Musings from the Bottom of Chestnut Hill

Where I've Been

2010-07-21T07:57:00.003-04:00

Hello? Hello? There's an echo in here. I think I see one little face way in the back. Hi there!

I'm still here, sort of, but in a much different place than I was when I started this blog.

The story goes like this.......

Jan 2009 I went back to work after being home with children, and Fibromyalgia and Chronic Fatigue for a few years. With the help of a great MD (Dr. Robban Sica in Orange, CT, can't recommend her highly enough) I was able to claw my way back up from the depths.

I had been working for the local firehouse a couple of days a week. But in September of 2008, my husband was laid off from his job in construction. My 10 hour per week job wasn't going to cut it anymore. So I began expanding my horizons to further than 5 miles from home (close to the kids in the school system in case of emergency). The very next day I made that decision, I received a phone call from my massage therapist. Tara works in concert with my chiropractor, Dr. Lou, and I've been seeing them (incidently because of the CFS/Fibro) for the past 10 years. Tara told me that the current office staff was experiencing crisis, including an unexpected death of a very close family member, and the other a move to Bermuda. They needed help, and fast! Was I looking for work?

Hell yah!!! I had an interview the next day (a Friday), which wasn't really an interview but more of a "We need you, will you please work for us?" and started on Monday.

To make a very long story short-ish, what started out as a part-time 20 hour per week receptionist type position turned into a full-time plus position where I am now managing the office. There have been a LOT of changes, as there were a lot of things that were not taken care of due to lack of knowledge, motivation, and time. I'm not the type of person that can do an incomplete or shoddy job even if that is all that is expected. So aside from doing things the right way, I also educated them as to how an office is supposed to be run.

In the meantime, back in April of 2009 I had a wreck on Lakota. It was a pretty good wreck, and its been almost a year before my back is beginning to feel somewhat normal again, but the area I fell on still tends to give me fits from time to time. The footing in my roundpen has washed away over the last year or so, and we have pretty much hit a plateau in our work together with just a small roundpen to work in. So for a multitude of reason, I haven't spent much time working with the girls. I did take Lakota out and just walked around the roundpen a few times, and she was perfectly fine. But with the lack of footing, time constraints, and just being plain old tired after working 6 days a week, I haven't done a whole heck of a lot with her other than loving on her and feeding/cleaning up.

Lakota did get a bath last weekend, and she actually let me spray her with the hose this year! Its taken a number of years to get her over her fear of the sprayer and water, and I've had to take it very slow, starting with just a sponge bath and not being upset about water pouring off her, to pressing hte nozzle of the hose right against her skin so it wouldn't make the spraying sound, to now she can tolerate a little bit of spraying against her skin, but only for a few seconds at a time. She's such a good girl, and she tries so hard, and she amazingly seems to get better when I give her long breaks between teaching her things, she apparently likes a LOT of lick and chew time. At this rate she will be ready for the dressage ring if I stay off her for a few more years, LOL! Just kidding!

So in addition to managing the chiropractic office, I have received Reiki Level I training in November of 2009 and plan to continue through Level III over the next year or so, and this year I am learning Bowenwork. This is something I have wanted to learn for many years, and I'm finally at a place in my life where I can learn and offer this amazing healing modality to others. I have completed through Module 3, and have 3 more modules to go, then testing sometime during the beginning of 2011 for my certification. Then there is a lot of great continuing education after that. I'm very excited, and seeing positive results in our patients at the office, and friends and family as well. I'm also in the process of revamping the website, we're developing a new logo, and adding more services for our patients.

My daughter continues working with Jen. She has spent a lot of time just tacking and untacking her to get her over her fear of gear. She progressed to leading her away from the barn and the other horses until she was calm about that. Now she is beginning to take her out of the paddock and hand graze her around the barn, with short little walks away from the barn then back again. Jen is responding well, and has developed a relationship with my daughter so she trusts her more and more every day.

So, while my horse time has not been very exciting, which was the purpose of this blog, my life has been anything but uninteresting!

So in case you thought I fell off the face of the earth, I haven't. We're still here doing well, the horses are all still doing well but enjoying a bit of a respite from work.

A Suburban Housewife

2009-10-20T21:15:00.002-04:00

This is making the rounds on Facebook -- omg its pee your pants hysterical! Warning, foul language and hardcore drug inferences -- but hysterical!

Pics for no reason

2009-10-11T20:02:00.003-04:00

Other than the fact that I haven't posted anything in a long time :-)

"Mom! You never visit us anymore! Come give me a scritch, right there......"

"Brick Shithouse? I've never heard that term before. I'm sure it must mean that I'm beautiful."

"Look at my beautiful ear curls. The dried mud really helps add emphasis."

"I love you, mum, let me touch you all over and fog up your glasses with my hot breath...."

"That damn little one always has to steal my glam shots....."

"It's all about mmmeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

"Put that @#$% thing away and bring the food already before I stuff my hoof where the sun don't shine ...... "

I did it!

2009-09-05T21:20:00.000-04:00

Some of you may remember the wreck that I had with Lakota back in April. Well, between pain, exacerbations, and my 11 hour work days, I had't ridden since that fateful day. Until a couple of weeks ago.

Mandy, may daughter, rode her first, she's been jonesin' to ride, so I promised her she could ride Lakota. It rarely goes well. Lakota is so sensitive, and Mandy has only ridden lesson horses. So there is frustration between the two of them. Mandy is asking something, and Lakota is saying "huh? I have no clue what you are trying to say, so I'll just stand here and do nothing". She doesn't fill in any blanks at all. Its actually kind of fun to put Mandy on her when she gets all cocky and thinks she can tell me how to ride ;-) So Mandy learned that she has to soften and relax her leg, not use her heels to ask for forward, keep her wrists straight and keep that straight line from "bit" to elbow (i.e., no spagetti arms), to look where she wants to go, to be clear and deliberate in her asks, and to keep her seat bones neutral or they will just go backwards around the roundpen. And to keep her focus or Lakota starts looking around for monsters.

I just wanted to make sure it really was Mandy and not Lakota, so I hopped on (no stirrups, I had my sneakers on) grabbed an old beat up helmet, and had a blast! Lakota was sooo good. There were some distractions, and she did just fine with "coming back" just by touching the reins. She moved of nice and softely, whoaed beautifully when I just stop riding. Then I did some serpentines, and OMG her bend was just GORGEOUS! I have never, ever gotten such a beautiful arc in her body from nose to tail before. It was one of "those moments" that you go WOW, this is IT! It was a touch sticker to the left than right, but still nice and a lot of try. So we repeated that about 3 or 4 times then I hopped off. I was just flabbergasted with how wonderful she was after 4 months and our last ride ending in such disaster. This girl can be an awesome horse given the right rider and enough time.

Busy, busy!

2009-06-27T21:45:00.002-04:00

Wow, I can't believe its been over a month since I've posted. Well, there's been nothing to tell, really. Its been RAINING for an ENTIRE MONTH. Honestly, no exaggeration, it has rained since the middle of May, every single day. Either pouring down rain totally more than 3 inches, or all day drizzle, or spotty rain, or vehement thunderstorms that wash out driveways, basements, and roundpen footing.

I have done nothing with the horses in a month other than feed them and trim their feet. They're turning feral again. I've been working my backside off at work and trying to keep this house in some semblance of less-than-disgusting. I've been working 50 hour weeks (not bad for a part-time job), although I do LOVE it. The reason for the double-hours is because I've been working on/building a website for us. It is now FINALLY finished! I'm proud of it, we have worked hard on it, so that it reflects exactly what we are about, gives the information that we want to put out there, while still being concise and eye-catching. www.bethanychiropractic.com.

No other news, really. I would like to send Lakota out for some professional training, but I lack the funding. All cash is going toward hay now. Still no job for hubby, though I am extremely hopeful he finds something soon. So we just keep on, keepin' on. All plans are on hold, and wish lists are growing longer and longer. But you have nothing if you don't have dreams, right?

Stand By Me -- amazing version!

2009-05-19T19:22:00.001-04:00

Amanda's first show!

2009-05-17T18:43:00.002-04:00

My daughter attended her first horse show today! She did great, First Place in Equitation, Second Place in Pleasure, and Fourth in ground poles.

You have GOT to watch this -- amazing!

2009-05-06T07:49:00.001-04:00

Don't Stop Dancing by Creed

2009-05-02T15:34:00.001-04:00

Don't Stop Dancing by Creed

More Creed music on iLike

2009-04-27T17:22:00.002-04:00

A great message from one of my favorite bands...

weather

2009-04-26T07:57:00.003-04:00

I just checked www.wunderground.com, and clicked on the history for yesterday. At 15:42 we reached 97.9 degrees. Average temps for that day is 66. Its already that now at 8 am, so I expect a repeat today. eesh.......

Still Alive ...

2009-04-25T20:23:00.002-04:00

Nothing much has been happening. I'm feeling 99% better after our little wreck last week, just some residual issues in my upper back, which I think took the brunt of the hit, and it is a structural weak point for me, anyway. I had hoped to get back on this week, but we had gobs of rain, so everything was slop. Then the slop dried up today, because it was over 85 degrees! I am sunburned from my sons baseball game, and exhausted from the heat, and more is expected for tomorrow and Monday with air quality warnings. I thought this was April, not August! The horses were all standing around inside, lethargic in their winter coats. They did manage to perk up for a minute when I let them in the grass area, but even that didn't last long, and 90 minutes later when I headed back out for grain/dinner, they were all up top waiting for me. Even grass wasn't enough to keep them in the late day sun. So its not looking good for this weekend, perhaps I can get back on Tuesday (my short day at work). I know the longer it is that I don't get back on, the harder it will be.

The Good, The Bad and the Ugly

2009-04-15T21:54:00.004-04:00

I rode Lakota for a short while yesterday, and we had a les than stellar day. She was a little resistant, and I wasn't sure if it was her mood, or I was being conflicting.

So when I had the chance to take her out again today, I was excited. The kids are off school this week, so I don't have to meet any school buses, and have the luxury of time after work.

First, my daughter wanted to ride Jen a little bit. That went quite well. Jen was mostly happy to be tacked up, although she is still a bit tense at the saddling/girthing process. We just go slow, and give her lots of pets and reassurance through it.

We tried moving away from the crutch of myself walking along beside them for reassurances. At first Jen was resistant and didn't want to move forward for my daughter. Then she realized that I was out of the picture, and she was pretty good, although extremely herdbound. Even though she was riding in the paddock, Jen kept wanting to head back to the barn. So after about 3 or 4 discussions between the two of them, with my daughter getting her to walk a few steps away from the barn, she ended the session on a good note, with Jen taking 4 steps away from where she wanted to turn back to the barn, and she dismounted and untacked facing away from the barn. Jen is improving with every ride, so I'm sure we'll be able to help her along with her barn sourness, although I suspect it will a lot of time and patience.

Last night I was thinking that perhaps the tiny bit of attitude Lakota had yesterday may be boredom. I always struggle with the line between boring them, and overfacing them, considering I have no experiencing training a horse. So today I decided I was going to do some cone-weaving. I brought Lakota out, and she was good as gold. We did the cones from the ground first, then I circled her w/t a few times in both directions and she was soft, willing, and quiet the entire time. I mounted up without incident, and we did about 1/2 dozen weaves through the cones. Her gait felt a little funny to me. My daughter thought she was hesitating, asking questions between steps, and I wasn't sure if she was trying to do that odd gait she has that I don't know what it is. I still had the camera in my pocket, so I rode over to where my daughter was sitting, we halted nicely, and I asked her to come get the camera and video tape it so I could see what it looked like.

As my daughter reached up for the camera, she touched Lakota and Lakota got a zap of static electricity. I didn't know that's what it was at the time, but all of a sudden as I'm leaning down to hand the camera over to my daughter, I feel Lakota coil up under me, and up she goes then spins in the other direction. My daughter said I stayed on for quite some time, but I did eventually fall off. I landed ass/back/head in that order, I think, judging from the amount of dirt shoved in my underwear. I remember hitting the ground hard on my upper back between the shoulder blades, and looking up to see my foot wrapped up in the reins, which were over her head and she was standing there looking at me, horrifed, and slowly backing away from me. I looped my foot out of the reins, and she started to move off. I asked my daughter to go get her, and that is when she bolted, snorting, and headed up to the barn.

I told my daughter to just leave her be, and I laid there, assessing damages before slowly hauling myself upright. Wow, was I hurting! I've fallen off before, but never this hard. This was no slo-mo fall, first she was under me, then she wasn't, like cartoon, and I just landed with a heavy, old thud.

I hobbled back up to the barn to make sure Lakota didn't get her leg caught in her reins with my daughter following me apologizing profusely. Lakota did not want my daughter anywhere near her, and kept snorting at her and shying away. My head was quickly starting to ache, not to mention my ass (sacrum for you scientific folks), and my mid-back (thoracic) felt like it was in a vise. I had my cell on me, and called work immediately. My new job (for the last 4 months) is working for my chiropractor whom I've been seeing for the past 9 years. I made arrangements to head to Lou's house (because it was now after business hours) and get things put back where they belong immediately. But first I had a horse to attend to.

Lakota seemed otherwise calm unless my daughter came near her. So I had her sit aside, and I brought Lakota back down to the riding area. I walked her around a little to make sure she wasn't spooky or nervous. She did want to sniff and snort at the HUGE divots her hooves made in the dirt with her massive piourrette, or whatever the hell she wants to call that maneuver. I shuffled on over to the mounting block, and managed to haul myself up there. Let me tell you, it was NOT easy, thank goodness more physically than mentally.

I got on her, and we literally did I think 3 circles of the roundpen, and then I hopped (or more likely, slithered) off her, and brought her back to the barn. I just wanted to end on a good note, for both of us but mostly for her. She was still definately very afraid of my daughter, so after getting her inside and untacked, I handed my daughter a handful of treats. The first one she snatched from her hand and leapt back so fast as if she would get bitten. But when she didn't, she then took 2 more treats nicely. I gave her a scritch, and hobbled my butt down to the house to change my clothes (I had somehow managed to pee my pants when I landed on the ground, that's how hard I hit the ground), and needed to get cleaned up before I headed anywhere! Let me tell you, that was NOT easy, I was that stiff and in that much pain already that changing my clothes was extremely difficult and painful, but I managed the 20 minute drive, got adjusted, and felt immiedately better. Certainly not good, but definately better. My daughter helped me feed tonight, I can't shovel manure, stuffing feed bags is difficult, but the worst is sneezing! And of course I have a sniffly cold thing.

My daughter managed to snap this only photo. This is when I got back on after the horrendous crash for our couple of circles. You can probably see the dirt all up and down my left leg, on my butt, on my back, and also on the back of my helmet. I'm grateful that I always wear a helmet! There was a goodly amount of dirt ground into the back of it.

Equine Supermodels

2009-04-14T18:43:00.002-04:00

This really tickeled my funny bone -- Michelle

Sometimes things don't have to have a point - they just have to make you smile. Jockeying for position to be best-in-show, it was up to award winning advertising photographer Julian Wolkenstein to keep the supermodels of the equine world in check.

As you do: Stylist Acacio da Silva and photographer Julian Wolkenstein made Harmony the horse look like a tourist in the Caribbean

'The idea for these images came from a discussion with a friend who said, 'Hey wouldn't it be fun to shoot horses with big hair?',' says Sydney-born Julian, 36. 'It is important to do personal projects just for fun, not to sell anything, but just to remind you why you make images, but mostly, and simply, to make you smile.' Putting the project into motion, Julian teamed up with prominent hair-stylist Acacio da Silva to whip the horses into shape.

Just for fun: Misty the horse actually appears to be giving the camera a flirtatious grin as she enjoys her new flowing curls

'Each horse took around four hours to groom, with hair extensions being added by Acacio, and then when they were presented in front of the camera's and lights they would shake their heads, give a neigh and then ruffle up their hair,' said Julian - with a somewhat forced grin. 'To get them just right, with their hair all set and standing to attention was a bit of a battle. 'But the horses loved the grooming. The lights and camera, well, they were less taken with that.' At first, Julian thought the shoot would be a quick affair. 'We initially thought how hard can this be? A couple of hours on each one,' he said.

Only in Australia: Florence the horse looks demure with her fringe and ginger mane

'Well, we figured out pretty quickly on a test day that it was a major undertaking. 'Apart from casting horses and preparation work which took a few months, each horse took a full day to shoot.'

Even for a seasoned pro, such as Julian, there were hitches to his horse hair project. 'I tend to be drawn to projects where just in trying to describe and trying to explain the concept to all the crew and the people who supplied the horses was fascinating ,' says Julian. 'Most of the time you could see the cogwheels of the mind trying to work it out, trying to visualise it in their own minds, then, a bit of a smile, a chuckle and then the inevitable question - why?' Of course, sometimes - as these pictures show - it's better to live life by asking, why not?

Spring Centered Riding Clinic

2009-04-12T10:23:00.004-04:00

This weekend, I attended and rode in a Centered Riding Clinic at Fox Crossing Equestrian Center by Jamison Wallace, Level III Centered Riding Instructor and Vice President of Centered Riding. My daughter audited.

For a variety of reasons, I chose to use a lesson horse for the clinic. Cost was one factor, including having to get rabies and current coggins, etc., on Lakota to bring her, but also the fact that she is very green, and hasn't been off the property in a year. I felt I would get more out of the clinic working on myself by riding a BTDT lesson horse who was already comfortable in the surroundings. I was assigned Beau Dandy.

Friday evening started off with a talk, and introduction to some of the basics of Centered Riding. We covered Soft Eyes, Breathing, Centering, and Grounding. We practiced different ways of walking, moved through the crowd with our arms extended like an airplane using our Soft Eyes to avoid each other. We took turns wearing a bridle while our partner guided us with the reins, being as soft as possible. Its amazing how the "horse" can literally feel the persons thoughts through the reins, without even engaging the reins. We also "danced" with each other, and practiced opening our shoulders and arms to straighten a crooked or evading horse.

Then we sat on the big exercise balls, and found the "allow" upward for posting trot. Then we moved on to the exercise trampolines and trotted on them, again finding the allow, balance and centering.

On Saturday morning over coffee, we did some exercises to help us find out body awareness. We did some different stretching exercises, and again practiced on the exercise ball, finding our center and "allowing" the motion. We used the "tippy stool" (I forget what its called) to practice engaging our seatbones. Then we put a saddle on the ball, and again, practiced in the saddle, and we again practiced engaging our seatbones through the saddle to the ball. I finally understand now how to engage a seatbone! I do have much trouble rounding my back and tipping my seatbones forward, but no problem arching my back. This explains why when I get tense, Lakota goes backwards, my seat is telling her to! But I finally "get" the feeling of left/right seat bone, its more of a "scoop" or "roll" motion than a "jam it down" motion.

Then we headed out to the horses. I was in the 3rd group. At first I led Beau around the ring awhile just to get to know each other. I love doing this with any horse I ride, and still with Lakota. Its just a way for us to connect before I climb aboard. I think its kinda rude to actually just grab a horse and leap on them, I think its only polite to get to know them a little first, and I'm glad that it was encouraged, rather than discouraged or looked at oddly. He was very sweet, and lead next to me beautifully with his left nostril just barely touching my elbow the entire time.

The first thing Jami does, which I love, is the "rain drops" on your feet. She pats the bottom of your foot, and you begin feeling it in your foot, then through your ankle. Then as she suggests, you begin to feel it up your leg, to your thigh, then hip. Then she continues to suggest feel it up your torso, then your neck, and your head. What was really amazing, is that as she did this exercise, I not only literally felt it up through my body, but as it got to my torso toward my head, I started to get really, really light headed, to the point I felt like I had to put my hand on the pommel of the saddle to steady myself. It was really something, and then she repeated on the other side, and I had the same experience again, although very slightly less intense. It was like the energy was moving up through my body and right out the top of my head.

During the ride, I spent quite a bit of time "finding my toes". I could not manage to stand in the stirrups balanced and kept falling back (although it was certainly not as ugly as it was the last lesson I had in August! I spent a lot of time laughing during that lesson). Then finally I realized that I had no toes. Its not that I was crunching them or "monkey feet", but I just had no awareness of them at all. They just tend to disappear. When I wiggled and "found" my toes, I spread them out a bit in my boot, and suddenly my horse, who was calm and relaxed anyway, did this little shudder, then sighed and licked and chewed. WOW! That was really something. So when my legs would start getting out of position again, or I started to lose my balance slightly, I realized that I had lost my toes again, and once I found them, suddenly I was able to balance. So amazing! So this is something that I am now practicing, especially when I drive. Oh, I also need to work on holding my head level, too. I have no "c" curve to my neck, so it tends to jut forward, so then my chin is sort of pointing up to compensate. My daughter is the same why, so I suspect its just the genetic way we are built, rather than from an injury or arthritis.

So all in all, it was a great weekend. Now if I can just remember all I've learned :-) I plan on practicing at home, of course. And I'm hoping to start up some lessons again in the next couple of months. I think I may be able to manage a monthly lesson at least. My daughter is really looking forward to a little schooling show on 5/17, it will be her first one. So the cost of that his been difficult these past couple of months, with the show fees, practice fees and lesson fees, not to mention the show clothes she needs. Eeek!!! This kid better not grow another inch until she gets a job! So once the show is behind us, I think I can maybe squirrel away a few bucks for myself per month. And the better a rider I can be for Lakota, the more and easier she is going to learn.

Edited to add: in chatting with some friends, I remembered a few other exercises that we learned.

One that I'm finding really, really interesting is that you lick your teeth. Sounds weird. But try it. Take your tongue, and run it all around your top teeth from front to back (on the outside of your teeth), and do the bottoms. Do it over and over. And then note what you feel when you are done. Almost all of us felt a release of tension in our necks and shoulders, and jaws. Some of us (me included) did a LOT of yawning after.

Another one is to stand with your feet straight ahead, feet slightly apart, like 2 feet, so just slightly outside the width of your hips. Slightly bend your knees, then bend at the waist so that your torso is 45 degrees from your legs. Hold your arms outstretched to your sides like an airplane. Then turn to the left as far as you can from the waist, and when you can't go any further, then stretch your right arm over your head continuing the stretch further. Do the same thing on the right.

Another is again same stance feet slightly apart, standing upright. Then slowly "crunch" by collapsing your body (arms hanging down), one vertabrae at a time. When you get as far down as you can go, take a deep breath, let it out, and you'll drop some more. Repeat again, and again. Then slowly "uncurl" standing upright one vertabrae at a time.

Also you can do the "lunge", much like the regular exercise you would do with weights. You stand with one foot forward, and one behind you. The one behind you is sideways toe facing out, and the one forward is pointed forward. Reach forward as far as you can with one foot, and stretch, but not to the point of pulling, just go as far as you can until you meet resistance. Its better to slide the back foot back to go lower, rather than slide the front foot forward. Repeat by swapping the feet.

Then of course, roll your head. Turn your head side to side as far as you can. Then from neutral, tilt your chin down to your chest, then tilt your head back, and to both sides as far as you can. Not pulling or stretching the limits, but just going as far as you can, then you go side to side again and you'll see that you have gained some range of motion.

Oh, we also did some grounding exercises. Where you ground yourself and try to push each other down. Very cool that when you are not grounded, standing in the same position, you are easily pushed over, but when you take a deep breath and "think" grounded, planting your feet, you simply cannot be moved.

And when using our arms in riding. Do not use your biceps. Your biceps become neutral, they are not used at all. Back and forth arm motion uses the triceps. Hold up your arm and hold it firm by using your bicep. Have a friend try to bend or move your arm. You'll see that it CAN be moved, and so can your body. Release, and then hold your arm in the same position but use your tricep to hold your arm, and the friend will not be able to move your arm, and also will not move your body in their trying.

Horsey Day today

2009-03-28T22:41:00.004-04:00

Mandy and I had a nice little horsey day today.

She had her lesson this morning, which went well. She did some dressage basics, i.e., straightness, balance, riding from behind. She had some nice canter departs today! She will likely go to a show in mid May, w/t/c and possibly some cross-rails, we'll see about that. She's excited, to put it mildly.

Then we came home and had some lunch, and headed out to play with our girls before the two, yes TWO inches of rain that is supposed to start tonight.

First up was Lakota, who heard us come outside. And as I was cleaning up the yard from winter debris so we had a safe-ish place to ride, she came over to the gate and was watching us and calling. So cute. So today we tacked up properly which hasn't happened since last summer. Today, she decided the yard was scary. Maybe because it was cleaner? lol! Who knows.

So we spent a little time snorting at all the corners before settling down, which actually didn't take all that long. I decided to try ground driving, after chatting with some friends about Lakota's issues with trust in me when I'm not in front. A first for both of us.

It went better than I expected. I did have to swing the tail end of one of the reins at her rump a few times so she understood forward. She did a LOT of thinking about this, as it was quite new to her. Once I got her going forward, she moved along nicely. Whoa didn't go as well. I usually use my body, not my hands to whoa, and she whoas on a breath out and when I stop riding. Well, I couldn't really do that with ground driving, unless I turned myself into something like an anchor. So any ideas/advise would be great. When I asked for a stop, I did "breath out" which she responded to somewhat, and then I just closed my hands, and when she ran into that, it was upsetting for her. She fought the pressure a bit, then she turned sharply and wrapped one of the lines around her hind pastern and stepped on it. She didn't freak out, but she hit the pressure, felt it on her leg and wasn't too happy about it. I easily got her out of the mess, but after that she wasn't really a fan of this game anymore. She was ready to head back to the barn, which is so NOT like her, so I knew she was upset.

So I asked for one more circle, and then we took off the lines, and I mounted up.

Riding wasn't all that exciting, the roundpen was still pulled apart, I didn't feel like taking even more time to put it back together, and we're trying to get away from that crutch, anyway. So since it was only our second time out of the paddock since last fall, we stuck to just some figure 8's inside the pen, although both ends of it were open. She softened and relaxed into the pattern nicely. So after that, we called it a day. She was quite warm and sweaty considering she did nothing more than a walk. It was warm, around 55F, and she still has her full winter coat, but I think it was more emotional sweat than physical sweat, she really didn't do much at all, and the sweat was in her armpits, and her chest and underside of her neck, and behind her ears.

Mandy got this shot, which cracks me up. And of course shows how much more relaxed she was with the riding as opposed to ground driving.

Then Mandy took these two shots, which I like.

Lakota has never been a fan of kisses, but she has learned to at least humor me and tolerate them, as is obvious from this photo.

Then it was Jen's turn. She was eager for her turn to get to play. Mandy tacked her up with no problems, other than her bracing and getting worried when girthing up. I suspect that will take a good long time to overcome the old "kick in the gut" girthing process. But we went slow, one hole at a time, with a lot of reassurances, and she never moved a foot. I also remeasured Jen for the gullet size, and she measured right on the wide side of medium wide, so I decided to put the wide gullet in the Wintec with the thicker fleece pad (I really hate changing that thing, "easy-change" is a misnomer and it takes quite a bit of grunting, slamming, and swearing to get it back together). I looked more objectively at Jen's back, and she has the same conformation as Lakota, which is not a good thing. She has those huge shoulders that rotate about 4 inches under the saddle, and the same weird long withers, short back and forward girth-groove (sigh). But I was hopeful this would work for her.

So Mandy led Jen around a bit to make sure her mind was connected, and they did fine.

Mandy REALLY wanted to bring Jen out of the paddock, so we did. Jen was worried, she is an extremely herdbound horse, so considering that she did quite well. We left the gate in stages, taking breaks, turning back from time to time. I think it helped that the other 3 didn't really care that she left (although they stood at the gate and screamed for Lakota when she was out).

We made it out to the yard, and checked it all out. She was nervous, I could feel it, but she was well-behaved and tried to be brave. The ducks were flapping around, as were chickens, the goats, the goose was playing it up, it was a lot to take in for a horse that hadn't been out of the paddock in a year, and had only been out two or three times in two years. Then I took Jen for a bit, and asked her to move her feet around me, and we meandered her and there and I asked for her attention. Then Mandy laughed, and she teleported a bit, so I knew then that she was quite tense as I had suspected ,but was trying to stuff it down and be brave. So I slowed down then, and just spent some time standing and petting her, chatting with Mandy, and relaxing. And then Jen started to drop her head, blow, lick and chew, and relax. Her head was about at my waist level now. I decided that was enough emotional stuff for her today, so we slowly brought her back to the barn, stopping along the way to look at this or that.

Then Mandy hopped on her for a short bit in the paddock. Jen was a bit anxious about that, and she had a real grumpy face as we walked through the paddock. Then we stopped for a photo op, of finally trying to get a pick of Mandy in the saddle. Jen didn't look real happy, and she kept biting at Mandy's foot.

So I decided that the saddle still wasn't fitting well, and asked her to hop off. After untacking and putting our gear away, I decided at the last minute to toss the Barefoot London treeless on her, just to see how it looked. It looked OK on her, so then I asked Mandy to hop on. We went for another short walk, and I was really blown away by the difference in Jen.

so that was our day. I really hate saddle shopping. And its not in the budget, either. I'm not sure what I'm going to do. I suppose I can sell both our Wintecs and see how much I can get for them toward a Treeless for Jen. For now, I guess Mandy can share my London.

Is it spring?

2009-03-24T15:51:00.003-04:00

The temps sure don't feel like it, but my crocus' seem to think spring is coming.

Clicker fun

2009-03-22T16:19:00.002-04:00

I spent most of the day yesterday cleaning so I could spend time riding today. And last night around 9 pm I started to feel "the crud" come on. How frustrating! So I'm stuffy-headed, headachy, low energy, and have occasional bouts of light-headedness. (sigh).

I trimmed hooves this afternoon, and when I was sitting down on the stoop waiting for my back to quit hurting so I could actually stand up straight, Lakota came over and was begging for attention. She stood next to me and kept touching my arm. Then she started to paw. I took the hint that she really wanted to do something.

So I went inside to gather my clicker/treat back, and while I was doing that, Lakota decided she was going to start without me. I had the camera with me, so shot some video. I had so much fun, I'm glad she talked me into playing.

Spring has arrived!

2009-03-21T23:35:00.004-04:00

The girls went out for their first bit of grass today, and boy were they happy about that!!!!! I did have the forethought, however, to only let them out an hour before grain time, I knew I would never get them back in again if I didn't have something up my sleeve ;-)

Lakota: "Ummm, Hello? The gate is closed! Would you be a dear and trot right on over here pronto and open it back up again?"

"What do you mean 'no'? Fine, I'll just wait here all night until it opens back up again."

Jen: "Whaddya mean the gates closed? It sounds like its biting, too. Damn, that sucks!"

Whinney: "Get your lazy @$$ over here and open this @#$% gate, NOW!"

Before the rain comes .....

2009-03-08T16:38:00.005-04:00

My daughter and I had a nice day today. The 8 inches of snow has melted and left mud in its wake of course, but it was GORGEOUS in the 50's and up to 60 with a bright, warm sun this weekend, so I couldn't possibly spend it in the house cleaning. I did get the worst of it cleaned up though ;-)

My daughter really wanted to do something with Jen. You may remember that Jen is a rescue (see http://www.savingmissjen.blogspot.com/). The first year we had her we spent just dumping food into her, and loving on her to get her over her tension, anxiety and fears. Last year we started clicker-training with her, rewarding her for attention, focus, and fun games like targeting cones, follow-your-footsteps, touch-the-goblins. She will not accept a bit in her mouth, she clamps her jaw shut and flings her head up, no matter how many, or what value treats we use. So I've started her in the Dr. Cook's Bitless Bridle. She was quite tense mounted. I guess I can't say "under saddle", since we used a bareback pad, because her back muscles were still quite wasted and in no shape to hold a saddle. She braced, wouldn't move forward, and was a balled up bundle of nerves and anxiety. When I bought her, I was told that her only issue was being herd-bound.

I rewarded her for taking a few steps forward, and flexing her head/neck to both sides, and then put her away for the fall/winter. I've just spent more time loving on her, expecting some more respect on the ground, and just being very calm and loving with her, and spending time just stroking her and talking softely to her.

Today was her day. Unfortunately, I left the camera in the house, but hopefully I'll remember next time. So we changed out the gullet in my daughters saddle and messed with girths until we got an OK combination. We decided to stay in the paddock to keep her emotions down for the first time we've done anything for about 8 to 10 months. She was only mildly concerned about saddling, but treats took care of that, she sighed and did a lot of licking and chewing. She took the Bitless with no problems at all. I stood on the ground and we practiced a lot of lateral flexion. Her first reaction to the feeling of any pressure at all is that her head goes up and she braces. I don't escalate pressure (start where you want to end up), I just take up contact and wait, while she works it out. the head goes up, it goes down, she tries pulling the rein out of my hand, then finally, the neck relaxes and she gives her nose. BINGO! instant release with a click, and then a treat. Yehaaa!!!! Repeat ad naseum. Jen has a lot of braced default behaviors that is going to take a lot of time and repetition to undo. Did the same thing on the other side. Then hubby came home, so I stopped to talk to him for a bit. Jen fussed, pawed, fidgeted, and was trying everything to figure out how to get another treat. She finally settled down, dropped her head, relaxed, closed her eyes, and then it was time to reward her with more fun.

I briefly repeated the lateral flexion on both sides, and she braced at first again, but remembered much quicker this time. I think I'm going to have to use this sort of thing for her for awhile, a lot of repetitions on one thing, then a break and do it again. She tends to forget between sessions, so hopefully a break and repeating it will break that habit. She also needs repetition, or she gets anxious wondering what the next behavior is that she will get rewarded for. She gets fizzy and tries too many things. Lakota, OTOH, gets bored, so we do something until she gives me a good try, or improves, then we move on to something else, and go back to the first thing (maybe). Interesting difference in horsenalities.

So then I had her walk along side me, and we practiced backing up a step each time I asked her to whoa. Interestingly, she settled down, relaxed and was very happy to be moving, where she was more tense with the flexion at a standstill. I think she was anxious about the other horses in her space while there was food involved. But she needs to learn to deal with that, too, and she actually was much better than she has been in the past. Then rather than saying whoa and stopping abruptly for a halt, I decided instead to "breath out" and just "stop riding(walking)", and blow-me-down, but she whoaed beautifully and so relaxed! We practiced that for a bit, and it was fantastic, she was so soft and relaxed, very unlike herself, it was beautiful!

It wasn't in the plan today, but she was doing so well, I asked my daughter to hop on board. Jen is supposed to be her horse, I didn't know she had so many issues when I bought her, but I did figure she wouldn't be as perfect as the seller said she was. She hopped on board, and we walked through the paddock. At first, I did the leading, as we had to walk past the other horses grazing, and Jen can be pretty defensive of her personal space, I wasn't sure if she would act differently while someone was on board. But she was! She did fantastic! At first she braced and her head went up, but we didnt' ask for anything. Just stood there at the rock she mounted from, and scritched her withers while I rubbed her neck and told her what a good girl she was. When she softened and relaxed, we moved off. After a few laps, I gave up the reins to my daughter, although I walked alongside just in case I needed to snatch them. But she did beautifully, and whoaed on a breath out. Gorgeous!

But the BEST part, was we dismounted/untacked on the far end of the paddock away from the barn, and Jen was astounded! She sniffed at the saddle and mouthed it multiple times while my daughter wsa holding it, and I had the bridle hanging in my hand, and she turned toward me and put her nose right into the noseband. Awwwwww....... she wanted to keep riding!!!! Both of us were just so happy to see this, after the tense, anxious little girl last year. This is exactly how I wanted to leave her ,wanting more, not thinking "When will this be over with?"

Darn, I wish I had the camera.

But we did take Lakota out for a little spin in the yard. Everything is mud, so we only did a few circles and figure 8's in the gravel of the drive, but she was really begging for a turn, so who was I to say no?? =D

Threw on the bareback pad and Bitless, and walked around the yard a bit to look for goblins. Then I mounted up, and we had a nice little ride, and Lakota was her sweet self, as usual. Then I asked my daughter if she wanted a turn, and she said "Sure!" with a huge grin on her face. She mounted up, and it was just so comical! She has been taking lessons, and is a nice little rider, W/T/C ready for jumps now, and perhaps just a wee bit cocky about her ability. But she's been riding school horses, not uber-sensitive older greenies. She usually has a comment about my riding ability, my lack of ability to post, the fact that I haven't cantered since I was her age, etc. Well, she could not keep Lakota on a circle to save her life. Poor Lakota was so confused, and getting a bit ticked off. Lakota doesn't fill in the blanks for you, and my daughter kept looking down, losing her focus and thinking about something else, or yakking and not paying attention, and she almost ran Lakota into a trailer twice, the roundpen panel, the woodpile and a truck cap. She couldn't keep her bent, and she kept trying to head back up to the barn. She had a little bit more respect for her mothers riding abilities after trying to ride MY horse. Not that she's bad, certainly not. She is just incredibly sensitive and reads your thoughts. And you simply can NOT get strong with her, or she will either brace, or get upset and start getting spooky. Less is more with her, and if she isn't doing what you ask, then you are not being clear, or are just being too overbearing.

I hopped back on Lakota after my daughter was done for a few circles just to get her confidence back, and then we were done for the day. My son ran in the house and grabbed the camera, so I at least have some photos of Lakota and I and my daughter.

Fly Free, Ducky

2009-02-20T21:09:00.003-05:00

Ducky is no longer with us.

You may remember Duck from November. The Muscovy ducks decided to hatch out a clutch of eggs on Halloween night, and they were all waddling around on Sat 11/1 early morning. Except for one, who was upside down, cold and half dead. My son found her on the ground, and despite my best "it will probably die, such is nature" speech, the kids insisted on bringing it in the house ,warming it up and trying to save it.

http://shellyct.blogspot.com/2008/11/newest-addition.html

And they succeeded. But it was too cold for Ducky to go back outside in the winter after being raised in the house. She was apparently premature and behind her siblings, she just couldn't keep up.

http://shellyct.blogspot.com/2009/01/ducky-update.html

So she was raised in the family room, with a dog crate and an x-pen for a duck house. She had visits to the garden to play when the weather was warmish (30's and up), and visits to the bathtub for swimtime, and was allowed to roam the family room from time to time when we kicked the dogs out of the room for awhile, always supervised.

This morning, I had Cher gated in the kitchen to eat her breakfast (she's a little food aggressive, so eats separately). Ducky was in her x-pen in the family room, which is up a flight of stairs and around the corner from the kitchen. I went out to feed horses, and when I came back in the house, Ducky had somehow managed to fly out of her x-pen, down the stairs, around the corner, and over the gate into the kitchen. Cher killed her. My guilt is enormous.

Good bye, Ducky. I'm so sorry.

I'm Baaaack -- I'm Back in the Saddle Again!

2009-02-17T21:21:00.003-05:00

Wahoo!!!!

I haven't ridden since September. In case you can't count too well, that's FIVE months!

But I only worked until 12:45 today, rushed home and had a quick lunch. It was around 35F and sunny with NO wind, which we've had for about a week now, so it was a gorgeous day. I headed out to see my girl, Lakota. I did not, unfortunately, have my camera with me.

The roundpen is muddy, with deep holes from frost heaves with the constant freeze/thaw thing that has been going on for about 2 weeks. The paddock didn't look too bad though, with hooves pounding them all down. I decided to just toss on the Bareback Pad and Bitless and head into the lower grassy section of the paddock. I figured its been so long since we've doing anything, I thought it would be a good idea to stay in the paddock, plus there was the whole mud issue.

I walked that area first looking for holes, and it was a bit squishy down on the bottom half, but not bad on the top half, but of course its the side of a hill, with stumps, and rocks, and ledge. I picked up all the downed brush, and the girls apparently knew what I had in mind, because they were all on high alert (GRASS!!!!). April started racing along the fenceline with her nose on the ground looking for a way through. Its only electric, and it was off, not a good combo with a mini.

I brushed Lakota, which she of course enjoyed, but then she side stepped away when I went to put the bareback pad on. I gave her another scritch, and then she was fine. It took us a little bit to put the Bitless Bridle on, she's always been funny about headgear, and if we dont' work on it consistently, she reverts. But I only waited for less than 5 minutes for her to decide to put her nose in, and of course she got a treat after, so all was OK in her world.

We headed down to the grassy area, and as I gathered the electric fence handles in my left hand, with Lakota's reins in my right, sure enough they all came flying over. I managed to keep two out, but the mini eluded me (sneaky little shit that she is) she squeezed right through.

That was enough to get Lakota upset -- the little brat was racing around snatching at tall grass, Lakot awas trying to snatch at grass at the same time she was spooking, at the same time I was trying to reattach the gate handles. So Lakota and I walked back and forth about a half dozen times, feeling the footing, looking for holes, and trying to catch the little yellow shithead. It didn't work, and I gave up, figuring I probably wouldn't ride long enough for her to founder, anyway.

I lead Lakota up to a rock, that was about literally 3 inches wide and 6 inches long, but tall sticking out of the ground. She lined right up like a good girl, she'll line up to just about anything now. And then she stands quietly while I zipper my back, turn it to the side, and try to figure out how far I have to jump to get on her. Admittedly, it does take awhile, she's so patient. So I ungracefully lept -- and slammed into her side with a big - huh! Ooops, sorry girl. The next time I managed to get more air and belly over so I could scramble up.

So Lakota and I walked back and forth for about half hour, while the little yellow demon ran around snatching as much dead grass as she could stuff in her little face. Lakota did quite well considering we have mostly only ridden in the roundpen, where it is relatively flat (its all relative around here, nothing is flat, not even the house, anything dropped that is round all ends up in one corner of the house). She really wasn't a fan of carrying me through the mud, she doesnt' like to slip at all with me on board, which is OK by me. So we used the higher side, but I was worried about a big sinkhole over Leroy's grave which I had filled in, but I didn't trust it. Lakota kept wanting to go higher and higher away from the mud. She did mind my leg mostly when I asked her to yield around the filled-in sinkhole. She got a little upset a couple of times, onced when she slipped which wasn't so bad, her head just came up a bit and she got a little rushy, but she settled right down again when I said "easy, it's OK" (which seems to be my default not-thinking thing to say when they get nervous). The other time she got upset, spooked and squirted forward is when that little yellow demon squeezed between us and a 4 foot high ledge outcropping, which her fat gut caught my boot and twisted my foot around backwards, likely goosing poor Lakota in the ribs. We did OK though, she setled right back down and I did not lose my seat, despite being only on the Bareback Pad, and on the side of a somewhat slick hill with tons of rocks.

We rode that for about a half hour, interspersed with a lot of standing and relaxing/doing nothing. It seems that now when my phone rings (actually it was my school bus alarm, which goes off twicde at 15 minute intervals) she stops and drops her head about a foot, cocks a leg, sighs and closes her eyes. lol!

The footing was getting a little slick from being churned up by you-know-who, so I thought about it a bit and decided to ride in the upper dirt area where the girls are fed daily (not the top "upper paddock", up the steeeep hill). So I dismounted, brought Lakota out, and remounted without incident. She was a little confused "now what?". I just asked her to walk-on, which she did, which is great, because forward can be a little sticky sometimes. The first time by the gate to the steeeep hill "upper paddock", which is where we rode the last time, only once, way back in September, she stopped and looked up the hill. I asked for foreward again (straight), and she wanted to veer up the hill. There was no way I could sit on her, over that horrible rubble which is like something out of those Tevis photos you see, up that steep hill, in a bareback pad on a fat out of shape mare (not to mention my condition!).

We avoided that, and did a couple of laps. And on the way by Jen (as April continued to gnosh) Jen flattened her ears, threatened to kick and made a really nasty snaky face. Lakota is Alpha Mare, but it seems that when I'm riding, Jen gets nasty toward her. I really have no idea why, but this is not the first time she did this. I hollered at Jen, which upset Lakota, but she did OK (she hates it when I yell at the other horses, although two of them really tend to deserve it often, Jen and Whinney). We circled around, and Jen had come around the barn and was blocking out path, making nasty faces at Lakota! She was not listening to me telling her to get lost, and Lakota was being SO good. She knows that we don't play horsey games when the humans are nearby, all of them know that except Jen has been having a hard time understanding that rule.

So I finally decided to dismount, and put Jen in the stall. I remounted, and Jen was tossing a fit, pushing on the door, and pawing it with her front hoof. I was afraid she would do something really stupid, so we did one lap around the paddock, and I dismounted and let that little pita out.

Jen continued to be quite obnoxious for the rest of the afternoon. After catching the little yellow monster with a cookie and some roundpen-type body language/movements, I stood and hung out with Lakota for a bit, which she liked just standing next to me dozing. Jen tossed a fit, and was racing around ,bucking, and zipping by us with April in tow, then back again, being a total pest. Then she came around the back and stood behind me making faces at Lakota (who mostly ignored her aside from a tight face). I backed Jen up a few times as she was getting to be a pushy pest.

I'm not sure if she was jealous, or taking advantage of the alpha, but I'm going to have to come up with a better plan, I guess. I had hoped that Mandy and I would be able to ride together, I don't know. Perhaps Jen just needs more work, (which she hasn't had much of). I do need to work with her, she loves it so much. But then she is a total in your face pest for months, lol!

So, in any event, I'm excited that I finally got to ride again, and really excited that Lakota was so, so good after 5 months off. She really wanted to head up on that hill, and I may do that next time, once I figure out what to do with Jen. I also got all the defrosted manure and frozen, trampled, peed on/pooped on hay scraped up, so its all clean and spring-like, ready for the snow, sleet and freezing rain predicted for tomorrow night :-(

For any of you who are RAC readers, I'm posting this over there too, but a much abbreviated version. They have far more interesting thing sto read than my long-drawn out drivel, but in case you were feeling a bit of deja'vu reading this, that's why ;-)

A sighting ...

2009-02-15T21:44:00.002-05:00

Early Saturday during the morning feed, I saw Jen looking at something. I stepped so I could see better through the barn doors, and saw a bobcat running across the neighbors backyard! It came across the stonewall and over Bobby's junk cars that are on the property line. As I watched it disappear into the trees, suddenly, a second one followed the first along the same path!

I have never seen a Bobcat before. Its possible it wasn't, but I'm pretty sure. It was dawn, and the sun came over the horizon where they disappeared into the woods, so I couldn't see any coloring or markings, they were sillouettes, but the size, shape and movement fit a a Bobcat perfectly. They didnt' make a sound, not a single leaf russle they moved silently along, very cool.

I was just reading up on Bobcats, as I didnt' think we had them here. And now is there mating time, and they are active at dusk to midnight, and dawn to 3 hours after dawn. So it fits perfectly to see two of them together, possibly in pursuit, and at dawn.

What a gift!

as long as they leave my poultry alone, that is.

And of course I didn't have my camera with me.

How to get them to want to work for/with you

2009-02-08T21:10:00.005-05:00

This came up briefly a few posts ago, Funder had made a comment after Lakota didn't want to go back to the barn, something to the effect of "It must be so nice to have a horse that wants to work with you". Well, Lakota sure didn't come that way!

Some of you may remember, but likely most don't, that when I bought Lakota 6 years ago, she was inherently a nice horse, but she was also largely unhandled and/or mishandled.

Back in 2003, she was a 7 year old broodmare being bred to her half brother. When I sent some emails to the seller (and I am not badmouthing anyone here, this is a learning exercise) I asked many questions since I couldn't visit her myself to meet her.

Some of the questions were:

How are her feet/hooves? The answer was "We have lifted Lakota's feet and she does fine. She has never needed to have them trimmed, she self-trims"

When asked how much training she has had, the answer was: "Yes, she keeps a halter on, and leads well, has been trailered, has not been handled a lot but you can't tell she is a very sweet."

In reading between the lines later on, the answers were more like: "We thought we should trying working with her feet, but never got around to it" and "We keep a halter on her at all times becuase otherwise you can't get one on her without an act of Congress, but she isn't mean about it".

So the horse that got off the trailer back in April of 2003 was scared to death, having never been away from her sire, dam or siblings at the age of 7. She was trailered once, when she was bought by the person I bought her from, they bought an entire family/herd.

I mistakenly took her halter off her in the paddock as I always keep my horses without a halter unless they are uncatchable, and then they wear a breakaway. Well, I can't remember how long it took, but it was week sbefore I got halter on her, that I left on (breakaway). She didn't know how to hold her feet up to be trimmed, either. She is deathly afraid of the dewormer tube, and her eyes pop out of her head and she rips her head away if you even think about looking at her left ear. Don't try to approach her right side either or she's gone.

So how did this horse end up being the one that doesn't want to go back to the barn?

Well, it has been 6 years ;-) But she's been like this for awhile now. I had to go back to square one with everything I learned. Lakota has taught me SO much. She was not this way because she was resistant, or "bad". She was truly just scared, and unsure, and very, very sensitive, and had no life experiences to draw from.

I found that sending her off when she did the wrong thing, was a very bad thing, and created a horse that snorted and went on alert whenever she saw me. I had to sort of sneak in the back door, not let her realize that she was learning something and make it seem like she had figured it out all on her own.

So I hung a halter next to her grain bucket. It was a larger, oversized halter with a breakaway poll. After a few weeks of that, I held the halter while I delivered the grain. Then I progressed to touching her with it. Then we moved on to having her touch it before she could get her bucket of grain. Then I asked her to let me slip it on her nose, and then I took it right back off and let her eat. She didn't get to have her grain at all until she let me do these things. Then we progressed to her wearing the halter while she ate. Then she was tied and she stood tied while she ate her grain. Eating grain while being caught turned being caught into a positive thing, without getting anyones emotions up.

When this worked so well with her, I started thinking more and more about clicker training. I had heard of it, but everyone I knew poo-poohed it as "bribery". But using food as a reward worked so well in getting her caught.

So halter on/off everyday with grain worked really well. And when I caught her to groom her was no problem, either. But if I had to catch her for the vet or farrier, suddenly she was uncatchable again. It took me a little while to realize why that was. It was my emotions, and my intent. When I was feeding or grooming, I had no agenda. It didn't matter if she didn't get caught, so it was no big deal. But my thoughts were that the farrier or vet didn't have time to wait for me to try to catch a horse, so I was purposeful in my mannerisms, and that scared her. The snorty, avoiding horse was back again.

Then I realized that if I approached her, and chatted while giving her a scritch on the withers, or a rub on the neck before haltering her, she was completely fine with being caught. My girl needs a little bit of foreplay before she'll give herself up to you ;-) She can still be this way to this day, although it is not nearly as often, and its always when I'm in some sort of rush, or very distracted. She's a great barometer for my mental outlook at any particular time.

I also rarely catch my horses. Seems counter productive, doesn't it? They still get haltered/tied for eating grain (I don't have stalls yet), and they readily drop their noses into their halters and stand very quietly and relaxed to be haltered. But for hoof cleaning, grooming, hoof trimming, blanketing/unblanketing, and even temperature-taking, they don't get haltered or tied. I carry my goodies on out to the paddock, and do what I need to do with them loose. The first few times I do this with any new horse, they usually walk away. After I am persistent and follow them around, finally they sigh, and just munch some hay. With them not being caught, they have the freedom to leave, so they don't feel trapped. Knowing that if at any time I do something that upsets them and they can leave, they are less inclined to be worried and want to leave. As a matter of fact, when I head out the door with my trimming tools, or an armload of blankets, I often have horses lined up waiting their turn.

Other times, when I'm feeling kinda low-energy, or I don't have much time to spend with them, I'll head out to the paddock and do nothing. I may putter around fixing something, or I bring a book and sit in my little video chair I keep in the barn, leaning against a tree, and read. Sometimes I'll even sit down and fall asleep in the sun. I always have at least one horse who comes to stand guard over me, and most times they take turns. I trust them to not step on me, and they don't.

There have been times when I head out with the intent of riding, or some task I want to work on. And perhaps the horse I want to work with is having a nice doze in the sun and doesn't seem interested. Many times I'll decide to sit with them and doze myself instead. Or choose a different horse. I usually have volunteers, or horses arguing over who gets to be first, or next. Sometimes they are way up on the hill enjoying a play time. Sometimes I'll go up and get one, but many times I won't, and leave them to their games. Sometimes they'll come down and be keen to go do something. But if they really are not interested in playing together, then I don't push it. I learned that if the horse wasn't interested that day, then we usually did NOT have a good time at all. Either a spooky horse, or a grumpy resistant horse, or many times it is them reading me, and knowing that I am really not in the right place to work with them that day. I respect that, and we are more of a partnership than a dictatorship.

Then I started playing around with clicker training. I found that using this method taught ME to be more precise in my timing. And it also was far more interesting for the horse, and they were more keen to try. And I can tell that it certainly is not all about the treats. I have had horses take the treat from my hand and spit it back out again if they didn't want it. I've had horses refuse to take the treat, and instead offer the behavior again, because it was fun for them. It is engaging, they become a willing participant in the game. They offer just that much more to the game. I use clicker to train something new, but once its become old hat, the click/treat fades for that old task as we move on to something new to teach.

Lakota loves the "touch the goblin" game. As a mare that had basically nothing outside her paddock until she was 7 years old, new things were pretty darned scary. She is a "stop/snort/stare" kinda girl. Now when she sees something scary, she stops/snorts, then looks at me very expectantly asking if its safe. When I tell her it is, she appraoches cautiously and touches the scary thing, and then looks at me saying "See? I touched it, can I have my treat now?" Then she'll thorougly investigate the new thing, touching it all over in many ways, sometimes progressing to playing with it if I allow her.

When teaching a new move, or teaching to stand still for mounting, that precise instantaneous timing showing exactly what you want, helps her to get it so much better. She says "AHHH, so THAT is what you wanted! I can do that!" Many times she'll offer better and better each time. Without using clicker, and using only pressure/release, Lakota tends to get dull. " I really don't have a clue what you want, so I'm not even going to try really hard, this is boring and it sucks, can I go have my hay now?"

Lakota started off as a very inverted moving horse. She is 25% TWH which I think influenced her movement conformationally, and at 7 years old of boodmare/paddock living, her movement patterns were pretty commited to muscle memory. We also do some roundpen work, using Dan Sumerel's methods which are very quiet, without running the horse around, tiring them out, or waiting for submission. You look for acknowledgment, not submission.

Anyway, my point was, during this I noticed that Lakota moved very inverted, hollow back, ewe-neck, all strung out. As the roundpen relationship work evolved, I started clicking her for moving less inverted, progressing on to carrying herself. Now she gives me the most gorgoues, collected trots you have ever seen. And she is so proud of herself, that she now offers them to me all the time, then as I'm giggling about how cute she is, she'll stop and look at me with her ears perked up and forward, both eyes on me, so proud of herself, saying "See? Look what I can do!!"

While we have not progressed to any kind of advanced or even mid-range manuevers, which is mostly due to my lack of knowledge, ability and time, we are muddling along at our own pace, but we are both happy, and I have a horse that is excited to head out of the paddock away from her buddies, one who was so herdbound that she screamed for her herdmates and turned to jelly. I have a mare that puts on the breaks and refuses to go back to the barn while her buddies in the paddock are hollering for her, rather than one that puts on the breaks refusing to leave.

Ode to Horses

2009-02-06T21:27:00.002-05:00

Why do I like horses? I think I must be mad.My mother wasn't horsey -
And neither was my dad.

But the madness hit me early - and it hit me like a curse.A
nd I've never gotten better. In fact I've gotten worse.

My stables are immaculate. My house is like a hovel.
Last year for my birthday - I got a brand new shovel.

I hardly read a paper - but I know who's sold their horse.
And I wouldn't watch the news - Unless Mr. Ed was on - of course.

One eye's always on the heavens -but my washing waves in vain
As I rush to get the horses in - in case it's gonna rain.

And though they're wearing 15 rugs, the best that you can get,
I bring them in to keep them dry - while I get soaking wet.

I spend up every cent I've got - on horsey stuff for sure
I buy saddles, bridles, fancy rugs - and then I buy some more.

I should have had my hair cut - or bought that nice blue shirt
At least it wouldn't now look ripped to shreds and in the dirt

I can't make a bloody sponge cake -I don't even try
But I can back a truck and trailer - in the twinkling of an eye.

It's jeans and Muck Boots that I live in night and day
And that smell of sweaty horses just doesn't wash away.

Once every now and then I dress up for a ball
Make up and a hairdo - with high heel shoes and all.

I ache from long forgotten falls. My knees have got no skin.
My toes have gone a funny shape - from being squashed again.

But late at night, when all is still - and I've gone to give them hay,
I touch their velvet softness and my worries float away.

They give a gentle nicker and they nuzzle through my hair
And I know it's where my heart is - more here than anywhere

- Author Unknown

TO HAVE A HORSE IN YOUR LIFE

2009-01-23T22:24:00.002-05:00

To have a horse in your life is a gift. In the matter of a few short years, a horse can teach a young girl courage, if she chooses to grab mane and hang on for dear life. Even the smallest of ponies is mightier than the tallest of girls. To conquer the fear of falling off, having one's toes crushed, or being publicly humiliated at a horse show is an admirable feat for any child. For that, we can be grateful.

Horses teach us responsibility. Unlike a bicycle or a computer, a horse needs regular care and most of it requires that you get dirty and smelly and up off the couch. Choosing to leave your cozy kitchen to break the crust of ice off the water buckets is to choose responsibility. When our horses dip their noses and drink heartily; we know we've made the right choice.

Learning to care for a horse is both an art and a science. Some are easy keepers, requiring little more than regular turn-out, a flake of hay, and a trough of clean water. Others will test you - you'll struggle to keep them from being too fat or too thin. You'll have their feet shod regularly only to find shoes gone missing. Some are so accident-prone you'll swear they're intentionally finding new ways to injure themselves.

If you weren't raised with horses, you can't know that they have unique personalities. You'd expect this from dogs, but horses? Indeed, there are clever horses, grumpy horses, and even horses with a sense of humor. Those prone to humor will test you by finding new ways to escape from the barn when you least expect it.

Horses can be timid or brave, lazy or athletic, obstinate or willing. You will hit it off with some horses and others will elude you altogether. There are as many "types" of horses as there are people - which makes the whole partnership thing all the more interesting.

If you've never ridden a horse, you probably assume it's a simple thing you can learn in a weekend. You can, in fact, learn the basics on a Sunday, but to truly ride well takes a lifetime. Working with a living being is far more complex than turning a key in the ignition and putting the car or tractor in "drive."In addition to listening to your instructor, your horse will have a few things to say to you as well. On a good day, he'll be happy to go along with the program and tolerate your mistakes; on a bad day, you'll swear he's trying to kill you. Perhaps he's naughty or perhaps he's fed up with how slowly you're learning his language.

Regardless, the horse will have an opinion. He may choose to challenge you (which can ultimately make you a better rider) or he may carefully carry you over fences - if it suits him. It all depends on the partnership - and partnership is what it's all about.

If you face your fears, swallow your pride, and are willing to work at it, you'll learn lessons in courage, commitment, and compassion in addition to basic survival skills. You'll discover just how hard you're willing to work toward a goal, how little you know, and how much you have to learn.

And, while some people think the horse "does all the work", you'll be challenged physically as well as mentally. Your horse may humble you completely. Or, you may find that sitting on his back is the closest you'll get to heaven.

You can choose to intimidate your horse, but do you really want to? The results may come more quickly, but will your work ever be as graceful as that gained through trust? The best partners choose to listen, as well as to tell. When it works, we experience a sweet sense of accomplishment brought about by smarts, hard work, and mutual understanding between horse and rider. These are the days when you know with absolute certainty that your horse is enjoying his work.

If we make it to adulthood with horses still in our lives, most of us have to squeeze riding into our over saturated schedules; balancing our need for things equine with those of our households and employers. There is never enough time to ride, or to ride as well as we'd like. Hours in the barn are stolen pleasures.

If it is in your blood to love horses, you share your life with them. Our horses know our secrets; we braid our tears into their manes and whisper our hopes into their ears. A barn is a sanctuary in an unsettled world, a sheltered place where life's true priorities are clear: a warm place to sleep, someone who loves us, and the luxury of regular meals. Some of us need these reminders. When you step back, it's not just about horses - it's about love, life, and learning. On any given day, a friend is celebrating the birth of a foal, a blue ribbon, or recovery from an illness. That same day, there is also loss: a broken limb, a case of colic, a decision to sustain a life or end it gently. As horse people, we share the accelerated life cycle of horses: the hurried rush of life, love, loss, and death that caring for these animals brings us. When our partners pass, it is more than a moment of sorrow.

We mark our loss with words of gratitude for the ways our lives have been blessed. Our memories are of joy, awe, and wonder. Absolute union. We honor our horses for their brave hearts, courage, and willingness to give.

To those outside our circle, it must seem strange. To see us in our muddy boots, who would guess such poetry lives in our hearts? We celebrate our companions with praise worthy of heroes. Indeed, horses have the hearts of warriors and often carry us into and out of fields of battle.

Listen to stories of that once-in-a-lifetime horse; of journeys made and challenges met. The best of horses rise to the challenges we set before them, asking little in return.

Those who know them understand how fully a horse can hold a human heart. Together, we share the pain of sudden loss and the lingering taste of long-term illness. We shoulder the burden of deciding when or whether to end the life of a true companion.

In the end, we're not certain if God entrusts us to our horses--or our horses to us. Does it matter?

We're grateful God loaned us the horse in the first place.

Author Unknown

Sunny winter day!

2009-01-20T15:49:00.002-05:00

It was a gorgeous sunny day here in CT today. The high is 25F, but the sun is shining so its just gorgeous out there!

I snuck in a little time with my gal today. I had two ideas of what I wanted to do. First I thought we would work on temperature taking. Lakota is quite resistant to the, ummm, intrusion. So I thought that would be a good ground exercise to work on, that wouldn't entail too much movement with the poor footing.

Lakota was quite excited to see me come out to the paddock at a non-feed time, and she nickered to me. Then when I came out of the door with her halter in my hand, and my fanny-pack of treats, I got a really big nicker, because she knew then that we would be having some fun! She strolled right on over and stuffed her nose in the halter as fast as she could.

Well, color me surprised, but we were finished with that exercise in less than 10 minutes! We went into the stall and after about 3 clicks and treats, the thermometer wsa inserted, and she never moved an inch. Didn't squirm, fuss, fidget, nothing. I even worked a bit on duration, and kept it in long enough to actually take her temperature, and had to deliver her treat with an outstretched arm while still holding the thermometer in place, and she still didn't move a foot, and stretched her neck to meet me without moving feet. I'm so proud of her"!! It was as if she has been fine with this all along, and that is just not the case. If a horse can clench up their butt checks, then that is what she did, because there was no way you were getting that thing where it was meant to go if she had any way out of it.

Then I wanted to take a walk in the yard. Lakota hasn't been out of the paddock since late August or early September. So before I take her out to ride, I wanted to re-walk the yard a bit so she gets re-familiarzed with things. Historically, she can get a little snorty when things are new. But not so today! She strolled right down the hill. She stopped a few times to stare and blow, but she remembered the exercises we worked on last summer. I allow her to stop and look, and then she gets a treat for relaxing her head/neck and coming back to me. So I waited for her to do so a few times and she got her reward. Then I ask her to come back to me a little sooner than she offers, by just lightly jiggling the lead. Most times all I have to do is touch it and she comes right back, but for bigger scary things it can take a bit of a larger jiggle. She's a pretty sensitive girl, so my effort is always to not over-do it with her. She is a less-is-more kinda gal.

We strolled all around the yard, checking out all the nooks and crannies. She got excited when she saw the backhoe parked in the roundpen, because she loves to go touch it and get a treat. She thought that was the coolest thing when we first got it, she snorted at it and wasn't sure what it was all about, but she got a treat for being brave and investigating it, so now she can't wait to go touch it and show me how brave she is. We are weaning off touching the backhoe, though, lol!

Then one of the dogs noticed we were out, and came charging over to the fence barking. She looked but that was it. She offered to circle around me down near the garden, she remembered that in the summer we worked on my asking her to move calmly and listen to me in strange areas of the yard. So as we headed down to the garden, she offered to circle a couple of times. I did discourage this, because there is about 6 inches of snow on top of about 2 inches of ice, and its a hillside, so not a good idea.

But we did head back up to the flat area in front of the equipment barn, and she again offered to circle for me, so she walked and trotted some circles there and was quite proud of herself. She got a treat for carrying herself nicely and not moving strung out (which wsa her habit prior to working with her, likely her 25% TWH heritage).

Then I asked her to disengage her hips on both sides a handful of times, then we attempted to yield the forehand. That didn't go so well, but we'll keep working on it. Then it was time to head back up to the barn. But each time I started to walk back to the barn, Lakota would trot on ahead of me, then circle right in front of me and stop crossways in front of me so I couldn't continue walking! LOL! She didn't want to go back, despite April, Whinney, and Jen calling incessantly and beating on the gate. This happened 3 times before she finally dropped her head and moped back to the barn.

So we had a really great time, and I was just so thrilled that she remember all the things we did during the summer, even after its been so darned long since we've done anything together

Dayum its cold out there!

2009-01-16T21:27:00.002-05:00

Wow -- this "cold snap" is ridiculous! I know that most of the country is in a deep arctic freeze right now, and its not any different here. We have had daytime highs of about 10, and last night I saw -7 when I went to bed, and my local news reported the next town over from me at -13F, actual temperature, plus windchills, of course. We had frozen pipes this morning, because we ran two woodstoves last night to keep warm, and the furnace apparently didn't run, so no heat got in the basement. Luckily, opening up the doors to the basement, which froze the rest of the house, was enough to get the water going again. !

I was in a bit of a panic about getting water to the animals, and soaking Whinneys haycubes. We now have an electric/oil radiator running in the basement so the pipes don't freeze again, AND water dripping in two faucets, AND letting the furnace run (but keeping the woodstove going so that we don't go broke!) So of course, forget doing anything productive outside other than trying to get chores done without freezing. The horses are all handling the weather fine. Lakota is finally fluffed up and April is about half fluffed. Neither are showing any effects of the cold, other than choosing to nap in the sun. Whinney is toasty warm in her super thick blanket, and very grateful for her warm mush. Jen seems to be doing just fine, she is wearing her blanket and is warm underneath, and not acting cold or hungry at all.

Speaking of hungry, I just LOVE the Nibble Nets! They have actually left hay behind even on their normal rations with the cold, and are not acting hungry at all. They just pick away and keep warm and full, without me feeding twice as much hay and having them still go hours and hours without hay by just tossing it out.

The goats are not real happy about this weather. I'm getting a little concerned about Momma goat. She seems to be getting a little thin, so I've increased her grain, and am watching and making sure Baby goat doesn't steel it. Baby goat is overly fat. Momma goat is old, but still. They refuse to go in the shed, and if I do lock them in, they just head-butt the door until they bust it open and break out anyway. So I've been feeding their hay in the low corner next to the shed, its sheltered between the hillside and wall of the shed there, and they seem to like that spot, and sleep in the hay and chew their cud. Hubby is going to have a cow when it all melts and he has a fit about stuff against the back of the shed or it will rot out. Oh well, just need to shovel it out in spring!

The ducks are not happy, but so far all are still alive. They spend a lot of time alternating standing on one foot while warming up the other one, with their heads tucked under a wing. I feel bad for them, but there really isn't anything I can do. They have been living under the truck cap, and I put plywood around the bottom on one side for a windbreak, and the other side is against the woodpile. They could go inside the hay shed, but they won't go in there anymore, they prefer this spot.

The barn cats seem to be faring well, also. They spend most of their time in the loft, snuggled up in the hay, and only come out for breakfast and dinner. They are all FAT, and I actually checked Daisy's belly, she looks pregnant but I was told she was spayed.

No photos, its too cold for the camera, even my electric fence charger stopped working last night, but worked again this morning once the sun got on it. Its 3F right now at 8 pm, keeping fingers crossed that everything is as it should be in the morning.

Sunny day

2009-01-11T19:14:00.004-05:00

After about 3 inches of snow on top of 2 inches of ice last night (I'm not complaining, they predicted 8-10"), the sun came out and the sky was robins egg blue, as is typical of a New England day after a snow storm. The sun warmed the air and the snow reflected the sunshine back, and it was glorious!!! Even though the thermometer said 25F, it sure felt at least 40F with the sun and no breeze. Have I mentioned the sun?

After morning chores, then lunch, I decided to push the housework (which is in DIRE need, I might add) to the back burner. After all, its going to be hard-pressed to get to 15F for a high for the next 4-5 days, and I'll have plenty of time to keep warm vacuuming, scrubbing, and organizing. My daughter and I decided to play with the girls for a little while before the sun dropped too low, causing long frigid shadows.

Unfortunately, I still can't even bring a horse out of the paddock if I wanted to, there is just too much ice, and ice combined with hills is just not a good mix. They are fine on their own, they can pick their way, they know every square mm of their paddock, but I don't like to take them out where they don't have the ground memorized, when the footing is either deep mud, or icy. Mandy wanted to play with Whinney a little bit first. Whinney is Mandy's pony, that she has sadly outgrown. Whinney loves Mandy so much, she just begs for them to do something together, so Mandy has started doing ground stuff with her, and she wants to end up with an obstacle course, sort of like dog agility. We'll see how that goes.

Since we couldnt' really do anything requiring movement, Mandy wanted to teach Whinney to pick up rings, with the goal of her carrying them and putting them on a peg, or in a bucket. Whinney watched me start this process a few weks ago with Lakota, so she already had an idea of what the game was. Soon enough, Mandy had Whinney picking up the rings. All the while, Lakota stood at the door, watching, taking notes, and giving tips and pointers to Whinney.

While we were waiting for the use of the stall, I sat down in my chair to soak up a little bit of sun and that elusive Vitamin D, while Jen stood watch over me (and blocking most of my sun, too!).

After Mandy's hands got cold from wet pony slobber, Lakota leaped into the stall and gave me "the look".

In no time at all, Lakota had progress from just touching the rings, to letting me put it in her mouth, then opening her mouth for me to put it in, then to picking it up herself. I think the next time, I'll start putting the ring in different places and see if I can get her to pick it up herself, then we'll move on to what she can do with it once she has it. She progressed much, much faster than last time, I think because she was watching Mandy and Whinney. Mandy also noted that Whinney was sticking her muzzle inside the ring, which is what Lakota did last time while Whinney watched.

This may sound like silly stuff, and while it is fun, it also has a use. Lakota has mouth issues. She hates a bit and won't take one, she also hates dewormer tube, and really doesn't like her mouth messed with. This exercise will help her to soften her mouth (mentally), and allow me to handle her mouth without her being so resistant to having things done with it.

As I mentioned before, it also develops our relationship, she continues to have trust in me, and she gets to do stuff that is fun for her, too. By mixing things up, with stuff that is fun for her rather than just me, she is more eager to do things together, wondering what sort of fun thing we may do next.

Lakota was not even halter-broke, nor was she catchable when I got her at 7 years of age. So she will revert to what I call her "feral" state when she is left for any amount of time. Not that she forgets anything she's learned, she just goes back to not wanting/needing human company. So it is very helpful for me to have some fun little things to do with her when the weather doesn't allow us to work on more traditional exercises.

Ducky update

2009-01-10T21:36:00.004-05:00

You may (or may not) remember back in November, I posted about Ducky, who was the duckling hatched out on Halloween night. The kids found him half dead laying in the yard, left behind by mom and siblings early on November 1st. They brought him in the house and saved him, warned him up by snuggling with him for hours.

Unfortunately, its winter here in New England. Ducky couldn't go outside by himself in that weather, and he couldn't keep up with his mom and siblings. He seemed to be a bit premature, and wasn't really good at walking for a few weeks, and really didn't have much of an inkling to follow and stay with them.

So we've been raising Ducky in the house, since its too cold for him to go out on his own. He has a dog crate for safety, and an x-pen that we let him out in when we are around to make sure no cats or dogs are interested.

Ducky is doing well, but, well, he doesn't know he's a duck. See, he thinks he's a dog. He gets upset when the dogs leave the room, and he weaves at his fenceline. He plays with the dogs through the x-pen, reaching his beak through to grab Skippy (the corgi) in the tail or foot, or even her ear. He'll grab Shouey's fur and pull it when she is laying next to the pen. He stands at the pen and "air bites" with Skippy. She snaps, he snaps, and the two of them snap at each other. Its very, very funny, but I'm not sure how safe it is for Ducky.

The kids take him out to the garden when the weather is nice (unfortunately not that often), and he has a blast investigating everything, digging, eating weeds, and just being a duck.

I opened the x-pen the other day to let him explore the living room a bit. He's getting quite bored with nothing but shavings, food, water, and newspaper, so he grabs stuff through the pen and pulls it in. He pulled in a shoe (which he proceeded to poop on, so now its his), he pulled in a sock (don't ask), a dog leash, the sleeve of my jacket, and he opened up the curio door and pulled out some of my elephant figurines.

Ducky has an angel wing. One of the males had an angel wing, and one other of the 9 outside has one as well, the rest are all normal. So I have a feeling that the non-dominant male snuck in and had a little fun before he got taken (shortly before this clutch hatched).

I tried wrapping the wing, but my attempts failed miserably. So we are just going to have to resign ourselves ot the fact that Ducky is going to need a little extra care.

I guess these pics are a little old now, 12/13 and 12/17, but I'm finally getting around to posting them. Sort of a comparison picture. Now, please don't look at ME in this photo, its just positively awful and must have been taken pre-coffee and pre-shower. But its cute to compare it to the older pics.

Here is my pathetic attempt at correcting an angel wing. It didn't last long. Oh, if you don't know what angel wing is, its when the last joint of the wing turns out, so the feathers don't lay flat against their body, they stick out sort of sideways. It could be from too rich nutrition, and the feathers growing in too fast, the weight of which subluxates that joint. Or it could be genetic (which I suspect is in Ducky's case, because they all ate the same thing, and only two ducks one inside and one outside, developed it).

I thought I had some photos of his siblings, but they don't even have feathers in those photos, wow they got big fast! I'll try to snap some tomorrow, they really are gorgeous. There are three whites like Ducky, 3 blue & white, and 3 black and white. One of them is really, really mild in temperament and doesn't wander away from mom at all, just hangs with her, and is really quiet. Maybe she can be a companion for Ducky in his rabbit cage. We'll see when spring comes.

Updated -- here are the photos of Duckies siblings that I promised.

2009-01-07T22:40:00.003-05:00

Yesterday was the first day of RAC2009 http://curlyhorsecountry.com/RAC2009contest_details.htm that I actually had a chance to do anything with either of my girls. I had about an hour to either start taxes, or play with my girls. What do you think I chose?

We have lots of ice, and frozen rutted mud, so I decided to work on deworming today. Neither of my girls are good about it, at all, and I've just avoided the issue by squirting dewormer in their grain for years. I know the day will come when I need to get something into their mouth, so it was long overdue.

I mixed up some applejuice in one syringe, and some molasses and warm water in another syringe, and out to the barn I went. The kids apprently got to the applesauce before I could.

Lakota volunteered to be first, and she was clicked and given a treat for touching the curious yummy smelling tube with her lips. It wasn't long before she understood the game, and by the third or fourth time, she was putting it in her mouth. She was a bit offended the first time it squirted until she realized it tasted yummy.

Then Jen was begging for a turn, and she is so much fizzier than Lakota. She is an over-achiever, and after only a few minutes she though that if putting the tube in your mouth gets you a treat, then perhaps biting the tube in half gets you a bigger treat! Not so, Jen, it just makes the game end, as she ran off, spitting bits of broken plastic out along the way.

Of course, Whinney and April were right behind me, and trying to snatch at any drips that came from the girls mouths. After the crunching incident, I told Jen the game was over, and played with Lakota just a little longer (I had been doing two of them at once). I decided that now was the point at which I should have her allow me to put it in her mouth, rather than offer her to take it. That went surprisingly well, and I stood on her right (because that was the uphill side), wrapped my left arm around her head gently, then inserted the syringe between the lips on the side on her right side. Historically, just the site of the tube would have her eyes popping out and her running backwards snorting, and if she was haltered the head would be 15 feet in the air, eyes popping out and running backwards.

I just gently inserted the syringe, squirted a little apple juice or molasses in there, then clicked and treated.

The only downside to this fun? It is cold out. Actally, only 30F, and with the ice storm that started last night and has continued all day long, there was that really raw feeling to the air. And my hands were sticky with molasses and apple juice, AND frozen!

I tried getting a photo of both girls together to post, but, well, it didn't work out all that well, this is the best I got out of 25 photos

And here are some photos this morning from the ice storm

The promise of spring, still enrobed in winter

Thoughts for 2009

2008-12-29T08:48:00.002-05:00

"45 Life Lessons"

This was written By Regina Brett of The Plain Dealer, Cleveland, Ohio.

"To celebrate growing older, I once wrote the 45 lessons life taught me. It is the most- requested column I've ever written. My odometer rolls over to 70 in August, so here goes:

1. Life isn't fair, but it's still good.

2. When in doubt, just take the next small step.

3. Life is too short to waste time hating anyone.

4. Don't take yourself so seriously. No one else does.

5. Pay off your credit cards every month.

6. You don't have to win every argument. Agree to disagree.

7. Cry with someone. It's more healing than crying alone.

8. It's okay to get angry with G~d. He can take it.

9. Save for retirement starting with your first paycheck.

10. When it comes to chocolate, resistance is futile.

11. Make peace with your past, so it won't screw up the present.

12. It's okay to let your children see you cry.

13. Don't compare your life to others. You have no idea what their journey is all about.

14. If a relationship has to be a secret, you shouldn't be in it.

15. Everything can change in the blink of an eye. But don't worry; G~d never blinks.

16. Take a deep breath. It calms the mind.

17. Get rid of anything that isn't useful, beautiful, or joyful.

18. Whatever doesn't kill you, really does make you stronger.

19. It's never too late to have a happy childhood. But the second one is up to you and up to no one else.

20. When it comes to going after what you love in life, don't take no for an answer.

21. Burn the candles, use the nice sheets, wear the fancy lingerie. Don't save it for a special occasion. Today is special.

22. Over prepare, then go with the flow.

23. Be eccentric now. Don't wait for old age to wear purple.

24. The most important sex organ is the brain.

25. No one is in charge of your happiness except you.

26. Frame every so-called disaster with these words: 'In five years, will this matter?'

27. Always choose life.

28. Forgive everyone everything.

29. What other people think of you is none of your business.

30. Time heals almost everything. Give time time.

31. However good or bad a situation is, it will change.

32. Your job won't take care of you when you are sick. Your friends will. Stay in touch.

33. Believe in miracles.

34. G~d loves you because of who G~d is, not because of anything you did or didn't do.

35. Don't audit life. Show up and make the most of it now.

36. Growing old beats the alternative -- dying young.

37. Your children get only one childhood. Make it memorable.

38. All that truly matters in the end is that you loved.

39. Get outside every day. Miracles are waiting everywhere.

40. If we all threw our problems in a pile, we'd grab ours back.

41. Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need.

42. The best is yet to come.

43. No matter how you feel, get up, dress up, and show up.

44. Yield.

45. Life isn't tied with a bow, but it's still a gift.

Only for Love

2008-12-23T20:45:00.002-05:00

A brother and sister had made their usual hurried, obligatory pre-Christmas visit to the little farm where their elderly parents dwelt with their small herd of horses.

The farm was where they had grown up and had been named Lone Pine Farm because of the huge pine, which topped the hill behind the farm. Through the years the tree had become a talisman to the old man and his wife, and a landmark in the countryside.

The young siblings had fond memories of their childhood here but the city hustle and bustle added more excitement to their lives, and called them away to a different life.

The old folks no longer showed their horses, for the years had taken their toll, and getting out to the barn on those frosty mornings was getting harder but it gave them a reason to get up in the mornings and a reason to live. They sold a few foals each year, and the horses were their reason for joy in the morning and contentment at day's end.

Angry, as they prepared to leave, the young couple confronted the old folks. "Why do you not at least dispose of 'The Old One.' She is no longer of use to you. It's been years since you've had foals from her. You should cut corners and save so you can have more for yourselves. How can this old worn out horse bring you anything but expense and work? Why do you keep her anyway?"

The old man looked down at his worn boots, holes in the toes, scuffed at the barn floor and replied, " Yes I could use a pair of new boots. His arm slid defensively about the Old One's neck as he drew her near with gentle caressing he rubbed her softly behind her ears. He replied softly, "We keep her because of love. Nothing else, just love."

Baffled and irritated, the young folks wished the old man and his wife a Merry Christmas and headed back toward the city as darkness stole through the valley. The old couple shook their heads in sorrow that it had not been a happy visit. A tear fell upon their cheeks. How is it that these young folks do not understand the peace of the love that filled their hearts?

So it was, that because of the unhappy leave-taking, no one noticed the insulation smoldering on the frayed wires in the old barn. None saw the first spark fall. None but the "Old One".

In a matter of minutes, the whole barn was ablaze and the hungry flames were licking at the loft full of hay. With a cry of horror and despair, the old man shouted to his wife to call for help as he raced to the barn to save their beloved horses. But the flames were roaring now, and the blazing heat drove him back.

He sank sobbing to the ground, helpless before the fire's fury. His wife back from calling for help cradled him in her arms, clinging toeach other, they wept at their loss. By the time the fire department arrived, only smoking, glowing ruins were left, and the old man and his wife exhausted from their grief huddled together before the barn.

They were speechless as they rose from the cold snow covered ground. They nodded thanks to the firemen as there was nothing anyone could do now.

The old man turned to his wife, resting her white head upon his shoulders as his shaking old hands clumsily dried her tears with a frayed red bandana.

Brokenly he whispered," We have lost much, but God has spared our home on this eve of Christmas. Let us gather strength and climb the hill to the old pine where we have sought comfort in times of despair. We will look downupon our home and give thanks to God that it has been spared and pray forour beloved most precious gifts that have been taken from us."

And so, he took her by the hand and slowly helped her up the snowy hill as he brushed aside his own tears with the back of his old and withered hand. The journey up the hill was hard for their old bodies in the steep snow.

As they stepped over the little knoll at the crest of the hill, theypaused to rest, looking up to the top of the hill the old couple gasped and fell to their knees in amazement at the incredible beauty before them.

Seemingly, every glorious, brilliant star in the heavens was caught up in the glittering, snow-frosted branches of their beloved pine, and it was aglow with heavenly candles. And poised on its top, a crystal crescent moon glistened like spun glass.

Never had a mere mortal created a Christmas tree such as this They were breathless as the old man held his wife tighter in his arms. Suddenly, the old man gave a cry of wonder and incredible joy. Amazed and mystified, he took his wife by the hand and pulled her forward.There, beneath the tree, in resplendent glory, a mist hovering over and glowing in the darkness was their Christmas gift.> >Shadows glistening in the night light.

Bedded down about the "Old One" close to the trunk of the tree, was the entire herd, safe.

At the first hint of smoke, she had pushed the door ajar with her muzzle and had led the horses through it. Slowly and with great dignity, never looking back, she had led them up the hill, stepping cautiously through the snow.

The foals were frightened and dashed about. The skittish yearlings looked back at the crackling g, hungry flames, and tucked their tails under them as they licked their lips and hopped like rabbits. The mares that were in foal with a new years crop of babies, pressed uneasily against the "Old One" as she moved calmly up the hill and to safety beneath the pine. And now, she lay among them and gazed at the faces of the old man and his wife. Those she loved she had not disappointed. Her body was brittle with years, tired from the climb, but the golden eyes were filled with devotion as she offered them her gift---

Because of love. Only Because of love. Tears flowed as the old couple shouted their praise and joy, and again the peace of love filled their hearts.

Merry Christmas!

2008-12-21T15:59:00.000-05:00

Horsey Truths (Amen!)

2008-12-20T18:05:00.003-05:00

Going around the chat lists ....

1. Think before you slap a freezing cold bit into my mouth. Try a little pre-warming instead.

2. Don't punish me for pinning my ears when you tighten my girth. If I grabbed your belt and pulled it really hard, you would make a face, too!

3. When you toss that flake of hay into my stall, please make sure my head is out of the way first

4. Remember: I wouldn't rub my braids if they didn't make me look like a dork

5. If you must wash under my tail, lay off the cold rinse

6. When taking me to a show, don't let Dad drive as fast as Mario Andretti and weave in and out of traffic

7. Regarding tube worming: there has got to be a better way

8. When we're warming up for our dressage test, please dont flap your arms and kick your legs. Spur, spur, spur, whip, whip, whip. It's hard to concentrate with all that extra movement going on up there

9. Get the dogs and cats out from under my legs where I can't see them (unless you like them tenderized)

10. When we're jumping, let me decide when to leave the ground. After all, they are my feet.

11. Watch where you make me step. Would you want to walk over gravel in your bare feet?

12. Let me have lots of time outside with the herd. It gives both of us more of a chance for a social life

13. On using tie-downs and draw reins: have you ever tried running with your nose strapped to your chest?

14. Don't start a tug of war with me - I'm bigger than you and I'll always win

15. If you want to jump ahead of me, be my guest. But be prepared to jump alone

16. Try to remember to clean my bucket. Would you drink out of the same glass every day for months on end?

17. My tail was made for getting rid of flies, not to practice Hollywood hair-dos on

18. When you're giving me a bath, try not to let the water run down into my ears and I'll try not to let it run down your arm and bra

19. When you brush my face, keep it in mind how you felt when your mother used to insist on wiping your nose for you.

20. You watch television when you're bored - I spook at the troll in the corner of the arena. It's the same thing really

21. I don't go to your house to bother your little brother or your dog, so please don't bring them to the barn if they are going to bother me

22. If you can't sit in the saddle properly, don't expect me to keep jogging

23. When cleaning my hind hooves, don't crank my leg high up in the air or my only recourse will be to pass gas as soon as your face is level with my tail

24. Don't hate me because I insist on saving both our lives from the monster that lives in the mailbox

25. Be understanding. There are days when you would buck and squeal if you could26. If you don't want me to roll right after my bath, don't put me outside

27. I only keeping knocking the barrels over to keep you on your toes

28. Please don't get angry with me when I try my best but I'm just not good enough to win. Remember you bought me - I didn't pick this career

29. Be warned: They don't call it "lungeing" for nothing

30. I only helped you remove those bandages because you forgot to last night

31. Please don't lock the cats out of the barn at night. They tell the best vet jokes

32. Honest, I meant to just grab your sleeve to get your attention

33. Half-pass, schmaf-pass. I can think of an easier way to get from one corner of the ring to another

34. Why do you think they call it a "flying" change?!

35. "Nose painting" on the walls of my stall is more fun with beet pulp

36. Please don't get frustrated with me when I don't perform like Big Ben and I promise to love you even when you don't ride like Ian Millar.

Holiday Horse Health Warning!

2008-12-19T18:09:00.002-05:00

We get those emails with the warnings of holiday things toxic to our dogs and cats, like essential oils and pointsetta's for cats, and of course dogs and chocolate, turkey skin, holiday decorations and plants.

But does anyone ever put out a holiday warning for horses? I've never seen one, but had the opportunity to experience one first hand.

We're getting our first real snowstorm of the season. I thought "Yeah! Finally I can get some decent Christmas horsey photos without mud!"

So after we got a good 6 inches, I trudged on out with my bag of tricks -- my Santa hat, some red bows, and a new item this year, a strand of gold garland. I've seen photos of horses with the garland wrapped around their halter, and it looks kinda nice.

My first victi.... er I mean model, was Lakota. (Well, actually Whinney was first, but she was so intent on getting her mush I barely got a shot with a bow on her, she couldn't manage to stand still knowing that big bucket of nice warm hay cube mush was waiting for her). So I haltered Lakota up, wrapped the festive garland around her halter, and took a few photos.

So then I added a red bow, and took more shots. Then I took off the bow, and added the Santa hat, kept rearranging her in front of the barn doors for a nice background, and kept snapping away. Jen was very interested in the entire process. In hindsight I think she was assuming there would be cookies involved and wanted in on the deal.

So Lakota is tied up, looking horribly bored and wishing her annual torture to be over, and Jen was standing inside peeking around the corner, and looking interested in Lakota's adornments. I thought that would make a cute photo, she had her neck all arched, stretched out sniffing Lakota, so I stepped back and commenced to shooting and missing most of the shots because of the camera delay

Then suddenly, Jen reached out, grabbed the garland off Lakota's halter, and took off with it! I went after her, attempting to grab it out of her mouth, but she was furiously munching it down! I then started to get pretty worried, as I'm chasing a non-haltered previously abused mare down who is frantically chewing a 2 foot long strand of garland and gnoshing it down as fast as she can before the insane human catches her (as if I actually could outrun a horse). It was something out of an Abbott and Costello movie, as Jen kept running around one side of the barn, I came out the other door to head her off, and she spun around and wheeled off the other way, still chewing, and repeat a half dozen times. The next thing I know, I see nothing hanging out of her mouth. Uh-oh.

I am now mentally dialing the vet to find out how badly I should worry about 2 feet of garland down the hatch of a 14.1H mare. Lakota, in the meantime, has pulled loose (her lead was only draped over a ring, she wasn't tied tight), because the insane human must certainly be after her next. She is running off trailing her lead, in a rope halter, with garland remnants trailing from her head. I put her out of my mind at the moment, because I know that if she steps on her lead she'll just stop and give to the pressure and not freak out, which of course she did, she is such a good girl.

But Lakota is getting a little worked up because her herdmate has been captured by the insane 2-legged, and has poor Jen by the mouth (still sans halter), reaching into her cavernous gob digging out wads of garland.

Jen took exception to the intrusion, and was running backward, while I've got her lower jaw in my left hand and my right arm reaching into her mouth as far as I can without getting bit. I did get munched once, and when I yelled OUCH!!! she ran faster (backward). I pulled a couple of wads out, then had the presence of mind to grab a halter. It took a bit to convince her to let me halter her, but she eventually (after some impromptu roundpen-esque body language quick change of directions until she stopped moving). I haltered her, then reached in and pulled out a couple more gobs. When I got far enough back to start hitting hay, I knew I had gotten it all. I never saw her swallow, so I'm pretty sure I got all of it, and even had to pull bits of the plastic pieces off her tongue and the roof of her mouth. Jens' mouth is pretty messed up and lots of scar tissue, from whatever reason, harsh bit in harsh hands and/or lack of dental care, and she holds big gobs of hay in the sides of her mouth, then spits them out in the water tank (yuck). So once I got to hay I was pretty convinced I had all of it.

That was my afternoon. I then caught Lakota, re-dressed her up, and thats when I think I got some pretty decent shots. I did ditch the darned garland, though!

The 6th Picture Challenge

2008-12-16T19:22:00.005-05:00

I recently read about a new-ish Blog game. Check your images folder for the the 6th photo. I've also seen it to check the 6th folder for the 6th photo (on Lasell's Horsey Therapist blog). I wasn't going to bother doing it at first for two reasons. The first reason, is that I lost all my photos in a hard-drive crash over the summer from a lightening strike. What I do have is recent, only from July of this year, so I didn't think it would be all that interesting. The second reason, is that my folders are very unorganized. I have not taken the time to reorganize them yet, rename them and put them in folders so I can find them, they are just in dated folders. That is my "after-the-holidays, horrible winter weather nothing else to do project".

But I looked anyway, both ways.

Here is my 6th photo:

This is an Appy filly at a broker lot at risk to be sent for slaughter, that Another Chance 4 Horses was trying to get pulled and find a home for. I had seriously considered taking her in. But I had to pass on her, due to our financial situation. It ripped me up. I understand that she did find a home at the 11th hour.

This is the 6th photo in my 6th folder:

At first I wasn't going to bother posting this one. Booo-rinnnng ... just a photo of the barn progress. That's my husband up there on the roof, scaring the crap out of me. I wanted a shot of him before he plunged to his ultimate death (which of course didn't happen). And that is my son by the stall door, doing who-knows-what.

But then for some reason I decided to zoom in to make the photo larger. You can't see it well on this version, because I made it smaller to post here. But take a look off to the far right, where the horses are locked in the upper paddock so they don't get into trouble with tools and open gates while working on the barn. That's Leroy up there, about 3 weeks before he died. Here, I'll zoom in on it for you...

Why is this such a great photo to me? That is Jen there, sharing a hay pile with Leroy. I never saw any of the girls share with Leroy, and nobody ever shared with Jen, either. I thought he never quite managed to worm his way all the way into the herd in the brief 8 months he was here. But I was wrong. I have a huge grin on my face now, knowing that he did fit in, and shared "breaking bread" with his herdmates.

The two of them look so normal, and so happy, and content. Not like the scared, starving creatures that showed up here on a trailer. Its the little things like this that make me happy, and make my heart sing.

TO HAVE A HORSE IN YOUR LIFE

2008-12-15T21:54:00.001-05:00

TO HAVE A HORSE IN YOUR LIFE

To have a horse in your life is a gift. In the matter of a few short years, a horse can teach a young girl courage, if she chooses to grab mane and hang on for dear life. Even the smallest of ponies is mightier than the tallest of girls. To conquer the fear of falling off, having one's toes crushed, or being publicly humiliated at a horse show is an admirable feat for any child. For that, we can be grateful.

Horses teach us responsibility. Unlike a bicycle or a computer, a horse needs regular care and most of it requires that you get dirty and smelly and up off the couch. Choosing to leave your cozy kitchen to break the crust of ice off the water buckets is to choose responsibility. When our horses dip their noses and drink heartily; we know we've made the right choice.

Learning to care for a horse is both an art and a science. Some are easy keepers, requiring little more than regular turn-out, a flake of hay, and a trough of clean water. Others will test you - you'll struggle to keep them from being too fat or too thin. You'll have their feet shod regularly only to find shoes gone missing. Some are so accident-prone you'll swear they're intentionally finding new ways to injure themselves.

If you weren't raised with horses, you can't know that they have unique personalities. You'd expect this from dogs, but horses? Indeed, there are clever horses, grumpy horses, and even horses with a sense of humor. Those prone to humor will test you by finding new ways to escape from the barn when you least expect it.

Horses can be timid or brave, lazy or athletic, obstinate or willing. You will hit it off with some horses and others will elude you altogether. There are as many "types" of horses as there are people- which makes the whole partnership thing all the more interesting.

If you've never ridden a horse, you probably assume it's a simple thing you can learn in a weekend. You can, in fact, learn the basics on a Sunday, but to truly ride well takes a lifetime. Working with a living being is far more complex than turning a key in the ignition and putting the car or tractor in "drive."

In addition to listening to your instructor, your horse will have a few things to say to you as well. On a good day, he'll be happy to go along with the program and tolerate your mistakes; on a bad day, you'll swear he's trying to kill you. Perhaps he's naughty or perhaps he' fed up with how slowly you're learning his language. Regardless, the horse will have an opinion. He may choose to challenge you (which can ultimately make you a better rider) or he may carefully carry you over fences - if it suits him. It all depends on the partnership - and partnership is what it's all about.

If you face your fears, swallow your pride, and are willing to work at it, you'll learn lessons in courage, commitment, and compassion in addition to basic survival skills. You'll discover just how hard you're willing to work toward a goal, how little you know, and how much you have to learn.

And, while some people think the horse "does all the work", you'll be challenged physically as well as mentally. Your horse may humble you completely. Or, you may find that sitting on his back is the closest you'll get to heaven.You can choose to intimidate your horse, but do you really want to? The results may come more quickly, but will your work ever be as graceful as that gained through trust? The best partners choose to listen, as well as to tell. When it works, we experience a sweet sense of accomplishment brought about by smarts, hard work, and mutual understanding between horse and rider. These are the days when you know with absolute certainty that your horse is enjoying his work.

If we make it to adulthood with horses still in our lives, most of us have to squeeze riding into our over saturated schedules; balancing our need for things equine with those of our households and employers. There is never enough time to ride, or to ride as well as we'd like. Hours in the barn are stolen pleasures.If it is in your blood to love horses, you share your life with them. Our horses know our secrets; we braid our tears into their manes and whisper our hopes into their ears. A barn is a sanctuary in an unsettled world, a sheltered place where life's true priorities are clear: a warm place to sleep, someone who loves us, and the luxury of regular meals. Some of us need these reminders.

When you step back, it's not just about horses - it's about love, life, and learning. On any given day, a friend is celebrating the birth of a foal, a blue ribbon, or recovery from an illness. That same day, there is also loss: a broken limb, a case of colic, a decision to sustain a life or end it gently. As horse people, we share the accelerated life cycle of horses: the hurried rush of life, love, loss, and death that caring for these animals brings us. When our partners pass, it is more than a moment of sorrow.

We mark our loss with words of gratitude for the ways our lives have been blessed. Our memories are of joy, awe, and wonder. Absolute union. We honor our horses for their brave hearts, courage, and willingness to give.To those outside our circle, it must seem strange. To see us in our muddy boots, who would guess such poetry lives in our hearts? We celebrate our companions with praise worthy of heroes. Indeed, horses have the hearts of warriors and often carry us into and out of fields of battle.

Listen to stories of that once-in-a-lifetime horse; of journeys made and challenges met. The best of horses rise to the challenges we set before them, asking little in return.Those who know them understand how fully a horse can hold a human heart. Together, we share the pain of sudden loss and the lingering taste of long-term illness. We shoulder the burden of deciding when or whether to end the life of a true companion.

In the end, we're not certain if God entrusts us to our horses--or our horses to us. Does it matter? We're grateful God loaned us the horse in the first place.

Author Unknown

To Good Home Only!!! (satire)

2008-11-28T20:08:00.004-05:00

For Sale to Good Home Only!!!

11.2H pony mare, very pretty color and an easy keeper! She hardly needs much food and her feet are great, she is barefoot! She has done everything, jumping, polo, trails, leadline, pony parties. She loves kids, and teaches them a lot.

I have no choice but to sell or give her away to a good home only or she will go to auction tomorrow. The pasture is gone now and well, you know how the economy is, and I just can't afford to feed her for the winter. She is 25 years old, but doesn't look a day over 10! She can't chew hay anymore, and you know, its just such a pain to have to buy a special feed for her, and to actually have to bring a bucket of hay cubes in the house to soak for her to chew.

She loves kids, and only does a few pony tricks, like the old drop & deke maneuver, but all kids know how to deal with that. She knows how to stand forever while she is being kicked in the ribs, too, but if a grownup just gets her started, she goes alright. She knows when a half hour is up though, and then she's done.

But, she's really cute, and a pretty color, so you could breed her!!! She's only 25, and you know ponies live to like 50, so she's still plenty young enough to breed.

The first person that shows up with a trailer and cash gets her, or she goes to auction. You know what will happen to a fat old pony at an auction, so it won't be my fault because you didn't buy her before I had no choice. Or I will trade her for a chainsaw, or an ATV, or tractor, or a breeding hound dog, or one of them thar pretty painted kinda horses.

See how great she is? Come get her before my kid gets home from school. I just really can't manage to feed her anymore.

==================================

So anybody that knows me, knows that this post was nothing more than satire. Yes, Whinney is ancient. Yes, Whinney can no longer chew hay and is sucking the flavor out and leaving wads of hay all over the paddock. Yep, I've spent the last week going to the ends of the earth (or at least New Haven County) looking for hay cubes that are soakable and OK for an IR pony. She's getting chilly at night because she can't eat enough hay t keep herself warm, so now requires a blanket at night.

She is still as fat and sassy as ever, and will not be leaving.

But I have read SO MANY ads just like the one I wrote above. I just couldn't resist.

Giving Thanks

2008-11-27T08:28:00.002-05:00

Every year I write a few paragraphs on what I am thankful for. I beleive it is important to give heartfelt thanks. This year, it is going to be harder than other years to give thanks. It has been a difficult year, and we have suffered many losses. I will need to dig deeper than usual to find things to be thankful for.

This year, I am thankful for the health of my family. We are all still going strong, perhaps a year older and with a few more aches and pains under our belts. I am thankful that my children remain healthy and are doing well in school.

I am thankful for friends and family, both those here geographically and those that I have known and befriended through email. Our friends and family seem to always be there when needed the most, and I hope that we have been able to do the same.

I usually give thanks for the privilege of being gainfully employed, but I cannot do that this year. Instead, this year I am thankful for government unemployment, because without it I don't know where we would be right now, but it wouldn't be here.

I am thankful for the companionship of my critters. They give me their love and devotion every day, no matter what mood I'm in or what challenges I'm dealing with that day. They teach me much about unconditional love, and patience. I am thankful for the all-too-short time with Ana and Leroy. They were both taken from us far too soon, but I am humbled by being given the opportunity to share a part of their lives.

Last, but certainly not least, I am thankful for all those special individuals, who give their time, heart and soul to helping those less fortunate than themselves. Those people who save horses from neglect, abuse and slaughter, dogs and cats from neglect, abuse, and the gas chamber, children from unfit homes and other people from unfortunate circumstances. They risk their own comfort, lives, even safety, and their very own soul by subjecting themselves to the daily horror that most of us could never imagine, in order to make a difference.

Thank you.

It's done!!!!

2008-11-14T21:56:00.003-05:00

Yahoo!!!!! Finally, it is finished. Well, as finished as its going to be for awhile, anyway. But my part is finished. The painting is complete, 18 gallons and 6 weeks of hand-brushed onto rough-sawn pine. The doors are up, windows on, trim, etc. The only thing left to do is some lighting and outlets, gutters, and of course the floor/footing. That will have to wait due to lack of funds, and without flooring there aren't any stalls. But at least there is shelter. And hay storage.

I decided to paint inside the stalls, because I hate the look of muddy, poop smeared old plywood. So I chose poop brown for the bottom half, and used a cream/beige for the top half, to keep it from looking like a cave. I want to do a little running horse stencile along the color line to soften it a bit. Too much? Tough -- its my barn and I'll decorate it the way I want to. lol!

I left the upper 4 feet above the plywood plain pine, and I left the beams unpainted, too. I like the look of old beams. I'm thinking of putting a clearcoat over this, but havent' decided yet. Or more likely, I'm not yet over all the painting. I'm starting to begin to feel my right arm again. I had to wait 3 hours to brush my teeth after getting up in the morning or else my hand is so swollen I can't close my fingers and drop the brush. Now I'm down to about 2 hours. So improving :-)

The newest addition

2008-11-11T21:37:00.005-05:00

No -- not another horse! I can't believe you would even think that! (grin)

Sometime Halloween night, our Muscovy duck managed to hatch out a clutch of 13 eggs (coincidence?). Not the best time of year, but she is a new mom, so I guess she has to learn somehow. I knew she was sitting on eggs but couldn't find the nest for about 3 weeks. Since they hatch in 28 days, I couldn't really take the eggs away from her at that point, it just wouldn't be right.

So on Saturday, 11/1, there was momma duck with her little trail of ducklings behind her in the cool sunshine. We called the kids out to come see, and they ooohed and aahhhhed over the cute little ducklings that momma kept far away from the humans.

Then my son happened to look down by his feet, and there was a little duckling, upside down, eyes closed, head lolling to the side, and cold. Nope, it wasn't dead, but almost. He nestled it in his hands, then handed it to me, where I then pronounced that it may not make it. The kids insisted on trying to save it, and while I tried to explain about survival of the fittest, and that the reason why they lay so many eggs is because some will NOT make it. I busily readied myself for the days painting, and the kids brought the duckling in the house and snuggled it all morning long until it perked up. Then they set it up in a cat crate, and its name became "Champ".

Champ is now a week and a half old, and has endeared himself to the family. The kids snuggle him before and after school, and I have been known to take pity on the poor thing and let him climb up my shoulder and nibble my hair, which seems to be a favorite pasttime of his (or hers?)
(self portrait, not good at all, I know, and also quite early in the morning).

If we can just keep Champ from getting chomped by the dogs until he is big enough to go outside, we'll be doing well. He's far behind his siblings in development, and I don't think he would make it if we tried putting back out with them. I tried last weekend, but he sort of stumbled around, lurching rather than waddling. Since the kids had named him and grown attached, I decided he would need to be raised in the house if he would have any chance. He is also smaller than them as well, so I think he was a bit premature, or a runt. Maybe he was the last egg laid, so didn't get as much incubation time. If he becomes nothing more than a lame duck (har, har, har) he can live in the old rabbit pen that was abandoned by Dengi, when he went in search of greener pastures (or more likely, girly bunnies). The pen is protected from legged and winged predators. He'll need a companion I'm sure, I haven't even begun to think about who I would relegate to companion to a lame duck, but that is all a ways in the future.

Champ apparently like snuggling in sleeves, also. He stayed in there for well over a half hour before my son decided it was his turn to hold the duck.

Paddock Paradise

2008-11-07T18:49:00.013-05:00

I thought I would share the Paddock Paradise I have set up here for my horses, ala Jaime Jackson, with a few tweaks due to my property setup.

Here is a map of the property.

Red is the property boundaries of 3.88 acres

Yellow is the horses perimeter fenceline

White is the electric cross fencing

Maroon squares are barn (lower) and run-in (upper)

Green are gates

The purple circle is the roundpen

You can also see hubby's barn which is his "good stuff" storage, and hay storage in the loft for my horses. And then in the lower left corner you can see the house. Yes, I have to walk all that way every day (barefoot in the snow, uphill both ways, doncha know). Seriously though, it really is very uphill, as you'll see in the minute.

The white cross-fence in the lower paddock has grass growing, as well as the one on the right, and the far left lower have been seeded as well. The horses have continuous access to the "center" portion, sort of a screwed up Z shape.

The upper section is their "playground", it is the flatest area of their turnout, and they rip around up there when the mood strikes. The lower area which is attached to the barn as a 24/7 run-in is the feeding area. I have ordered some NibbleNets, I can't wait to see how well they slow down motor-mouth Whinney, whose "full" button is broken, and she just never, ever stop chewing.

This is the lower paddock/feeding area, the barn is just to my left behind that rock and the electric fencing dividing this lower paddock in half is now just to the right of that rock you see in the center. So Jen (the horse in the blanket on the far right) is standing in what is now a grassy/grazing area. I set out hay in separate piles, 1/2 to 1 flake per pile.

And this is the far end looking back toward the barn. That is the back of hubby's barn there, and you can see the posts of the barn there (these pics were taken last winter before it was finished). Again, from about the center of the photo to the barn is now electric fence, with the left half being grazing. (I guess I should get updated photos).

Standing at the bottom of the paddock, looking up toward the run-in shed. There is now electric cross-fencing about where the red brush is all the way to the top of the hill, and that section on the right has been seeded for grazing and erosion control.

This is standing at the top of the hill, looking to the left. This is the "playground" where they like to race around.

This is standing with the photo above behind me, looking back down toward the yard and house. Ther eis now an electric fence right in front of me in this photo, so this steep hillside has been seeded for grazing and erosion control.

This is a shot of the terrain of the "center section" just behind the run-in. Yes, they run across this, too.

And here is some older video of them racing around on it.

Happy Birthday, Cher!!!

2008-10-01T16:50:00.004-04:00

Cher turned 10 on September 20th. She's doing great for a 10 year old girl, although she is becoming quite grey around the muzzle, and her eyes are getting cloudy. But she sure is still full of plenty of energy!

And someone, in case you can't tell above, was very jealous and wanted her photo taken, too. Skippy actually turned a year old in September, if I could find her paperwork I could remember when the actual date was! I think it is something around September 23rd.

And on the first day of Autumn, KeKe snuggled into a nice, warm, fluffy bed (otherwise known as Shouey) for her evening snooze

Wow!

2008-10-01T16:17:00.007-04:00

Here is a photo of a little friend that visited me this morning :-)

Well, it sure has been a long time since I've updated, so I guess I'll throw a few random things out here in cyberspace.

September has been absolutely crazy. Something weird is going on with the world or something, because nothing is quite right. It reminds me of that Dr. Suess book, now I can't think of the name of it, where there are shoes growing on peoples heads and alligators walking down the street. I am hoping that it straightens out soon, and we can all get back to normal around here. I'm not going to write much about it all now, because I'm trying to keep a positive outlook, and keep positive energy flowing by not focusing on the negative.

On a positive note, we are finishing up the work on the barn. Its coming along nicely, and I am in a lot of pain from painting! I get a pinched nerve in my right shoulder when I use that arm for much of anything. Now the muscles are so knotted up and pincing the nerve, that its difficult to sleep. Hopefully I'll have it finished in another couple of weeks, then I can work on getting this arm fixed, but there is no point doing that now when I only need to keep painting and getting it finished.

Hay in the barn is like money in the bank (well, mostly the opposite, but you get my drift)

It sure is nice to have a tack area for a change and not have to drag it all up from the house anytime I get a chance to ride. Plans are to put a wall up here and separate it from the hay, to keep the area as dust and dirt free as possible. The window should be installed this weekend.

I also finally got the last, most difficult area of the paddock cleared out and seeded a few weeks ago. There was a lot of brush that needed to be cleared from trees the horses killed in order to keep us warm in the winter. And of course, my resident lumberjack takes what he needs and leaves all the brush behind for yours truly to clean up. I spent most of the summer on that, clearing the areas nearest the fences first and tossing it over the fence, then I had the center left to do. I finally decided to just stack it up into 3 brush piles to let it rot where it lay, otherwise I would have killed myself. The hill is at about 30 degree angle, and with oak trees and thus a ton of acorns, its like walking on marbles uphill. Its very exhausting and tiresome, and my legs and back always ache for days afterward from working on that hill.

I was thrilled when I finally finished it, and seeded it. So we should have some grazing next year, even if its only an hour a day, I'll feel better with them getting something live to eat.

And on the top of this hill is my "flat area" for riding. Flat, of course, is a relative term around here. But its larger than my roundpen, and I think will be a good transition area for Lakota and I to work in. She is very comfortable riding in the roundpen ,but not elsewhere. So we are working on having confidence in my leadership abilities in the saddle while out of the safety of the pen. This also gives us a bit more challenging terrain for her to learn to balance with me on board. Our first time proved that she was very unsure if she could carry me over varying terrain.

And here is my girl modeling her new saddle. I sold my Torsion Treeless, and bought a Barefoot London Treeless. Its a dressage model (for those that don't already know), and it fits both of us a bit better than the Torsion. It can still use a bit of tweaking, and we're working that out. But its comfortable, and puts me in the correct position, and fits Lakota better. I just need to work out the fact that it (and all saddles) tend to ride up on Lakota's withers, and her huge shoulders, and that I can feel the stirrup leathers under my thighs which is quite uncomfortable.

I just had to throw this photo in, of her mule-face. It cracked me up. She was being a bit stubborn!

The Best Decision ~ A Joe Update

2008-08-22T13:31:00.003-04:00

I made a very difficult decision last year, and that decision was to sell Joe. Joe is (or was) a 6 year old Quarterhorse gelding that I bought a few months after Turbo's death. He was going to be my trail-riding buddy. But of course, with other horses, kids, and a household, my trail riding plans are unfortunately few and far between.

After 2 years of only sporadic working together, Joe began to lose his patience with me. I could tell he was becoming unhappy and bored. Joe is a very charismatic, smart, funny, outgoing horse. Standing around in a paddock eating all day was not his idea of fun (although my girls don't seem to mind it at all). When I did get time to take Joe out, he would be so over-enthusiastic that I couldn't manage to channel his enthusiasm into a productive outlet.

I thought long and hard about it, but I had learned a lesson a few years prior. I was always very proud that I wouldn't be "one of those owners" that dump their horse at the first sign of trouble. I am committed to my horses. I love them, and provide them with the best home. They are kept barefoot, fed hay 24/7, safe fencing, an interesting paddock lots of hills for condition and nooks and crannies to investigate, the best food, minimal chemical interevention, and gentle, natural horsemanship type training with the animals best interests taken to heart.

Well, that last item, with the animals best interests taken to heart, can become clouded by our own pride. What could be a better home than mine? What horse really wants to work? Horses don't mind standing around eating and relaxing at all, in fact it is what they would rather do, right? I was committed.

And then I met *Wind Traveler. Trav was my first Curly horse, and I bought him as a young colt. I had a baby at the time, and not much time to spend with the horses, other than daily feeding, handling, grooming, etc. Then Trav was 2, and it was time to start some groundwork and relationship work with him. He was becoming pushy and obnoxious. I will admit, that I really didn't get along with Trav much at all. I don't think he liked me, either. It was nothing personal, we just didn't mesh. But I was proud, and I was going to work through our differences, and we would be friends eventually and riding partners.

I had my trainer come over, and Traveler did NOT like being told what to do, at all! He reared and struck out at her, and at that point I decided it was time to geld him. I put the training on hold, scheduled his brain surgery, and it was done in October. I had him scheduled to go for a month training with a John Lyons trainer in January. It was obvious he was more than I could handle at the time, and we needed someone with some more experience. But I was committed to this horse, and was going to keep him for life no matter what. I never sell a horse.

In January, there was an ice storm on the weekend we were going to bring Trav up to Maine for training. So we postponed it until April and better weather. Then on February 2nd, Trav somehow managed to impale himself on an 8 inch long, 1/2" diameter oak stick. Peritonitis had already begun to set in by the time he was found. We decided not to put him through heroic measures of 30 days of 24/7 IV antibiotic flushes and the certain risk of laminitis, and decided to humanely euthanize him.

I am ashamed to admit that I felt a little bit of relief. I can't say why, but there it was. My husband was devastated, and I had no idea how he had connected with Trav, a non-horse person, but he had.

So there you have it. If I wasn't so proud, and had admitted that Trav was too much horse for me, and found him a more appropriate home, he may not have had to die in order to get out of here, where he didn't belong.

So when it became obvious to me that Joe was unhappy, I decided to do the right thing .... for him. I now feel that my presence in his life was merely to serve as a catalyst, to bring him from Iowa to New England and keep him until his rightful owner was in the right place in her life for him.

I advertised Joe for sale in a number of places, both online and locally. I had planned to send him to a trainer for a tune-up, since I hadn't ridden him much, and couldn't really speak to his level of training or what he would be suitable for in his advertisements.

I was contacted as I arranged for a trainer, by a young lady who seemed very interested. She was very insistent that he was the horse for her, and even came out to see him when I wasn't home, even though I had left her a message at home cancelling the appointment and asking to rescheduled because of a doctors appointment.

She was quite insistent, so I agreed to let him go on a 1 month trial, to make sure they got along well, and for my own peace of mind that he would be well cared for. This young lady talked about how much she loves her horses and takes care of them, and that she would never subject them to "that Quarterhorse training", they are all so mean, etc., etc.

I dropped Joe off at a quant little family barn, with just a dozen horses in individual paddocks attached to their stalls, and the owner living on the premises. It seemed nice. Joe waltzed in like he owned the place (he always does), and settled right in. It seemed good.

She rode him a few times, then the phone calls started coming. She needed to put shoes on him, the boots I provided were rubbing and he was sore on gravel (although he wasn't sore on gravel at home). He spooked at the yellow lines in a parking lot. He refused to cross a stream. Then he started to act up after he "got a spanking" for not crossing the stream. He started to buck when he was forced to do something he was unsure of, rather than letting him take the time to sniff it and decided if it was OK. After he was still being forced with a crop, he started to rear. But he only behaved this way with the one person, not her friends or "trainer".

Everyone loved him at the barn, and nobody wanted to see him leave. But he continued to act up, and act out. I arranged to visit, to try to see what was going on. When I arrived at a predesignated time (and I was on time, which is a miracle itself), he had just been turned out into a grass pasture from his usual dirt lot. When the girl caught him (easily enough), she decided, for some reason, to run with him toward me and the gate, away from the horse he was turned out with. Now, Joe is a confident, herd-leader horse. He likes buddies, but he is confident enough to not need a horse with him at all times. But these people made him herd-bound, by doing everything with her friends horse. They rode them together, always, turned them out together always, lead them together, always. It was quite odd.

Anway, as she runs in with Joe, he pulls away, breaking the snap and taking off at a dead run around the pasture. He wants nothing to do with being taken off grass, and the horse he was with went into a tizzy fit, racing around, snorting and blowing as if he had a tiger on his tail.

I stood still, waited for Joe to slow down, then walked up to him and took him by the halter. I asked her for the lead and looped it on, then handed the lead to her to head out the gate.

Joe shouldered into her, barged ahead, and was a total BUTT about leading. I took the lead, and showed her how to lead him (basics, right? an experienced horseperson?) If he barges ahead, ask him to back up. Ask him to take his shoulder away if he gets in your space. She insisted she "can't be mean to him". Joe was walking on a loose draped lead with his chin at his knees with me and his "buddy" way up ahead and almost out of sight. With her, he pushed, and shoved and barged. It was horribly obvious, but I am certainly no magical horse trainer!

When we went back to his paddock, she fed him about half a bag of carrots, then talked about how much he likes donuts, and Slurpees, and all this other crap. How much he likes his treats, etc. I looked him over, and he did not have a sore back, nor sore feet (but the feet were too long with those horrid shoes on). But he did have a big crease down his back, and a cresty neck. He was FAT! I told he she had to stop feeding him all that crap or he would founder, and it likely didn't help his attitude or energy level, either. I showed her how to lead him, I told her that she was letting him walk all over her. He tried bumping me a few times, and I politely asked him to stay out of my space, which he did. But he continued to mug her, push her, get in her space, and he basically herded her around! Joe is a Watch Joe Jack bred hot little cutting bred gelding. So he is damn smart, and dominant, too. Its not rocket science to handle these horses, but maybe it is?

The girl decided that she was going to try sending him to a trainer. Two weeks later she called and changed her mind. Everyone had convinced her that it would never work out. I agreed, wholeheartedly. So now I had a horse that had developed bad habits at someone elses barn, a horse I had for sale, and I had already turned down a few prospective buyers, after all, he was there for 6 weeks!

I found Jenn of Roundtuit Ranch willing to take him and tune him up, and entertain perspective buyers, with an arena so he can be ridden there (which I don't have). Joe was delivered, mostly without incident (but without a halter), and spent 3 weeks with Jenn.

Joe never put a single hoof out of place while there. He never acted up, or attempted to act up once. He was the perfect gentlemen. Jenn put him through his paces, lunged, free-lunged, walk, jog, lope, back-up, tied, roped, and dragged stuff around on him, and he was just perfect. I visited him there numerous times, and he was happy, confident, and respectful. Finally, someone that gave him direction!

A few people came to see him, some interested, some less so. I had him listed for what I had paid for him 2 years prior. Most people wanted to spend significantly less, so I'm not sure why they were looking at him anyway.

Then I got an email from his Dreamhorse ad, the mother of a teenage girl looking for her first horse. At first I wasn't sure if a young girl would be right for Joe, since he can be a bit dominant. I explained to the mother that Joe LOVES children (he does!) but that he can be a little dominant and pushy if he is allowed to walk all over you, so needs someone that is more on the confident side, not a timid person. She said her daughter had been taking lessons and riding horses for 4 or 5 years, and had been saving up for her own horse, and that they would contact the barn owner and go look at him.

A week or so later, I got a call from Jenn, the barn owner. The young girl had been out to see and ride Joe a number of times, and they were very interested! She said that Joe went perfectly for her, and they seemed like the perfect match. Since Jenn does this for a business, I had to put my trust in her that she knew what she was doing.

The arrangements were made, and Joe was sold to a teenage girl I'll call "L" in August of 2007. (I won't share her name or location for her own privacy). I ended up selling Joe for quite a bit less than I had him listed for, and I also had to pay another $650 for his 3 weeks at the training/sale barn, but after speaking with L's mother, I was less concerned with the money, and thrilled that Joe had found his match!

L has kept in touch with me every few months with little updates and photos of she and Joe. She sent me Christmas photos, and High School graduation photos. And she gave me permisson to share this most recent update and photo. My heart melts, and I get all teary eyed thinking about the wheels that needed to be set in motion to make this all come together for them. And how thankful I am that Trav taught me that lesson (or maybe thankful that I was able to see the lesson in that situation). And now I know, that Joe was never truly "my" horse. He was never meant to be my horse. I was the middleman. I was the catalyst to get him across the country, and keep him fed and healthy until L was ready for him.

I didn't have a horse of my own as a young child. I am thrilled that I was able to make it happen for another.

Hi there Michelle,

How have you been? I hope all is well and that you have been having a great riding season/summer! Everything is great here, I just wanted to let you know how Joe and I are doing together since on August the 16 it had been a year since he had come home!!!!

Joe and I are going wonderfully together! He has excelled in almost every way possible, it's amazing what a year's time can bring. We ride almost every day and he loves it (especially the part when we're done and he gets his abundance of treats, hugs, and kisses)!!!! I am telling you, he LOVES to run! I love to run too so it works out perfectly!!!! In the evenings we go up a certain stretch of dirt road by the barn and his whole demeanor changes: he gets all excited and jazzed up and the minute I say the word "lope..." I don't even have to use any leg, just the word and it's like shooting a bullet out of a gun...he takes off up the road and when we stop at the top of the road he's ready to either keep going or go back and do it again!!!! He is just one amazing horse. He has become so confident and no matter the situation he puts his trust in me. I am so happy that he has become my horse because I really love him to pieces! I am pretty sure he is very happy, too!!!! : )

Sometime I'd love it if you'd come see him...maybe we could all go on a nice trail ride someday. You and I could finally meet, you could see Jojo again, and Joe could reunite with one of his old horsey friends again!!!

and ......

Hi there Michelle,

Of course you could share my e-mails! I really do not mind. I think it would be great to show people how much I adore Joe and how far we have come in just a year, because he really has simply blossomed! **HE IS A STAR** Of course, I think it was WONDERFUL that you sold Joe because he has made my young life feel so complete and enriched. My buying Joe from you was the single best thing that I have ever done. I can't tell you enough how wonderful it feels to finally have a horse of my own. Before I bought Joe, I had been taking care of and riding other people's horses since I was thirteen years old; although I enjoyed it, it's just not the same as having a horse of my own. To me there's nothing like heading to the barn after a crappy day at work or school and seeing Joe come loping through the paddock and over to the fence to greet me...I can't help but smile and think of how lucky I am.

It makes me feel so happy to read that you feel as if you made the right decision in selling Joe to me. I want to assure you that my home will be the last home Joe will ever have. I want him to grow old with me. In your selling and my buying Joe, not only have I found a wonderful horse and a great riding partner but I have also found a lifelong friend and companion.

Hope to hear from you soon!!!!

--L

Gillette Castle

2008-08-07T20:54:00.018-04:00

Today we took the kids to Gillette Castle. It is the home of William Gillette, the original Sherlock Homes in the earliest movies.

The Castle was built from 1914-1919 to be Mr. Gillette's retirement home. It took 20 men 5 years to complete. He hired local farmers $1.00 per load to bring fieldstone up the hill to construct the castle. It is steel framed with local fieldstone structure. All the woodwork (and there is a LOT) is Southern White Pine, and hand-hewn. There are 47 doors in all, and no two doors are alike, each is intricately engraved by hand. There are quite a few little secret hallways. Mr. Gillette also had a "state of the art" security system -- in the form of mirrors disguised as windows. When he stood in certain areas, he could see into other rooms, who was entering his home, if anyone was in teh bar doing something they shouldn't be .. that sort of thing. He also had a fire-protection system, which consisted of a 7,000 gallon cistern on the roof that collected rainwater. He had sprinklers piped throughout the castle, and he had a carved wooden pull-handle in one nook, that all he had to do was pull it, and it opened the pipes and sprinkler system in case of fire.

When William Gillette died in 1937, his will insisted that the medieval castle he'd built not fall to "some blithering saphead who has no conception of where he is or with what surrounded."
The castle was valued at $1 million in 1937. The estate sold the castle and 120 acres to the State of Connecticut for $30,000, and it has been a State Park and attraction ever since.

http://hartford.about.com/cs/daytrips/a/aagcastle.htm

The kids loved it, and my son had decided he would like to move in immediately ;-)

Here are some photos.

This is the walkway toward the entry

If you are facing the castle entryway, this is the right side

And this would be the left side

This is the rear of the castle, standing in the garden looking up

The garden

This is the view of the Connecticut River from the garden

Some of the interior photos will be blurry. Flashes were not allowed, and it took me awhile to figure out the best setting on my camera for interior photos with no flash.

Here is one of the lightswitches as soon as you walk in the main entrance. Mr. Gillette was a railroad buff, so he had a railroad influence throughout the castle. All the lightswitches look like railroad levers.

This is a window in the hallway to the main room

And here is the main room. All the stone is local fieldstone. Mr. Gillette chose black grout for between the stones in the hallway for a dramatic flaire. For the rest of the house, he chose red grout, as you can see in the lightswitch photo above.

All the ceilings and wood is Southern Pine.

The table you see in this photo has an interesting story. Mr. Gillette also loved cats, and he had anywhere from 12 to 17 cats at any one time living with him. Its hard to see in this photo, and the closeup one did not come out. But there are cutouts and "dangly" carvings hanging all around the table, similar to a Tiffany lamp. Mr. Gillette had all the "dangles" suspended on cord, rather than having them carved in on the same piece of wood. He did this so that the cats could lay under the table and play with the dangles. He also loved frogs, and he had a collection of ceramic frogs on the fireplace, as well as some incense burners. He had them cemented to the mantle so that he could enjoy them, without the cats knocking them down and breaking them.

View from a hallway window of the Connecticut River

Mr. Gillette had ordered in some grass-type matting for the floor-covering. But when it arrived, he decided he wanted to leave the hardwood floors so they can be seen, and that this would work better as a wall covering. Some of the rooms have some hand-painted designs, which would be the master bedroom, and his niece's guestroom.

This is a photo of the windowlock

This is the office. Interestingly, the office chair is on rails, similar to a railroad track. Apparently all the furnishings were from Mr. Gillette's fathers house, and this heavy chair had scratched up the floor. So he created these tracks, to keep the chair from marring the pine floors. A little different from those plastic mats we are so used to, eh?

The kitchen was quite small and unremarkable

The lighting throughout the castle was very interesting. These are all hallway lights, if I remember correctly.

Here is the master bedroom

And the niece's bedroom

And some more lightswitches

This is the hallway up to the library. It was really striking, I wish the photo came out better.

The Library

I only managed to get photos of 8 of the 47 doors, so here they are. I don't recall where most of them were. This one I do remember, of course. It is from the main room to the garden.

This one is a broom closet in the office

This is a door to the library. The doorknob opens sort of a pully system. And this is not really woven wood, but it is carved, flat on the bottom, but carved and laid to look woven.

So that is about it for inside. Then outside, there is a walkway that goes down the mountain, to a couple of fields, one leads down to another road at the back of the property, and another path meanders down to the Connecticut River. It is quite steep and long. Mr. Gillette also had a boat, the Miss Polly (I think I remember that correctly) named after a nurse who nursed him back to health as a youngster through Tuberculosis. It was 133 feet long, then he decided to add 14 feet to it, so they cut it in half and added it in the center. Unfortunately, it burned completely and was never rebuilt. Apparently a piano was saved, and that was about it.

This drainage ditch runs the entire length of this path. We actually got some good ideas from this for our own hill!

The bottom of the path looking back up

A pair of stone pillars serving as the entryway for a field

A cool twisty tree I saw on our walk

Ledge that the castle is built on, just above the photo is where the castle is

The pond

The kids playing on the beach of the CT River

Vacation Week

2008-08-06T13:45:00.013-04:00

Well, we kicked off our vacation week with Leroy's death yesterday, unfortunately. But we had promised the kids tobring them to Action Wildlife, which is more like a habitat than a zoo. The enclosures are very large, at least an acre each, grassy, with natural waterways, etc. Its really very nice, and the animals are all happy and well-adjusted, as well as reasonably friendly.
These photos are in no particular order, because it is a royal pita to upload and move images around bloger

This is some sort of wild yarrow, on our "wilderness walk", which is about 3 miles altogether. This goes around the back of the park, through the huge deer exhibit.

This appears to be a "Zony", a cross between a zebra and a pony. A Zorse would be a horse, but this one was about 13H, so pony sized. No, it is not pregnant, it is a gelding, just quite fat!

Thistle, again on our wildness walk

A tortoise, he was very cool, and had 2 companions.

Waterfowl

This we shot down the road as we were leaving. This is a 296 acre parcel of land that has been for sale for over a year now. Would anyone like to fund it for us? I would LOVE this piece of property!

Queen Annes Lace on our wildnerness walk

I have no idea what kind of flower this is, but I liked it

Silouhette of a red maple tree

Mystery bird, does anyone know what this is? They were all over the place, and following us around.

I forget what these flowers are called, having a brainfart, I have them planted along my front wall.

Ornamental grass

Some sort of thistley thing, not sure if it is a true thistle or not, it didn't look like the others, and the leaves are differnet, too.

Bull Elk

Some sort of weed thing, I thought the "flower" part was cool, its really just leaves.

Huge honkin' long-horn steer

Morning glory

Can you spot the mountain sheep?

This cow was funny. He was like "What are you lookin' at? Haven't you ever seen a cow bathe before?"

Daylilies

Another variety of daylily

I forget what kind of deer these were

Doe Sika deer .. she was standing

Cool cloud formation

Coreopsis

That silly cow again

I was impressed by the massiveness of this bull, his head was HUGE

This is a funny story.This rabbit is caring for these baby piglets, and totally taken on the roll of mothering them. The rabbit is not only a rabbit, but a male! And, the caretaker told me that the piglets have begun hopping about. She felt confident they would grow out of that once they are separated from the bunny.

Cattail

More clouds

Gorgeous black swan

The massive bull again. If I try to move this, its going to take me another hour to reformat the whole page. Sorry for the out-of-orderness of it all.

Great Blue Heron. He wasn't part of the exhibit, he was just visiting ;-)

A
A handful of blackberries -- we at them the whole way, the woods were loaded!

And the black swan again.

R.I.P. Leroy 8/5/08

2008-08-06T08:52:00.000-04:00

Leroy passed away sometime this morning. He was his usual self this morning at 7:30 morning hay time, eager for his breakfast.When I went back out at 9:30 for grain and mid-morning hay, he was gone. There was no sign of a struggle, it looks like he was gone before he hit the ground, likely dozing in the sun, or meandering to the next hay pile.

http://savingleroy.blogspot.com/

Blog-tag

2008-08-01T18:13:00.003-04:00

I just recently found out that I've been Tagged by Lasell on her Horsey Therapist blog. I hereby admit that I didn't know the rules, and had to hit my old friend Google up for the scoop. I had only recently heard about blog-tagging on Carmon's blog, but knew nothing more about it.

OK, so I'm game, though I doubt anything in my life has been very interesting ;-) So, 6 things you may not have known about me.

1) My first job was at a newspaper (the one my mother worked at), and I did the "tear-sheets", which is literally that. I scanned the daily newspaper for advertisements, and tore out the page that the ad was on, put it in an envelope and at the end of the month they were mailed to the advertisers, apparently as proof that their ad ran. Usually this was done with national advertisers, rather than local ones, who would be reading the paper anyway. The newspaper was about a 15 minute drive from high school, I was about 15/16 years old when I had this job. I either paid a friend $5 a week to drive me there, and when she wasn't there I hitched a ride with one of the teachers that lived nearby (which would raise a LOT of eyebrows these days!), or I walked. It was about a 45 minute to an hour walk. I would never walk, as a child or adult, there in this day and age! There are a couple of unsavory areas on the way.

2) My blog is mostly about my horses, with some other stuff interspersed in, but I didn't have my own horse until I was 31 years old, and as a child, only rode for about a year or two. My mothers friend (and our babysitter) boarded her horses at our house for a bit over a year when I was 14/15. That was the extent of my horse experience. I guess I dove in with 2 feet, which is generally how I do things when I develop an interest.

3) This is getting hard, I barely got the first two out. Hmmm.... what else. Ummm, still thinking...... OK, how about this. I'm afraid of getting killed or paralyzed on a horse. Seriously, I have a real fear of it. But of course, I have a fear of that with driving too. Yes, my mother instilled that in me well. I can look at almost any situation and see the danger in it. But I do like to have a life, so I do my best to put that stuff behind me, but its always there, right below the surface, ready to come out and save the day.

4) I am a woman, and I hate to shop. Yep ... hate it. I hate the crowds, I hate the noise, I hate driving there and fighting traffic, and finding a parking spot. I hate going into a store, and feeling guilty that I can't afford anything, and walking out again ... especially if it is a small, local shop. I hate seeing the exhorbitant prices of things that I would like to own, yet not being able to justify the cost. The internet has been a Godsend, I hardly have to go shopping at all anymore.

5) Building on #4, I also hate clothes and getting dressed. I am happiest in a comfy pair of sweats and an oversized t-shirt or sweatshirt. Perhaps from my years and years working in an office and having to get dressed and put together an outfit every day, I now LOVE not having to worry about what I look like (well, except on the 2 days I work).

6) I consider myself to be very blessed. I have a good marriage, a decent house, a small bit of property, live in a pretty nice little town, and don't have to work a million hours a week. My family is healthy and all lives close by. We may not talk to each other and visit often, but we all know that if one of us needs something, we're all right there for each other. We are all relatively healthy, with only minor little issues or aches and pains. I have wonderful, bright, outgoing, well-adjusted children whom I love with everything I have. I have 5 amazing horses in my backyard who bring me so much joy. I also have 5 wonderful dogs, and 2 cats living in the house with me. I love them all dearly, and am truly blessed to be able to share my life with all these wonderful souls.

So there ya go, 6 things about me. I told you I'm boring. Boring is good, though. I prefer boring to too much excitement. Excitement usually isn't positive for me, I'm happy to be boring.

So now I guess I need to tag some other people? OK, here goes. I tag ......

Adria of Green Mountain Curlies

Bonni of Kiva Arabians

Denise of Chocolate Curls

and Elaine of Dances With Hooves

There, I think that's all I have to do. If I'm forgetting something, someone please tell me.

The Incredible Power of a Teacher

2008-08-01T08:00:00.002-04:00

or this could also be titled: "How a Little Boy Can Be Left Behind"

My son was born on his due date of August 23rd in 2001. It didn't occur to me until about 4 years later, but he would only be 5 years old for about a week when Kindergarten started in September of 2006. I thought long and hard about his starting Kindergarten at such a young age for a boy. Boys typically mature a bit slower than girls on average (well, do they EVER really mature? I'm not sure about that .....). I had dutifully entered my son into preschool when he was 3. He went 3 mornings per week. I was told that he was a bit behind the other kids his age, and that I should increase him to 5 mornings per week to help him get ready for Kindergarten. I thought "Get 'ready' for Kindergarten?" When I was a kid, Kindergarten was "getting ready" for grade school. But times are changing, and kids are expected to have a solid start on reading by First Grade.

I had been a Stay-At-Home-Mom since February of 1997 when my daughter was born. I was closing in on 10 years of not working (or working part-time sporadically). I considered long and hard whether he should start Kindergarten, or wait another year. Since we were really feeling the crunch of a one-income family, we decided that he could enter Kindergarten, and he could easily repeat Kindergarten if he fell behind, and I could begin looking for a job.

When I think back to the events leading up to this summer, I think: "I should have seen this all along". But, I didn't. As the mother of a very bright daughter, I wasn't terribly surprised that my son weaned later, talked later, and potty-trained later than my daughter. He also stutters when he is excited about something, or trying to get his point across without being interrupted (usually by his big sister). He struggled a bit in preschool, and was more interested in the social aspect than the academics. He is a very outgoing child, a bit of a class-clown, and all the kids think he's cool. He is also very, very sensitive and loving.

I met his Kindergarten teacher early in the year for the "Meet the Teachers" night at the school. She was an older, grandmotherly type woman, rather soft-spoken and seemed nice enough. It wasn't long before the telephone calls started coming. "Victor has a hard time sitting still in class." "Victor comes to school with dirt in his shoes, and it falls out all over the classroom floor." "Victor comes to class with dirty hands."

In the conversations, I politely reminded the teacher that Victor has afternoon Kindergarten. He plays all morning, and while he is dressed and cleaned up before lunch and after we walk out the front door, he does play while we wait for the bus, which can come anywhere from 10 minutes to 30 minutes later. I told her that if I did not allow him to play with his trucks and cars, or play ball or frisbee while we wait for the bus, she would be having far more trouble getting him to sit still than she currently does! That comment went over like a lead balloon.

Then I got "the" call. Mrs. Grandmotherly Kindergarten teacher called on a Sunday, and the conversation went something like:

Teacher: "I don't know how to ask this question, so I guess I will just come out and say it."
Me: "Yes.......?"
Teacher: "Well, you know, there are people to help .......... you see, Victor comes to school without a coat ........... Does he own one? Can you not afford to buy him a coat? And all his pants are too short, and he doesn't wear socks, either."

I about bust out laughing, and explained to Mrs. Grandmotherly Teacher that yes indeed, Victor has no less than three coats, and he chooses not to wear them. Now, this wasn't February and 20 degrees outside when she called. Oh no, it was October or November, and unseasonably warm weather, in the 40's and 50's. I explained to Mrs. Grandmotherly Teacher that I dress my children for the weather, not the date. If its 60 degrees in January, I'm not sending him in a ski parka! I told her that he is smart enough to put on a coat if he is cold, and I am not going to force him to wear something and be uncomfortable. He also chooses to not wear socks becuase he doesn't like the feel of them, and I do force him to wear them when it gets below 40 degrees. I also explained he has a drawer full of new school clothes, and he much prefers to wear his too-short, well-worn in comfortable clothes from last year. At that point, I was thrilled that he liked going to school, so wasn't going to push the clothing issue. It was enough of a fight to get him to wear non-stained clothing, so I decided to choose my battles.

Mrs. Grandmotherly Teacher breathed a sigh of relief, laughed, and told me stories of her son, and his odd clothing choices as a child, and that she still doesn't buy him clothes for gifts, but gives him a gift certificate instead to purchase his own.

I thought that was the end of it. But it continued, with more phone calls home. During the first week of school in 1st grade, I had a call home from the principal. Apparently the school bus driver had a freak-out about my son and two other boys sitting on the bus discussing "My Daddy's gun is bigger than your Daddy's gun." Apparently she felt these 6 year olds were going to hijack the bus with Uzi's or something. Luckily, the principal is a native to this town (rather than one of the "big-city" folks that have moved in more recently), her husband is a hunter as well, and she understands that ownership of a shotgun or rifle does not automatically cause you to become a serial killer or terrorist.

I had spoken with Mrs. Grandmotherly Kindergarten teacher about possibly retaining him to repeat Kindergarten because he was struggling a bit and not quite up to grade level. She assured me that he was improving and would be fine.

The new first grade teacher was supposed to be one of the better teachers for active young boys. Her philosophy was that "every day is a fresh start", and "anybody can have a bad day", so she had a card system, where your first infraction your card went from green to yellow, then yellow to blue, then blue to red. You lost part of your recess or all of it as the infractions continued to grow, but each day you started out fresh in the morning. It seemed like a decent system at first. Now I feel this may have served to label him as a "troublemaker" child, and you'll see why if you choose to keep reading (sorry, this is so long, but I think you need the history to understand).

Victor liked his teacher well enough, he liked school and enjoyed going every day. We had a few conversations, and at the Parent/Teacher conference we had a chat about Victor and his behavior, and she seemed to understand about "little boys" and their inability to sit still for long periods of time. I thought we would have a good year. I'm sure I didn't even hear half of the stories, but we had a few telephone calls home about Victor's impulsivity, inability to sit still, his inability to finish any task without someone standing over him encouraging him to finish. He was having some difficulties keeping his hands to himself, also, and tends to strike out when frustrated. He always feels remorse and knows when he did something wrong, but seemed to have difficulty controlling the intial impulse.

Then one day Victor came home with some Starburst candy in his backpack. Hmmm..... I asked where he got that from. He said his teacher. I asked why his teacher gave him candy? He said it was a reward for doing something (I don't recall what it was). I thought to myself, Why in the world would a 1st grade teacher give out sugar-laden candy to a child who has a difficult time controlling himself and focusing? So I spoke to the teacher and told her that Victor is easily affected by sugar, and it wasn't a good idea to give him candy at school if she wanted him to sit still! She explained her reward system (which I don't agree with, but it was her classroom....). I agreed to purchase some little toys to give my son as a reward rather than candy. So I picked up a package of little plastic dinosaurs, Matchbox cars, and other little trinkets that I knew he would like, and I left them with her to give to him. He did love the special little treasures he received, I think moreso because they were cooler than candy!

Victor was also placed into an extra reading help group for kids struggling with reading. He was also placed in a speech class for his stuttering (which only comes out when he's stressed). Finally, he was placed into a class called "Special Friends", which was supposed to help him learn to deal with conflict and other children without getting frustrated and lashing out.

During this time, Victor had been having some illnesses. He seemed to pick up these stomach bugs easily, and was always sick for 3 days, where the other family members seemed to only feel ill for a few hours, or not at all. Then one day he came home from school, and he looked at his sister and said: "Your head is BIG!!!" She screamed and told him to shut up, but he said it again, and again. After I told him to stop teasing his sister, he said: "No, really mom, her head is HUGE!" I said "What are you talking about?" He said that sometimes peoples heads look really huge for awhile, then it goes away. He said that mostly round things, like heads, light fixtures look really huge for awhile, or really close, then it goes away. He called it "the eye thing", and when I asked him how long it had been going on, he said it had been going on since Kindergarten (so for at least a year!)

I thought this quite odd, but I remembered having weird feelings like that when I was a kid and having fevers. I got on the internet and started googling key words like "visual disturbance in child", and I came across the Alice in Wonderland Syndrome website. It seems a lot of people were getting this, most grew out of it by puberty and never said anything to anyone. Most of the people found that when they hit puberty, they started getting migraines instead. Some had brain tumors or other health issues. So I brought him to the pediatrician, and he had a head CT (which thankfully showed nothing), and he also had a full workup by a pediatric opthalmologist, which again thankfully showed nothing.

Then one weekend my husband brought my son home yet again from a weekend away, sick. He was on the couch for 3 days, with a headache, low-grade fever, and throwing up. My mother in law made a comment that he always got sick after being away, and I had noticed this, too. Then I started grilling hubby about what they did, where they went, when he went to bed, how often they ate and what they ate. I finally put 2+2 together, and realized that my husband was feeding them a lot of bacon, sausage, ham, and hot-dogs. Hmmm, all loaded with MSG. I read Dr. Mercola's article on MSG and being an "excitotoxin", and how it affects the nervous system. Hmmm, again.

Now, I have to say, that in general we eat pretty good. It is not often that we have pre-packaged foods, things loaded with food colorings and artificial flavors. But I didn't stress about when we were away from home, thinking that a little here or there wouldn't kill us, if we were good about our diet in general. I guess I was wrong. I immediately informed all family members that Victor was to NEVER have a hot dog, piece of bacon, sausage or ham. I told them no more food coloring, no Gatoraide or "fruit punch" juice drinks. No more Campbells soup at my mother-in-laws. I told them what to look for on labels, and I gave them a list of things that were OK for him to eat. That list included things like in-store baked turkey and roast beef sandwich meat, Wolfgang Pucks Organic soups, Apple and Eve or Juicy-Juice juices (or preferably water). No Cheeto's, Fritos, Cheeze-its. No bologna, hot dogs, ham, sausage, bacon. No food colorings, i.e., no Gatoraide, "fruit snacks", Skittles, Starburst, blue-colored yogurt, etc. As a bonus, since we were doing all this, we eliminated high-fructose corn syrup, also.

Victor has had absolutely NO MORE of his "down-for-three-days" illnesses. Wait, he did once, he had a terrible headache and was sick to his stomach. He had been sneaking candy in my husbands barn, that was leftover from the Memorial Day parade. They were tossing out to the kids as they drove the old Army Jeep in the parade, it broke down so they didn't get to finish and had a lot of leftover candy. I think he learned his lesson that day, luckily that time his migraine only lasted one night.

His reading level had increased by 10 levels. He stayed at a level 4 for a very long time, and was having difficulty concentrating and staying focused. By the end of the school year, he was at a level 14. He had improved expoenentially, but was still not quite at the level they wanted him to be at. I had discussed numerous times with the 1st grade teacher about keeping Victor back in 1st grade. I felt it would be better to do it now, than to have him struggle for the rest of his life in school, frustrated. We decided it would be best for him to repeat 1st grade.

At the very last minute, the school system decided to offer a summer school program, for some children that were struggling in Kindergarten and 1st grade. I eagerly enrolled him, and then was thrilled with the extra bonus, that they had found funding for it, so there would be no cost. I was willing to pay for the service, but was pleasantly surprised.

Victor was not all that thrilled with having his summer vacation interrupted with summer school. It was a struggle getting him there the first day, but after that, he was eager to go every day! He loved it so much, and even more so because his best friend was in his class. There were only 6 kids per class, and it went for 4 mornings per week for an hour and 45 minutes, for 5 weeks.

To say I am thrilled is an understatement. After about 2 weeks, the teacher took me aside and asked me why we had decided to keep him back? I explained to her, and she was surprised. She said he was reading and spelling at a mid-2nd grade level. He was reading and spelling words like "through" and "enough". His comprehension was also quite advanced, and he was able to relate to stories emotionally rather than just factually. The teacher said that his self-esteem really increased in the class, he was so excited that he was the "smarter" one in the class, and was able to help the other children out, rather than being the one that needed help. (See how easily a child can be labeled? Even if it isn't stated, they still pick up on it.).

Victor said to me something in the 4th week of summer school, he said "Mommy, I had no idea I was so smart!!!" Oh my, that statement just about broke my heart. It proved to me, that while nobody ever told him that he wasn't smart, he felt that is what people thought of him, so that is the way he acted. He lived up to the expectation that he was behind the rest of the kids.

So now he is going to 2nd grade, and he is just so proud of himself! He is now reading at a level 20, up two levels from where he started just 5 weeks ago. I am very happy for him, and I am ever so grateful to his summer school teacher, for believing in him, and for recoganizing the fact that he is a very smart little boy, who was only living up to what was expected of him. She also recognized how affectionate and loving he is, and that he would do better with a teacher who is affectionate toward children (which I do not believe either of his previous teachers were).

We are both hoping that Victor is assigned to this teacher for 2nd grade. She has requested that he be in her class, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed. She did recommend another teacher that she feels he would also do well with, so I'm sure he'll get either one. I do prefer the summer school teacher, however, because if he regresses during the school year, with longer days and larger class sizes, she already knows what he is capable of, and will be able to recoganize that he is getting lost in the shuffle.

It is quite incredible, the power that a teacher has in a childs life. The right match is amazing, and the wrong match can be devastating.

The New England Farmer

2008-07-28T07:46:00.007-04:00

New England's history has been one of farming for literally centuries. The soil is rich (albeit rocky) and rain is usually plentiful. An old New England farmer saying (one of many) is "You can't have winter until the swamps are full."

The winters can be long and hard. They vary in my lifetime memory from Nor'easter storms dumping 2 to 3 feet of wind-driven snow, to winters with virtually no snow, but plenty of cold wind-driven rain, ice storms, and freezing rain, to frigid cold with high mid-day temps around 20 and nights dipping below zero. Did you know that it can be "too cold to snow" in New England? Ayup, typically it snows between 20 to 32F, below around 20F, its not that common to get snow.
Winter usually starts around November with frigid winds and cold, dreary rainy days. December historically begins snow season, though I recall snow as early as October 4th! January and February are long, cold months. The holidays are over, winter has settled comfortably in, and dumps snow, cold biting winds, though usually gorgeous blue skies after a snowstorm. We "make it through" January and February to windy, wet March which typically brings some short-lived heavy, wet snow storms, the ones that take down branches, trees and power lines, along with more cold wind-driven rain, and the promise and hope that spring will come soon. The rain continues through April, and by mid May, the buds are starting on the trees, and there is a green haze to the horizon, the Sugar Maple sap is running in full force, sealing my car doors shut with dried sap, which is parked under a large Maple tree.

The point of all this? New England summers are busy, busy, busy! We spend our New England summers preparing for New England winters. Spring is cleanup from the winter, repairing areas washed away with the rain and melting snow, cleaning up downed trees and branches, repairing fences, and cleaning up debrish blown around the house area. Summer is preparing, reworking what didn't work well the previous year, fertilizing, planting, weeding, harvesting, freezing and canning. Hay is cut, raked, tedded, baled, brought in from the fields, loaded in the trailer, and put up in the barn. We need three dry days in a row to get the hay safely baled and under cover. Considering it has rained about 4-5 days out of the week since March, we've been doing a lot of nail-biting! We have now been going weekly, getting one or two trailer loads of hay. Each trailer load holds 76 bales of hay, we need about 9 loads this year to fill both barns, which should get us through about 9 months or so. Each bale costs $5. You can do the math, I would prefer not to.

Putting up hay when its 88-92 with high humidity is not pleasant. As I'm driving the truck & trailer to the barn to get another load of hay, dripping in sweat from areas that should never know what sweat is, I watch all the exercise nuts jogging through the little village past the antique shops and boutiques, with their iPods firmly planted in their ears, coordinated stark-white name-brand exercise outfit and fancy sneakers. And I can't help but think ..... I've got a great way for you to get in shape without having to breath in exhaust fumes, and you can be productive at the same time. Perhaps I have a fantastic new gym idea? Build your body and sooth your soul with equine-assisted-fitness.

So, summer has been busy, busy, busy! The barn is coming along nicely. The roof is up and shingled, the dormer is constructed, as is the little deck off the loft and steps. Hubby created a rather unique option -- a removable railing off the loft deck. This way, it is still safe and up to code with the railing, but it is removable so that we can easily access it with the hay conveyor. Clever! Its built with Trex decking material ... we had some leftover from the garden project, which was from the scrap pile at the lumberyard, so we've gotten double-duty from it.

Yesterday the plywood went on the inside of the stall area. My girls (and Leroy) are not very impressed with it. They are used to being able to see all around them at all times, and having it closed it was a bit disconcerting for them. The aisle still has no doors on it, the plywood doesn't go all the way to the ceiling yet, so this is going up in stages, and they get used to it being a little more closed in each time. Leroy, in particular, was not too impressed. I told him that he needed to let me know that he came up by the barn to get water. And he did, just like he did back in January when he was introduced to the herd and learning what the lower paddock is like .... he leaves me a giant pile in front of the tank. I'm not sure if I should be pleased or not by his little gift.

Well, I started this entry 4 days ago, and have not been able to get back to it to finish. so I'm just going to finish it for now and get it posted. I have a few more entries in my brain that hopefully I will get typed up this weekend. Which proves the point of this entry ... summers are busy! Until next time -- stay cool!

More updates

2008-07-12T14:08:00.002-04:00

It seems all I do is update, summer is too busy to spend time in front of the computer, but in the winter there is nothing going on to write about. Sort of like having the time but no money to do things, or having the money but no time.

Its been a month of my concerted effort to ride Lakota. Unfortunately, we seem to have slid backwards a bit, so this effort will need to continue. Last week, I was working with her on going outside of the roundpen. The roundpen is her comfort zone, and she doesn't like going out there in the big scary world much. Not that it matters that we walk right through the "out there" to get the roundpen, or to the grass for some grazing. No, that doesn't matter because nobody is on her back at that time. Suddenly, with a human on her back, she can't quite manage to hold it together.

So I had been working on walking out the gate, doing a few circles outside, then going back in as a reward. We've done it a few times, and she was doing well, but still sticky and needing some encouragement to get out the gate. She always seems to get stickier going out the second or third time. Hmmmm, not sure why that is.

Last week, we had gone out once, with only a bit of a balk, she did well so I rewarded her by going back inside again. We did a few circles inside, and headed for the gate again. She really balked, and I insisted she stay facing straight ahead. So she used her classic evasion technique of going backwards. Except she backed herself into the open gate, and spooked herself. She teleported to the left about 10 feet, then continued to leap sideways a few feet at a time, most likely because I was clinging to her side like velcro. I had only put the bareback pad on, so nothing to hang onto. I finally grabbed her neck and hauled myself back up. We both stood there and settled down, I waited until the shakes stopped, she dropped her head and blew and sighed a number of times. Then I asked her to move off again. And she spooked again. And again, and again. Each time I asked her to move forward, she got tense and spooked.

I finally got her to do one circle without spooking, so I decided to hedge my bets and get off her then and put her away. I didn't give her any grass rewards, or hay her after (as I usually do). Then I took her out again last Sunday. And she was still very tense, nervous and spooky. Again, I managed a couple of soft circles after awhile, and put her away. And again yesterday, the same thing. Her spooks are becoming less violent, and less often, so we're making progress. But gosh we slid back a LOT of steps! Either that or we are going through a training hump, I'm not sure which yet. I have not tried going out the gate again, she is just not settled enough even inside. I am considering avoiding the gate the next time I'm ready to go outside of the roundpen, and just mount up on her outside and see if it is the gate that is the issue, or outside that is the issue. She has become very resistant, to moving forward, to stopping, to everything. How disappointing.

Lakota has also had a runny nose for about 3 weeks. I haven't figured out what it is yet. It is intermittent, usually clear or slightly greenish tint. Not opaque green, but a clear green, like the green is just from grass or hay. She will occasionally have a bit of whitish discharge, or very slightly yellowish ,but its just a glob, then gone. She has on enlarged lymph node on the same side as the discharge (the other nostril is clear), its about the size of a pea, and not tender to the touch, I can rub it, and prod it, and she doesn't care. She has no fever, is not off her feed, and not acting off at all. I had her on an immune-boosting herbal blend for 3 weeks with not much change. I have since switched to a head congestion blend, we'll see if that helps. Oh, an she hasn't been off the property since October.

The barn plans continue to move along. We were able to manage to get our permit after some argument and pointing out how the regulations are written, not how they are "interpreted" by any town employee. The roof is going up as I write. It should be up by now, but the help bagged out on us, something about a dead neighbor. So now I get to climb up there and help plywood the roof. Have I mentioned that I don't do well with heights? Fifteen or twenty feet is OK, but the far end of the barn is up on piers, and the ground slopes down away from it sharply, so it really feels like you are out on the ledge of a 20 story building out there.

My vegetable garden is growing beautifully!!! I'm really pleased with how well it is going for only the first year. We have been eating the most delectable, tender lettuce for weeks. I only wish that lettuce and tomato's matured at the same time!!! My tomato plants are loaded with blooms and little green fruits, we are going to be having a LOT of sauce this winter! I love cooking sauce in my crockpot in the winter, and coming home from work to a finished meal and the smell of it cooking. My kids love coming home from school and smelling dinner cooking, too.

Speaking of kids, my daughter will be going into 6th grade this year. Heaven help me, she is becoming a pre-teen. My tomboy is now looking at clothes as something other than what mommy makes you put on before you leave the house. When she gets spending money, she buys herself clothes instead of toys. She is talking about boyfriends. And how annoying boys can be. And how all the other girls have boyfriends. Oh, and she wants an iPod for Christmas. I don't even have an iPod, not to mention the fact that its only July! She just got a cell phone a few months ago, against my better judgment. But, OTOH, I would like her to be able to keep in touch with us in case of emergency. So there are only select telephone numbers programmed into her phone that she can call, or that she can receive calls from. With 6th grade comes a new school too. With lockers. And changes of class. And a whole new host of problems. There have been drugs found on students in this school. And there was a bomb scare last year. So it seems that high school stuff is beginning to happen to the kids younger and younger now.

I'm not sure I'm ready yet. Why can't you keep them 4 years old forever? I loved 4. Out of diapers, out of the "mine, mine, mine" stage, helpful and snuggly, the world still revolves around Mom & Dad and they still know everything, able to entertain themselves or play with parents, and not yet tainted by the outside world.

Leroy Update

2008-06-29T21:51:00.005-04:00

OK, here is an update on Leroy. He is doing quite well. He is gaining weight, although it is slow. There is a LOT to gain! I finally got him weighed, and he weighed in at 1400 lb. He's about 16.2, my best guess, and he had already gained weight by the time he trusted me enough to let me put a "thing" on his body to measure him.

He has become very relaxed and seems like he has found his place. He will come to me and softly sniff my hand in greeting, then present his itchiest spot to me for dutiful scritching. He will now wear a blanket, a rain sheet, and a fly sheet. He is not a fan of fly spray, so I wipe it on his legs with a cloth. We are now working on picking up his feet. He will lift them, then slam them right back down again. The last time I asked for a foot (2 days ago), he hesitated for a second before trying to take it back, so I let it go right there, told him he was a good boy, gave him a scritch, and left him alone. Luckily, he is self-trimming his feet beautifully. They really do look nice!!! But, that may not always be the case, he only has about 1/2 inch left of his old hoof wall before the new stuff hits the ground, and I wouldn't be surprised if that doesn't chip off as well as the old stuff.

He is still bottom of the pecking order, but he has sorto found his place, and is no longer on the outskirts looking in. He hangs out with the girls under the fans, and spends a LOT of time at the salt block!

Here are a couple of photos I shot last week. It was early in the morning, and the sun was shining down like a beacon through the trees, right onto the ole boy.

Report from Dan Sumerel clinic

2008-06-28T20:34:00.003-04:00

OK, Lasell, and anyone else interested. Here is my best shot at my experience and what I've learned, from attending one and auditing two clinics. Oh, first of all, if anyone is interested, his website is www.sumeraltherapy.com.

To begin with Dan discusses horse thinking, herd dynamics, and helps us to learn to interpret their language, and to speak to them in their language as best we can. He tells stories of his experience getting into horses as a 40-something year old with no prior horse experience at all. Although he does admit to being somewhat of an adrenaline junkie, skydiving, racing motorcycles, that sort of thing. So he was drawn to endurance racing. He tells the story of Sunny, the Arab stallion he bought, "because he was pretty". Apparently, the seller told him that he should not buy the horse, but he did anyway. To shorten the story dramatically, Sunny ran away with Dan 42 times in the mountains of Colorado. He was told to geld the horse, which he did. He was told to get bigger bits, which he did. He was told to take the horse to "Fancy Horse Trainer of the Season", which he did (many of them). He did everything you are supposed to do, and nothing worked.

So Dan decided he had to figure it out on his own. Most of us would have sold that horse years ago, but apparently he's a little bull-headed ;-) So he said he went into a roundpen with Sunny. He asked him to move. He asked him to change direction. He did this, he did that, and before long, Sunny was beginning to realize that Dan did have a clue, and knew what he was talking about, and he could trust him, and believe in him. Sunny hasnt' run away with him since. Dan does readily admit, however, that Sunny is a horse that needs work constantly, or he starts with the little signs of the domination game, trying to take over again.

We learn what those signs are. The horse gets into your space uninvited and demands attention, runs you over, bulges their shoulder or ribcage into you brushing you as they walk past, ear pinning, cow-kicking, bolting their feet to the ground when you ask them to move. Soon you have a horse that doesn't lead well, then a horse who gives you a hard time under saddle, bolting, running away, bucking, rearing, or just plain old being difficult.

Next, Dan discusses many of the things a horse needs to be happy and comfortable, based on their evolution. He discusses shoes vs. barefoot. He discusses all the reasons that shoes are not good, what problems they cause. He discusses the pumping action of the hoof, the traction, the concussion, contraction. He talks about the fact that horses will run 50 mile endurance rides barefoot over rocky, mountainous terrain, but a dressage horse in a groomed arena that is ridden for an hour needs 4 shoes on to be sound. What is up with that? Aside from the excuse of "Well, that's what he needs", or "Oh, he has bad feet, my farrier said so", or "Of course he needs shoes because he's ridden". Well, stalls are what's up with that. Keeping a horse stalled inhibits the circulation, which causes poor hoof quality. Keeping a horse stalled is bad for his joints as well, as he doesn't get enough movement. It is bad for his back, because it keeps him living with his head up, eating with his head up, and trying to get some mental stimulation while in confinement, holding his head up to look out of his stall. It is worse for his mental health, because he is denied companionship, in an animal that has evolved over millions of years to rely on herd interaction to warn him of danger coming, for companionship, play. Would you lock your child in a closet when you are not playing with him, and toss him some macaroni and cheese twice a day?

Dan also discusses bits. He quotes Dr. Cook's papers written while a doctor at Tufts University. Those studies are available on his website. From my memory, those studies show the effects of a horse carrying a bit in its mouth, with no rider, and no reins, just carrying it, on a treadmill, and it had something like a 20% decrease in airflow (that may be wrong, please see the website for accurate details). Holding the horse "in frame" decreases the airflow another percentage. In all, the airflow is decreased something like 60%, which is what causes all the foamy sweating ... its shear panic, and trying to work while having your airflow decreased by 60%. This is not even considering a shanked bit, twisted wire, ported, etc., bits. All the salivation also, tells the body that it is eating, which ramps up the metabolism for digestion. That digestion doesn't happen, there is no food coming in so what happens? Ulcers. Which are painful, plus the decreased airflow. Is it any wonder these poor horses start to act up? That doesn't even take into account poor saddle fit or poor shoeing jobs!

Dan also discusses saddle fit, but admits to not being an expert. He does a pretty decent job, IMO, of teaching us things to look for in saddle fit, i.e., bridging, rocking, checking pomel/cantle levelness, checking the shoulders for being pinched by the tree.

Then you get to go in the roundpen, with your own horse. The goals are to get and keep your horses attention, and that the horse should be calmer at the end of the session than the start, and I've forgotten the third goal. Oops, sorry. Dan uses a plastic bag on the end of a whip as an attention getter. The owner steps to the center of the pen, and shakes the bag to get the horses attention. The amount of bag movement is directly dependent on the horse. I've seen horses that all you had to do is touch the whip so the bag just barely moved, and the horse is outta there. I've seen others (at the same clinic, incidentally), a woman needed TWO bags, and was leaping up and down waving her arms and the bags around, and her horse barely even glanced over his shoulder at her, than proceeded to lazily walk away, dragging his hooves in the arena surface, gazing out the door.

So once you have your horse moving, you need to ask the horse to change direction. The goal is for the horse to change direction calmly and respectfully at your request. Some get emotional and worried, and for these all you may need to do is take one step to the left or right. Others try to barge right through your request, and for those you need to get very animated, only going as far as you need to go to get them to pay attention, and no more. Depending on the horse, you ask it to change direction a few times. Some that pay you no attention at all, you need to work pretty hard at getting them to pay attention to you. Others require a lot of retreating from you, away from their bubble, to take the pressure off.

After you get a few good changes of direction, the pressure comes off. You stand still and get quiet, and do NOTHING. Wait for the horses reaction. Some may continue running around (the emotional ones), others will stop and look out into space, others will stop, and look at you. The looking at you is what you want. For the emotional horses, typically you need to retreat, take a step back, one at a time, until you cause them to turn toward you. Some may turn toward you, then back away again. That's OK, its a try. We reward the try by leaving them alone. I think 99% of them come back when they are ready. The ones that look out into space, ignoring you, we typically do something to get their attention back. Usually just shaking or wiggling or popping the bag. As long as you have an ear or an eye on you, that is enough, leave them alone. Sometimes we need to block their forward motion to get them to stop moving, if they are ignoring you and looking for another horse, buddy, etc.

Once you get the horse to come to you, you do nothing. Just leave them be, and let them get quiet, and comfortable with you. Some may leave, and for the most part, they come back, depending on the horsenality. Others wander off because they don't think you are really very important. Our job is to make them think we are important enough to pay attention to.

So once you have the horse really connected to you, we do some off-lead exercises, of inside turns, outside turns, stop, back up. Then we put a halter/lead on, and do some lead-line exercises. The horse is expected to walk quietly and calmly on a loose lead, not barging ahead of you, running off with you, stepping on your heels, etc. Dan has you flip the lead rope up in the air if a horse is running you over, getting pushy, or barging on ahead. When that is good, he ups the pressure, and opens the gate to the roundpen. That gets almost every horse ready to head out the gate ... its just habit. The gate is open, lets go! So then you work on some leadline work, and keeping the horse focused on YOU, not the gate.

The second day he has all the participants bring their horses into an area, and do some leadline exercises all together. This again increases the pressure, and it gets even harder to keep your horses attention, but it is a great exercises.

So, that is my own personal interpretation of these clinics. If there is anything that makes no sense, it is all my own ineptness. It is far from a complete write up, that just isn't possible, each horse is different, and you make decisions as you go along depending on what the horse brings to the table (or roundpen) that day.

Update on Lakota

2008-06-22T08:04:00.004-04:00

Well gee, I didn't know I had (a) fan(s)!!! I thought I just sat here writing for my own benefit and tossing it out into space. I will hereinafter try to be more diligent about posting. Lasell, I know I owe you a report on the Dan Sumerel clinic. I will get something written up soon, I promise. Shez, I understand your frustration with delivery services. Of course, it never occurred to me to put special instructions on the package, duh! I will try that next time, but as you said, there is no guarantee that they actually read it or follow through with it. Funder, I will try to keep updated more often, I promise ;-) I just checked your blog briefly, I love FHOTD, too. I don't agree with 100% of what she says, but most of it I do, and she has a unique way of putting it. I've been trying to keep up on her VLC blog, too, because I am in a similar situation, except that I am doing exactly what she says you shouldn't do. A greenie training a greenie, but it sure isn't for lack of trying. Congratulations on passing the Bar! In my other life, B.C. (Before Children), I was an office manager and legal assitant. I worked for, hmmm, 3 attorneys offices over the years. The first one was, ummmm, interesting, and that attorney now has quite the reputation in the area. The second was for a very, very large firm, there were over 100 attorneys at the time, I have no idea how many they have now. It is one of the biggest and oldest firms in Connecticut. The third and final one was for a Labor and Employment, and Workers' Compensation firm. The owner/managing partner was one of the attorneys I was assigned to at the big firm, and when he left to open his own firm, I went along with him. Then I had kids, and he moved to a bigger office in the City which was too far for me to be away from the kids, so here I am, working part-time for the firehouse, lol!

Anyway, so I have made an agreement with myself that I will ride Lakota at least 3 times per week, and more if possible. I think I've been doing pretty good. Since I started this 2 weeks ago, we have had some great improvements. For those that don't know, I bought Lakota 6 years ago. She was uncatchable for at least a year, and pretty unreliable after that. After rereading emails from the seller, and reading between the lines, she pretty much stood out and made babies (with her half brother) ("she's an excellent broodmare, she foals out in the field on her own". She wore a halter 24/7 ("she wears a halter fine"), and was caught for deworming and vaccinating ("she is up to date on deworming and shots" -- "we haven't had time to mess with her"), and that's it. She never had her hooves trimmed ("she wears her feet perfectly!"). And these people rescued her from someone who wasn't feeding them and was abusive! I guess that would explain why she is 14.2, and her sire is 15.2H and her dam is 15H.

Anyway, got off on a little rant there, sorry. So the first year, 2003, I pretty much worked on Lakota being caught consistently, getting her feet trimmed, and letting me touch her. The second year we worked on refining those things, so they could be done in a relaxed manner, rather than her bracing and worrying. Then we started some roundpen relationship stuff (Dan Sumerel), and backed her in 2005. In 2006 I started riding her in the roundpen a bit, and brought her to a friends place for her to be ridden for a month. I'm not sure how much she actually was ridden, she seemed pretty much the same when I brought her home again. So we just continued on. In 2007 she was doing well, and I brought her out to the trails. Apparently I missed a big step, and she got very unconfident and worried with me on her back. She was fine being led, but being ridden was just too much for her out in the big scary world. So I brought her to another trainer last August for another 30 days. Again, I'm not sure how much riding she had. She never got out of the arena, I know that. And I made appointments to come watch her riding twice a week during that month. And I saw ONE session in those 30 days. It seems that the trainer was always too busy, or somewhere else, or just not around when I came, even though it was a preset day and time. She could very well have been ridden 5 days a week as she was supposed to, but its kind of hard to believe it when you show up at a predesignated day and time, and nobody is there, at all.

So I brought her home, and Lakota was very, very uptight and worried. She wouldn't even let me touch her. I treated her for ulcers, and within 3 days she was back to her old sweet self. I pretty much left her alone for the winter, and started up again this spring. And here we are!!!

I had always been in a 3 steps forward, 2 steps back back rut. So my very good friends on the naturalhorsemanshiphaven yahoo group convinced me that I really need to be more consistent. Between weather, lack of a good safe place to ride, job, kids, and just life in general, I had been very inconsistent in working with Lakota. I have no arena, no field, and only a very small outdoor roundpen to work in, that gets deep in mud in the rain. Its really only safe for working at a walk, maybe a slow jog if the footing is really, really good, but that hasn't been the case in probably 8 or 9 months now. So that was my excuse for not "just doing it". Well, now I'm "just doing it", at a walk, but at least its something. So Lakota will now stay on the rail (mostly) rather than cutting the corners or floating around. She stops on a breath out (mostly, except when she gets worried). She steers on just my focus, and she'll walk-on with just a "life up" from me. We can now do figure 8's and serpentines. I'm sure they are nowhere near perfect, but they are becoming softer and softer. I recently progressed to riding her out of the roundpen. This was a big issue for her. She feels safe in the roundpen. Taking her out of it gets her emotions up, and she gets worried. This is a horse that did nothing but stand around in a field making babies until she was 7. She has no life experience to call upon, she didn't get exposed to anything new before she was 7. She is also a lead mare, so she is responsible for keeping the herd safe. And she is a mother, so she must be hyper-aware to keep her babies safe. Lakota is learning to put that trust in me.

So we recently started riding out of the roundpen. When I tried this last year, she would stop dead at the threshold and flat out refuse to walk out the gate. She would avoid it, turn at the last second, or if I managed to get her facing the gate straight-on, she would just plant her feet, or walk backwards when I asked for forward. A benefit to this is that I am learning how she will react to different scary things. I've learned that when she gets scared or spooked, she plants her feet and stares, and she may blow or snort. If she can't see something, it worries her. If she knows what it is, she can easily look then move on. It is the unknown that upsets her. When she gets an attitude and doesn't want to do something, she gets bargey and girder-necked and will plow through my aids. A vibrating rein gets her attention. If she gets a little emotional, a one-rein stop calms her down. If she is refusing to go forward, she goes backward. This is definately a preferance over rearing or bucking when I insist, so I'll take it!

We've been working on softening and suppling, relaxed circles, bending to the circle. We've been practicing one rein stops, and whoaing (these are very important to me!) We practice "giving to the bit" (even though she hates a bit, so we use a Bitless Bridle), and relaxing her neck/poll and dropping her head. We've been working on "default is do nothing" (don't do anything until or unless I ask). That's a hard concept for my ADD girl. All these things have softened her up enough that I've been able to ride her out the gate of the roundpen. The first time, she was a bit anxious, but at least we got out the gate. I just asked her to continue doing the same thing we were doing inside, and this relaxed her a quite bit. Lakota seems to need a lot of repetition of something for her to relax and "get over it". When our circle turns toward the long driveway that faces the road, she would get lookey-loo about it, but is now coming back to me and softening her neck rather than bracing to she can continue staring. We are now doing soft circles and figure 8's outside the pen, between the barn, pen, backhoe and driveway. This area is also gravel, so much better to work on when the ground is wet than the soft loom of the roundpen, which becomes deep mud when its wet (which has been pretty much since February).

My hope is that as we continue to do different things, that push her buttons a bit, and she lives through them, softens to them and relaxes, she will figure out that she survived. The human was right, it wasn't really all that bad at all, and the next time, it will get easier, and easier, and easier to try new and scary things, because we are only building on the past experience of living through it. She should gain confidence in me, and learn that I will not ask her to do something that could hurt or kill her. I will not ask her to do something that will scare the crap out of her.

So, that is our journey. We may not make it back out to the trails this year. I want to take it slow, and keep her soft and relaxed. I am working on the barn side of the pen now, I want to progress to the "yard" side of the pen, with more scary stuff. The neighbors, their kids, the road, flapping laundry, the garden, the dogs, the house and the deck of the house that is littered with "stuff". There is also a path in the woods behind our house. I would like to at least take her for hand-walks out there by the end of the summer. Its not safe for riding, I need to spend more time up there cleaning up broken, rusted, downed barbed wire, and some low-lying tree branches. We do have sort of permission to be on that property, though I haven't specifically asked about riding horses there. And the guy that owns it, owns it for hunting, so fall time is out, pretty much October through December, which is the best riding time here in Connecticut :-(

Here are a couple of photos from yesterday

Let This Be a Lesson to You, or Don't Let This Happen to You! or Learn from My Mistake

2008-06-20T21:07:00.002-04:00

Ugh, what a week! Well, let me start a few weeks ago. I get daily specials in my inbox from TigerDirect, for electronics sales/clearances, etc. I've bought a few things through them. They had those little thumb drives on sale for I think it was $2.99 for 1 gb ones. I bought 2 (the limit), because I have been lax in backing up. Since getting new cameras, they are much more space intensive than my old camera, and I used up my hard drive on this rickety old beast pretty quickly. So I bought an external hard drive last fall to store photos on, and its been working great! It worked so great, that I stored all my info. on it, photos, documents, spreadsheets, e-zines, etc. It takes simply FOREVER to backup to CD's, literally all day, so I haven't done it in awhile. Well, technically, since October of 2006, if you must know.

OK, so back on track .I ordered these little drives thinking they would be great for backing up, photos on one, documents on another, and easy to take right out of the machine to keep them safe, rather than climbing under the desk and unplugging stuff. Can you see where this is going?

So anyway, I'm waiting for these little drives to come, and waiting, and waiting. Then I sorta forgot about them. Two weeks later (last Friday) I had to go into the garage to look for something, I've long forgotten what. We rarely use the garage, hubby's truck is in there, but only gets taken out every few week sor so, and even then, we use the garage door to go in and out, not the side door deep in the bushes. I forgot to grab the garage door opener, so climbed through the bushes into the side door, and what do I find in there? Not one, but TWO packages left by UPS. Now, I have complained to them about this before, even directly to the driver, and it hasn't happened in months, so it never occurred to me to look out there. So my packages were sitting in the garage for close to two weeks, and I didn't know it. No note on the door, nothing.

That was late Friday. I grabbed my box, annoyed, and brought it in the house, and set it down on the dining room table. Saturday I spent the day cleaning the house, and never got around to opening the box. And as has been happening almost daily for about 2 weeks now, along came the daily evening thunderstorm. Yep, you guessed it. Power went out for a second, and came back on, and I kept hearing a "tick,tick,tick" noise, but I couldn't figure where it was coming from. I finally narrowed it down to the external drive, and couldn't find the drive from my computer, at all. I turned it off and on again, unplugged and replugged, and don't you know, the damn thing was plugged directly into the wall, NOT into the surge thing (not those cheapy ones, the big UPS/battery backup surge thingamajig). Monday I brought it to a local computer place. Nothing, nada. Can't get a single thing off it. They said I could try sending it to a place that specializes in data recovery. The cost, you ask? Oh, anywhere in the neighborhood of $500 to $2500 and up. Chump change!!! But, what cost do you put on SEVEN YEARS worth of photos? Every single photo of my son is digital from his birth until present. All family photos, animal photos, artistic type photos, photos of the renovations we did on the house, everything is gone.

And I'm blaming U.P.S. Its all their fault, of course. Its not my fault that I had the external drive plugged into the wall, or that I didn't shut the machine down when the storm came in. Its not my fault that I haven't backed up in 18 months. But it IS U.P.S.'s fault for leaving my package in the garage, because you know I would have backed up had I received my little drives.

So, no photos for awhile. I don't have enough room on my hard drive, and I don't have the cash right now to resurrect what I have and buy a new hard drive. I need to start putting hay up for the winter not to mention feeding them in the summer. And pay for the material we bought for the addition on my barn ... that is now held up due to zoning issues. That is quite a long story, that I won't go into now because nothing is resolved yet. But once it is resolved, I may have something to say about that. Not to mention paying up to $750 in the fees for the various departments to be told that we have zoning issues when you get to the very last department.

So its been a crappy week. But, 2-legged and 4-leggeds are healthy, so things really aren't all that bad anyway, are they?

Sumerel clinic

2008-06-08T18:21:00.002-04:00

I am SO behind on this blog! But, with this horrible hot weather we're having, I guess I have time to catch up, its too darned hot and humid to do anything outside.

Last weekend, I brought my friend Bernice, and her Curly horse Buddy to a Dan Sumerel clinic at Live and Let Live rescue (http://www.liveandletlive.org/) in Chichester, New Hampshire. Buddy has been having some issues with saddling, i.e., he is scared to death of the saddle after a misguided attempt at saddle training by a hired "trainer". Apparently this trainer felt it is appropriate to saddle up a young horse for hte first time then slam the stirrup against his side to "desensitize" him. What actually happened, was he scared the crap out of this poor horse, who bolted up and down the aisle, then slipped on the tar and fell.

So, when I heard that Dan was going to be out this way again, I suggested that Bernice could get some good use from attending this clinic. Dan teaches you how to convince the horse that you are good enough to be an alpha, all in a calm, pain-free way. If Buddy puts his full respect into Bernice, he will be able to get over his saddling issues easier, becuase he will trust that she is not going to hurt him. Sure, it will still take a little time, but it sure will cut down the anxiety on Buddy immensely.

I arrived at Bernice and Buddy's barn around noontime on Friday to pick them up. We loaded all her gear up, then brought Buddy out. Buddy decided he did not feel like going for a ride that day. It took about 90 minutes to get him loaded, but he eventually did so relatively calmly. He still wasn't too thrilled about it, but we didn't beat him, yank on him, use whips or butt ropes. Just a lot of approach and retreat, and patience.

We arrived without incident, tucked Buddy into his pen, dropped the trailer, met all the wonderful folks at Live and Let Live, said Hello to Dan, and then we headed to the motel for the night.

Saturday listened to Dan lecture on barefoot, saddle fit, bits, stabling vs. turnout, etc. Of course, he was only preaching to the choir, everyone there was on the same page, which was very refreshing!!! There was not one shod horse there, everyone already used gentle methods and clicker training, many horses were ridden in halters or bitless bridles, there were very few bits, although most of the horses there were rescues. Teh farm itself houses over 60 rescue horses and donkeys, a few goats, some pigs, dogs, cats, puppies, some exotic birds, its a very busy place!

Then a few people worked with their horses Saturday afternoon, then on Sunday Bernice went first. She and Buddy did very, very well, we were both quite pleased with Buddy's reactions to this method. Later in the afternoon they did a leadline class with all the horses in an outdoor arena and they did some ground exercises. Again, Buddy was a star! Granted most of the other horses were rescues, but some were very, very upset, although these are horses with some very deep seated issues.

I videoed the event for Bernice, so she can refer to it later as she continues working with Buddy.

It was great to see Dan again, and I wish Jocelyn could have made the trip too. I picked up a few tips and reinforced some of the things I've been doing with Lakota and now more recently, with Jen. And of course the improvements I need to make are: "Do less!"

Spring has finally arrived

2008-05-09T12:23:00.005-04:00

Spring is here, and with it comes all the busy-ness and work that we've been pondering all winter long.

Of course, the rain is here, off and on, usually bucketloads of it followed by some sunny days, the as soon as it dries out enough that mud isn't being tracked into the house, more rain comes.

The barn plans are underway. The fill has finally been delivered to attempt to level up the base of the barn, at least somewhat. It may end up being tiered.

You can see that we have a long way to go toward level. Then of course, you can't have a 4 foot drop, so it will need to be filtered into the rest ofthe area. We're going to try to move some of our bumper crop of rocks to hold back some of it, so we hopefully won't need to use so much fill. Then I'll rope off the bottom area and let the grass grow, as well as on the right side of the paddock, and the far left steep hill. So the horses will have a sort of horse-shoe shaped track (how ironic -- a barefoot track system in the shape of a horseshoe).

The overhang will be closed it, incorporating the new and old sections into one larger proper barn, with a gambrell roof and storage for a few hundred bales of hay, along with a trap door to drop said hay down. It is far from pleasant to truck down the hill in the pouring rain or feet of snow, to the grey tarp shed, and drag said bale of hay back up the hill to feed it out. This will be MUCH more pleasant to deal with in the bad weather. I may even have tack storage! What a concept!

I'm going to have to move my water tank somewhere else. I'm not sure where I'll put it yet, because of course it is nice and close to the hydrant here already.

Here is the lumber for the siding, picked up in two loads on the little trailer and unloaded by my other half and myself. Its the same as what is already on the existing single-stall stable, locally rough-sawn pine. A local guy, Ray Stanton, has a small mill, and he mills up lumber for some local people for smaller jobs. This is really rough-sawn, random width, and random-thickness, complete with knots and bark. I love the look. And it is much, much less expensive, and nicer to look at than T111. It does suck up a LOT of paint, but if you look at the photo above, that was painted over 10 years ago. It looks as fresh as the day it was done, so I have no complaints there.

It looks like I won't be doing any riding for awhile, as my roundpen is temporarily out of commission for ease of moving between the two areas of the property that it blocks, the "house" side and the "barn/critter" side.

This is the machine we borrowed to move all the dirt -- its sure saving us a ton of money by being able to move the fill ourselves rather than hiring someone. Thanks, Don!!! I think we have spent somewhere around $50,000 just in excavating and landscaping in the 16 years we've lived here. Living on the side of a hill is a bit of a challenge, for sure.

And our other nice project for this year, is the garden. I am SO STOKED to have a real vegetable garden, rather than a patch here and a patch there. We had to build a raised bed garden, due to all the rocks. You can't dig anything at all without a machine, its nearly impossible to put a pansy in the ground. So the topsoil arrived for that along with the fill for the barn. It was installed yesterday over a nice, thick layer of manure which I've been dumping in there for the last few weeks. It will all get tilled up soon -- its too wet now with all this rain, then I can start planting. Of course, it will be fenced, to keep the ducks and chickens out. For now, its going to be a black plastic netting w/T-posts due to budgetary issues ;-) But next year we hope to fence it in with something nicer to look at, since its right out the back door off the deck, nice and close for harvesting while cooking. We chose to use Trex decking material for the sides of the box, so we wouldn't have to worry about replacing boards due to rot in a few years. It was a little more costly, but it actually worked out because we got some old, mis-matched and sun-beaten stuff from the scrap pile at the lumber yard. We had to reinforce it with rebar pounded into the ground to keep it from bowing out. Trex boards are like working with cooked spagetti.

Here is a shot of Sherry-goose-goose. She is Bunners girlfriend, and here she is pretending that she is setting on eggs. She's too young, not even a year old yet, and she only sets there for a few hours before she gets bored and goes walkabout. Silly goose.

Here's Mr. Leroy modeling his new rain sheet, to keep him warm and dry. He took exception to it at first, but this morning he seemed more appreciative of being warm and dry when its cold and rainy out.

Both Mandy and I have started riding lessons at Sabills Morgan Horse Farm. She loves it, I am SORE!!! Its tough to teach an old dog new tricks, and it hurts, too! But I am already figuring out some stuff and becoming more balanced for Lakota. She will be happy, I'm sure :-)

I still have not worked with Jen. It seems everytime I have time, the weather is bad, or something else is going on . Soon Jen, soon, we will start your retraining. She's looking good though. I intend to start with some roundpen/relationship stuff, very, very easy going and see how she handles it. Then we'll progress to bridling and saddling. She hates having a bit in her mouth, so we're going to start with a bitless bridle and see if we can sneak in the back door with that. Then I plan to just get on her very slowly, as if she wsa never trained at all. Not because I'm worried that her training is poor, but because I don't want her to associate our riding with our she has been ridden before. I want this to be a very calm, relaxing, and fun thing to do, not something she needs to be worried about, which is how she is about riding now. She has really settled down in day to day handling, seeks out attention, and is no longer quite as braced and reactionary. She has softened so much, its just amazing to see. I know riding is an issue for her, so we'll take it slowly.

Lakota, April and Whinney are on a diet, to get rid of the pounds they packed on over the holidays. Either that or we have an equine immaculate conception on our hands. Of course, with the two skinnies, I can't cut down hay, so they are getting higher amount of VR (more protein to boost metabolism), and canola oil to detox inflammatory xenoestrogens. We'll see how it goes! After a couple of months of this, if the weather settles I'll do the full VR detox, but I want to start slowly.

So that's about all the exciting that is going on here at the moment. Happy Spring!

Despooking, and the perils of the Forest

2008-04-13T18:40:00.009-04:00

Spring is trying very hard to spring here in New England. The sun is getting stronger, and the rains are a constant threat. We have had a few dry days however, it seems for every 3 or 4 dry days, we get 2 days of rain. But overall, the sun is getting warmer and warmer, and the grass is beginning to poke its brave little starts out of the cool soil.

On Monday we had a gorgeous day in the 50's. I signed Mandy and I up for the Ride-a-Curly contest that Denise is putting on (http://www.curlyhorsecountry.com/) and for the month of April, she's having a mini-contest for despooking, since weather really isn't good enough to ride in the northern areas of the US and Canada yet. Those southern folks get a good head-start on us!

Anyway, after cold and clouds this morning gave way to sun and warm temps (52F right now and sunny -- T-shirt weather!) I had to drag my butt outside. For some reason, the thought of riding was not appealing at all, and I almost stayed in the house and did laundry I knew that was not the thing to do on a sunny day, so the laundry piles up, and I remembered about the Calmer-Smarter-Braver mini-contest. So I assembled my props, stuffed my camera in my pocket, and headed outside.

As I mentioned, Lakota has turned somewhat feral again. So as I walked into the paddock with my water bottle, a brush and a halter, all she did was turn her ears back toward me (she was facing away, standing on Ana's rock, dozing in the sun). After a few minutes, I kissed to her. That got her attention and she turned to look at me. So I clicked from across the paddock, and her head popped up, ears forward, but she didn't come for her treat. I held out my hand, and waited and waited, and waited while I was thoroughly molested by Jen trying to figure out how to get me to give up that alfalfa pellet. I attempted to invite Lakota in, and she was having none of it. I circled to the left, circled to the right, and she wouldn't take a step forward ..... until I sat down on a log. She came right on up and got her treat, nuzzled me, pressed her forehead to my chest, and put her nose into the halter. Awwwww, that is the first time she has ever willingly put her nose into the halter. I've been able to get her neutral, to the point she won't turn away before. Remember I'm still sitting on the ground, so she had to lower her head all the way.

So then I brushed her all over, and Jen was quite jealous (funny, I almost typed Ana there and had to correct it), and out the gate we went, among lots of fussing by the others, including Leroy. Leroy has such a low, deep, throaty nicker, but a high-pitched girly whinney, it was sooo funny! He called to her numerous times, April body-slammed the gate, and Whinney dug a hole to China. We made our way down the hill slowly, Lakota was unsure its been so long. So we checked out the goats sleeping in the sun, walked around and touched the pile of sand on the ground from Vic's sandblasting, the sawhorses, the crappy old trailer, and just got used to leaving her buddies behind. Remember that Lakota has a water and mud phobia, and won't step on shadows and such, so it was a big deal for her to stand on the sand, as it was different color and texture from the ground.

Went into the roundpen, and started looking at all the props. I had a pedestal, a big plastic owl, a trampoline, and a backpack filled with balls, an umbrella, and apples!

We started with the pedestal, and I was only able to progress to her pawing it, I couldn't get her to step on it (at liberty -- next time we'll try with a halter). When I tried to get her to mirror my steps and I stood on it, she bumped up to it and wanted me to get on. Awwww. She got a hug for that (lol).

So we moved on, and checked out the plastic owl,
and the backpack. Now THAT was interesting! She had her whole head in the backpack, was biting the umbrella and flipping it all around. Of course, I missed the shot when she picked up the backpack and was flipping it around in the air as I was checking the time at that moment.

Do you guys have any idea how hard it is to take photos when you are trying to hold a prop, hold the camera, and deliver treats at the same time? So these shots aren't perfect. Oh well.

So then I took out the umbrella, and rubbed her all over with that, it makes that rustling sound. Then I opened it up and she targeted it on the ground, and in the air. It was a little freaky and she didn't like it, but she wasn't scared of it. She just found it a bit too obnoxious to her sensitivities (lol). Then I rubbed her body with it open, she did quite well with that, better than I expected, she's not a fan of obnoxious things touching her body. Not scared, just doesn't like it, its rude.

Then we played with a ball, and targeted that and rolled it arounda bit. Then I got on the trampoline and bounced. That was a little freaky! She touched the trampoline while I bounced gently (feet not leaving the surface), and she gave it the hairy eyeball. I think the black shiny mesh top looked weird the way the sun was hitting it as it moved while I bounced. I kept bouncing while she took her treats though. Then I started to bounce a little higher, and OMG I laughed so hard as she bounced her head up and down with me to get her treat! Then after I got off, she had to go give it a good looking over.

Lakota had to go back and molest the backpack some more, it really smelled good, and she eventually found the apples in there.

So then we went back up, and I had about another 10-15 minutes, so I decided to bring Jen out and see what we got out of that.

Jen was very excited to get to go do something! Whinney was PISSED off that she was not chosen, and lunged at Jen and dug a deeper hole.

Jen was very eager to go do something, and didn't care about the goats, or ducks, or any of the other stuff, she just walked right down like she's been doing it every day (I think she's been out there 3 times in the past year?)

At first Jen zoned in on the cones. Mandy has worked on targeting cones with her, and that was all Jen could see. She didn't care about the other stuff out there, went right to the cones. I thought the umbrella would get her attention. Nope. I opened it, rubbed it on her, nothing. She didnt' care at all, totally ignored it, but was focused on those cones. She had a bit of a spook (a teleporting type spook, second one today) when the goat got up from sleeping in the shady corner of the roundpen.

So I walked away, and took out the ball, and pointed to it, got her to target it, then rolled it. That got her attention, so she targeted that a little, but kept going back to the cones. Soon enough, she realized that she only got a treat when she touched the ball. The lightbulb went off, and she understood that its not only about cones, there is other stuff to do, too! So kicked the ball around, and she went after it, touching it, and pushing it with her nose. She loved it!!! She had so much fun!!!!!

So after about 15 minutes of that, I brought her back up to the paddock. She was a bit bargey and excited, (food gets her a little bit up and excited). So as we walked back up the hill, I played the "post" game. The first time she ran into the halter, she almost leapt out of her skin and said "Oh crap, I better pay attention to that!" The second time she said "oh shoot, forgot", the third time she said "just testing!" and then she walked beautifully at my side the rest of the way. She was a good girl waiting while I sorted out the fence/gate, etc., and moved horses out of the way, went in and stood quietly while she was surrounded and sniffed over.

Then I brought them their late lunch, and that was our day!

Later on, when I headed out to feed for evening meal, I found Jen 3-legged lame. She would not weight her right hind at all. So I haltered her, and brought her up to the stall. I could find nothing wrong, no heat, no swelling, nothing. She was looking for her dinner, and otherwise happy. I was stumped, so assumed she had an abscess. I tried soaking, which did not work, Jen wouldn't put her hoof down in the boot filled with water, she hiked it up high.

I tried again on Tuesday, with the same results. Finally on Wednesday I had a brilliant idea, and soaked paper towels in Apple Cider Vinegar and water, and wrapped her hoof in them, put the whole mess in a plastic bag, then put it all in a boot. That seemed to work, and she would put the foot down and not hold it up in the air, but she was still very lame on it, and wouldn't put any weight on it at all, not even to rest it.

After having a lesson Wednesday morning then running to the Health Food Store for Silicea for her abscess, I checked her foot, and when I took the boot off, and unwrapped the foot, I felt something catch on my hand as I put the hoof down. looked, and saw a bit of papertowel stuck to stomething sticking out of her coronet! Of course at first I paniced and thought of a bone protruding. Yes, that's me, always think of the worst. Anyway, she would not let me touch it, at all. So after realizing that it was a piece of wood, I rummaged around until I found my pair of pliers, and while standing on her left side so she couldn't kick me, I reached under and across and pulled the piece of wood out of her right hind coronary band.

No pus came out at all, thank goodness. I cleaned it up best I could with Betadine, then wrapped it up and called the vet. Dr. Will came out that afternoon luckily. She is the same vet that came for Ana's injury, ironically. So she clipped her fetlock hairs, and scrubbed her up, applied hoof testers. There was nothing to report, no fever, she wasnt' acting off at all. So she got a tetanus shot, bute, and SMZ, and Hetacin K injected into the hole 2x/daily and rebandage. Unfortunately that evening, Jen had a reaction to the SMZ, and begain rubbing her face, swinging her tail aggressively, pawing, biting at her injury ,biting at her sides and back, and really getting anxious. I immediately called the vets office, and Dr. Will called me right back. She had me dose her with 1/2 dose of Banamine, and that settled her down almost immediately. Well, after I managed to wipe the paste off of Jen's cheek and my sleeve and stuff it into her mouth with my fingers.

On Thursday I drove to the vets office to pick up doxycycline, so she is on 35 tablets of doxy 2x/day now for 9 days.

So far, so good. Jen's last dose of bute was last night, and I've kept her on Nutrient Buffer to help ward off ulcers. Her temp. remains normal, and she is weighting her hoof. She stumbles around on it a bit, but is fully weighting it and resting the other foot. She's getting better and better about her treatments, although this morning she was reluctant to eat her grain with her doxy. I hope it was just a one-off, and she'll gobble up her evening meal. Which, as a matter of fact, is due right now. Keep fingers crossed, say a prayer, send Reiki, whatever you can do for Jen, and lets hope that she gets this behind her quickly. She has had enough tragedy in her short life already. So, until later, signing off.

I miss you, my sweet Ana

2008-03-09T11:20:00.003-04:00

Now that I'm starting to be able to think about Ana without crying uncontrollably, I'd like to write a little bit about her all to short life.

Ana was a true miracle. Her mother was emaciated and abused, and left with two studs, and I never did find out who Ana's father was. I had planned on DNA testing, but it is unimportant now. I was so worried that Ana would be unhealthy considering how undernourished her dam was. I watched Jen day in and day out for signs of foaling for 2 months. I kept her on camera, and I slept on the couch for 2 weeks, setting my alarm for every 2 hours to check the camera. To say I was exhausted is an understatement! As Jen got closer to foaling, I started setting my clock for every hour.

Jen was afraid to use a stall or shelter, and she was also so herdbound that she became extremely anxious, agitated and stressed in the roundpen where I had set her up. It was so severe that she was pacing the fenceline and doing this head flip thing that reminded me of the bears in he zoo who have gone insane from lack of stimulation and confinement. It was very unnerving. So I had hurriedly rigged up a section of the paddock for her, and bedded the favorite sleeping spot with bales and bales of hay. I put up snow fence so her foal wouldn't roll under the electric fence by mistake, and Christmas lights around the perimeter so that I had some light on the camera and could see. It still wasn't perfect, but I could usually at least see where she was standing, and if she was standing I knew that she wasn't foaling (most likely!)

The evening of May 17, I thought Jen was very close. All the signs were there, but Jen was very quiet, not fidgeting or fussing at all like many mares do. Her udder was ready, her backend was ready, all systems were "go". I watched her every hour. When I woke up about midnight, I checked the camera and saw Jen standing. I laid back down, but couldn't get to sleep. Around 12:20 or so I looked again, and Jen was laying down. Then she stood up, and I almost closed my eyes and tried to sleep again, then she went down again, then up, and back down. I was pretty sure this was time! So I woke my husband told him I was going outside. Of course, all the other horses came barreling over to the barn when they saw me come out in the middle of the night. I quietly crept over to Jen's pen. She was laying down flat out, pushing! So I stayed back, quietly watching. She pushed a few times, I saw feet, and a nose. Then she pushed 3 or 4 more times with no progress. Considering Jen was so thin and depleted, I didn't want her expending more energy than necessary. So I headed down, grabbed onto feet, and with the next contraction, I applied traction to help her along. I felt a little "pop", and out slid this perfect little bay baby!

I grabbed a towel and rubbed her dry and rubbed her all over her entire body before she got up. Jen had gotten up, and when Ana was ready to stand I helped her up. Jen nickered to her, and licked her like a good mama. She was getting crampy, and didn't want baby to nurse, so I gave her some Banamine (she had already slipped the afterbirth). She then settled down, and I helped Ana figure out how to nurse. She drank, she pooped, and she peed. With those milestones out of the way, she then started investigating the world immediately. She visited the other horses at the fenceline, much to her mothers admonishments. She walked, she trotted, she cantered! She was so excited to be born, and loved to fly freely through the night.

I retired to bed, and the next morning found the fence half down. I set about setting the other horses up in the upper paddock, and took down the electric fence and snow fence and gave Jen and Ana the lower paddock for themselves. Ana already was helping me with fencework at less than 24 hours old. A true Curly!!!

I decided to name her Huyana, which is a Native American word for "rain falling". It had rained for 2 days before Ana was born, it cleared up the night she was born, and then it started raining again and rained for another 2 days.

Ana adored people from her first moment on earth. She loved nothing more than to have attention, being scratched, petted, and played with. Ana loved her udders scratched so much that she would lift a hind leg to allow you better access. She loved her belly rubbed, and that little crevice between her butt cheeks!

Oh, she had so much personality! She loved to run, and play, and leap and cavort around! She made excuses to play, and would pretend she was spooked so she could race around, bucking. She had a particular interest in my wheelbarrow from the very beginning. Every day of her life, she licked and chewed the wheelbarrow. She tried climbing in it. When she got big enough, she started knocking it over if I left it long enough for her to sneak in there. She chewed the left handle (only the left one!)

Every evening, she would have a little romp session after her dinner. She began eating grain pretty soon, she started stealing her mothers (and her mother would have none of THAT!) so I started giving her small handuls at only a couple of weeks old, and increased as she grew. So after she finished her bucket, while the other horses were still working on theirs, and while I was cleaning manure, she would race around the paddock, bucking and rearing, tossing her head, and having a good old time. She would circle around me, then come racing past me, letting her heels fly on the way by! She thought it was such a great game!!!

Ana was also quite sensible for such a youngster. She learned to lead and give her feet very quickly. She was very proud of "being like the big horses". She so wanted to do what they did, much like a human child. If I brushed another horse, she was right behind me, almost climbing on me begging for her turn. If I haltered another horse, she was sticking her nose in their halter. If I put a bareback pad or saddle on another horse, Ana was right there, grabbing it and trying to put it on her own back.

In December of '07, I wanted to take my annual Christmas photos of the horses. I put a Santa hat on them, and little bows, and take pics for my Christmas card. I started with April, as she is always game to get dressed up, brushed, etc., she loves attention. As I'm putting bows in April's mane, Ana was picking up the bows, then taking the props in my bag and putting them on herself. I hadn't intended on using her for pics, as I didn't think she would stand still or appreciate things on her body, since she was still a youngster. Boy, was I wrong!! Ana was so proud to be dressed up, that she literally stood taller and pranced around. She turned around and looked at the things on her body, admiring them. She had beads draped around her neck, a tablecloth on her back, a bow in her tail and bows in her mane, and a Santa hat on her head. She was so proud of herself, and she posed so nicely for her photos. Then the Santa hat fell off her head, and she picked it up and her teeth and had such fun with it, flipping it around through the air, tossing it, pawing it.

Ana made me smile every single day, and for that I miss her most. Even when she was at her worst devilish self, rather than making me angry, it was more of a "tsk, tsk, tsk -- Ana will you please STOP that?" Ana would grab the velcro on my coat sleeves and rip it, then restick it, and rip it again. She would grab the little zipper pulls on my coat (which unfortunately had short little elastic pulls on them), between her teeth, and pull the elastic back then FWAP!!! it back which is quite unpleasant! She would untie the laces on my shoes or boots, then put her teeth around the base of the lace, and pull her head up, running the lace between her teeth (which eventually pulled the little plastic ends off all of them).

She also would of course grab my hair and chew on it, and pull it, rest her head on my shoulder, grab my coat from behind if I wasn't paying attention and pull on it. Once she grabbed the back of the collar of my coat and yanked so yard I almost fell backward!!! She did get in trouble for that one, the little imp. She was such a little monster, but it was all in fun, she never, ever did anything mean.

It was very difficult to get photos of Ana, because she always had to be so close to you, I would run backwards while snapping shots, hoping to get a decent one out of the bunch, or sneak around the corner and snap one.

Then Ana discovered that she had "The Power". She had the power to move another horse. Oh, what fun!!!! The first time she pinned her ears at Leroy, he moved away. Her head popped up, her ears pricked forward and she looked right at him. You could just see her saying: "Huh, check that out! He moved!" Then she did it again, and again, and then again. Poor Leroy. Ana thought it was the greatest thing to move another horse, and she did it often, just because she could. None of the other horses put up with her sillyness, but Leroy allowed her to rear up and jump on him, she would leap up and bite his neck, back and shoulders, and he would just look at her "Silly girl...... harumph"

Then on February 28th, I found Ana 3-legged, with her front left hoof just sort of hanging there. X-rays showed that she had shattered P1 (pastern). To say I'm devastated is an understatement. I had so many hopes for Miss Ana. She would have been such a bold, confident trail horse, and so much fun! I was looking forward to building out relationship together, a horse with no emotional baggage from past owners, one that I grew together with and had a bond with like no other. But it was apparently not to be ......

Goodbye, Ana. I miss you, your momma misses you, your aunties and uncle miss you. You were a shining light, the silver lining in the dark cloud of Jen's life. You brought so much life, joy, and happiness. Until we meet again, my little Ana-Banana........

Goodbye, Ana

2008-03-05T21:31:00.003-05:00

On February 28th, 2008, I fed horses hay at 6:30 am as usual. At 8:30 I went back out after breakfast for grain and more hay, and found Ana 3-legged. Her left front hoof was dangling. I called the vet, and while we waited, I held Ana's leg for her as the swelling began. We went into the stall to lie down. When the vet arrived, she wasn't hopeful. When the x-ray machine arrived, it confirmed our worst fears. Ana shattered her pastern.

Goodbye, sweet baby.

A Belated Update

2008-02-16T21:46:00.003-05:00

Wel, I haven't updated in quite some time. And that is most likely because there isn't a whole lot to say! So, I'll just go on down the line.

Skippy is our new Corgi puppy. She was a Christmas gift for my son, and a reward for finally sleeping in his own bed. Skippy is #5 of the canine variety. She is a smart little dog, but also a garbage hound, and an energetic little thing. She is much different from my chows, I've been so spoiled with them. Chows are the easiest puppies, ever! They don't chew, they almost potty train themselves, and they aren't destructive at all. Skippy has somehow decided that I am her human, however. And she has taken it upon herself to guard me from all the other animals in the house.

Georgie has Lyme disease again. We'll see what happens when she finishes her antibiotics. I always know when she has Lyme, because she acts like a normal dog, and is actually pleasant to be around, rather than the spinning, kinetic ball of energy.

I have no ridden at all this winter, save for once. We have had more rain, and mud here in the Northeast than I can ever remember. There is water everywhere, the sump pump is running on overtime, the rabbits hole is filled with water, its just percolating out of the ground, and of course the horses are in mud. Even on the side of our hill and with all the ledge, its still mud. In 10 years, I've never had so much mud in the paddock. Did I mention the mud?

I rode Lakota for a short while on the 23rd of Jan. We had a nice warm sunny day, but the ground was frozen and not muddy (if you can imagine that, for a day or two). Lakota was unsure at first. As I went to brush her, my mind was wandering and I was thinking about what she learned while she was away. Well, she picked up on my thoughts, her eye became very hard, and she wouldn't let me touch her. So I said to her: "OK, Lakota, don't worry about what you learned while you were away. We'll just do what we've always done, and nothing more." She immediately softened, and came over to me to be brushed and tacked up. She is an amazingly sensitive mare. She was a little worried, as she hadn't been out of the paddock since Oct, and that was when she was away for training. But she settled down quickly, and the other 4 girls stood lined up at the gate and watched us the entire time, like a line of monkeys watching the show.

April, of course, screamed her head off. She has become quite the feral little beast, I have done nothing with her in years, its all my fault. She gets so upset when a horse goes out of the paddock, and she gets upset when she goes out of the paddock. If anything is wrong in April's little world, she gets terribly upset. I need to do some stuff with her this year, I think, and tame her down again.For those that don't know, April is a 36" mini, and was my daughters first horse, whom she of course outgrew very quickly.

Whinney is, well, Whinney. A pony mare, need I say more?

Jen is in pretty darned good weight now. She needs plenty of muscling and bulking up, but she doesn't look like she needs to be seized anymore. She's starting to show a few emotional issues though, which we're working through, and it seems to be working. She is very braced, and worried, with any handling. She will brace her neck, close her eyes, and look away, wit hthe attitude of "hurry up and do what you have to do, and get it over with" while she is mentally somewhere else. I've been working with her on this, and slowed myself down a lot, expecting her to soften and relax. I'm getting so much licking and chewing from her, and softening, and she just wants to be with me now. her eyes are softening, her mouth no longer has so many wrinkles and isn't all pursed. Her upper lip is becoming fat and soft, and not tight and hard.

Ana is, well, Ana. She's 10 months old, and a little monster. She LOVES attention, and will do anything for it. She is so people-oriented that she is a pest. She is learning "my space vs. your space" now, and "don't grab food out of my hands". She has also discovered that she has the power to move other horses. The first time I saw her do it, she pinned her ears at Leroy, and he moved off. Her ears popped up straight, her head popped up, and the expression on her face was: "Wow, check THAT out! How cool is that? I have the Power!!" So now she moves him around all the time, and I've even seen her bite his shoulder, and rear up and leap on his withers. Ooohhhh, she is SUCH a monster!!!!

Speaking of Leroy, he is doing great. I can catch him, scratch him everywhere (which he loves), and I even lifted a foot today! That is a huge step for him, and it wasn't much, just a quick grab and let go, but we'll work on it. His hooves haven't needed trimming, and for that I am grateful (and I'm sure Judy is, too!) I think he's pretty happy now. He has lost his worried look, and his tight, sticking out upper lip and his tight nostrils. He shows me where he wants to be scratched, and he moves out of my way when I indicate (rather slowly, but he does it). Leroy doesn't do anything fast, he stops and thinks about everything.

On the human sideone is doing well. My daughter just turned 11, and thinks she is abut 25. The attitude is growing, along with the mouth. But she's doing well in school, and has some nice friends, so all is well there, if I can just get her tamed down at home ;-) My son is doing very well, since I cut all the chemicals out of his diet. He was experiencing AIWS, an after a head CT and opthalmologist visit, ther was nothing to be found. I eliminated MSG, nitrates, nitrites, food colorings and artificial flavorings, and high fructose corn syrup from his diet. He is having no more AIWS incidents, no more migraines. His reading his improved a lot, his focus as improved, and his temper has settled. He still has more work to do on all these areas, but they have all shown improvement since getting him off the chemicals.

Aside from that, we keeping or fingers crossed for a piece of property that would be just fabulous for us. It has a brook, a field, lots of woods, access to the trails Bridle Trails, it would be heaven!!!!! Keep your fingers crossed for us!!!

Sweet Sixteen and Growing Up With Horses

2008-01-30T21:21:00.000-05:00

My daughter will be turning 11 in about 10 days. Someone sent this to a horse chat group I'm on, and I thought it very appropriate, and sums up pretty much how I feel about kids and horses.

Sweet sixteen and growing up with a horse

My daughter turned sixteen years old today; which is a milestone for most people. Besides looking at baby photos and childhood trinkets with her, I took time to reflect on the young woman my daughter had become and the choices she would face in the future. As I looked at her I could see the athlete she was, and determined woman she would soon be.

I started thinking about some of the girls we knew in our town who were already pregnant, pierced in several places, hair every color under the sun, drop outs, drug addicts and on the fast track to no where, seeking surface identities because they had no inner self esteem. The parents of these same girls have asked me why I "waste" the money on horses so my daughter can ride. I'm told she will grow out of it, lose interest, discover boys and all kinds of things that try to pin the current generation's "slacker" label on my child. I don't think it will happen, I think she will love and have horses all her life.

Because my daughter grew up with horses she has compassion. She knows that we must take special care of the very young and the very old. We must make sure those without voices to speak of their pain are still cared for.

Because my daughter grew up with horses she learned responsibility for others than herself. She learned that regardless of the weather you must still care for those you have the stewardship of. There are no ?days off? just because you don't feel like being a horse owner that day. She learned that for every hour of fun you have there are days of hard slogging work you must do first.

Because my daughter grew up with horses she learned not to be afraid of getting dirty and that appearances don't matter to most of the breathing things in the world we live in. Horses do not care about designer clothes, jewelry, pretty hairdos or anything else we put on our bodies to try to impress others. What a horse cares about are your abilities to work within his natural world, he doesn't care if you're wearing $80.00 jeans while you do it.

Because my daughter grew up with horses she learned about sex and how it can both enrich and complicate lives. She learned that it only takes one time to produce a baby, and the only way to ensure babies aren't produced is not to breed. She learned how babies are planned, made, born and, sadly, sometimes die before reaching their potential. She learned how sleepless nights and trying to outsmart a crafty old broodmare could result in getting to see, as non-horse owning people rarely do, the birth of a true miracle.

Because my daughter grew up with horses she understands the value of money. Every dollar can be translated into bales of hay, bags of feed or farrier visits. Purchasing non-necessities during lean times can mean the difference between feed and good care, or neglect and starvation. She has learned to judge the level of her care against the care she sees provided by others and to make sure her standards never lower, and only increase as her knowledge grows.

Because my daughter grew up with horses she has learned to learn on her own. She has had teachers that cannot speak, nor write, nor communicate beyond body language and reactions. She has had to learn to "read" her surroundings for both safe and unsafe objects, to look for hazards where others might only see a pretty meadow. She has learned to judge people as she judges horses. She looks beyond appearances and trappings to see what is within.

Because my daughter grew up with horses she has learned sportsmanship to a high degree. Everyone that competes fairly is a winner. Trophies and ribbons may prove someone a winner, but they do not prove someone is a horseman. She has also learned that some people will do anything to win, regardless of who it hurts. She knows that those who will cheat in the show ring will also cheat in every other aspect of their life and are not to be trusted.

Because my daughter grew up with horses she has self-esteem and an engaging personality. She can talk to anyone she meets with confidence, because she has to express herself to her horse with more than words. She knows the satisfaction of controlling and teaching a 1000 pound animal that will yield willingly to her gentle touch and ignore the more forceful and inept handling of those stronger than she is. She holds herself with poise and professionalism in the company of those far older than herself.

Because my daughter grew up with horses she has learned to plan ahead. She knows that choices made today can effect what happens five years down the road. She knows the value of land and buildings. And that caring for your vehicle can mean the difference between easy travel and being stranded on the side of the road with a four horse trailer on a hot day.

When I look at what she has learned and what it will help her become, I can honestly say that I haven't "wasted" a penny on providing her with horses. I only wish that all children had the same opportunities to learn these lessons from horses before setting out on the road to adulthood.

Written By Tracy Meisenbach

"Just a Horse"

2008-01-17T19:14:00.000-05:00

From time to time, people tell me, "lighten up, it's just a horse,", or, "That's a lot of money for "just a horse". They don't understand the distance traveled, the time spent, or the costs involved for "just a horse".

Some of my proudest moments have come about with "just a horse". Many hours have passed and my only company was "just a horse," but I did not once feel slighted. Some of my saddest moments have been brought about by "just a horse," and in those days of darkness, the gentle touch of "just a horse," gave me comfort and reason to overcome the day.

If you, too, think it's "just a horse," then you will probably understand phrases like "just a friend," "just a sunrise," or "just a promise." "Just a horse" brings into my life the very essence of friendship, trust, and pure unbridled joy.

"Just a horse" brings out the compassion and patience that makes me a better person. Because of "just a horse" I will rise early, take long walks and look longingly to the future.

So for me and folks like me, it's not "just a horse" but an embodiment of all the hopes and dreams of the future, the fond memories of the past, and the pure joy of the moment.

"Just a horse" brings out what's good in me and diverts my thoughts away from myself and the worries of the day. I hope that someday they can understand that it's not "just a horse" but a thing that gives me humanity and keeps me from being "just a woman".

So the next time you hear the phrase "just a horse" just smile, because they "just" don't understand.

Happy New Year!!!

2008-01-03T21:13:00.000-05:00

Well folks, as scared as I am to say it, the year 2007 came and went without a disaster here in Connecticut. I was afraid to even utter our luck into the universe for fear of it all coming crashing down at 11:59 12/31/07, but it seems our streak of bad luck has finally ended. It all started on 1/2/03 and from that day through 12/30/06 has been fraught with disasters, including the untimely death of 3 horses, 3 dogs, 3 cats, 2 sheep (not even counting the chickens, ducks and rabbits), with the final being my husband's argument with the telephone pole on 12/30/06. For those that weren't here, he lost that argument, the pole won. But after surgery putting rods in his spine and plates in his leg, 3 months in a chair, he is back to his old self again, so 2007 was a good year!

I am more than pleased to report that all animals and humans are breathing and walking as of the morning of 1/1/08. The streak has ended!!!!

Now, looking forward to 2008, my hope is that we can move forward in finding a new property. We have our sights on a 66 acre piece next door to my in-laws, owned by my FIL's uncle. I would love the entire piece, but would settle for 10 acres or so.

In the meantime, I would like to finish my barn and have hay storage easily accessible, without having to carry bales of hay uphill slogging through the mud, rain, sleet, snow, and enough storage to carry us through an entire winter so I dont' have to worry about having enough, or being able to get hay. I hope to get Lakota going well on the trails without any worry by either of us. Mandy hopes to start riding Jen lightly and building up her muscling. I would like to start taking Ana out for walks in the yard, away from the other horses, and maybe teach her some fun tricks, to keep her very busy mind engaged and get her in a learning frame of mind. I hope that Leroy will let go of the last of his baggage and trust me and other humans. I also hope to find a part-time job to help pay for this critters, and take stress out of our finances.

Goodbye, 2007, you were good to us. Welcome, 2008!