Today was my husband’s day off so I actually got to leave the property for the first time in about a week. We are in major housewife-at-home/husband-goes-off-to-work mode and as a rather independent person who spent all spring and summer throwing my horse in the trailer and gallivanting off to the trails–well lets just say this current lifestyle is a bit different. It won’t last forever though, we are looking at getting a second truck in a month or two to replace our Jeep that bit the dust this summer. And salmon season ends in November I think so his work on the boat will be over for the time being. He is having a great time working as assistant guide and its a wonderful opportunity as being a guide is his dream job and he has his foot in the door now with another young guy already succeeding at the business.

Anyway, the point of this post: When we got to town and cell service I got a voicemail from someone who said they were cleaning someone’s belongings out and found my checkbook! My cell phone number is on my checks and they saw the different name on the checks from the person who had the checkbook and decided things weren’t right and they should call the number. I called them back right away but went to their voicemail then I caught them on the phone this evening and turns out they not only have my checkbook but they found my PURSE TOO!! I am so happy about this, my husband and I bought that purse together in Maine on the day of our wedding and its the first nice purse I’ve ever owned. I always wanted a soft leather purse and that was it. I was really pissed off and sad about it being stolen and the funny thing is I hadn’t even dragged out one of my other old purse’s to use, I was rebelling against replacing it and had been carrying my wallet and junk around in my big purple AERC convention bag, lol. And come to find out the purse has been found and is being returned to me! Unfortunately they didn’t find my husband’s fly fishing rod that got snagged out of my truck at the same time–that was a huge surprise gift I gave him a year ago and a beautiful rod so bummer on that. But still, what are the odds of recovering the purse! And I get my nice leather checkbook cover back too, for what its worth.

Day two of weaning went well, Sheza ate her hay well overnight and let me put her fly mask on nicely this morning–sometimes she still skitters away when I walk up to her in the paddock with the mask in my hand, but after a couple steps and giving me the “you crazy person” look she always lets me put it on. AND this evening when I went to take it off she just stood and let me take it off instead of her usual: stand, pull the Velcro open, filly spooks and runs away, comes back, then get the mask off. Or sometimes when she spooks she throws the mask off herself. Tonight however she was all manners and the mask came right off. Desire seems to be off her hay slightly, I am keeping an eye on her. Her bag is swollen with milk tonight, poor thing. She ate her Elk Grove Milling mash in her usual greedy fashion so that’s good. I spoke to my vet this morning and she is coming next Wednesday to do Sheza’s shots. I’m planning to use my big irrigating syringe to simulate giving shots and try to get her used to that so its as smooth an experience as possible. Just used to the sight of a syringe and it tapping her neck etc. I also asked my vet if there was anything I could or should do with Desire as far as her big swollen milk bag but she said the mare just needs to tough it out and the milk should dry up before long.

I picked up a new bag of Elk Grove Milling mix today, this time I got the Timothy/Alfalfa/Rice Bran pellets. I like to add some water to it and make a mush and all the horses eat it right up. I threw some in with Sheza’s Foal Developer tonight and she gobbled it. She is born to eat wet mash so at least I won’t have to worry about that for her endurance career 😉 

Can’t wait to get my purse back!

I moved Desire to the paddock next to Sheza this morning. Sheza whinnied twice then saw how close mom was and they both went to grazing without further commotion, haven’t heard a peep since. I’m sure there will be a ruckus when I pull one or the other to work with them but I won’t do that for a few days yet. I spoke to my vet this morning about shots for Sheza etc now that is becoming a big girl and won’t be nursing. She will probably come end of this week or maybe next to do Sheza’s 6 month shots.

Time flies!! Didn’t she just look like this a minute ago?

50 degrees this morning! Right now its just made it to 60 degrees and its been raining lightly but steadily for a half hour. I’m wearing a sweatshirt and my fuzzy boots, after spending all morning riding both my horses, cleaning paddocks, and the house. Basically, I’m in heaven!

Today was my first ride on Desire with her 4 Easyboot Gloves on. I lunged her walk, trot, canter in the arena, then rode her w/t/c in the arena. We headed outside the arena into the pasture itself and had some fun trotting and cantering up and down the hill with Blaze and the mini running behind us. I was a little wary how they would behave with us riding out amongst them for longer than the quick route from gate to gate we usually take. Blaze seemed quite into it and was trotting along behind us like I was ponying him. No shenanigans, though I was watching for them. I love watching Napoleon the mini run, its HILARIOUS. He is SO tiny, he has to be like 32″ tops, but he gives ‘er hell up the hill bucking and kicking and having a ball. Plus he is getting all hairy for winter and with his pig-esque markings and woolly fatness…he is just so ridiculous looking! The Gloves stayed on fine, though I know that wasn’t much of a test of them. I figured I had to take one small test run from home before I ventured out– and all seemed well. The gaiters are full of stickers from running around in the field..ugghhhh I am so sick of all the crazy thistles and prickers we have here. We HAVE to make sure we keep some money in our spring budget to get our pastures fully mowed by a big tractor or something. And sprayed.

 After riding Desire I snagged Blaze out (so far no sign of his past tendency to run like hell from the halter when living in the big field) and went for a bareback ride. Just a couple miles out one of the dirt roads and back. I used the bareback pad this time and it was actually really perfect. Since Blaze has prominent withers and an uncomfortably pokey backbone the thick suede-ish seat of the pad was just enough to make it comfortable while still obviously bareback. Last time I rode with it I felt like it was harder to hold on with the pad on but this time it was nice and I did as much trotting as I could safely. Just on straightaways where I can easily stop him if a car comes, since I’m not a total ninja when bareback riding. Yet. This no saddle thing is turning into the thighmaster supreme workout. Posting Blaze’s trot bareback for 2 miles makes me a hundred times more sore than riding a 30 mile endurance ride does!! I’m going to be walking crooked for four days after this morning’s rides lol.

I got 3 heaped wheel barrow loads of manure and dead weeds out of the weaning paddock. That sounds bad, doesn’t it? I clean it pretty regularly but the dead weeds were the majority of what I took out today. We sprayed and killed all the weeds in the two smaller paddocks and there’s still some remnants of that to be scooped up and taken out. Luckily it heaps right onto the poo fork nicely and the paddock looks much better. Shhhh don’t tell the horses but I’m separating them tomorrow.

I took a couple of photos. I think Desire is so pretty!

After the last week of temperatures once again nearing the 100 mark, we suddenly have a cool cloudy day today and a forecast of 73 DEGREES AND 30% RAIN TOMORROW! What what! Maybe people are starting to think I am just a *tad* obsessed with the weather and weather forecast, but as a redhead I just don’t cope with the heat well and am always looking forward to comfortable days where things can get done, i.e. 80 degrees and lower. And fall is my absolute favorite time of year, with Christmas closely following! While I’m not ready for the full deluge, the winter onslaught, I wouldn’t mind 73 degrees and a little rain to take the edge off our serious summer dustiness. Its bizarre when the horses are getting thick coats–well Blaze and Sheza anyway, Desire doesn’t seem to be much of a winter coat grower–but when you brush them out you are still getting clouds of dust. Of course dust+water=mud sooo.. Nah, I really don’t mind fall and winter conditions, or spring of course. I’d rather be wearing muck boots scraping my muddy horse off than sweating just sitting still in the heat of summer. You can always add or remove layers for cooler weather comfort. You can only remove so much in summer before the place becomes a nudist colony and then guess what–you’ll still be too hot!
 My obsessive compulsive blanket shopping must go into swing again, I started it a few weeks ago when the first cool spell hit but hey, there’s even a little chance of rain coming so I really should be finding Desire and Sheza blankets, right?!

 Just realized this is my fourth post without a photo. My wordiness is overwhelming my drive for photography. Better take some new filly pictures tonight I guess!

Its pretty genius, this plan I have going. See I ride one horse and in so doing end up exercising all 4 of my horses at once! I rode Desire in the arena again this evening and Blaze, mini Napoleon, and Sheza trotted and cantered and bucked HARD. Til every last one of them was dripping sweat. Meanwhile Desire and I were doing endless circles and direction reversals and anything else to keep her paying attention to me and her feet and not the insane rodeo happening outside the arena. Blaze was absolutely ripping around the outside perimeter of the arena, tail to the sky, blowing like a steam engine. He actually pinned his ears and did his Elvis lip curl at Desire over the fence after he tired of galloping up and down the hill. Every time we trotted past him he looked up with a dry sticker bush branch in his mouth and gave her a little snarly face. LOL LOL LOL. I can only guess he is expressing some sort of jealousy that she is getting ridden, or why get so fired up and then so snotty? They are a pretty hilarious little herd I must say. The mini gives it hell up and down that hill as fast as his little stubby legs can go. I actually pulled Sheza out when I was done riding and cleaned and hosed her down as she had run through the few sticker bushes in her paddock and was dripping sweat with little stickery spines sticking out of her. Good grief! Its just amazing I can ride Desire at all with all that nonsense going on, kudos to her for keeping most of her brain intact. I know mine barely is.

I absolutely love reading and I’ve noticed that some of the other folks on horse blogs I follow enjoy reading as well. So I have to recommend two books I’ve just read that I really enjoyed. The first was given to me by my granny for my birthday this year and is called The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver. I am not a previous fan of her work but I really enjoyed the vivid color of this book, in all senses of the word and phrase. The second book I just finished half an hour ago and am probably going to be mailing to my granny to read, as I think she’ll rip through it as fast as I did. A real page turner and eerie mystery. Its called The Thirteenth Tale and is by Diane Setterfield. From what I can tell its a first time effort by this author and a good one, in my opinion. I will need to reread this one in about six months to pick up on more of the finer nuances that I’m sure I missed tearing through it for purely for the next plot reveal. I found the book on one of my extremely random choosing sprees in Barnes & Noble a few months ago. I choose books by a sentence or two I read in the beginning, and usually by an author I haven’t read before. It usually works out well, I’ve only really disliked one or two of the books I chose in that manner.

 Anyhoo, check out The Lacuna and/or The Thirteenth Tale if you’re in need of a good read!