Teach a Man to Fish

This year, we decided to skip out on the Mal's St. Paddy's Day Parade. We went fishing instead. The weather was wonderful so I loaded up on my Allegra and other asthma medicine and we headed over to the in law's house to see if we could catch anything. We had a lot of luck catching some white perch. Mark was the winner of the most fish caught award. Fish love him!...and I do too of course! Enjoy a few pictures of our day.



This is the "don't take my picture" pose.


Should I use this worm or this worm?



One of my first fish.


Jake's big catch.

Just call me Picasso.

If you haven't tried it already, I would encourage each and every one of you to make a trip to Easely Amused! A group of coworkers and my bestest bud Jen went last night and had an absolute BLAST! This is an art studio of sorts where non-artistic and artistic folks alike go to complete a masterpiece. The instructor is of course an artist and she chooses a painting for each class. Last night's painting was "Sweet Georgia Brown". For the low cost of $26.75 you are provided a canvas, paint and excellent step by step instruction on how to complete the painting. We had a wonderful time together and it was amazing to see how everyone's paintings turned out. No two were alike! Thanks gals for a great night out!

The first stages.

The finished product.

My Jen.

Jennifer and Lindsey.

It's a Zoo!

A couple of weekends ago we had some very nice weather around here. We decided to take a family trip to the zoo. This was just the Jackson Zoo so don't expect too much in the way of fabulous pictures. All of the animals seemed to be very tired that day. We went just after lunch so I imagine some of them were just taking their after lunch snooze. We had a fun time and did manage to get a few good pictures.


Sleeping Rhinos


Sleeping Hogs


Sleeping Chimp...notice a theme here?


An elephant holding up a rock


Jake, what do you think about the elephants?


I love it when he's happy!


Me and my boy


Look, more lazy animals...eating dead leaves

It was a really good day and we had fun...even if all the animals were sleeping.

It's been FOREVER!!....

since I posted anything on here! I'm going to start off with this little quiz since I don't really have a whole lot to blog about at the moment. Christmas pictures will be coming soon!! I know, it's been a month since Christmas!

You can only answer these questions with one word...feel free to copy and do this yourself!

1. Where is your cell phone? desk
2. Where is your significant other? work
3. Your hair color? brownish
4. Your mother? patient
5. Your father? funny
6. Your favorite thing? cake
7. Your dream last night? none
8. Your dream/goal? peace
9. The room you're in? office
10. Your hobby? running
11. Your fear? death
12. Where do you want to be in six years? madison
13. Where were you last night? home
14. What you're not? patient
15. One of your wish list items? tahoe
16. Where you grew up? ridgeland
17. The last thing you did? typed
18. What are you wearing? sweater
19. Your TV? heavy
20. Your pet? grey
21. Your computer? dell
22. Your mood? calm
23. Missing someone? Mark
24. Your car? fast
25. Something you're not wearing? socks
26. Favorite store? clothing
27. Your Summer? hot
28. Love someone? yes
29. Your favorite color? brown
30. When is the last time you laughed? earlier
31. Last time you cried? Saturday

The Shirtless Wonder

I wonder if anyone can explain why my 4 year old has suddenly decided that he doesn't want to wear a shirt...ever?? The first thing he does when we get home is peel off his shirt. He walks around all night long without it. Then, after bath time, he absolutely refuses to put his pajama shirt on, he only wants the pants on. Isn't he a little too young to be acting like Al Bundy? I haven't been able to get a picture of this yet, but I hope to get one soon!

We Got 2 Good Ones!!

This year's alligator hunt was a BLAST!! We left for Pascagoula on Friday afternoon. We arrived at about 4 p.m. and met up with my parents at Tucei's Fish Camp. After going to check in at Ward Bayou, we had dinner at Big R's in Pascagoula...if you're ever down that way, don't waste your time at that place...not at all what we expected! Anyway, I know you're all just dying to hear the details of our catch....

We got on the water at about 7 p.m. and headed North of the fish camp towards I-10. It only took us about 6 minutes to spot a gator that looked to be a pretty good size. The gator was swimming in open water, which is a good sign that it's a large one. We motored as close to it as we could and then killed the engine. The gator went down as we turned the motor off but don't worry, my dad employed the "blind cast" techinque...this means that you cast at the area where you last saw the gator and drag your hook back through the water and hope to catch something. In just a few seconds my dad looks at the rest of us and says "I think I got something"...he wasn't sure if he was actually hooked on a live animal or some sort of trash under the water. He slowly reeled in his line until we reached the spot where it was obviously hooked on something. Mark had the bright idea to drop another hook in the water to see if whatever we were hooked on would react...it did. The gator took off again and the line whizzed out of the reel. Again, we reeled in the line and got close to the monster again. At this point we noticed that the boat was moving in circles. When the gator begins to move like this, it means that he is disoriented...that's good for us. We eventually got him to come up to the surface and secured him with a snare only to realize that we were missing our gun. It was still in the truck. There are other ways to dispatch a gator, but a gun is our preferred method. We toyed with the idea of taping the mouth up and just riding back to camp with a live gator...I voted to call some buddies that were still at the fish camp when we were leaving and ask if they had a gun we could borrow. They came to the rescue and the gator was in our boat and we were back at camp at 8:30.

We got the gun from the truck and set out to find our second gator. As a part of the hunt, you are allowed one gator over 7' and one that must be longer than 4' but less than 7'. Again, it only took us a few minutes to see one we wanted. Mark hooked up with the second gator and after fighting it for about 15-20 minutes, we had him in the boat too. We filled both of our tags in 3 hours!!! We then went to "check them in" and get some final measurements.

Both gators turned out to be female. The larger one was 9' 1 5/8" long and weighed 196.5 lbs. The smaller one was 6'2" and weighed 50.5 lbs. The larger one was just 2 3/8 inches short of the state record for a female gator and just 3.5 lbs. lighter.

We had a wonderful time with my parents and Mark's dad. I really hope that we get to do it again next year!!

The larger gator.

The smaller one.


Team Hosford, yes, we have an official team!!

Sneak Peek...

Below is a picture of the scale when the wildlife folks weighed my biggest gator...yes, it weighed 196.5 lbs!! We did much better this year than last year. We're headed to the fair this afternoon but I promise to post more about the hunt later!! Stay tuned!

They're Baaack!

The beast. 8'.

The hunting crew, random guy, Mark, another random guy, Robbie (BIL) and Chris (FIL).

So, I have been a hunting widow/single mom for the past 3 days....let me tell you, I have the utmost respect for single moms. I can hardly make it for 3 days without pulling my hair out. I love my little man but I just get to a point where I need someone else to talk to! Anyway, Mark was alligator hunting this weekend in Pascagoula. He got the opportunity to be a "guide" for another hunter. They loaded up Friday and headed for the coast. Friday night was a bust for them but Saturday proved to be a better night and they harvested an 8 footer.


Jake and I got a glimpse of the beast this afternoon at my in-laws house.


Next weekend is my turn...but on this hunt I will be the permit holder. I'm hoping to do better than my catch last year which was 6'10". Mark claims that they "left" a 10 footer out there for me. Let's hope I can get it!!

S'mores?!?

This afternoon, Jake says "Mama, I need some crackers, chocolate and a marshmallow." I asked "what are you going to make with that?" He replied, just as cool as a cucumber, "spores." Ha!

Pump It Up!!

Sooooo...it's been a long time ya'll! We have been super busy over the last couple of weeks and I have really had no desire to blog at the end of the day...basically, I have been a blog slacker!

We went to Hayden's birthday at Pump It Up a couple of weeks ago. Jake, Mark and I had a wonderful time. It's always a plus for me when the adults can have fun at the kiddo birthday parties! Jake and I raced through the obstacle courses and down the slides, we bounced in the bouncy houses, it was excellent! Jake has been asking to have his next birthday party there...he doesn't turn 5 until May...

Here are some pictures from the day.

Racing through the obstacle course with Jake.

I look like I'm striking a pose...really I'm just trying to cool off my armpits!!!

Did someone say CAKE??

The whole gang.