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Somehow we managed to make all the necessary clothing items fit into our suitcases . . . but all the additional accoutrements barely crammed into TWO vehicles. My NGF said, "I feel like I'm packing a small apartment." Yes. Exactly!
This was a unique experience for us. We've never "vacationed" with friends before. Like, we've stayed at friends' homes and they've stayed at ours, but we've never gone someplace together, intentionally, away from both our homes. Although, even as I say that, I have to admit this little cabin feels an awful lot like our very own vacation home. We've visited every year since it was built, hunting, gathering our family together, celebrating new babies and great food. I found my dad's Splenda packets in the cupboard and just about bawled my eyes out.
I think our kids were as excited to spend the weekend with their friends as we were excited to spend the weekend with ours :) That's 11 kids to four parents if you're counting. But we hardly had to! The youngsters claimed the top deck and we growns spent our time downstairs. They played card games, board games, and eventually phone games. In the same small space, we mostly saw them at mealtimes :) It is amazing how much food we brought--and how much of it 11 kids consumed!
We had a great time together, for sure . . . and learned some new things about each other. For instance, my NGF gets up regularly at 4:30 in the morning to work on editing photos and to complete stuff around her house. Buck was very confused when he rolled out of our room at 5 and she was already at the kitchen table working away. "Are you coming with us?" he wondered. Ha! Nope, she just doesn't sleep much (and drinks astonishing amounts of coffee :). So, she was (happily for me) in charge of the morning hunting team photos, and I covered the afternoon. The boys decided Buck had first shot, then G$, then Brennen. Buck's buddy had never been deer hunting before, so he was absorbing the whole process and loving it! They had a big challenge with the deer Buck shot that morning. The thing was made of iron or something and just wouldn't die. They tracked it and reshot it and tracked it some more. Buck almost had to use his buddy's side arm to put the deer down, because he was out of ammo. Such a strange situation!! However, the deer hunkered down under a tree and died, so that was the end of that.
My cousin--newly elected mayor--and his kiddos came over that afternoon, and then my other cousins (and the same kiddos) came over later. Not quite the same as when the whole family is gathered, but we were glad to see them as often as we could :)
That evening Graysen had success!! Here's his hunting story in his own words . . .
"We came to the cabin with our friends, and we settled in. We woke up the next morning we our got our hunting stuff on and we headed out. We were in the blind and 8 minutes after we could shoot we saw a buck. Dad got the gun and shot it. It was about 175 yards away. He hit it and it ran away. We followed it and it was hiding in the woods. We tracked the deer into a clearing. Dad was following it with his gun, and he fired right as it went behind a tree. The deer took a few steps; dad shot it again. It ran and then layed down. We waited there for awhile until it got up and ran again. We followed it, dad shot it again, and it ran. The deer layed down. We had a stand off. After a while, the deer got up and ran; we followed it and had another stand off. It got up and ran. The whole time it was bleeding a lot. It finally rested and layed down. We waited for a while then we left and got our cousin. We came back and it was still alive. Dad snuck up to it and shot it one more time and it finally died. We got it gutted and skinned.
"We came back to the cabin and hung out until we left for hunting later that evening. We went to the blind and waited for maybe an hour, and a nice buck came out of the corn. Dad was like "bububbuck!" It was so close and such an easy shot! It was perfect. I shot. It ran a few yards and it stood there. I shot it again, it took a few steps and fell over. It was dead! But the only down side was, on the second shot, I didn't hold the gun tight enough to my shoulder and the next day it hurt really bad. But we got that deer gutted and skinned. It was a nice fat 8 pointer."
My NGF's daughter was on Graysen's evening hunting trip. She helps her aunt with taxidermy sometimes and is fascinated with all the gutting and stuff, much like Gabby. Buck was super impressed that she wasn't grossed out. She was so excited to be taken along for the hunt and to see all the deer :) In fact, three total deer were harvested that day. Hooray for meat in several freezers!
That night the teen boys took care of the after supper dishes--rapping and dancing throughout the process :) And look at Buck's NGF, surrounded by three sleeping princesses. How they zonked on that concrete floor, I have no idea, but it was pretty precious!
1 comment:
Yay Graysen! You definitely will have meat for several freezers this winter! I thinks it's so cool that your friends' family went with you.
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