  Erin is a mermaid at heart!

Here are several pictures from the day.