two boys...a dog...and a stream full of fish

I had the most wonderful day fishing with my two cousins..."Big-J" and "mini-j". I was a little nervous about taking them for a few hours but Scott told me how to get to the stream nearby. Loaded down with a bag full of bread(for the fish but Charlie ate most of it...charlie is our dog), empty poke containers(poke is fish...it works out), nets, my camera gear, and "mini J"s spiderman backpack, ...oh, and I almost forgot the towel and rubber ball(I didn't want to run out of things to do), we had to hike around the block to get the stream. It was a small miracle that we managed to get there at all with me dragging Charlie and endlessly yelling "stay on the grass" to the boys.

Big-J was in little boy heaven. He clambered all over the stream bank and caught so many little fish with his net that they collected themselves into a little dark cloud at the bottom of our container.

My biggest fear was "mini-j" falling into the stream...I stood him on a patch of rocks where he could reach water and his little booted feet did not move the entire time we were there. I brought some bread to bait the fish. I showed "mini-J" how to carefully pull little pieces off the roll and drop them in the water to entice the fishies closer. He watched closely and when I had repeated the motion a few times, I broke off half the roll for him. I figured it would be enough for ten minutes. He promptly grabbed the roll and threw it one fell motion into the creek. The tiny minnows now seemed desperate to avoid this gargantuan iceberg of dough.

Me: No...no....little pieces....see? like this...little bitty pieces

I handed him the second roll and watched as he launched the entire thing...this time, further down the creek. Hmmm...let's just skip the whole bait thing and just fish.

"Big-J" proved to be an ingenious fisherman...he found spots with larger fish and found they were too fast for his red net. So he threw rocks into the middle of the water to scare the fish towards him and into the path of his trusty net. He did seem on the verge of launching himself into the water at certain times.

"mini-J" had a "mini-net", Stanton's little green aquarium net. With his feet anchored firmly, he swung his little net and bashed the shore until he had scared away any aquatic creatures on his side of the stream. He did manage to catch two medium-sized rocks...it was a proud moment for us all. Being a kind-hearted fisherman, he released them back into the wild to grow into more medium-sized rocks.

I thought this pic was a nice end to the day. I may want to lighten "mini-J" since he is being silhouetted and his features are darkened. I did promise to take them back...Next time, I'm bringing Scott instead of the dog.