End of January...

Can you believe it's already the end of January??!! I can't. It proves for me how fast time is really going. For me, ususally January is the slowest month at school. Getting back from Christmas break and getting the kids going again always seems like forever. School is going to be out before we know it! I carpool with 3 other teachers from Spearfish. It makes it so we only have to drive 1 week a month (which is wonderful compared to 4 weeks a month) I only have to drive 4 more weeks - that's crazy!
Monday was my day off.......I thought I was going to sit around and get stuff around the house caught up. Although, Mike's dad called and wanted to know if I wanted to go fishing. There is a lake that doesn't freeze and he had already caught 5 trout that morning and came back to town to see if I wanted to go back. It was a nice day out, so I dug my regular fishing pole out and went with him. We ended up catching 10 more trout (the limit for 2 people) in just a couple of hours. It was great - I had so much fun. We just fished right off the dock. I think Mike was a little jealous that I was fishing and he was working :)
Friday was also Mike's dad's birthday! We went out to dinner with his brother, sister-in-law and dad. We went down to Elk Creek Steakhouse. I hadn't been there since by Junior year of high school for prom! It was a good time. Saturday we decided to go to Rapid to look at some fishing equipment. We ended up getting a Marcum flasher for ice fishing. It has a cord thing that you put down the hole and it shows up top on a screen where the fish are at and where the bait is. Dennis has one - people say it's cheating - but it doesn't make the fish bite just helps us locate the fish! So I say it's not cheating :) We had called Gary and Sommerlyn earlier and said we were bored and asked if they wanted to have supper together. (So we kind of invited ourselves!) Gary made us pork ribs on the grill - it was very yummy! Malaya enjoyed showing us new things that she could do!
Today, Mike and Dennis are in a fishing tournament at Sheridan Lake. As I'm writing this, it's 6 degrees out so I'm guessing they are in the ice house with the heater on :) I talked to him earlier and they had caught 4 perch! Hopefully they had a good time.
I'm getting laundry caught up, the house cleaned, friends called and relaxing. I have been working on a baby blanket for a friend who's having a baby around the same time as Sommerlyn. It seems as if it's neverending, but I know someday there will be no more blank X's on the quilt :)
Hope everyone has a wonderful week!



the 10 trout Mike's dad and I caught


Another picture of the 10 trout


Cox Lake where we caught all the fish! Notice
the darker spot in the middle - that's where you
have to fish - I guess the rest is too shallow!