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Not a whole lot has been happening in the last couple of weeks. We’ve been staying home during the last couple weekends and didn’t really do much. We’ve been watching the NCAA tourney and are happy to see MSU make it to the Final Four. We’ve also continued to go ice fishing but haven’t had much luck during the last couple weeks. I’m still hoping to ice fish on Munising Bay soon to catch some coho salmon (yum). The weather has been pretty mild and the snow is slowly melting. Much of the snow in town has melted but our yard still has a good foot of snow left. Needless to say, we won’t be raking the yard or mowing anytime soon. With only 5 or 6 inches of snow for the month of March, it was one of the least snowiest months on record. Many of the storms missed us and with Lake Superior being 95 percent froze over for during the later part of winter, we didn’t get much lake effect.

This weekend we’re headed to Leah’s hometown for her friend Kami’s baby shower. Chris and Theresa are also coming up but Chris and I won’t be attending the party. Instead, we’ll be going to a nearby ski hill. The place we’re going is always the first to open and the last to close in the area. They still have 40 some inches of snow base on the hill. This will be the first time I’ve snowboarded since we lived in Duluth. We’ll see how many runs it takes to get back in the groove.

I’ve made no secret of the fact that I hate the cold. So I’m really, really enjoying this brief warm up we’re having right now. Today it got up to 61° at our house (according to our weather station), which is so awesome. During my lunch today, I drove out to the park and sat in my car and read for awhile and it was great. I had the windows open a bit and it actually got hot inside after a little bit. Just wonderful.

The only thing I don’t like about this time of the year is the dark, dirty mess everywhere from the melting snow. With the bare trees, it’s just ugly. Hopefully this time next month we’ll be officially done with winter and trees will be budding. I can’t wait. I know we’ll probably get at least a couple more snowstorms before then and the temperature will be dropping again, but I just keep telling myself it’s only one more month. I can deal with that. At least it’s not January! I hate January warm ups because you know there’s still so much winter left.

Last weekend we went fishing and I was actually warm in the 50° heat, though I couldn’t feel my toes by the end of the day, of course. Even in the middle of summer, my feet will be cold. Frustrating. Anyway, I actually outfished Greg in quantity, but definitely not quality. The total length of my two fish was probably 6 or 7 inches. My first perch was only as long as my index finger and the second wasn’t much bigger. Greg was fishing with minnows that were way bigger than those little guys. I thought it was the funniest thing ever. I’d been fishing with my usual sized hooks and getting nibbles but nothing was taking the hook. I finally switched it up to this tiny little hook and caught the little guy right away. So apparently my hooks didn’t fit in its mouth. Greg caught a pretty good-sized northern. He went out again on Sunday while I stayed home doing laundry (fun, fun!) and he actually got a slight sunburn. He did catch a few walleye, though.

A couple weeks ago we went to watch my cousin Iris play in a basketball tournament here in Marquette. She plays on a 7th grade team from Menominee which won both of the games we went to. Her third game was 8:30 on the Sunday morning after the time change and I wasn’t about to get up that early to go watch, so I’m not sure if they won that one or not.

We also watched Greg’s little cousin Caleb play in his hockey team’s exhibition game. He’s only 5 and plays on a skills team with 4- and 5-year-olds. There were some tiny little guys on that team, let me tell you. Their jerseys looked like dresses and their skates were just so, so small. This one little guy would skate by the boards after every score and high-five, whether it was his team that scored or not. Greg and I were standing by the team taking pictures, so we were high-fiving him, too. It was cute.

It’s hard to believe we’re already into March even though it doesn’t feel like March weather. The last few mornings have been extremely cold. Parts of the eastern U.P. were -27 this morning! It looks like the weather is supposed to be a few degrees above freezing for the next few days which will feel extremely warm. It has been a cold winter and Lake Superior is pretty much frozen over except for a few open water areas. Since the last posting, we’ve had a couple blizzards and a lot more snow. Greg’s had a couple white knuckle drives to work but he’s managed to stay on the road.

Leah is definitely ready for spring. Greg, however, psycho that he is, wants to get some more ice fishing in (he’s predicting he’ll be out until mid-April) before things are finally thawed for good. It’s hard to believe that Daylight Saving Time is here already. It’s going to be really hard to get up on Monday, even harder than usual (Leah’s not exactly a morning person).

Last weekend we watched one of Jacob’s (Greg’s little cousin) last hockey games for the season. It’s very entertaining watching seven-year-olds play hockey. Then on Saturday night, we went to an NMU hockey game versus Lake Superior State Univ. NMU won the game and will start their playoff run this weekend against MSU. It was especially funny to go from watching the little guys who seem to do more by accident than design to seeing the skill of the older guys. What a contrast. On Sunday, it was pretty cold so only Greg went ice fishing while Leah did the laundry (fun, fun!). He caught one largemouth bass and a splake (cross between lake trout and brook trout) that measured 14.5″.

An update on the prospective house: we’ve been going back and forth on offers and counter-offers. We’ve reached our max and we’re just waiting for a response. We’ll just have to wait and see where it goes…

14.5″ splake caught by Greg

Greg’s little cousin Jacob (#15)