Thanksgiving - Retirement Style

When I look at these pictures it makes me think of the song from that 80's move "Annie." I think the song is called something like "It's a Hard Knock Life" or something along those lines. These pictures are from Wednesday and Friday of this week. These horses lead such a hard knock life, it just isn't fair! I guess if we were to ask our residents what they are thankful for they would probably say good food, good friends and plenty of sleep.

Levendi napping, and if you look closely you see a white blob on the ground which is Ivan

Ivan does his best dead horses imitation on a regular basis. It always makes my heart stop for a moment.
He is sleeping hard when he is in dead horse position, and I always have to walk up to him and say his name loudly to wake him up. Ivan saying "mom, why did you wake me up??"

Levendi looking quite refreshed from his nap. He popped up when he saw me. "I wasn't sleeping, I was wide awake, really."

This scene was in another pasture

Bridget napping and Lexi fast asleep doing her dead horse imitation

Poco having an afternoon siesta

Sparky getting in on the "action" as well

Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope everyone has a wonderful day today, and takes some time to reflect on all of the things we have to be thankful for. I know I am very blessed to spend my time caring for all of the wonderful horses retired with us, and thank everyone in my life who has helped me to reach this point. Jason and I first need to thank my parents for their amazing support. Without their support and belief in what we wanted to we would not be where we are today. I am blessed to have the most wonderful parents in the world and I don't thank them often enough for simply being them and being there for me.

I also need to thank the team of people that supports all of our activities here on the farm. Gwen, our wonderful farrier that I have posted about many times. She cares about each one of the horses on the farm and is always so kind and patient with them. Dr. Bob McCullough and Dr. Nathaniel Wright of Tennessee Equine Hospital for always providing such excellent care, any time of the day or night. Bonnie & Stephen Ozburn who own the feed store Bonnie's Barnyard, who always take such great care of us. Amy for helping us out whenever we need it, being available on short notice, and allowing us to have a break occasionally. Laura for taking the huge mound of dirty and sometimes torn horse blankets that we dump on her and returning them looking brand new, repaired, and ready to go. And of course all of the wonderful people across North America that have trusted us to care for their horses.

I'll wrap this post up with a few more pictures. We're moving into October's pictures now!

Buffy

Apollo

Trillion and Ogie

Sparky

Sebastian coming for breakfast with Faune behind him

Ogie

Trillion and Sebastian

Faune drooling after a nice drink of water

Grazing

Teddy and Harmony

Trillion and Faune

Full Circle

We had another new resident join a couple of weeks ago. His name is Clay, and he is a chestnut quarter horse. Clay has an incredibly sweet personality and always has an adorable expression. He also tends to be a bit head shy, and had a very worried look his first day with us.

Clay minutes after arrival

Clay is about thirty years old and the trip to our farm was hard on him. He had to travel about 800 miles to get to our farm, and he looked like he felt every one of those miles when he got off the trailer. Before anyone goes jumping up and down about shipping an older horse a long distance, there were some unique personal circumstances involved with his owners, and they had no choice about relocating Clay. Everyone needs to be applauding them for taking care of this grand elder statesman.

Clay resting after his trip

Jason and I were both very drawn to Clay from the moment he arrived at the farm. As we led him into his stall and watched him, he was so sweet yet clearly so worried. It was almost like we knew him even though we had just met him. Later that day it finally dawned on me - he reminded both of us Mable, a former resident who unfortunately passed away in July. Clay has so much in common with Mable, from looks to personality. Especially that worried look he had when he first arrived that said he wasn't sure about us or his new surroundings but he really wanted to like it here. I have missed Mable greatly since she passed away in July and have thought about her every day. I must say that since Clay's arrival things have just felt more "right" in regards to losing Mable. it really does work out that when one door closes another one opens.

Mable

I am happy to say that Clay quickly decided that he loves it here. The first few hours were rough, and Clay spent most of that time laying down in his stall resting and recovering from the trip. Jason kept asking me if we should call the vet but I said no, he was clearly just worn out from his trip, and what he needed was rest, not the vet. We did give him a tube of electrolytes and a nice mash of well-soaked alfalfa cubes to aid his recovery though. Interestingly Clay travelled here with his barnmate Chili who is the same age as Clay, and Chili walked off the trailer fresh as a daisy as if he'd just gotten on a few minutes ago. Thankfully Clay was fully recovered by the afternoon, and has been bright and full of energy since. He and Chili are great friends and very attached to each other.

Clay checking out his new digs

Clay started off life as a racehorse on the quarter horse circuit. He actually won a good bit of money at the track. He then went out west and lived in Colorado where he lived on a ranch at 8,000 feet altitude and went on trail rides up to 10,000 feet altitude. Unfortunately Clay displayed major lameness issues after only a year in Colorado and has actually been retired since 1996. He has the stereotypical quarter horse teacup feet. Kudos to his owners for keeping clay for all of these years!

Clay and Chili

Chili was also a trail horse alongside Clay, except he stayed sound until he was retired a few years ago. From what his owner told me Chili took amazing care of her on trails that were incredibly rugged! She said they would ride all day stopping only to eat lunch on trails that went straight up and down over some pretty tough terrain, and that Chili never took a wrong step.

We are thrilled to have Clay and Chili join us, and Clay has brought us full circle in regards to Mable. I'll have more on this topic in another post.

Pictures

I hope one day I will actually be caught up on sharing pictures. These were all taken in late September.

Apollo coming for breakfast with Leo behind him

Sebastian
Faune

Ogie

Elfin and Chance

Harmony rolling

Homer and Leo

Teddy with his head buried in the grass

Hello from number eighteen

Ogie

Trillion

Faune and Sebastian

Harmony, Buffy and Teddy

Elfin, Homer, Leo and Chance is in the very back

One Of My Favorite Videos

I was recently looking through some of my old videos of the horses here and watched this one. This is one of my favorite videos. Poco the shetland pony and What, a retired Grand Prix dressage horse, racing around in the field. Yet another horse who apparently didn't get the memo that he would hate retirement! After all he was a show horse, was used to having a job, travelled internationally to compete, etc. etc. He seems to be having a pretty good time in my opinion!

Having Fun

I've mentioned before about watching all of the horses just being horses and having a grand time. Today I managed to capture some of the antics on camera. These videos are of the group of geldings I refer to as the Big Boys. The Big Boys are all young, retired geldings that are very interactive and playful with each other. They love to play, graze, nap and occasionally go galloping around and around and around . . . ! Today was one of the galloping days. The footage isn't great as it was overcast and I had the zoom maxed at times, but you can get the general idea.

Cloudy and Olivia

I've introduced you to Cloudy before in this post. Cloudy not only has his good looks going for him, but also his adorable personality. I also mentioned our other barn cat, Olivia. I said you would probably never see a picture of Olivia because she is shy and retiring, and also quite nocturnal. Well, I lied. I managed to take one (1) whole picture of Olivia a few weeks ago. Unfortunately she did not care for the flash and went up into the loft after the first picture.

Olivia is a big fan of my dad. She comes when he calls her and will sit on his lap while he brushes her. She slinks around in the background while I put the cat food out but I cannot say that she particularly likes me. She does love Cloudy though and the two of them are great friends.

Olivia up in the rafters; she did NOT like the flash so this was my one chance at getting her picture

Cloudy being a mighty hunter or something along those lines. He was being quite playful on the fallen tree limb.
Getting ready to make a dash up a tree; something had his attention

Trying to be stealth cat

Sharpening his claws

Taking a break to wash himself

Worn out from his excursion he wrapped things up with a nice roll in the grass

Pictures

I am still way behind with all of my pictures so here is yet another attempt at catching up. All of these were taken between September 23rd and September 28th.

As I mentioned in my last picture post Apple was named by Amy who pointed out she had the Macintosh symbol on her forehead. Here is a better picture of Apple and her Mac logo.

Week old chicks
Harmony with Teddy in the background grazing

Poco and Sparky; I still have my morning rodeo with Poco every day giving him his Liver Kl'een. At least we only rodeo once a day now instead of twice!

Sebastian swishing his tail and Faune with his head down grazing

Sebastian and Trillion are on the move; apparently they had places to go and horses to see.

Elfin and Homer

Homer and Ivan

Elfin

Apollo and Ivan in the next two pictures - inseparable as always

Leo with chance right behind him

Chance and Homer touching noses

Grazing

Welcome Levendi

Levendi is the newest addition to our retirement farm. He is a striking bay Oldenburg gelding with, in my opinion, one of the cutest faces on the farm. Levendi made the trip to our farm from Florida last week. He has been settling in nicely and has taken to the menagerie of animals on the farm quite well. He is quite fond of the goats and likes to groom them on the rare occasion that they stand still long enough for him to do so.

Levendi is another horse who was a lottery winner when horse owners were being assigned. Retired at the young age of ten due to complications from arthritis in his neck, he has no idea that many horses will never be as lucky as he is. Levendi is very well loved by his owner, who sent him to us after his previous barn hosted a retirement party in his honor. Kingsmeade Farm in Florida really treats their horses and clients right!

Like all of our residents Levendi considers himself an expert at grazing

He has a really cute face and typically has an alert yet soft expression

He thinks the goats are simply awesome little creatures

Exploring the paddock on his first day

Pictures

Another attempt to catch up on posting some of my pictures. These were all taken in late September.

Faune

Chance and Leo
Hanging out; Ivan, Apollo, Chance, Leo

Apple in the front. She was aptly named by Amy who pointed out she has the Macintosh symbol on her forehead; Buster is the black and white steer in the back

Elfin

Trillion and Faune

Trillion and Sebastian

I don't think they could graze any closer together; Finn, Homer and Elfin

Content

Apollo and Ivan

Apollo

Pictures

As usual I am way behind in uploading my pictures. Today's pictures are from mid-September. The pastures look fantastic in these pictures, much better than they look today. We are coming to the end of the grazing season and will be putting hay out in a couple more weeks. No more gorgeous green pastures until mid-late March when spring comes again. I love it when the pastures are full of vibrant green colors, the trees are fully leafed out, and everything looks so alive. Right now isn't too bad with the colorful fall leaves, but the grass is starting to go. By the first of March every year I am wondering if the pastures will come back. Thankfully they "spring" back every year!

Chance over the fence; this was taken on one of his first days with us

Trillion and Ogie
Trillion, Faune and Sebastian

Billy the goat (what a creative name dad!) and the rooster

the goats

Bella, Bonnie and Lexi

Teddy

Buffy with Harmony in the background

Harmony

Buffy, Teddy, Harmony

Follow the leader

Leo

Ogie and Poco napping together

A Time To Roll

I don't know why, but every horse on the farm seemed to have the need to plop down and roll in front of me today. The best part was when I watched Ogie, Trillion, Sebastian, Faune and Asterik roll one right after another. Ogie started the domino effect with the rest of them following suit. One of them would roll, then the next one would walk over to the same spot and roll until each one had had their turn. What a rough life!

Elfin really went all out

Elfin doesn't usually stand up and then go down on the other side. He sits up like a dog and scoots himself to the other side with his front legs
On to the next side

Dogwalking back over to the side he started on

Back to his original side again

Finally finishing up his extended roll

Trillion

Faune

Asterik

Changing Roles

The shoe was on the other foot for me this weekend. Instead of having someone coming to the farm to visit their horse, Jason and I drove 440 miles one way to visit my horse Hoffy in North Carolina. Hoffy has been on lease with Jessie in North Carolina since April as I simply did not have time to ride him along with Bonnie and Lexi. I have missed him and have especially missed seeing his big, white face waiting for me every morning since he left. I think Jason was sick of listening to me talk about how much I miss Hoffy as he happily spent his weekend driving 900 miles so I could visit him. Any horse would be happy to be living with Jessie, and being the compassionate horse lover that she is Jessie recently rescued Jakob, a Friesian gelding. You can read more about Jakob on Jessie's blog about him.

I was rolling my eyes at myself as I babbled on about Hoffy as we drove to Asheville on Friday evening. I kept asking Jason if Hoffy missed me, what Hoffy was thinking when he was on the trailer to Jessie's farm, if Hoffy was as happy there as he was with us. The answers to all of those are no, Hoffy doesn't miss me, he wasn't thinking about anything except eating the hay in front of him as he was on the trailer, and he was every bit as happy in North Carolina as he was in Tennessee.

How did I know these answers before ever seeing him? Because horses and all animals have the gift of living in the present, not the past and not the future. As long as their present circumstances are as good or better than their previous circumstances they are content and happy. Hoffy's life with Jessie is the same as his life here. He lives in gorgeous, well maintained pastures in a temperate climate with compatible friends. All of his needs are attended to and he wants for nothing. But every bit of common sense and horse knowledge I had seemed to be flying out the window onto I-40 as I talked about Hoffy.

Hoffy and I in front of Jessie's barn; Hoffy has an adorable, goofy personality

On Saturday morning we got up early and left Asheville to drive the last 100 miles to Hoffy's new residence. When we arrived Hoffy's reaction was exactly the same as how the residents here greet their owners when they visit. He definitely recognized me, he was quite happy to see me, but was definitely more interested in the treats I had brought for him. As long as I was feeding him treats it was "Oh my gosh mom I've missed you so much, where have you been???" As soon as I stopped feeding him treats and he realized he was not going to be getting any more his reaction was "Well, thanks for stopping by. I would really like to go rejoin my friends now."

I had run out of treats so he moved on to grazing

I now understand why it is so tempting for our clients to keep feeding the treats when they visit. Because I felt so loved and so missed as long as I had the treats. Without the treats he honestly was more interested in eating the grass in front of the barn. Eventually even the grass in front of the barn wasn't enough and he was ready to rejoin his friends. I was thrilled that this was the reaction I got from Hoffy because it told me he was perfectly happy with his life and didn't need me.

We made Jessie join us for one picture

After spending a couple of hours with Hoffy and Jessie Jason and I headed back towards Asheville. We spent the rest of Saturday exploring the Blue Ridge Mountains and drove part of the Blue Ridge Parkway. The weather was spectacular, the foliage was right at peak and was spectacular, and the mountain views were gorgeous.

The typical view out our window as we were driving on Saturday and Sunday; the trees at our farm are just now thinking about changing colors

Taken in the Blue Ridge Mountains

On Sunday morning we ate breakfast, checked out of our hotel and took the long route back to our farm. We spent the balance of the day in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. We experienced more fantastic weather, saw more gorgeous mountain views and the most spectacular fall foliage either of us have ever seen. And given that Jason is from Ontario and we lived in Vermont we've both seem some pretty amazing fall colors. The fall colors we saw today were the most breathtaking fall foliage we'd ever seen and we took lots of pictures!

All in all it was a nice weekend. I spent time with Hoffy, spent time with Jason and saw some amazing scenery. Not a bad weekend!

Another scene in the Blue Ridge Mountains

The pictures don't do the scenery justice; my camera couldn't pick up the colors on the mountain tops as they were too far away; I took this with full zoom so I could capture some of the mountain colors

Me in Smoky Mountains National Park

Jason on the walkway to Clingman's Dome, elevation 6,643 feet

Jason and I at the entry to the Appalachian Trail

Pictures simply don't do justice to the views