Holy $#!#, I'm Tired.

[TOGIE]

I'm kinda gonna try a new style here. This will be a hunt recap of sorts, but it's been a wild year. And so, really, i'm gonna kinda call this a year recap, as my hunts were not very substantive from a story or length of time standpoint. There hasn't been much availability for me to be away hunting and I was mostly certain I wouldn't hunt at all, yet I did. Don't worry, hunt pictures and landscape photos will be presented.

But first...

The beginning of the last 12-13 months started with closing on our brand new and first home, attending two funerals, and beginning to move into our new home all in the span of 7 days. It was a horrible month. That was December 2021. Then my wife reveals to me that she is pregnant about two-thirds of the way through January. Due date: Oct 1st. Oops. Bye bye hunting season 2022.

So, obviously we're getting set up here for a very exhausting year and it really didn't start out well. December 2021 was a very emotionally straining month. However, after reading about the hardships and family struggles of some of our members here on Hunt Talk, it's wrong of me to complain. Overall, what a blessing of a year it's been. A year full of so many good things. A new home, a healthy pregnancy, a healthy (yet slightly scary birth), and hunts that ultimately panned out, even after having to switch things around several times.

But, it's still as true as it was when I loudly proclaimed in my thread about my baby being born and my thoughts on the first 3 weeks of being a new dad asl well as a summary of the last 12 months: "Holy Shit, I'm Tired."

Really, we were planning on getting pregnant, just not at the end of December 2021/Beginning of January 2022. The idea was to get pregnant in March or April and have the baby come after hunting season. At least a half dozen of our friends had already had kids or got pregnant in the preceding 12 months and it seemed they all agreed that getting pregnant wasn't as easy as it seems, even when everyone is perfectly healthy and fertile. So, we played it a little fast and loose there after getting all nested in our new home. Again, oops. But not an oopsie.

At least we learned that before Wyo NR Elk apps were due. Quickly yanked the plans to Draw Wyo General Elk and I did some quick research and threw in for a cow tag that ran from October through January essentially. Logic there being with such a long and late season, I'll manage to find a weekend to go. I drew that tag.

I picked up an archery mule deer tag in CO and bought a bow in hopes of getting a quick September hunt in before the baby comes and would look to grab some later season bull and cow tags in CO in hopes of maybe getting out for a weekend in November.

Lot's had to happen before hunting season. Lots of baby prep and lots of house prep. Our backyard was a dirt pit. Being a new house the backyard came "unfinished." I got some quotes for sprinklers, grass, and rocks. None were under $20k and some were as much as $30k. I was in shock. For grass, sprinklers, edging and rocks? #*^@#* that. The yard is small too.

Guess I was gonna break Randy's rule... we'll call it the DIY Days of Summer. I didn't realize how much hell I was signing up for.

I'll end post #1 with one of the very fist pictures taken in our new house. Our pup, watching me go down into the crawlspace, concerned for my safety in this abyss as I disappear from her view:

 

[TOGIE]

We were working on settling in to the new house. Boy does that take time.

The dog was settling in too. This is her every day, sitting behind me on my office chair while I work. My wife thinks I shouldn't allow these things. I love it.

 

[TOGIE]

First trimester was pretty awful for my wife.

She was basically nauseous 24/7 for three months straight, luckily never actually "got sick" though. She had pretty intense chronic abdominal pains in the first few months, and was beyond exhausted. Typical 1st trimester stuff really. But it can really vary from woman to woman. She was miserable.

Summer rolls around and it's time to start on the yard.

I was hell bound and determined to not take a single day off to do this yard. I hoard PTO like Lucky the Leprechaun hoards his Marshmallows.

It took me three months from start to finish. It was hell. It was hot. I didn't get to use very many weekends to work on it. We had several family trips and several more family obligations that took up many of our summer weekends and we were determined to at least use one weekend for ourselves to do something outside should my wife feel up to it. All said and done, i'd say 80% of this work was done after work in the evenings.

One family trip had me taking off a Friday, Monday, Tuesday over the weekend. I figured hell with it, I'll take that remaining Wednesday through Friday off to knock out some yard stuff.

..... we flew home from that trip with COVID. It knocked me on my ass. But i kept working on the yard. I got maybe 30% done in those days off and the weekend than i hoped. I really stopped feeling horrible pretty quick after COVID. It was only like 2 days of being on the couch and feeling awful. But after that, I was perpetually exhausted and getting out of breath was, well, easy.

The yard came together. Dozens of trips to the landscape yard, many dozens to home depot and lowes. And many more dozens of trips to the gas station for nicotine in some sort of oral form.

Probably ultimately spent somewhere around $4500 on this yard (excluding nicotine costs).

 

[TOGIE]

I said we were determined to do at least one thing outside this summer as a couple and we managed to.

It was really depressing seeing our entire summer basically evaporate before our eyes doing this yard. Randy's advice is sage advice for a reason. If you want to spend time outside, doing fun things with your family, and hunting, ditch the tool box. This shit will consume your life.

We managed to hike in to some lakes in wyoming with the fly rod and the spin rod. My 6-month pregnant wife kicked ass. Also, she caught the only fish.

 

[Farmerj]

Nice recap…

 

[Derek44]

Definitely watching this one. Great recap so far. Thanks for sharing. Sounds like a FULL year.

 

[TOGIE]

There were some twists that developed in the hunting plans as the summer progressed. One of my closest friends got his bachelor party plans put together. Said plans were going to be a hunting bachelor party. Knowing that I was really only going to get to do one hunt post baby in Colorado, I was going to have to shift plans. Basically, I was really going to be allotted two hunts by my wife, 1 hunt to go out in Colorado and at least 1 attempt on my Wyoming Cow tag.

My plan turned to putting all my eggs in one basket for the bachelor party. I returned my archery mule deer tag and managed to pick up one of the three returned buck tags on leftover day for the bachelor party unit. This was good because at this point I had not so much as even picked up this bow I bought. It remains untuned and unshot in the crawlspace as I type.

So, I picked up a leftover cow tag and an otc bull tag as well. Somewhere along the lines i grabbed a doe tag for the bachelor party unit too, i don't remember where along the lines I did that, but I managed to grab it.

So, I was going to be heading to the bachelor party, my one primary hunting trip with 4 tags for 3rd season in the same unit.

Buck, doe, bull, cow. "I'm for sure filling one of these tags. For sure." I kept telling myself.

But, a bachelor party... a lot of dudes, of varying degrees of seriousness about hunting, varying styles. The bachelor party is also about more than hunting (and really only maybe 1/3 of the attendees will be hunting) it's about drinking, and poker, and grilling, and hot tubbing. Two very tiring, sleep depriving activities combined in one.

But I had all the tags I need. The focus returned to helping my wife through this pregnancy and prepping for baby's arrival. Not a small task, honestly. So. Much. Chit. To. Do.

All. The. Time.

 

[TOGIE]

There was a super snooty "super Boulder county" liquor store/market that was on the way to/from our OB appointments. We'd often stop in on the way home and peruse the excellent selections of Bourbon and Whisk(e)y.

one of those visits resulted in the shelves having something i was told previously by other liquor stores there was no more of anywhere. had to buy it. my fave.

 

[TOGIE]

Yard done.

Nursery... meh, like 1/4 done, baby won't be sleeping in there for like 6 months anyway.

Various other projects done.

Due to something called IUGR, google it if you care to, my wife was going to be induced 1 week early. You kinda don't have a choice with IUGR towards the end, the OBs want it out early.

Sweet, now we know exactly when the thing is coming out. We start getting everything in order and start planning several date nights out to some favorite restaurants for our last week.

Its september 17th, my wife wants to go do a 4ish mile hike in boulder with about 1300 feet of elevation gain. In my head i'm like this is a bad idea, but whatever let's do it.

Pretty exerting hike, especially for a 9+ month pregnant woman.

Well hot damn she went in to labor on Sept 19th at 4 am. I'm convinced had it not been for that hike, our baby would've been one week early, not two.

What a bummer. We had two dinner reservations that week.

 

[Farmerj]

Reading all I can think….

Oh he’s got an interesting 20+ years coming. First time driving, first time driving alone. First date. High school, first year of college…


Bringing back a lot of memories from our own kids.

 

[thomas89]

Yard done.

Nursery... meh, like 1/4 done, baby won't be sleeping in there for like 6 months anyway.

Never understood the obsession with the nursery being done when the baby hits the ground. Literally could be an empty room with maybe a card table and a camp chair and it’d function just fine. Also save money.

Follow me for more interior design tips.

 

[TOGIE]

Never understood the obsession with the nursery being done when the baby hits the ground. Literally could be an empty room with maybe a card table and a camp chair and it’d function just fine. Also save money.

Follow me for more interior design tips.

fact.

further, i dont understand why a nursery needs to be more than a changing table and a crib from the thrift store.

but, i'm also not a chick, so.

 

[TOGIE]

Reading all I can think….

Oh he’s got an interesting 20+ years coming. First time driving, first time driving alone. First date. High school, first year of college…


Bringing back a lot of memories from our own kids.

this is a really weird time in life for me, thinking about that, the next 20 years of my baby's life.

i look at my parents, and they probably look at me and think, "holy crap, it feels like yesterday when we were in their shoes, pregnant, 3 month old, etc."

which makes me think, holy crap, i'm gonna blink and all of the sudden be sitting in a waiting room waiting for my grandson/daughter to be born.

it's just, life, ya know? freaks you out sometimes.

 

[TOGIE]

So, the baby was born on Sept 19th. Baby boy.

Went 0 to 60 real fast. OB called a C-Section after about 6 hours due to fetal distress.

Watched the whole damn thing, that was wild.

Healthy, happy baby.

Again, you can read about my whining here but holy crap, there is just no preparing for actually having that baby once it's here. No one anywhere can actually help anyone understand what it's actually like, i'm convinced. The C-Section changed the game dramatically. I was the only person available to do much of anything, whether it was take care of the baby, feed the baby, take care of my wife, feed my wife, take care of the dog, feed the dog, whatever had to be done, i was the only one available to do it for 14-16 days. This was something that we never thought about, or learned, about C-Sections prior to having the baby, probably because we weren't planning to have one.

It really was just brutal. I never could have comprehended such levels of sleep deprivation. I'm calling it the rule of three: For 3 weeks straight i never got more than 3 hours of sleep in a 24 hour period, and those three hours were typically broken up into thirds. I lost nearly 9 lbs during the first month of my childs life. And i'm not exactly the type of guy who has 9 lbs to lose.

Anyway, hit up the other thread for more on that. We're trying to funnel this towards hunting eventually.

 

[duckhunt]

this is a really weird time in life for me, thinking about that, the next 20 years of my baby's life.

i look at my parents, and they probably look at me and think, "holy crap, it feels like yesterday when we were in their shoes, pregnant, 3 month old, etc."

which makes me think, holy crap, i'm gonna blink and all of the sudden be sitting in a waiting room waiting for my grandson/daughter to be born.

it's just, life, ya know? freaks you out sometimes.

This is so true. I was thinking about some old times with my kids just the other day. When they are growing up you really don't think about it and then all of the sudden they are grown up and gone off on their own. Sometimes I wish I could go back and do it all over again.

 

[marksjeep]

Just remember, one is one...but two is ten.

Back to hunting, been enjoying your write ups. Looking forward to the rest of this one.

 

[Brad W]

Congrats Togie. The circumstances of my first were very similar to yours in every respect, but my second was completely different and much easier. It’s a rollercoaster for sure but every kid is unique. It should start to get easier in the next month or two. Don’t make the mistake of rushing the milestones. Crawling seems like it will be awesome until you have to watch them like a hawk so they don’t kill themselves. Same for walking. 2-3 yo was by far the hardest age for me. They are insane at that age but you get through it and the. They start getting more independent and you can take them fishing and then hunting. Mine are 10 and 6 now and we are getting ready for the oldests’ first MT deer hunt. Exciting times. Kid lives to hunt and fish and it is fun to have a little partner. Best wishes

 

[Deleted member 40728]

Glad to hear you, wife, and baby all made it through everything healthy. It’s definitely a nerve wrecking time in life.
By the time your a year or 2 into it you will be use to never sleeping again in life.
Don’t sweat the losing of weight!!! Those 9 pounds you lost from nerves will come back as 20 pounds gained once you start finishing the little guys chicken nuggets, French fries, and everything else. Nothing can go to waste lol.

I’m enjoying the write up. Looking forward to more.

 

[duckhunt]

Glad to hear you, wife, and baby all made it through everything healthy. It’s definitely a nerve wrecking time in life.
By the time your a year or 2 into it you will be use to never sleeping again in life.
Don’t sweat the losing of weight!!! Those 9 pounds you lost from nerves will come back as 20 pounds gained once you start finishing the little guys chicken nuggets, French fries, and everything else. Nothing can go to waste lol.

I’m enjoying the write up. Looking forward to more.

I forgot about the food and drinks. They will want a pop or juice and take one drink and never touch it again. Same for snacks, throw a fit because they want a snack and one bite then in the garbage it goes. Then there's the teenage boy years where you buy 300 dollars of groceries and it's all gone in about 3 days. Then they ask when are you going back to the grocery store.

 

[duckhunt]

Lol I forgot about the clothes and shoes. Buy new clothes and shoes and within 30 to 60 days they don't fit anymore.