A fishy Thanksgiving....

So,  what was the Thanksgiving surprise....? Here it is...

Our kiddo doesn't LOVE fishing in 30 degree weather...

We now know officially.

I don't blame him really...

So Forrest and I vacated the chilly drift boat and headed for warmer temps of at least 48 on the Oregon Coast, (running around on a sunny beach with several dogs and their owners beats a cold drift boat anyday says this toddler!) while Alex caught us our main course of Thanksgiving dinner.

You see, a high of 41 doesn't exactly lead to great conditions for a defrosting turkey. At 1pm, it was still frozen solid...

No sooner did I start to worry that our Turkey day dinner would be turkey less, (which wouldn't have been all bad...as we had plenty of yummy sides...) then did I hear some hoops and hollars coming from the river just out of our camp...

And, my wonderful husband caught our meal....

Funniest looking turkey you ever saw huh!

 Forrest still had a blast and for much of the trip acted like the cold was nothing. He slept like a baby all bundled up and ran around camp with his tike bike, day and night. We set up either the bike or the baby with one of our head lamps so he could make his way safely....

We are happy to be home, but glad we attempted the adventure and got in some outdoor time just as winter has officially hit. Alex and I really want to keep doing the things we love through our kiddie rearing time...and though there will be bumps in the road, a good time was had by all!

P.S.
So the  picture below was one of Alex on Friday.  Needless to say Forrest and his mama were NOT in the boat on this cold blustery morning...we were...dum da dum duum.....Black Friday Shopping at Fred Meyer's! I have NEVER actually shopped the day after Thanksgiving. But given the fact we were in Oregon, (can you say...um, tax free!) and a warm store sounded better than a cold wet drift boat with a toddler, we bailed.
It was actually a great experience. We were greet by warm apple cider and donut holes at the front door. The crowds were a bit nuts by the time we left, but I made the choice to limit the trip to an hour and good moods and lots of gifts were the result! Forrest loved the Christmas decorations and lights.  Alex obviously had a great time too and got two great fish. Unfortunately the rain fogged the camera up for ALL the pics....so this is what we got...

Happy Thanksgiving to ALL!!!

The Tailes of the Toddler Fish Extravaganza: The Conclusion

The morning came dark and early. Mr. F blearily looked at his parents in the wee 5 o'clock hour and for a split second thought about giving some protesting shrieks as his mama changed his toosh in the chilly tent. He then smiled wildly and shrieked in DELIGHT at the excitement in the camp.
What was this morning going to bring?
The family headed out to run the shuttle with Forrest happily sucking down his milk and snacking on his cereal bar. His mama thought through all the supplies they had brought, hoping everything was accounted for.
Into the boat they went, with dawn barely showing itself. The family had wanted to be the FIRST on the water, and indeedily they had done it, toddler and all.
This morning a friend was joining them...The Mighty Mr. Tyson. Forrest was in awe of Mr. Tyson. The "hi, HIIIIII, HIYEEEEE"'s were frequent the the morning air as his papa prepared the fishing gear, cut the sardines, and lined us up.
The morning of fishing started. Lines were in the water and hopes were high.
10 minutes went by, then 20, then 30. Forrest started to clamor about. The sweet treats were opened, and the fussiness started.
Mr. F's mom started to get worried. Her little active son wanted OUT. She played, sang, fed, and entertained all while watching her reel. Forrest's smiles and giggles were plentiful, but the crazy baby mode was also surfacing.
Suddenly.....
WHAM
Rod tip down.....
"Fish on, FISH ON...." yelled Mr. F's Dad, excitedly.
Mama grabbed the rod up and started reeling, quickly feeling the weight of the creature on the end of it and adjusting. ZIIIIIPPPPPPPPPP, taking line again. She struggled to keep the line taunt, and reeled when she could.
This felt like a LARGE fish, bigger even that last night's beast? Could she hope? Mr. F looked on in amazement and quickly vroom vroomed his cars around the boat edge adding to the excitement.
The weight of the situation weighed on his mom's arms. Her left forearm threatened to cramp, but persistence won out and the large salmon slowly came in closer to the shore. In the net it went and the dawn crew yelled in excitement.
WOW!
"40 lbs"? Suggested the Mighty Mr. Tyson.
Forrest looked at the enormous salmon in amazement. This creature was so much bigger than he was!  His mama and him were so energized from the situation they choose to sit the next drift out and run around on the rocky beach.
Forrest looked out on the river, a bit perplexed at where the mighty salmon were coming from.

He never saw glimpses of them until one of his parents pulled them from the river! They were so mysterious!

Into the boat they went and down the river they floated for more fishy fun. Despite the excitement and the crew's elation, Forrest's mood was quickly souring. Toys and food were being flung and timeout was being threatened, (not that a place for timeout was convenient....but you know, the parents were pulling out all the stops...)

The Mighty Mr. Tyson spoke of a magical place just down river where he had caught steelehead. Mr. Forrest protested at the thought of being cooped up. His mama sighed at the thought of being cooped up with HIM, and his papa sighed at all the sighing going on. Mr. T again requested the extra fishing time and found the saving grace as they ran a small rapid.
And what was that grace of the river gods.
Yes, you guessed it...
NEEDLE NOSE PLIERS
Miracle toy indeedily.
Not a peep out of Mr. F and the crew happily wet their lines.
Mama bit her tongue and hoped the miracle would hold out. The Mighty Mr. T took in the beautiful scenery and became content with just trying this one last spot....
And, you guessed it....

Have you guessed it???/

"SLAMMMM, Clank Clank!!!BANG BANG..." Pliers on the bottom of the boat, repeatedly dropped by Mr. F who decided some boat work needed to be done. Forrest's papa grumbled, about to let loose verbally on his son....
And.....
"Wham......!!!" Rod tip down, Mr.T's rod tip down! He got a fish!
and...
Jerk, jerk, mama's rod tip too? Two fish? Forrest looked up briefly at the excitement and held his pliers in his tightly toddler grip.
"Katie, reel up! Tyson's got a fish on!"
"But....but...I do too, maybe?"
"Just REEL!"
Soon, the truth became aparent. Mr. T did indeed have a fish on, a BIG fish....and Mama indeed had hooked Mr. T's line....
"UGGGHHHHHH. "

Perplexed Dad looking at the mess after the fight....

Forrest's papa quickly sprang into action cutting the line away. But...it was too much of a mess, some was firmly affixed to his rod tip...
Tyson fought the fish like someone Mighty does, Forrest looked on in awe, and Mama held her breath. If ONLY he gets this fish....she would hate it if her line caused this mighty beast of a salmon to get away.....
Rod tip doubled over, the battle went on.

The fish jumped in fury and showed just how bright it was. He took line, took MORE line, and then slowly began to tire.
To the boat he came, into the net in one joyous swoop, and a big sigh of relief was had by mama while hoops and hollars were heard from the mighty Mr. T.

Forrest looked in awe at his Mighty friend, holding the tail of the amazing salmon...the THIRD salmon he had witnessed being caught in the last day.
What a trip it had been....

The take out was waiting for them quickly down stream and the tired mama and Forrest wearily packed up into their chariot and Forrest fell to sleep, dreaming of the day HE would be able to battle the mighty salmon and be part of their "Tailes" of triumph and loss. His parents knew that he WAS already part of the tale....such a good part!

Little did Forrest know this river would hold many more surprises in the weeks to come.

*More surprises you wonder? Perhaps, only time and Turkey day will tell! Stay tuned!

The Tailes of the Ultimate Toddler Fish Extravaganza Part II

"Uhhh ohhhhh" said the small but never meek toddler as he stared overboard....
A small yellow truck flashed bright red lights as it's fate was met in the mighty Chetco.
Down, down it floated, and sank, soon to be either fish scenery or a river touched new toy for a kiddo down stream.
Mr. F stared at the river, the permanence of the situation sinking into his young brain. It brought him back to a time last year when he was first at awe of the power of the river.

He didn't cry, or scream, for he knew that not even his powerful dad or amazing mom could rescue his little truck...(in that cold water, NO WAY!!!;-)
Luckily, as mom and dad fished away, in hopes of a magical salmon made even more magic by having Mr. F in the boat, Forrest had his other cars which he seemed to be very careful with.
Mr. Nomad was a favorite, and the family is happy to report it made it through the trip...

As Forrest clamored about in the boat, the sun was quickly setting in this November evening, as darkness was falling. The hopes of the mighty fish were sinking away in the sun as the parents began to make plans to give up for the night and row to the take out.
Mr. F started to get his toddler evening blues. His mama countered this by throwing his favorite gold fish crackers at him with lots of "JUS" (juice...) but the menacing toddler was gaining the edge.
His mama sighed, just happy to make it through the bulk of the afternoon dry and happy. She took in the scenery of the river, the beauty of the evening , and the triumph of at least TRYING to fish, and her lovely family.... and was content.

Suddenly.....

"BAM" the rod tip flew down.
"Zip, zip, ziiiiiiipppppppppppp" line flew out of the reel as something.....SOMETHING BIG.....took line.
"Fish on! That's it....wait....okay grab it....yes!" said the excited Dad.
Mama grabbed up the reel as Mr. F looked on at the fire drill. As his mom struggled with the fish, his dad quickly reeled up the other line and rowed to the bank.
This was truly a fish, a BIG fish.
The fight was on.
Mr. F watched in awe and also showed his excitement by dumping his goldfishie crackers all over the place. He figured they would help his mama fight on! His dad quickly contained him and stood ready with the net, but relaxed a bit when he realized the fish just kept taking line.
This was going to be a long fight....
His mama reeled and reeled, only to have the amazing salmon take more line. He left arm was fatiguing, but she kept at it, in hopes of achieving the goal.
"splash", "SPLASH", zip, ziiiip. This salmon was putting up a fight. The whole river was responding to the show. Other salmon rolled in the pool in the setting sun, ducks cruised by, Forrest yelled in the evening.
The miracle of nature at it's finest.
FINALLY, the amazing fish made it's appearance close to the bank. The exhausted mama held her breath as Dad scooped it with the net.
The goal had been met......

The rest of the night was filled with happy banter of the feat the family had accomplished. A 30 pound salmon had been caught! On top of Mr. F's dad's fish early that morning, this was truly looking like a great trip! Talk of the next morning ensued as the family considered a longer drift at dawn.
Could the feat be repeated? Was this too much?
Mr. F's mama thought about the evening. She just couldn't let another possibility go by could she? The trip had gone reasonable well, but they had only been fishing for less than two hours. This trip would be more like 4-6 hours,....hmmm.
It would be attempted, the family decided. Mr. F raced around the camp in the dark in the excitement. Dinner was being made, excellent drinks were being drunk, the mood was one of excitement. The headlamp Mr. F's parent had strapped to him as not to loose their son in the dark evening flashed brightly to and fro.
The excitement quickly turned to exhaustion as the night wore on. The thought of the 5:00 a.m. wake up drove the family to the tent.
They snuggled down, alarms set, for the night. Dreams of big fish, and the looming morning adventure filled their heads.

What WOULD the morning bring?


Stay tuned for Part III

The Tailes of the Ultimate toddler fish Extravaganza...Part I

Once there was a boy named Mr. Forrest. He had two loving, though sometimes crazy, parents. His dad LOVED to fish, and his mom just loved any kind of adventure at all. One weekend his parents decided to adventure on the mighty Chetco River, lusting after tales of mighty salmon, great beauty, and a toddler friendly fishing technique, (no joke...)
So off they went, to Brookings Oregon. After an overwhelming trip to the super duper Fred Meyers where Mr. Forrest stared sadly into the kiddie land unable to attend due to his youth of not quite two, the family headed to the camp ground and snuggled in for a long winters nap.
Mr. Forrest burrowed in the tent with his parents wondering WHAT the morning would bring. His thoughts were filled with his new found love for tent stakes. Little did he know exactly what kind of tale, (tail???) would float his way.
Morning came at 7:15, and his fish frenzied papa had been out of the tent already for two hours going solo on his drift trip. Mom was a bit worried about having Mr. F in a VERY small boat for hours and hours and opted for the morning in. Meeting the neighbor campers, a breakfast of champions, a romp around the campground and down to the river ensued. Mr. F loved to shout his encouragement to the fellow serious fishermen at the top of his lungs while his mom cringed....ahhh...kiddies...
Mr. F and his mom found themselves on a hike where the young buck snuggled on his mom's back in the carrier and took in the sites of the river, beautiful redwoods,  and boat after boat....but where was his dad? Boat after boat had no fish...was Dad to be disappointed as well?
Suddenly, around the corner, there stood his "DA" in his jet black drift boat, fishing away. Forrest yelled as he had been doing and his "Da" answered gleefully that the fabled stories of magic fish had been true and he had a VERY nice salmon already in his fish box!
Just how nice you ask???

Wow! Mr. F. was so happy and amazed he gleefully poked the mighty salmon's eyes, amazed at fish anatomy...(I suppose...:-) and in awe of his papa of course!

Now that dreams of the mighty Chetco were coming true, the Family planned for an afternoon drift WITH Mr. F. along for the ride. Visions of toddler overboard, yelling and screaming, and all other mahem worried his mama, while the same visions peppered with boat failures, loosing daylight, and only god knows what else worried his dad. But...they took the risk, and foraged on....
Down the river the family floated, with Forrest bundled tightly in if life vest, and ALL with aspirations for another fish or two swimming in their heads.

Suddenly, out of the blue.....PLOP...."SPLASH"......!!!!!
GROAN........



Stay tuned for Part II......

My 20 month old Forrest, November strawberries and bell peppers, and more!

Woweeee, this Fultmeyer household has been a bit crazy. I've been neglecting this blog simply due to lack of sleep, time, exhaustion, etc. etc. This mama just finished working 11 of the last 12 days and is now starting off a 3 day weekend! Thank goodness to the exhaustion gods for that.
Meanwhile, I have a 20 month old kiddo TOMORROW!!!! My goodness, that sounds old, 20 months going on 20 years, huh!
Forrest is a big ball of energy and at the moment is babbling away yelling at me to do SOMETHING.  His language has taken off in the last month, as has his singing. He's constantly singing away all the songs he learns in kiddiecare. His words include our dogs names, Chester and Tessie..."teeee" for teeth as in brushing his teeth, "gigi" for blankie, and a ton others.
He still loves the outdoors and his favorite thing to do is push his tike bike around our dirt roads. It's not at all unusual for him to push that thing a mile! He really amazes me with his activity. I'm just so thankful we live where we do and CAN let him burn his energy outdoors.

I recently broke down and bought a DVD player for my Subaru. Forrest has no exposure to TV at home, but the hour drives 2-3 times a week into my work and his daycare are hard on his toddler body and mama...and on his lack of patience, (patience....does that exist for a toddler???;-) So this way it at least helps the situation and I can control what he's watching. So far the Baby Einstein videos, (despite their lack of "genius building" skills, or whatever you want to call it....) and Planet Earth seem to keep him entertained. As does Barney...ugggh....not my favorite....
He's an eater, when he's not sick...and the sicknesses....they do keep coming. An ear infection, and a cold in the last month. He's handled the last one quite well. His favorite foods are soup, cereal with milk, most all fruit, milk, spagetti, chips, (of course....), and oatmeal usually goes down. And of course yogurt...where would we be without that miracle food!
His 19 month appt. stats were 26 lbs, 33 inches tall, and a head still in the 97th percentile. His hair growth is finally catching us with his head and coming in blond and thicker!
So there's the Mr. Forrest update. We're off to Southern Oregon for some camping and fun while this weather is decent. And I"ve got to go clean the chicken soup off the walls....;-)

P.S. Yes, we have strawberries and lovely sweet red bell peppers in November! Amazing!

The 2nd Annual Fulton Fright Fest!!!

 Halloween is a bit different for us out here. We don't have trick-or- treaters, (in fact I would be pretty worried if we did!) and given that Forrest is not yet at the trick-or-treating age we like to make our own fun out here in the woods. When it comes down to it, our home would actually be the PERFECT place for a big Halloween shindig...thing about it...plenty of dark creepy trees, old barns, and and old cabin to deck out with all kind of freakish and haunting delights! I mean we even have a cemetery on our property...a REAL life cemetery...no fake headstones needed!

Some of our spooky treats....mmmmm mmmmm

and of course some "spirits" for the spooky spirits....

This year however, we repeated last years festivities. We did a campfire gathering with good food, drinks, and some spooky decorations and sound effects to boot. Forrest was the only one dressed up, and he was as cute as ever in his little cow costume! I'm so glad I got it to fit him, with only minor alterations, as it was a 1 year old size.  It even had a "MOOOOOOOOO" sound effect if you squeezed the hoof...:-)

The tail was great!

The little calf was snacking on more than hay...cookies on his mouth!

He had a great time and we all enjoyed soup, salad, bread, and plenty of Halloween goodies, hot apple cider, and of course "Dead Man's Ale" and good wine. This year we had a nice little group with 6 of our neighbors showing up. Our neighbors are the type to NOT be so into Halloween, so they were happy for our low key get to together...costumes optional.
Forrest was just into being outside in the dark. We eventually had to pull one of the flashing lights from our jack-o-lanterns and stick it to his little cow tail as he kept wandering off and we were afraid we'd loose him! He was quite the sight, a little cow running to and fro with a flashing orange light on his tail! He grabbed a sugar monster cookie before I could catch him and I think he was running on the sugar high from that for quite awhile!

A perfectly haunting night was had by all. I have a sneeking suspicion our little get together might grow in size and Halloween spirit in the future...maybe to the point of a huge Halloween Haunt when our little Forrest is older. A Haunted Ranch Extravaganza.....hehehehehehe.

Alex was practicing the sleepy look....that Dead Man's Ale can do it to ya!