this hunt of harry missing school reminds me of tom sawyer and huckleberry finn for some reason....great way for father and son and friends to spend a day together...charlie

Great job guys!

Nice!!! Congrats on a great day : )

It is surely important a youngster to coached, taught, mentored, and supervised by qualified authority figures. There are schools, sports teams, and vocations for that.

But it is entirely different for a youngster to experience being included in an endeavor with his father and his friends. He garners many of the same benefits, not as someone’s charge or as a subordinate, but as a member of the group, crew, or team.

He will look back on it with a sense of pride and fulfillment for the rest of his life.

What a wonderful day! And should count as an excused absence in my opinion! Looks like everyone had a lot of fun...

When I was 9 or 10 my dad took me with him to a exclusive quail hunting club in central California. There was a member who was about 60 at the time and was a lover of quality SxS shotguns that was hunting with us. For the first part of the day I walked behind my dad and retrieved birds for him. At lunch, this man came up to me and my dad with a Ithaca Flues 16 in field grade and told my dad this young man needs a shotgun if he is going to hunt quail with us and handed me the gun and said you are going to hunt with us this afternoon. I was so excited and I got to hunt as an equal that afternoon. About an hour later we came into a covey, they rose and I swung and knocked one down. My mentor told my dad “if he keeps this up he’ll be the best wing shooter to ever come down the pike” I had never been prouder of anything in my life.
50 years later and I still remember the day like it was yesterday. That is far more important than another day in school.

It doesn't get any better than that. :)

Back in the day here in NH, the opening day of duck season started at 12 noon. So at 10 am my mom would come and get me out of school so me and my brother could go duck hunting with my dad. That was 48 years ago. And i remember that every opening day. I have some of my dads ashes in a wooden black duck decoy i take out in our late season opener. He loved to hunt the black duck. And by the way great hunt with your son and friends.
Scott

Well done Mills for being an inspiration to others... brings back a lot of memories when my kids were young

Thanks for all of the kind comments!