So, we’ve got us a teenager under our roof as our oldest, Helena, officially meets the criteria today.

Helena meets bass (kept it small, less intimidating)                                     Helena meets fungus

Easter Sunday Fulton Co. fishing                    Color coordinated panfishing and love the barefeet in all the goose crap

The destruction of camping air mattresses begins

As kid number one in the chronological order there were many firsts as Julie and I took on the role of parents, still remember it being a little intimidating leaving the hospital and shortly thereafter walking into the house with a kid.  No real clue on actually being a Dad although I had a good role model.  Pretty much just hit the ground running, realized that the world didn’t revolve around me anymore and thanked my lucky stars that I married a wonderful lady who I have since addressed as “Mama.”

Found this write-up from the early outdoor writing days to share 13 year later:

“Julie and I welcomed Helena (second “e” pronounced as a long “a”) Grace Jackson to the world at 6:22 pm on July 1st.  She weighed in at 7-4 and was 20 inches long.  Here’s some statistics from the family record book for comparison:

Largemouth Bass Record        8-4   (only bass larger than our kid)
Channel Catfish Record          13-8  (three catfish larger than including 7-14 and 7-12)
Carp Record                          19-4  (Helena would be 24th on the list)
Muskellunge Record               7-14  (two muskies tied at this weight are larger)
In addition, all of these top fish would be longer than our little girl.”

Note: that muskie record stated above is bigger now…and so is that little girl.

Love you kiddo.  Talk to you later.  Dad

I considered some theme music for this posting but wasn’t sure how to do it or if there were any sort of copyright hang-ups.  So instead it’s up to your imagination for the background music featuring Alice Cooper’s classic #7 hit “School’s Out” which debuted on the Billboard Hot 100 chart forty five years ago this week.  With a catalog that contains today’s anthemic theme song, the anti-drug composition “Hey Stoopid”, uncharacteristic ballads such as “You and Me” and “How You Gonna See Me Now” and rock standards like “Be My Lover” and my personal favorite, “No More Mr. Nice Guy” you just can’t go wrong with a dose of Detroit rocker Vincent Furnier (no he was not born Alice Cooper).  Diverse, not overly serious and a stage persona second to none make Cooper a legend.

Anyway, school ended Tuesday afternoon for the kids (Julie got a couple day head start), so in my book it is now officially summer regardless of the date.  I asked around to see what was on the agenda and the list included swimming, hiking, camping (Lake Storey and Little John Conservation Club), fishing (Carly wants to add a catfish to her species list) and some sand volleyball.

Personally, I’m looking forward to no more 6:15am wakeup calls for four kids in order to depart at 7:20am for the girls and 7:40am for the boys.  Most days I’ll only have to make my own breakfast and Julie won’t have to have two or three sack lunches packed.  However, there’s still plenty of duties and chaos that comes with four youngsters but hopefully a little less rushed than the last nine months of weekday mornings.

So, “Out for summer, out ‘til fall” and here’s looking forward to plenty of outdoor adventures before that old back to school routine sneaks up on us again.  To get June headed in the right direction I’ve got more than a few catch up postings headed your way including some fishing reports and a park review over the next several days.  Beyond those, who knows…Hope you’ll take a peek and talk to you later.  Troy

Mom (in blue, right of center) with a bunch of her crew

While there’s no pictures of this outdoor MVP holding a big bass or posing at the tailgate with a load of fur, there’s no doubt that Mom was highly involved and played the crucial roles behind the scenes.

Kind of like, well, being a mother.

Travel Planner – Traditional Memorial Day and Labor Day weekend camping trips for a family of six required an incredible amount of attention in terms of food, clothing and gear especially when some of the crew weren’t very big.

Cook – Equally adept with campfire, Coleman stove or kitchen, Mom always provided plenty of grub whether traditional fare or a wide variety of wild game.  Normally you’ve gotta be leery of a cook who won’t eat their own meal and while Mom elected to forego the wild game portion of the menu after prep, I guess it was just the unselfish motherly quality of making sure there was enough to go around.

Cleaner – Creek mud, grass stains, fish slime and various other interesting outdoor grime tracked into the house on kid or clothing was yet another unenviable task (by the way, Dad should probably just count as a fifth kid in some of these items).

Physician – Bites, scrapes, cuts, bruises and so on were ailments that fell under her care and were dealt with in the effective manner a good mother possesses.  Poison ivy was another nemesis for some of us kids that generally succumbed to Calamine but ran rampant a few times.  In those cases, mom was chauffeur to the clinic.

Zookeeper – Corralling four youngsters can be rather taxing no matter indoors or outdoors but our backyard also provided lodging for coon dogs and even some coons way back when.

Photographer – Thinking about it now, there’s an understandable reason why mom isn’t in that bunch of outdoor photos that used our backyard or driveway as a backdrop.  You see, once upon a time there were no timers, let alone selfies, on what were actually, and strictly, cameras so somebody had to sit it out and push the button for the subjects to bask in the glory.

Plenty more stuff, of course, but I’ll leave it with one final bit that will always convey that Mom knew how important time spent outdoors was for this kid.  One evening back in the early 80’s while I was in high school, the catfish were really biting at Lake Bracken on a school night.  Well, you can’t just walk away from a situation like that so I end up pulling in the driveway with my three years younger brother, Brent, in tow, a bit after 11:00pm.  At this point we’re finally both a little worried about how this is going to go down with Mom and Dad.  Mom is awake, of course, and pulls me aside saying, “In the future, try not to keep your brother out so late.”

Thanks, Mom and Happy Mother’s Day.

You know, the mother of my kids has remarkably similar motherly qualities…weird.  Happy Mother’s Day, Julie, and thanks for all you do in getting us outside.

Talk to you later.  Troy

“Who are you? Who? Who? Who? Who?” – Who Are You, The Who (1971)

Okay, so that “About” page is about the toughest part of the whole blog thing.  After a fair amount of research on how to introduce yourself, I decided to throw out most of the advice and went with the novel approach of being myself.  Quit overthinking, write how you write and start posting.  Expanding on that webpage formality, I can now move on to the unlimited landscape of blogging which is ultimately a perpetual introduction as each posting simply adds more details to the whole picture.

So, borrowing a trick from the old fashioned, grade school writing handbook, here we go with the first “W”.

I’ve been writing “fish stories’ since April 2002 and have had a blog going back to April 2010, most recently at http://www.heartlandoutdoors.com beginning in April 2011.  All told I’m nearing 1,000 outdoor related postings (a few more loosely related than others).  Overall, a collective endeavor that I am rather proud of, a whim that has developed into a hobby that adds to an already appealing slate of outdoor activities.

Lucky husband and dad full-time and lucky bass angler occasionally

As far as who I am as an outdoorsman I would first describe myself as a guy who thinks he is a bass fisherman but has also spent time pursuing a variety of freshwater species with a recent, welcome re-introduction to panfish courtesy of all these kids.  I possess a biology degree from Knox College in Galesburg, Illinois that I don’t use to earn a living but it does come in handy when playing nature guide with the family during camping trips or other forays into the outdoors.  Finally, I have spent more than a few years on the trapline dating back to the 1970’s although that pursuit has fallen by the wayside in recent years for a variety of reasons, lots of stories though (likely a late year project).

Enjoying the outdoors as a brother, son, nephew, dad, husband and uncle (yes, Julie and I are crazy taking all these kids camping)

Luckily for anyone stumbling upon this website, however, the “who” includes more than just the guy writing this stuff.  My wife, Julie, and our kids Helena, Carly, Jayce and Zac also get implicated in the adventures along the way.  In addition, there’s my dad, an uncle, one of my brothers, some nieces and nephews as well as a collection of fellow fishing fools who have chosen to play along with the Top 5 project introduced in yesterday’s posting.

It’s always interesting when establishing a foundation during a change of blogging scenery.  Lots of stuff to pass along to keep things moving forward so back tomorrow with another piece of the picture.  Talk to you later.  Troy