Last deer season opening weekend at Ironquill a special time

Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Another opening weekend of the deer season. This was a very memorable and even sad weekend. After 47 years, it was the very last time we would all be spending the deer season together at Ironquill.

Bob's brother John, who lives on Hilton Head, S.C., was the first to arrive on Thursday. He brought us a peck of Pink Lady apples (yummy).

On Friday evening, son Rob and grandsons David, Daniel, Ben and Bobkat arrived. The beds, sleeping bags and pillows were ready for the first arrivals. So far, all together, there were five hunters.

Got everything ready that I could -- the table was set, 30 cup coffee maker ready to plug in and, finally, time to hit the sack. The hunters packed their lunches that night.

Bob was the first one up (at 4:30 a.m.). After a short time, he hollered up the stairs

"Hey you buck hunters, it's time to rise and shine. Grandma (that's me) will have breakfast ready in the shake of a lamb's tail."

I made it as simple as possible -- scrambled eggs, sausage, English muffins, toast, juice and coffee.

We were just finishing eating when daughter Susie, husband Mike, grandson Scott and great-grandson Michael arrived. They had stayed in their cottage, about a 40-minute drive from here.

There were a total of seven hunters ready to head for the woods. Always on the first morning, the hunters are bright eyed and bushy tailed, but as the week progresses they seem to lose a wee bit of their enthusiasm.

In all the total years that Bob has been deer hunting, this was the first time that he didn't go back into the woods. He stayed at the house and kept up on everything with his walkie talkie. That afternoon grandson Kurt and great grandson Parker arrived.

It was a blustery day and rained part of the day. But that didn't stop the hunters from having a great day. They did see several deer, even a couple of bucks, but those wily deer outsmarted them and not a hunter got a deer on opening day.

In the afternoon, grand-daughter-in-law Shawna arrived. She brought the main course for our supper that night -- beef au jus, which everyone loves, and some blueberry and chocolate muffins.

I had made potato salad, homemade applesauce and pumpkin pies. Susie made some rice crispy bars, a Jell-O salad, and attempted to make some brownies, but somehow they turned into a brownie, fudgy sauce, and we used them as a topping on ice cream. Really not too bad.

To be continued.