# 464 - Six Year Old - Target Shooting

Last week, my niece stayed in the country with us. It was her first trip to our acreage so she could personally witness our preparation to start building some kind of cabin.

Shaye has been a huge part of our lives and us in her life. However, she has been raised mostly in Houston, with a few camping trips, so this has been a different way of life for her to experience.

Shaye writing in her notepad as she sits
under the tall oaks on our acreage.

I can't even begin to tell all the fun we've had together, but I will try to share the country through the eyes of a six year old.

Shaye's cowboy boots!
Yes, she always has a pair...she IS a Texas gal,
even though she lives in the city!

I gave her the first lessons she's ever had with shooting, of course with the approval of her parents. Her mom and dad know that we are strict gun safety advocates and our family has beyond ordinary gun knowledge. Our oldest, Heather, never really cared to cozy up to a six-shooter, but you can be sure that she understands more about point and shoot than the regular person. However, our youngest enjoyed taking guns apart and putting them back together with her eyes closed...no joke.

So, with my niece, I began with a Daisy BB gun. That will be sufficient for a long while. At first I was concerned she would have trouble pulling the stiff trigger. Uh, no, that girl had no problem.

Miss Six-Year-Old-Sassy

And these are the areas where adults can seriously under-estimate the power of a child's strength and ability with firearms.

Good thing I didn't rush anything. We first went through a long series of gun safety matters, which I drilled her about and she proved she was paying attention. This is an important area of deciding whether or not to teach any child how to use a firearm of any kind...if a child has trouble or resistance to learning safety measures necessary for handling ANY kind of gun, then they certainly aren't ready to learn how to shoot. However, this kiddo listened; she learned; and she repeated.

Therefore, I was SHOCKED when her third time to shoot the gun found her hitting a can with precision. Thankfully, I was videoing her first attempts to shoot and caught it on video. You can see the number of cans and then see her shoot --- hearing the can being hit and seeing it fall off the log as I yank the camera back to the direction of the cans in disbelief!

http://youtu.be/N5TqBXT5Paw

Then, we go over a few safety points, again. I let her tell ME about some of them as I video, and dang it, I ran out of space on the IPad. However, she does pay attention.

http://youtu.be/72ik6iwJhxo

I sent the video to her parents and told them that she might have found her calling. As she gets older, she might have found a great way to earn future college scholarship monies via the school shooting team. Yes, it is a sport.

For now, I feel like such a proud aunt. In her pink Barbie bathing suit, standing on a stool atop the RV deck, my niece is shooting a gun for the first time and is a natural. Yes, it must run in the family. And you can see her self-confidence is quite fine as she is initially more concerned with the fly on the camera than on her sharp shooting skills.

Now, I just have to show her some Annie Oakley documentaries so she can gear up to provide entertainment at our next family reunion!

Me and Shaye...Loving our time together.