What We Call Life: The Opening Day

The Deer Hunt....need I say more? This year I had the tag for the deer. I decided last time I went hunting and passed up some bucks because "they were too small" that I would shoot anything that came along with antlers otherwise the hunt could go on for days.

We were hunting in Circleville this year because, 1. it was my dear sweet Grandma's birthday opening day, and 2. that is where my babysitters were- love ya Aunt Nessa and Aunt Krista. Plus, I love that we get to come home and eat and then go back out because nothing is very far away. We headed down Friday night to go check the trail cams and get situated with everything. My sisters brought Mariah's kids over to Grandma's to help celebrate and their parents were either hunting or working. We ate some amazing homemade chicken noodle soup before the craziness of putting kids to bed started. I kid you not we started getting kids ready for bed at 7:45 and finished putting kids to bed at 11:30, thank you very much Jaylee- she was the night owl. We were all packing into Grandma's with three pack and plays for the babies and Sawyer who would wonder aimlessly if not confined. The night started out swell until Jaylee woke up to be fed and I was oblivious to her. Vanessa actually woke up and thought it was Hannah but to her relief it was my baby. I fed Jaylee but then Hannah woke up about 15 min later which Vanessa didn't hear so then Sawyer woke up. It was a bit of a three ringed circus for a little bit trying to get helping hands because I was the only one awake and I already had a baby. We made it through the night though....barely.

We came home and Sawyer was all ready to go hunting with his camo pants and his hunter orange, but he settled for a horse ride.

The opening morning Travis, Grandpa, Spencer and I headed out to the hunting grounds. This is the worst part of hunting if you ask me. We hiked to the top of hill in the pitch black in the freezing cold and sat there until the sun came up. Fortunately, it was only half of an hour but still I was frozen. Once the lights came on though all hell broke lose. There were a lot of shots and all for a little forked horn. When the sun came up too we were able to see all of the other out of town hunters in our spot, so frustrating. Travis had been seeing a nice 4 point in our spot for weeks and the morning of the hunt he didn't show himself so we moved on before we got shot because people were every where.

For lunch we all met up and headed down to Hoover's for Grandma's birthday luncheon. We had quite the crew. My mom and Dan met us there, along with Colby and Andie who were hunting on the Dutton. Andie didn't have deer yet either, we were having a bit of a competition. After lunch we headed back to the Grandparents to get ready to head out again. Travis and I headed to the other end of the valley that requires more hiking to get to the areas so there goes all the lazy hunters. We headed through the junipers and pinyons to find my buck. I kept getting distracted by all the pine nuts still in the trees. I love those things. My hunter/gatherer instincts kicked in and I started filling my pockets with pine nuts. Hey if I didn't bring home meat we could have nuts. Finally just before dark we got this little one. We thought me may have lost him in the sage brush but I found him. Yep, it was like a needle in a haystack but we found him.

We got him home and Travis finished cleaning him for me. I can not do raw meat after having kids. The smell and texture gets me all morning sick again. It was a family affair out in the barn. We were all excited that I got a deer until we started getting texts from Andie and Colby. She won!!! She got a really nice 4 point. If only I was that lucky. Maybe next time. We finished the evening off with cake and ice cream. Thanks for being born Grandma!

Sunday morning we all headed to church, Saturday night went a lot more smoothly. After church Grandma cooked a great roast and potato dinner. We rested a bit and then headed back to Monroe. Thanks for all the help and good times.