Procrastination

.......................... I'll get to it eventually.

.......................... Never put off today what you can put off till tomorrow.

Summer happenings

Hello my friends,

Figured I would drop a line to you guys out there. So far it has been a good summer, aside from the fishing. I have managed to put some hours in on the home lake but have yielded just one fish, see below (I don't count the perch and roach off cane poles with the kids).

I really need to have my kids hold the fish, they would look much bigger.

I caught this guy while trolling (my preferred method these days). Just no joy as of late, not sure if it is the weather or me. I will have to figure it out before the summer ends. But as they say, "A bad day fishing.......you know the rest". I also have been informed that there are some good sized Zander in the lake. For my north American brethren, that is pretty much a Walleye, very close cousins. I trolled a few late nights for them, but it has been a very long time since I fished for them. That will be a work in progress. I have some lures in the works, slowly coming along as usual. They last batch I made up, there are 3 good ones and the rest do not swim like I want them to. So back to the drawing board. I still enjoy making them so until that little pleasure ends, I am sure I will have lots of crap lures that don't work.

But the kids still love to fish and I hope they always will.

Now to my other favorite hobby, BEER. I have 2 more batches bottled and aging. That is going very well. I even made some crates to keep them in. I saved a bottle for a mate from the first batch. After aging for 2 months, I was very impressed with it. It was a fine tasting beer. I have to get another batch going soon but the weather has to help me out with that. I need to keep the brew at specific temperatures for fermenting and aging. Tough to do in the summer but it's Finland summer should only last a few more......hours at best. I also have some apple wine ready for bottleing. Not sure how that will go, more of an experiment. Might make me go blind.

I am having trouble with the format of this blog so it looks a bit like shit. Sorry folks, I don't have the patients to go back and edit the whole thing.  Hopefully to the right you are seeing the crates I made. Pretty easy construction and a little spray stencil that I cut out.






In other news around my hood. My timing belt is about to fail, so that means €2,000!!!! So that fucking blows. Looks like it's public transport and leg power for a bit.
Football season cranks back up in a couple of weeks. We have a 3 day tourney coming up next week that is usually a good time so looking forward to that. As far as league action goes, Arabia HC is currently 1 point of first place. We need to win the rest and get ourselves in the championship playoffs. Last time we finished 2nd in the table we went on to win the whole thing (around 48 teams in the league in 3 tables top 2 from each play off for the championship). On my division 6 team Ruisku 09 we are doing okay as well. Currently in 4th place. I would like us to compete for promotion but we need to score some goals. I am doing what I can, 4 clean sheets in 8 matches.



One more little shout out, we went just got back from Sweden on a day cruise. It was a good time and the kids enjoyed themselves. We also brought our niece along. We went the the Vasa Museum and the Royal Palace. The palace was okay but seeing the Vasa was excellent. I could spend days there looking at her.








Other than that, not much happening. I am going to try and put a post a month up from now on. I haven't been doing much on here and I enjoy sharing so stay tuned.







Peace and Chicken Grease

Some updates

Important news: The beer is ready!!! Very tasty. Plus I have some lures ready to go.

The beer came out nice. For the next batch I want something a little more bitter. But if any of you had any thought about home brewing and thought it might be expensive or difficult, it is not. Very simple these days. My only issue is not having enough bottles to continuously brew. You have to get a system together so you don't run out of beer before the next batch is ready. Timing is everything. I found the only home brew store, maybe in Finland, so that sets me up for a hobby that I will stick with for a very long time.
Here is my first brew.

In lure news: I finished up a few. Just letting the epoxy dry and then hopefully out next week to test them out. I know the paint jobs are horrible. My eldest daughter did paint one of them, can you guess which one?
These are more "proof of concept" models. Wait, wait, wait, what am I saying, all my lures are proof of concept. The reason for that is ZERO consistency. I take loads of pictures and loads of measurements and still can't get two lures to come out the same. I use the same templates but alas, I suck at replication.  The glider looking one is a new design along with the red and white one (should dive well), not pretty but we will see how they swims. (for a reference, the red and white lure is 19cm)

In less important news, I passed all my coarse work for this term.



Peace and chicken grease.

Fishing is close

Hi there fellow fishing fanatics.

I will give ya'll a quick update of my going ons. I got out for a couple of hours last week, but no fish. It was nice just to be on open water. Seemed like the ice would never go away. The plan is to get some fishing in next weekend. I still have lures in the works but have not picked them up in months. Been a bit busy. School for this term is coming to a close so plenty of studying for exams in my imediate future. Football season has started, and for those who don't know I play for 2 clubs and fill in for another 3 when schedules and my aching knee permits. Not to mention just hanging with the fam.

In the tradition of DIY, I started a new project. Making my own nectar of gods,BEER!!! So I will post some updates as it progresses. In the mean time good luck keeping tight lines.

Peace and chicken grease. 

and then there was silence...

To my two followers, thanks for following and sorry I haven't been writing anything.

It's the heart of winter here in the frozen tundra a.k.a. Finland. This really puts a damper on lure making as my wife is not a fan of me using sanders and grinders inside or paints for that matter. And it is a bit hard working with your hands outside when it's -30 (F or C, that is f'n cold). I have a few lures (one pictured below) that I have been working with ever so slowly. At the pace I am keeping it should be ready by October.

I was impatiently waiting for ice to get some ice fishing in. It came a bit later this year than last but due to my laziness and family and school (in that order) I haven't made it out. I was excited to ice fish but for some reason lost interest quickly. Depending on how long the ice hangs out I may make it at least once. Maybe even twice.
I hope to build a few lures before the open water season gets going. Stay tuned for that. Hope everyone has been more productive in the lure building and fishing than me.

Peace and chicken grease

Finished a few

Here are a few lures that I have just recently finished. I used a new product to me, EnviroTex to coat the lures. It was actually pretty easy to work with. The hardest part was waiting the 2 days from them to dry. I am pretty happy with the way they came out. I am no artist and my paint work has much to be desired but they should fool some fish. The epoxy really gives them a shine and it should protect them against toothy critters. Way better than the spray on varnish I was using.

With the way this weather is going, I may get to use a few of them before the ice shows up.

Sorry about the quality of the pics, my camera sucks

Peace and chicken grease

Lures for production

Haven't mentioned lures lately. Been busy with family and school. This winter however I plan on getting back into making some. I have two models that have been successful this season (you can see some teeth marks in them), so I will be recreating these in different colors and with some different depth ranges. I will also start work on some Gilder type baits. I will post pics as I get some finished.

PS: the ruler is 20cm.