Maria and her catch

We drove to Big Mario’s and Vicki’s house last weekend and fished down on their dock.  The entire trip out to Mario’s and Vicki’s house, little Mario talked about catching a fish.  He remembers Jon telling him that the fish don’t bite when it is the middle of the afternoon because it is too hot and they stay far under the water to keep cool.  Therefore, we have to wait until dinner time to go down to the dock with our nets and poles to catch fish.  I think fishing is Mario’s favorite activity at this time in his life – it probably even beats basketball.  He just loves everything about it – putting bait on the pole, watching for a fish to bite, holding the fish in the net, measuring its size, and like every good fisherman, bragging about how big the fish was after the fact.  Maria loves to head down to the dock, too, but her tolerance level is much lower, especially after she catches one (that activity is complete – onto the next (a lot like her mom)). 

 When we got to the dock, the sun was still beaming.  Mario and Jon worked on the fishing poles and bait while Maria and I sat on the dock and looked out at the water.  I asked her “pluses” while we waited (8+2 =..; 9+4=..).  She loves to work on math problems.  Jon and Mario finished and brought Maria a fishing pole.  Within five minutes of Jon casting it, Maria caught the first fish of the evening – a huge catfish with whiskers as long as pencils.  Mario immediately wailed: “Not fair, I didn’t get one yet!”  Maria consoled him and patted him on the back telling him “Don’t  worry little brother, you will get one soon.”  Because Maria had gotten her catch, she decided to leave her pole stranded and head back to the house. 

Mario holding his catch

My fisherman

As I walked her off the dock, I heard Jon yelling for me and turned around to see him trying to handle Mario’s pole and Maria’s.  There were good-sized catfish pulling on both of them.  Mario was beside himself yelling at Jon to get them out of the water.  Mario held the net with one of the catfish in it while Jon worked on getting the other free from the hook in its mouth.  Maria and I cringed while watching Jon but Mario just ate it up.  Maria told Jon “get that fish away from me.” Mario immediately chimed back “Get that fish towards me!” 

He begged Jon to let him fish some more.  After about ten more minutes, he pulled out a blue gill.  This one was more his size and he stood by it proud as a papa with his newborn son.  He begged for more but the mosquitos were biting like mad.  When we got to the house, he announced his accomplishments.  He exaggerated the size of both the catfish and the blue gill.  Everyone gave him a high-five and he slapped their palms hard with a smug little look on his face.  My little fisherman.