Ice Fishing + Weekend Adventures

I wrote last week about enjoying the cold weather, and this week I found myself eating my own words.
Kyle had the afternoon off on Saturday and he's been mentioning how much he misses ice fishing. By mentioning, I mean talking about it nonstop. Since his bestie, Andy, also had the day off, us wives decided to spoil them and surprise them with a day of ice fishing.
I spilled the beans to Kyle early this week to make sure he did, in fact, have an afternoon off. The reaction involved a lot of jumping up and down and high pitched noises of excitement. Also a statement that I've been reminding him of for the past 48 hours, "Wife of the year!"

We packed up and headed out to a nearby town full of lakes. I was layered in three pairs of pants (I couldn't locate my snow pants for the life of me!), a shirt, sweatshirt, fleece and winter coat, two pairs of ridiculously thick socks, and two pairs of gloves. Kyle had jeans and a sweatshirt, with carhartt bibs. Noticing a difference in body temperature here? (It's why I wear a snuggie in our home and Kyle wears shorts and a t-shirt.)

Thankfully, the sun was shining and it was a beautiful winter day in the north! Thank heavens for that sunshine!! It saved our lives. I couldn't bring my camera in fear of dropping it on the ice and not being able to operate it with multiple gloves on, so all the photos are thanks to my phone.

Niether Anna or I had been ice fishing since we were little, both with our dads. It was fun for our hubbies to re-introduce us to the ropes.



Okay let's skip ahead to the good part: I caught the first fish! Kyle and I ran to the hole as fast as possible once the flag went up and he let me pull the line up. I held it in the end, which clearly means I caught it. Right?




It was right after this that us girls realized we could no longer feel our toes. We sat in our chairs with two blankets each, plus our husbands coats (what gentlemen). We also made up songs, did a lot of jumping jacks, lunges and ice skating sliding in order to keep the blood flow. About four hours in, we were ready to call it a day. When you have snot on your nose and you can't even feel it, that's about the time when warmth is calling your name.



In the mean time, the boys were playing a real life video game with the fishies:


I'm sad to report that we didn't catch any pike. Just bass, which we threw back since it's illegal to keep them this time of year. I sound like I know what I'm talking about, but I'll be honest - 99% of my knowledge of fishing comes from my husband.


Another fun tidbit from this weekend? We pulled the trigger and ordered our new appliances for the kitchen! I categorize this as an adventure, considering it took five different trips to appliance stores and four weeks to decide. Can't wait until they get installed!


We celebrated with a homemade apple pie:




Hope you had a great weekend & kept plenty warm! I'm off to start a fire and begin a project that involves painting, fabric and cutting wood. Want to take a guess?!