Happy Easter

Happy Easter! Linda, Savannah and I have had a wonderful Easter so far. We started our festivities on Friday evening. We colored several eggs at the kitchen table. Linda has been sick most of the week leading up to the holiday weekend so we were not able to color eggs earlier in the week. For the last few weeks she had clogged sinuses and just felt miserable. When she finally went to the doctor, they did a chest x-ray and found that she had pneumonia. A small case of pneumonia, but pneumonia nonetheless. Luckily she is feeling better and she got to color eggs with Savannah. I think Savannah was amazed more by dropping the little tablets in the water and watching the water change color than actually coloring the eggs. Saturday morning was cinnamon rolls and an Easter Egg Hunt at Great-Grandma Huster’s house. This is a yearly tradition and only the families with little kids are invited. It was a lot of fun. Savannah was running all over looking for eggs with all of her cousins. I don’t know how many eggs Great-Grandma had at her house, but every kid had a basket full. Savannah had a good time. Then Saturday afternoon was spent over at Grandma & Grandpa Huster’s house with all of Savannah’s Cousins and Linda’s siblings. It’s always nice to hang out with the Husters, Schusters and Grandma & Grandpa. There was another Easter Egg Hunt at Grandma & Grandpa’s house followed by playtime in the backyard. What a beautiful day we had for being outside. Savannah and Erin played hard and wore each other out. The men cooked pork steaks (or we watched Les cook pork steaks) on the deck and took care of a few cold ones while we were at it. It was a very relaxing afternoon. When we finally got home it took Savannah about 10 seconds to fall asleep. Easter Sunday came early and we went to 8:00 mass with Grandma & Grandpa. When we got home from church the Easter Bunny had been to the Denison house. Savannah had to go out and Hunt Easter Eggs for the third time this weekend. She made short time of this Easter Egg Hunt. Then it was inside to count her loot and eat some Candy! She had a very cute Easter Dress on and, surprisingly she was willing to show it off for the camera. Now the rest of the family is taking naps (or at least laying down and talking to her “guys”) in preparation for the big Cardinals game this afternoon. Yup, it’s only fitting that Savannah go to her first Cardinals game on Easter Sunday. Mom is definitely on our minds and we know she would be beaming with pride taking Savannah to her first game. We’ll be taking the camera, so hopefully we’ll get to share this experience with you too. Enjoy the pictures, and we’ll be back soon.

More Fun on the River

The Denisons had another fun day on the river. This time we brought some friends with us. The Husters (the Melanie/Alan branch) joined us in our fun. Of course this was almost the trip that wasn’t. Unfortunately on Thursday night Grandma Denison was admitted into the hospital with severe anemia. The condition was found during a blood test for a routine checkup. The doctor called and told her to go to the emergency room. The following day they performed an esophagogastroduodenoscopy procedure and found that the loss of blood was from an ulcer. This was VERY good news (not that ulcers are good, but they are treatable with medication). Grandma was then released from the hospital on Saturday afternoon. She and Jan went to Tony’s for dinner Saturday night since that was where they were headed on Thursday when she ended up in the hospital. So, back to the river. We headed out a bit late, around 2:00 and stopped at the first spot we could find (Enterprise Island). The temperature was perfect, the sand was nice and the water was refreshing. Nikole and I played in the water, the Husters and Linda sat on the sandbar and watched Savannah and Josh completely cover themselves in sand. As you can see from the pictures, Savannah had sand from head to toe, but she was having a great time. She also had a lot of fun “jumping” up and down in the water. She was not happy about getting in the boat and riding out to the sandbar this time. She was clinging to Mom the entire time. A good time was had by all. What are Melanie and Linda doing in that picture? The ride home was quiet for Savannah, she was nearly asleep. Both Nikole and Josh took turns driving the boat as we left the sandbar. I don’t think Savannah moved after she was put into her bed last night. We think part of her problem with getting in the boat and the whole thing is that her life jacket doesn’t seem very comfortable. So Daddy went out today and got her a new one. This one is neoprene which fits her a little better, is a little more stream lined and gives her greater movement with her arms and neck. We tried it on tonight after we got home from being gone for the open house and she would not take it off. Each time we went to take it off she would say “No” and run away from us, so I guess she likes it. We were actually supposed to go out again today and meet up with the Haislips, but with the open house, going out yesterday, and just being worn down in general, we decided we would be better off to skip today and relax a bit. Hopefully we can meet up with the Haislips again another day.

Finally, a Savannah Update!

So the Denison family is slacking AGAIN! Our laptop that was on “loan” from Cameron’s work quit on us and with Cameron being gone, this silly blog just hasn’t been updated like it should! Never fear, we are back, or shall we say, still here and having a great summer with Savannah! We enjoyed our sixth anniversary together and also celebrated Father’s Day with Mom and Dad and Tom and family. It was a great day and the kids had a GREAT time playing. Savannah wanted to be like the “big kids” and play just like them. In the picture here, her and Jack and playing in the rocks and deciding just what to do, or where to throw them! Evening time is still a favorite time of the day when we get to kick back and enjoy some family time. Savannah sure loves to play with her daddy at the end of the day! Towards the middle of June we went to Tom and Amy’s for Claire’s baptism. They recently got a trampoline and to say Savannah had a great time in it would be an understatement. She just giggled the whole time, not being able to stand up, but being bounced around on her hands and knees! Her cousins were VERY careful around her and it was another GREAT Day! And of course her time at Miss Jenny’s is still so much fun while mommy and daddy go to work. Miss Jenny is an EXPERT at doing kid’s hair and loves to put pig tails in Savannah’s hair. She looks so darn cute and loves having them in! And now we are almost up to date, as Savannah and mommy had a great time while daddy was gone, but those pictures will have to come next time. We just gotta catch up on the rest of June first!

Canada 2008

Saturday, June 28, 2008
Les and I fished East Bay. We were going to fish the NW side of the little island straight across the bay from where you enter but the wind was too strong and we couldn't hold a spot. We pulled up next to Roger and Alan on the SE side, out of the wind, but didn't do very well there. We didn't stay there very long and ran up to Pindor Creek. We anchored next to Gary and Jeff, in the wind on the SE side of the opening about 30 yds off the shoreline and did really well.

Sunday, June 29, 2008
Les and I headed back to East Bay but went up to the cut just past Abalard Creek. James and Steve had a lot of luck there the night before. However, today was not good. We were anchored on the NW side of the cut and then drifted along that same side back into the cut and the decided to replicate the same conditions as the night before and fished the SE point of that cut. We were once again anchored in the wind about 30 yds off the shoreline and we caught a lot of fish. We did notice that the fish finder showed a structure every time we blew a certain direction and when it showed up we would catch fish. The Les brought up a log (the structure) and the fish stopped. So from there we went up to Abalard Creek where James and Steve were. They had caught some 22" and 23" walleye in the same general location we had been having luck with so we pulled in there and each caught nice fish. Then we tried the NE side of the little island but only caught dinks. Next we stopped in a little cove just outside of East Bay. Les caught 2 fish and we got prepared to troll the Post Narrows. We trolled the Narrows from the NE to the SW and decided to jig fish on the SW side of the little beach on the N side of the Narrows and I caught a 23" walleye.

Monday, June 30, 2008
Alan and I headed back to Pindor Creek with Les and Gary. We didn't do to well so we went to the next cut to the SW. We got setup to fish from the inside to the center of the mouth because we found a hump with a large drop but it turned out that they were on the other side where Alan could catch them. I couldn't catch a thing. So we went out and found the hump near the entrance to East Bay. We had to anchor 3 times, but we caught a lot of fish. In fact, earlier that day we decided that we were going to finish out our stringers before noon which gave us 15 minutes after we found the hump, but we did it with time to spare. After Alan caught a 34" northern and lunch we were getting tired of catching walleye we headed to the Post Narrows. Steve and Jeff were doing great trolling so we decided to do the same. After 3 passes and one lost lure we finished the day jigging the NE side of the beach. I didn't catch any.

Tuesday, July 1, 2008
Steve and I decided to go exploring to the E side of Martin Bay. We knew there were 2 humps out there and we found both, but no fish. Then we trolled around the islands just S of there. I caught one 22" walleye, but nothing else. From there we went to McNealy Bay and drifted from one point to another. Steve caught a few fish, but it was slow. Then we trolled around but had no luck and decided to head to the Post Narrows. We jigged the NE side of the beach for 20 minutes or so and decided to troll. We didn't troll but maybe 10 minutes and a storm was blowing in so we high tailed it for camp instead of beaching on an island. We almost pulled over twice but kept going and made it just in time. Between the lightning and hail we were glad to be back. Once it passed we went back out but stayed close to camp. We drifted the wall at the mouth of Martin Bay where Steve caught a few nice fish and one 23" walleye but again, it was slow. We went up into the bay but didn't have any luck. We made a quick run back to camp to find out what time we were eating and learned that James and Les weren't back from East Bay. It was late for them, but still early so Steve and I went back to Martin Bay and I finally caught my second fish of the day. By 7:00 we were back at camp. Gary, Alan and Jeff had left to go look for Les and James. By 8:00 or so they returned with boat-in-tow. Les and James had boat trouble, but weren't too pissed because they had a great day fishing.

Wednesday, July 2, 2008
Gary and I finally got to fish together. This is our second trip together, but our first day to fish together. After the day Steve and I had, I was ready to catch fish, and Gary didn't let me down. We made the trek to East Bay again and fished Pindor "Gary's" Creek. After getting there we made one small adjustment, moving from the middle to the west point, and caught good fish the rest of the day. I had two personal bests. I caught a 26" Walleye and a 32" and a 33" Northern. We spent the rest of the day right there catching one fish after another. Eventually I ran out of minnows and started throwing a crank bait, and still caught fish.

Wednesday Evening
I had never been to Parker Falls, and since James didn't want to go fishing, Jeff, Alan and I went up to Parker Falls. We nosed right up in the falls and started throwing spoons and crank baits. I only caught one 24" walleye, between Jeff and Alan they caught 11 walleye, smallest was 24" and largest was 28-1/2". It was AWESOME.

Thursday, July 3, 2008
While we were at Parker Falls on Wednesday evening, Gary and Steve caught a whole bunch of walleye just around the corner from Sunset Lodge so that's where Jeff and I headed. We caught about 8 walleye in a couple hours, all over 20" with a couple topping 25". After they slowed a bit we had to go find smaller fish so we headed to the Post Narrows. The first few fish we caught were still too big to keep for dinner so we moved off the east side of the south sandbar to the "rock" on the north side. We basically stayed here the rest of the afternoon. Jeff had a run-in with a Northern. It took his crank bait and then, later, we heard it come to the surface after something and you could hear the lure rattle. We did eventually get our dinner fish and headed in.

Thursday Evening
Since we had such good luck Wednesday evening at Parker, we headed back, this time Jeff and Alan in one boat; Les, James and I in the other. We each caught 2 fish. Les had a 24" walleye and James had one about the same size.

Friday, July 4, 2008
James and I started the same place Jeff and I started on Thursday, next to the floating propane tank near "Jack's Island" at the entrance to Sunset Bay. Nothing was going on there so we headed out. Jeff and Alan were headed back to Parker Falls to jig fish instead of throwing crank baits. As we left, Steve and Gary asked if we were going to Parker but we were headed to East Bay. Halfway across the main lake I almost turned around and went to Parker, but we didn't, and we went to East Bay. We started in Alabador Creek but it was slow and the male walleye (small ones) were moving in. Next stop was the "Hump". We caught a lot of fish here, but again they were mostly males. This time we moved looking for dinner fish. Back to Pindor Creek to the spot Gary and I fished. Ah, we found our dinner fish and decided to troll the Narrows. We saw Les and Roger in East Bay and let them know of our plan. We figured if the guys that went to Parker didn't catch fish they would be in the Narrows. When they weren't there I was almost sick. At that point I knew we had missed out on the best fishing of the week. After trolling down one side and back the other we saw Les and Roger coming into the Narrows and let them know we were headed around the back side of McKenzie Island to Parker Falls. We got there as Steve and Gary were leaving. No one had minnows left, they had all caught 50+ fish, it was nothing for them to have 24" and 25" walleye and Steve had caught a 30-1/2" walleye! Yup, James and I screwed up by not going to Parker that morning. James did land a 28" walleye and a 32" Northern before we left Parker and it was a good day of fishing, just not as good as it could have been.

Summary
Everyone agreed that this was the best fishing has ever been. Not only did we catch a LOT of fish, but they were huge. Typically, a good year is consistently catching fish and being able to put 3 walleye on a stringer that are 15" to 17-1/2" (dinner/freezer fish). If one person in the group catches one walleye over 20", that's icing on the cake. This year we seriously had to look for smaller fish. We cannot count the number of 24" and 25" walleye caught. Everyone caught at least one 24" walleye or bigger. We may never get to see this kind of fishing again, but we'll keep going back in the hopes that we do.