Carabou's sister Linda invited the family down to their ranch outside D'Hanis to shoot skeet. Not ever having done such a thing, I was understandably excited. You might have read about our adventure to Cabela's to get the shells and some skeet.

Clee and Topher joined us for the early morning drive down to the ranch and a great day of shooting, "fishing", family and good food.

What fun! Leroy gave each of us basic instruction in weapon safety and then we each took our turn trying to figure out how to aim at and hit the tiny, quick moving targets. The day was split into two rounds of 10 shots for each of us; one in the morning and one in the afternoon. Several of us also took turns shooting at stationary targets with pellet guns. (MUCH easier to hit...)

In the morning, I didn't manage to hit any of my skeet, and neither did any of the rest of the four of us. Carabou's family on the other hand, gave us plenty of examples of how it is supposed to be done.

In the afternoon, though, things changed for the better and I actually managed to hit 6 out of 10 of the targets and Cara got 5. Topher got one and Clee sat out the second round because she was bruising her shoulder. She and Topher are getting married in a couple of weeks and bruised shoulder with strapless dress is apparently not "in" these days..

We also took a break and went out to Linda and Leroy's tank where Carabou and her brother Jim went "fishing". I say "fishing" because the tank is relatively dry and all of the fish have been pretty well forced into a small area at the bottom. They had fun and Jim was catching smaller stuff. Carabou almost caught "the big one", but it broke her line.

Meanwhile , Topher and I had fun on the ATV, terrorizing the cows and going up and around the hills. Cassie (Amy and Gary's 8 year old daughter) also joined us and kept wanting to drive or to tell us where to go.

We were exhausted by the end of the day, but we had a blast!

For photos of the festivities, you can take a look at Clee's Flickr set.