Grandpa Palmer's Fishing Tournament

This past weekend we went to my parent's cabin in Pinetop, AZ. We went to attend my Dad's annual fishing tournament that he puts on for his Grandchildren and friends. We went to the lake on Saturday morning. The tournament starts at 6:00 AM or so and goes until 11:00PM. When fish are caught they are measured and all measurements are taken by an official score keeper (this time it happened to be my brother Aaron). Then after 11:00 we all went back to the cabin and had a barbeque and fish fry (we opted to catch and release as we do not love fish and I particularly did not want to worry about cleaning them!). Prizes are awarded in age categories. Largest fish for each category gets $50.00. 2nd and 3rd place winners get a brand new fishing pole. Everyone else gets to choose a toy that my dad buys from the dollar stores in the months leading up to it. Fun stuff. The coolest part about this year, was that everyone (all 25 kids or so) caught at least one fish. Haylee unfortunately only won the 4th place prizes (she thought the little doll was better then the money anyway!)
So now that you understand the context. Haylee had stayed up way too late in the excitement of seeing her cousing and taking a long nap on the way up to the cabin. So the next morning she did not really want to get up. So at about 8:00AM we got her up and went to the lake. Ryan bought her a little princess pole that proved to be more for show than really worth its value. He fortunately brought another pole along and they eventually managed to reel in 2 fish. Haylee was a little nervous about touching them and really only held them on the string. Needless to say, she has caught her first and probably not last! So exciting. So of course I was the official photographer and loved capturing all of her little expressions and moods on the camera. So hear are our latest from the fishing tournament. Enjoy.

I forgot to include that when Ryan and Haylee went to the lake first thing she was running aross the bridge so excited with her cousins and crashed leaving a wound on her face and scraping her little thumb!

Haylee and Ryan Fishing!See my pretty fish!

I don't really like to touch it though.

My sister Heather and Addie (all the kids got these hats to keep them from getting sunburned and to be real fishermen!)

The whole gang!