If you are going to be winter fishing...anytime before trout season opens, then weighted black woolybuggers and egg flies are the ticket. Fish them upstream and use woolybuggers with a good set of lead eyes in them. Trail the egg fly about 20 inches off the woolybugger tying your tippet directly to the bend of the wooly's hook. Use ten pound flourocarbon for your entire tippet section (the section below the tapered section you likely bought at your local flyshop). The tippet section should be about 3-4 feet and the whole leader about 10-12 feet in most winter fishing conditions. This is just nymphing for huge trout, so look at it that way. You can also use big weighted nymphs instead of the wooly to mix it up. You can also mix it up by using dark olive or even pink for the woolybugger color. Winter fish love salmon eggs and the big pink wooly might look like a glob of roe. Or......
If you fish on the Umpqua, you can swing flies in the tailouts all winter long and these fish will come up. There are places where weight on a fly is NOT LEGAL, so read the regs carefully before tying on a weighted fly.
good luck. and keep trying. Sometimes it takes a while before you learn where the fish are. But steelhead are aggressive feeders. The cold water of winter makes them less aggressive, but they still have to eat!