Fly Family Fishing Tournament

We got a last-minute invite earlier this week in order to participate in the First Annual Fly Family Fishing Tournament. ("Fly" is the nickname for Mike's step-family.) Mike is not one to pass up the opportunity to fish and I had been feeling pretty housebound for the past several weeks, we quickly jumped at the chance!

I left work around 1:30 on Friday, stopped at home to pick up the suitcases and feed the cats, then met up with Mike and Anne. We made quick time out of town, and were able to meet up with Mike's mom (Mary), his step-dad (Mike), and their friends (also Mike and Mary) at the Angry Minnow, a delicious brewpub in downtown Hayward, WI. Mike and Anne were very happy with their belated birthday dinner!

We then made it to his folks' cabin with a little light left to fish.

Mike had already caught a small bass even before I could make it down to the dock!

A small storm had passed through earlier in the evening, and the remaining clouds were just beautiful as the sun was setting.

(doesn't this next one kind of look like a Rorschach card?)

One of my favorite parts of being in Wisconsin is having access to New Glarus "Cherry Beer" (aka Belgian Red), and Mike likes trying their seasonals. We have a silly tradition where he uses the Bass pint glass and I use the Crappie pint glass, except we pronounce it "crappy" (not "croppy"). Yes, we're dorks.

The next morning we went out fishing in the john boat for a few hours before lunch. (It was so relaxing, but I ended up getting a little bit sore from all the rocking. I can't wait till I'm all healed!)

Look at how many fish Mike caught! :)

We even saw a loon!!

We then headed in for lunch when the sky started looking ominous.

By that time several more members of the Fly family had arrived. (I neglected to take portraits of any of the actual people in the family - Nathan & Britta, Dan & Gabby, Jim & Patty, and Tom. But I did get several shots of Gracie, N&B's dog. Oops.)

After the lunchtime storm passed, some of us hung out around the dock...

...where we did klassy things like drinking boxed wine out of Diet Coke bottles.

Others went out in the various lake vessels (i.e., the john boat, the row boat, the paddle boat, or the motorized canoe).

The sky still had some crazy cloud action going on.

We took a break for dinner, then Mike and I got in about an hour or so more out on lake before it was just way too dark. Time seems to enter some sort of vortex up at the lake and it just flies by!

After we came back inside, we stayed up way too late playing a cutthroat game of Catch Phrase with the family. It was great! But, once again, I neglected to take any photos of the actual people, only this one obligatory self-portrait (with Mike H included). :)

Then Sunday morning it was time to hit the road and head back to the Cities! (We had to hurry back for my company's summer picnic.)

We also got back in time for Mike to stop by the brew store to get the ingredients for brewing tomorrow (ah, the life of a grad student!), and also in time for us to stop at the uber-specialty pet food store for fancy new cat food. Since I'm falling asleep already, I'll have to post another day about the recent cat food / cat health fiasco in our household... and if that isn't a promising tease for an upcoming blog post, I don't know what is!  ;)

Have a great week!