Back to Normal

We are back to our regularly scheduled programming of retired horses with this post! The last two posts have been all about me and my horses which isn't the purpose of this blog. I appreciate everyone who took the time to offer their suggestions about Bonnie. I've read them all several times and am thinking about all perspectives. I think the best way to describe Bonnie sometimes is professional talent and a professional ride as well. I have the highest of highs and the lowest of lows riding Bonnie. With my revised schedule we've definitely been on an upswing the last few weeks. I also think she has been a bit slow to mature mentally and I think the brain is at least starting to catch up with the body. However it is has been the consistency of my schedule with her that has helped the most, no doubt about that. That said I'm very happy to have Sky in the picture. She's a very nice horse herself and so laid back, I've had a lot of fun with her in our first two weeks of getting to know each other. Thank you again for all of your comments!

Now on to the real starts of the show here, the retirees:

Dustin and Tony; Dustin is a son of Starman and was a big time jumper himself. Tony is a dutch warmblood who competed in the a/o hunters with a national ranking before stepping down to the 3' divisions his last few years.

Trigger and Ivan grazing by the shed. Trigger was a hunter and Ivan was a Grand Prix jumper.
Apollo and Leo; Apollo is a hanoverian and retired dressage horse while Leo is a dutch warmblood and retired hunter. In a former life Leo also competed up to 4th level dressage as well, a very versatile guy!

Snappy, Teddy and Chili. Snappy had quite an impressive career. He was an eventer originally and was competed through the four star level (the highest international level) by the double gold medalist in eventing, Mark Todd of New Zealand. Snappy was then sold to an eventer in the states. Later in his career he showed on the A circuit in the hunters and won everywhere. Teddy is a retired dressage horse. Chili is a retired trail horse who was a working cow horse prior to hitting the trails in the Colorado mountains.

Tony; tall, long and lanky are the words to describe Tony!

Bear running along the driveway

Asterik with Faune behind him; Asterik is a Holsteiner and was a big time jumper as well as sometimes showing in the a/o hunters.

Faune, Winston and Trillion. Faune is a Selle Francais and was a top hunter nationally. Trillion is a dutch warmblood and was also one of the top nationally ranked hunters. Winston is a thoroughbred and showed in the hunters as well.

Lightening is an Arabian and retired trail horse

Norman the pony. Norman still has the run of certain parts of the farm. We enjoy having him wander around so much we haven't been able to bring ourselves to fence him in! He is very content with the situation as well.

Mina and Jo, world's cutest fainting goats

MyLight and Buffy grazing with Harmony down for a nap. All three are thoroughbreds. MyLight is retired from dressage, Buffy is a retired hunter and Harmony is a retired polo pony.

Lily and Cuff Links. Lily is a Quarter Horse/Oldenburg cross retired from the jumper ring and Cuffie is a Welsh pony and retired from the pony hunters.

Decisions, Decisions

Someone asked a great question in the comments on my last post. I answered the question in the comments but I thought I would expand on it in this post to help me sort through my thoughts. The question was what am I doing with Bonnie and Lexi now that Sky is in the picture?

Me with Bonnie and Lexi

Lexi is the foal out of my wonderful retired show horse Bridget (click on the link for some pictures of Bridget). Lexi was born in April 2004. I got exactly what I wanted when I bred Bridget. I wanted Bridget's beautiful jump and amazing personality and temperament to be preserved, but I also wanted a better hind end and more length of stride in the resulting foal so they could be my next show hunter deluxe. On top of that if I was being extra picky I wanted a mare because I love mares. When I visualized my dream foal out of this breeding Lexi was pretty much it!

Lexi is about six hours old in this picture, she hasn't even unfolded yet

Bonnie was born in March 2004 a few weeks before Lexi. Bonnie is out of the wonderful swedish warmblood mare Gabrielle. Gabrielle was a wonderful dressage horse who also dabbled a bit in the jumpers for some variety. She was working Prix St. George when she had a pasture accident. She had been kept up for a few days due to weather and basically went crazy when she was turned out. She went up for a huge buck/spin in the air and came down dead lame with a bone chip in her ankle. As with Bridget her performance career definitely made her an excellent candidate for a broodmare. Bonnie was her second foal. Gabrielle was owned at the time by one of my oldest friends and she generously allowed me to breed Gabrielle at the same time I bred Bridget.

Bonnie's dam Gabrielle

Bonnie's sire is Budweiser, a Dutch Warmblood stallion. Budweiser was exported to Germany the year after I bred to him and then a couple of years later was exported again to Australia. Here is a blurb about Budweiser: 1994, 17 hh Dutch Warmblood. Approved by: GOV, RPSI, & SWANA. In his pedigree, Budweiser has the 5 top European stallions consecutively: Burggraaf keur, Voltaire keur pref, Ahorn Z (v. Alme), Landgraf I, and Roman. Budweiser completed the 100 day performance test at Pruessendorf with a score of 126.20 points for jumping (3rd). For his character, he scored a perfect 10 and scored 9 in Free Jumping, Temperament and Ability to Work. Budweiser has sired 22 Premium foals between years 2000 – 2002. Budweiser competes at the Grand Prix level in showjumping.

Bonnie meeting Bugle when she was about 9 hours old; she was born in mid March 2004

My hope for this cross was my future jumper/dressage horse. Any good jumper has to be able to do low level dressage! Of course I hoped for a mare as well. Yet again I got exactly what I wanted. When Amy hopped on Bonnie the other day the first words out of her mouth were "this is the most uphill horse I've ever sat on!" Bonnie is built like a powerhouse with an outstanding topline and hind end. She's been evaluated by two FEI dressage trainers who both told me she had the conformation and gaits to potentially be my horse to go to Grand Prix in dressage if that was what I wanted to do. She isn't a floaty, pretty mover like Sky but she has power to her gaits when she really engages herself. As one of the trainers said she may not win at Training/first level because she doesn't have the flashy front-end auction trot but she has the build to sit and collect which is what you need as you move up the levels. I have not really jumped her at all but from looking at her and riding her canter the jump should be there.

Bonnie and I cruising around the cross country course last August; she still looks like a baby in this picture. She has grown taller and filled out more in the last year.

If you want the quick re-hash of my undersaddle time with them here it goes. They were both backed as three year olds and then turned back out to grow until they were four. At four they were both back in work sporadically. My life was busier than it has ever been last year! I took them to a cross country schooling day to hack around, play in the water jump and see the sights last August. When I was on my way home some idiot decided to stop in the middle of a very busy 2-lane road going downhill on a blind curve and do a U-turn. Needless to say they halted traffic from all directions and cars were going everywhere. They did not stop at the scene but completed their U-turn and left. I was only going 25mph at the time but still had to slam on my brakes hard (I was the second vehicle behind this car). Lexi actually fell down in the trailer on her hind end and then slid under the chest bar and got stuck there sitting down.

Me on Lexi in February of this year; notice the short sleeves! Jason cut my head off in this picture

At the time I thought my main concern was the bad puncture wound on one of her legs that I had a heck of a time getting healed. Well, as it turns out what I should have been doing during the saga of healing the puncture wound was having the chiropractor work on her a LOT. She sustained a sacro-iliac injury and if any of you have had experience with rehabbing an SI injury they are tough ones. One of the keys is very specific and very consistent work. She started back to work earlier this year and sometimes I was all over the rehab program but then I would have a couple of weeks where I just didn't have time to ride and we backslid. It was a very frustrating up and down rollercoaster. Oh, we're making progress! Oh, we just lost all of our progress because I didn't have time to ride! Jason didn't handle my reaction to all of this too well and I can't blame him.

Bonnie in the water jump last August

Bonnie also had some time off after the trailer incident but spent some time with a trainer earlier this year to get going again. Once again this was thanks to my schedule. Bonnie is one of those horses that at least as a super greenie does best with a very regular schedule which she wasn't getting from me. It is very frustrating to have such an incredibly talented horse that you feel like you make no progress with at all! Jason often made the valid point that it didn't seem like I could be getting much fun out of a horse that was in full training somewhere else, although he went along with it and paid the bills without complaint.

Bonnie

As I said in Sky's introductory post Jason finally got sick of it all. He said "why don't you just go buy a horse that you can have fun with RIGHT NOW." And I did! During this time I had talked a lot about my predicament with one of the Amy's that works here. Amy is wonderful, an excellent horse person, an excellent rider, and an excellent person to discuss your horse woes with. She has been without a horse to ride for awhile now and one thing led to another and we worked it out that Lexi would move a few miles away to another farm and Amy would have a horse to ride again (we don't care any liability insurance for riding at our farm so no one but me can ride here). She is obviously fully aware of the whole situation with Lexi and her need for "physical therapy" riding. She also works with the same vets and chiropractor so will be able to seamlessly continue Lexi's rehab and get in back in the saddle herself. I'll hear about Lexi several times a week, she'll be fifteen minutes away if I have the time to go ride her myself, and I know Amy's high standards of horse care. A win-win situation for all of us! Amy gets to ride, Lexi gets the rehab schedule she needs, and I am relieved and feeling a lot less pressured and guilty.

Me with Lexi

Now the plan for Bonnie. I don't really know - and I can assure you Jason's blood pressure is shooting sky high as he reads that! Jason feels that I should sell Bonnie and for awhile I was starting to agree. Bonnie is a superb athlete but as mentioned does best in a regular program (what horse doesn't really?), and I have been unable to provide regular. It pretty much led to a circle of frustration for me as it constantly felt like two steps forward and one step back with Bonnie thanks to me and my schedule. I was beginning to accept that Bonnie is a fantastic horse with more potential than I would probably ever tap, but she did not fit in my life at this time.

Bonnie

A few weeks ago I started getting up an hour earlier each day. The only way I can fit more time into my schedule is one hour less of sleep. I did this so I could make a point of being on a horse and riding by a certain time each morning several days per week. I'm sure it will come as no surprise that things started really coming together for Bonnie and I once I kept to a regular schedule for a few weeks. Sky's arrival also helped a lot I think. I became less focused on progress with Bonnie as I had Sky to have fun on and wasn't stressing about Lexi's rehabbing. As I was cantering around on Bonnie the other day riding the most athletic, powerful, balanced canter I've ever felt on a horse (and I've had some really nice horses over my three decades of riding - thanks mom and dad!) my thought was "why in the world would I sell this???"

Bonnie

Now I have to be honest and say I haven't been able to replicate that exact canter since that ride although I've come close a couple of times, but overall the quality of our work and her understanding of what I'm asking for keeps getting better. The catch is what happens when we end up being more sporadic in our work again? On one hand I'm thinking I know the answer and we'll both wind up frustrated again. On the other hand I wonder if we've reached a place where maybe she's more mentally mature and more able to handle my life. I really don't know. I know Sky is the type of horse that as long as she is not completely unfit can be pulled out of a field and go right back to where you were before. I need that kind of horse in my life right now. I also think part of it is ego. I will admit I like knowing that I have a horse this nice. Sky is a very nice horse herself as is Lexi, horses that anyone would be happy to have and be seen on at an "A" show, but Bonnie has the potential to be something extra special if I can ever get my act together with her. As the title says, decisions.

Bonnie

If you've made it through this long-winded me, me, me all about me post I applaud you! I also have a question for you. If you were me would you go ahead and put things in motion to sell Bonnie? What would you do?

We'll be back to our regularly scheduled program of retired horses and their pictures in the next post!

Riding Sky and Overprotective Parenting

Sky and I are finally starting to get to know each other under saddle. I took it pretty easy on her the first week and didn't really do anything but walk under saddle, but we've had a few nice rides now. Hard to believe she hasn't even been here two weeks yet! You will noticed that I've dropped the second y from the end of her name. I'm not in love with the name Sky but everyone, including me, thinks of her as Sky now so I guess the name is here to stay! The name is starting to grow on me though, just like she is.


Sky is what I would describe as 'hunter' broke. She will trot and canter around in a nice rhythm all day with no real contact on the reins. She seems to have been ridden with more of a headset in mind than actual, true throughness and softness and thus no real elasticity and lifting in her topline. So especially at the walk and trot I've been trying to get her to start stretching down and reaching for the contact. At the canter I'm still just cantering in hunter mode, up out of the saddle in a half seat with light contact. She is a fantastic mover, even better than what I was expecting from her sales video, so I'm excited to see how much improvement we'll see in her gaits as we start developing her flatwork better.


By the way this was pretty much what I was expecting as far as where she would be in her training. Sky has never really had her own person and her own program. She was one of many foals at the large breeding facility where she was born, and then was backed and imported by a jumper barn in Ocala, FL and taken straight into the jumper ring when she was four. It doesn't surprise me that it quickly became apparent that Sky was NOT destined to be a big time jumper. She would be fine as a children's/adult jumper (3'6") but I wouldn't see her progressing up the ranks from there. Sky is definitely more of a hunter and nice horse to do dressage on at the lower levels, and I'm hoping she'll be game to jump around some cross country courses as well. Since she was in a strictly jumper barn she was turned back out after a couple of shows and sat in a pasture for over a year doing nothing. She was purchased by the wonderful people I bought her from a few months ago and was in sporadic work while waiting for a buyer. Sky is six this year.

I plan to do a lot of long and low work at the walk, trot and canter in the next few weeks and work on asking her to relax through her back and stretch into an active, soft contact. After just a few rides she is already starting to get the concept at the walk and trot. I won't push for it at the canter until she's really getting it at the walk and trot. She is also clearly not used to someone truly sitting the canter and is very used to more of a half seat, hunter type ride at the canter. With the incredibly willing attitude and quick learning she's shown me in our first three real rides together it looks like it will be fun to really develop her flatwork. I've already started to incorporate lots of poles in our flatwork and will pop her over a few low fences sometime soon.

Just as she needs some gymnasticizing on the flat I'm sure our jumping will consist of mainly gymnastics at first also. Every Saturday in August our local pony club chapter will have the cross country course used for the Middle Tennessee Pony Club Horse Trials open for schooling. The MTPC Horse Trials is actually the oldest consecutively run recognized horse trial in the country. Hopefully I'll have time to take her over there and we can cruise around, go up and down the bank, through the water jump and take in all the sights. She's never seen a cross country course before but she is so sweet and quiet I'm thinking she'll take it well!

I would love to hear about your favorite exercises for relaxing and stretching the topline and teaching them to have true contact. I plan on doing lots of leg yields, spiraling in and out on a circle, changes of direction, etc. Pretty much the usual, basic things. I'm trying to focus on having soft hands and showing her a very inviting contact that she would like to accept. I'm pretty rusty since I've been mostly out of the saddle the last few years so any exercises and tips are welcome. It is amazing all of the things you forget when you aren't using them. I also plan on taking dressage lessons as well after we've gotten to know each other more. I'm lucky to have Tami Crawford, an excellent Grand Prix dressage rider and trainer, just seven miles away from me. Tami qualified for the Olympic selection trials on one of her horses a few years ago so I'm excited to take some lessons from her.

In addition to my first rides on Sky our excitement last week was our concern over Jo's weight. Jo is one of our two fainting goats and as I mentioned in my last post we were weighing her in a cooler - and she got nervous, fainted, and fell out the first time! That was traumatizing for Jason and I but she seemed fine with it. Jo is used to being a fainting goat but we still aren't always used to the fainting ourselves!

Anyway, the vet was out to see Jo on Friday. We put Mina and Jo in their stall and she examined both of them for a couple of minutes. Then she looked at us and said "I'm not sure why I'm here. These two goats look amazing. Their coats have a gorgeous shine, their gum tissue and soft tissue around the eyes have perfect color and their weight is excellent." We reiterated to her that Jo had dropped a decent amount of weight and we weren't sure if it was a growth spurt, parasites, or what and that even Mina had dropped a little weight. Well, she said Mina didn't need to get any heavier or she would be really fat (good thing she didn't see her a couple of weeks ago!!!) and that Jo was in perfect weight. As it turns out Jason and I had fat goats that dropped down to a better weight. Oops. What can I say, this isn't the place to be if you want to be a skinny, sad looking animal! We were happy that we had the vet out for absolutely nothing, a much better outcome than it being something!

Do A Deer

If I had The Sound of Music on DVD I would so be watching it right now! I am sure Jason is down on his knees in thanks that we don't have that movie on DVD, because he would be forced to listen to me singing along with Do-Re-Mi a few times. I have had that song in my head since this afternoon. I was scrubbing the trough in the Big Boys' pasture and I noticed as I stood up for a break that their group seemed a lot bigger than usual. I carried on scrubbing the trough and while I was waiting for it to fill up I took a better look at things.

Well, their group was bigger than usual, in fact up by a total of three. They had three deer right int he middle of all of them happily grazing away, as were the horses. They were all very comfortable with each other and clearly this was not a new thing. I've seen deer grazing with the horses before but I've never seen them so relaxed, especially with me just a few acres away.

However the really neat part was when the boys decided it was time for their daily runabout. They have a good gallop around their 40 acres at least once a day. The big boys are a younger crowd and they can get pretty frisky sometimes. What made me watch in awe and amazement was the three deer ran with them. The deer weren't running away, but running right in the middle of the pack. It was amazing and really beautiful to watch.

When I was relaying this to Jason tonight he wasn't impressed at all. His response was "yeah, when I bushhog back there those deer don't even run from the tractor anymore." So I guess this group of deer consider the farm to be their home and all of the residents to be their friends. It was an amazing sight to watch those deer streaking across the pasture with the horses.

I just googled the lyrics to Do-Re-Mi so I could post them here. Now everyone can have this song running through their head!

Doe, a deer, a female deer
Ray, a drop of golden sun
Me, a name I call myself
Far, a long, long way to run
Sew, a needle pulling thread
La, a note to follow Sew
Tea, a drink with jam and bread
That will bring us back to Do (oh-oh-oh)

Maria and Children:(Repeat above verse twice)

Maria:Do-re-mi-fa-so-la-ti-do
So-do!

Unfortunately I did not have my camera with me. I could kill myself for not having my camera!! It was such a busy day that I never even bothered to take it out of the house. If only I could have gotten some pictures or video or something of the deer running along with the horses. I guess you'll just have to take my word for it that A) it happened and B) it was incredible to watch.

Faune and Winston Sebastian (in the flymask) and Lightening conversing over the fence. I think Lightening is saying something along the lines of "hey, there is something different about your face. I can't quite put my hoof on it . . . "

Bridget and Traveller

Mr. O'Reilly

MyLight was curled up in a ball napping
Then she moved into dead horse position for awhile
When she decided it was time to get up she rolled, including sitting up and doing the Elfin dogwalk, to roll on the other side Teddy with Snappy behind him

Grazing under a pretty blue sky

Leo, Ivan and Chance

Lucky grazing while Clay enjoyed a nice roll behind him

Lexi with Bridget behind her We've been a bit worried about Jo's weight. We think she is in a growth spurt but decided to start weighing her regularly. Jason first weighed the empty cooler.

Then it was time to put Jo in the cooler

Poor Jo, she is usually quite brave but being lifted in the cooler made her nervous when it tilted. She fainted and fell out. I was too traumatized to keep clicking and capture it on camera. It can be tough being a fainting goat.

Thursday Pictures

Our July weather has continued to be extremely pleasant the last few days. Yet again we did not get out of the 70's today. We also had rain off and on all day today. When Amy and I were feeding this morning we both got pretty wet. I managed to stay dry throughout the day including riding two horses. When I set out to do pm feeding and scrub/fill water troughs Jason said I should put Mina and Jo outside since it looked like the rain was done. I went over to the barn and put the goats outside, and turned the stalled horses out.

I kept looking at the clouds in the sky thinking we couldn't possibly be done with the rain. I made the decision to delay stall cleaning and do my pasture "stuff" first just in case. Thank goodness I didn't listen to Jason and looked at the sky! As I was walking back to the barn after finishing up the skies opened up and I got soaked again, but at least only for a minute this time. When I reached the barn I could hear two screaming, bellowing, distraught fainting goats in their pen because they were getting soaked. Goats hate to get wet and Mina and Jo won't go in their houses when it rains, they stand at the gate screaming to be brought in to their stall in the barn. So I got soaked again as I ran out to to open their gate so they could come back in the barn. They aren't spoiled at all!

It was pleasant to listen to the rain on the roof of the barn while I cleaned stalls, scrubbed water buckets and refilled hay for the next day. The horses enjoyed the warm rain and I didn't see any horses in their shelters, they were all out grazing in the rain. Actually no matter what time of the year and what the temperature is I rarely see a horse in the shelter when it is raining - kind of irritating really! You spend thousands of dollars per shelter so they can ignore them. I guess it makes us humans feel better to say that they have man-made shelters!

It can be confusing to identify the gray mares from a distance; L-R Buffy, Harmony, Lily

Faune
Winston; Winston had a little scrape on his leg that the flies found extremely attractive for some reason so I've been keeping it wrapped

Lightening, resident Arabian

The family; the goslings are pretty much grown up

Trigger, Baby and Tony

Ivan giving me the look of "what do you want, I'm busy!" as he was grazing by the pond

Levendi and Dustin; Baby and Tony are in the background

Lily, Missy and Buffy

Cuff Links MyLight and Lily hanging out under the trees

Homer (aka Homey or Homefry)

Leo and Trigger groomed on each other

This photograph is an excellent example of my terrible photography skills; I managed to cut Leo's nose off.

Slinky, Lightening and Teddy with Tony behind the fence

Nice Weekend

After the drama of the midnight fence repair last Thursday (or I guess it was technically Friday!) we have had a nice, quiet period since then. Gwen the amazing farrier was here on Friday, and then we had a very low key weekend. The weather was amazing for this time of the year, with a high of 79 on Saturday and about the same for Sunday. The humidity was also missing and no one was complaining about that either! I hope everyone had a nice, relaxing weekend and enjoyed the lovely weather as well.

From L-R we have Clay, Slinky, Chili, Lightening, Lucky and Snappy

Ogie and Faune
Asterik
Winston, Faune and Sebastian

Trillion

Missy, Buffy and MyLight

Sebastian, Winston and Trillion

Tony and Trigger

MyLight and Buffy

Missy, Harmony and Cuff Links

Levendi, Chance and Leo

What a Day

I am ready for this day to end, but I guess it is actually tomorrow since it is almost 2am right now. I had one of those days that had a lot of drama in it. Thankfully none involving Jason and I or the horses, or even the farm, but by the end of the day I was scared to answer my phone! Anyway, I tried to be a good friend and offer support to the people that needed it.

I was way behind on trying to get stuff done today and I didn't make it back into the house until about 8:30 tonight. I finally ate a meal, took a shower, tried to catch up on e-mail (I'm sure many of you reading this know that I didn't fully catch up!), etc. etc. At about 11:30pm I realized how late it was getting, (especially since that is past my bedtime) so I put my shoes on and headed over to the barn to do night check and put Mina and Jo, world's best fainting goats, in for the night.

I had walked maybe ten steps and I heard tires skidding and then a loud bumping noise. It sounded like someone had just had a wreck somewhere right by our farm. I really wanted to pretend I didn't hear it, but I did hear it, so I went inside and got my car keys to go investigate. I'm driving along the road not seeing anything and feeling relieved but then I found the cause of the noise, there was a car in the ditch. I pull over and find out if the person is ok (he was already out of the car) and he said he was. I then immediately asked about the fence, feeling hopeful since his car wasn't in the fence. This very polite teenage boy called me ma'am (I am NOT old enough to be a ma'am thankyouverymuch) and said I'm sorry ma'am but I did hit your fence. Great. He had sideswiped the fence.

I get out and investigate and two sections of the fence are demolished. In case anyone is wondering the sheriffs department would have made sure the fence was repaired in some fashion and not left it that way so no worries there if I hadn't heard it. Anyway, I saved them the trouble of having to track me down by beating them to the scene. Of course Jason happens to be away so I am stuck dealing with this damn fence - at midnight. (Excuse my language but I've been up for 19 hours at this point ok?) I was pretty cranky at this point so first I called the police to report the accident even though he said he'd already called.

Then I caved and called my Dad because I so did not want to have to deal with this by myself. He came and took a look around and we argued for a bit over the best way to deal with it before having the fence company out in the morning. I guess the one "good" thing about this is the driver's insurance company will have to pay for the fence to be repaired so at least Jason and I won't have to rebuild the fence ourselves. I finally won the argument as I said the easiest thing to do would be to get a couple of corral/round pen panels to put there. Very solid and not a lot of building involved. So we drive back to the equipment shed and load up a couple of panels in the back of the truck. Then I get the pleasure of riding in the bed of the truck with the panels so they wouldn't fall out, bumping across one of the pastures, while my dad drove. Of course they fell out once anyway, almost taking me with them, so we had to reload them and carry on again.

It was easy to actually set them up and secure them to the remaining fence posts once we actually got them over there. By then the poor kid's dad had arrived, the police had arrived to write up the report, and finally the tow truck came. I was really worried that the fence might get more damage as they pulled the car out of the ditch but thankfully that didn't happen, and at 1:30am the fence repairs and car extraction were done. I finally did my night check and put Mina and Jo in and here I sit, wide awake. I didn't even try to go to bed as I was just too awake. But I think I can sleep at this point. Awesome, I have to be up in four hours!! The wonderful farrier Gwen will be here tomorrow so I need to get an early start

I took this series of pictures yesterday. The geese (remember our goslings, they are really growing up) wandered through the big boys who were grazing around the pond. None of the horses even lifted their head. Trigger and Tony are in this picture.

Homer and Trigger
Dustin in front, Levendi and Leo in the back

They could care less

I had lots of help when I was dragging my arena this evening. Asterik is the one rolling and Sebastian and Faune are watching.

Winston, Trillion, Faune and Asterik; when I offered to reward their efforts to help me by riding them in the newly fluffed footing they left the arena - pronto! Imagine that!

My niece Caroline rode along with me in the Kubota as well while I was dragging the arena. Like I said I had a lot of help. She kept pointing out to me the parts I had missed (I kept trying to explain that I could only get so close to the jumps).

A relaxing scene, it makes me want to go to bed RIGHT NOW, lol. L-R Lily napping, Buffy standing watch, MyLight napping and Cuff Links napping

Front to back Apollo, Leo and Tony

We joke that Norman is like the Visa commercial, "everywhere you want to be." I think it is Visa, maybe it is AmEx or Mastercard?? Anyway, Norman is wherever he wants to be these days and it is so cute! Asleep in his stall here with the door wide open, not the closed eyes.

Looking out at me from his stall

Mina joined him in his stall

Chatting with Bonnie when I was untacking her after riding

Grooming with Faune; Faune is a huge Selle Francais, 17.3 hands I think and Norman is a medium pony at 12.2 hands. Norman was really having to stretch to groom on Faune!

Christmas in July - NEW HORSE!!

It still hasn't really sunk in yet but I have a NEW HORSE! To put it mildly my riding life has sucked the last few years. Let's see, both of my show horses were retired within a couple of years of each other. I had two very nice youngsters (Bonnie and Lexi) that I had bred to be their replacements but of course for awhile they weren't old even enough to even be backed yet. They were backed during their three year old year then turned back out to grow more. We started them up again in the spring of their four year old year (last year) and things seemed like they might finally be going my way.

Skyy

Then I had the trailer incident coming back from a cross country school which put us out of commission again . . . and the depressing saga of my riding (or should I say non-riding?) life continued on. Bonnie especially does not do well with this whole stop then start program, a consistent program is her friend. Of course a consistent program is best for any extremely green horse! Then of course you have to add my busy schedule on top of everything - I run a farm as you know! I've brought along a lot of green horses throughout the years, but I have learned there is a huge difference between a green horse and a horse that isn't started at all.

My very first glimpse of Skyy in person

Jason, world's greatest husband, finally got sick of it all. Sick of me not riding, sick of me complaining about not riding, then sick of me lamenting about how hard it is to bring along two completely green bean horses when you aren't working with them consistently. One day he looked at me and said "Why don't you just go buy a horse with more training and have fun with it?" I didn't think he really meant it at first, plus I felt guilty just thinking about getting another horse.

She has a very soft eye

But he kept saying that so I started kind of half -heartedly looking around. Yeah, you know how the rest of this story goes! Before I knew it I had seen Skyy's picture, then her video and then - voila! - I had bought her. Yes, you read that right. I bought her without ever seeing her in person or riding her. I did everything you aren't supposed to do when buying a horse! I did of course have a thorough pre-purchase exam done.

Meeting Norman. Norman has become our resident "barn pony" and is free to roam around certain areas of the farm. He comes in the barn to go in his stall and get a drink of water and check things out a few times a day. He usually ignores any other horses in the barn but he is pretty infatuated with Skyy. He stopped by to see her several times today.

The day I wired the money for her I called my favorite east coast shipper, Tapp Horse Transportation, to have her shipped to me (she was in Northern Virginia). They said they would be able to get her scheduled within a week. Then the next day they called and said they had a cancellation on one of their trucks that day and the truck was in Northern Virginia. So they picked her up, shipped her to their facility in Kentucky where she spent two days, and then brought her to my farm today.

Skyy realizing that she has hit the jackpot (in my humble opinion!) of horse homes!

So today I welcomed Skyy, my new horse! Skyy is six years old and is a Swedish Warmblood. She is nicely broke on the flat and although still green to the fences she will happily jump around a small course. Her lead change is even about 80% there already. She needs to do some more poles, cavaletti and gymnastic exercises but if I had the desire I could take her to a show tomorrow as is. I plan to do a bit of everything with her, some low level dressage (I do some training/first level dressage with all of my horses), some hunter shows and some low level eventing. I hope to do some foxhunting with her as well. She has a great brain and is the type that is game to do whatever you ask of her. The best part is she is fancy enough to be competitive at all of these things, yay me!

Like all of our new arrivals she found the goats to be of great interest

Happily grazing this afternoon

I hopped on her briefly today because I just couldn't stand to wait any longer. She was a good girl although Jason made me get off after just a couple of minutes. He said I needed to give the poor horse a day or two to rest and settle in and of course he is right. I can't wait to get to know her better. I have to say I'm not in love with her name but it would feel odd to call her something else at this point. How do you feel about changing a horse's name? In the end it is the package that matters though, not the name!

On a funny note I have been learning about what it means to own a gray horse. As I mentioned in my "name that gray" post I've never had a gray. I've always ended up with either bays or chestnuts. When Skyy was out this afternoon the first thought that went through my mind as she laid down to roll was "NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" My new horse already has grass stains on her. Quick Silver here I come!

Welcome Skyy!!

Blankets in July?

No, we're definitely not wearing blankets in July. But that doesn't mean I'm not having to deal with them! On Friday we gathered all of the blankets from the various places they are kept around the farm and got them all into the barn. It is time to get all of the blankets in for cleaning and repair as I have procrastinated on this task for far too long. I know what a huge pain it is to do this and am not above admitting that I've just plain avoided it for the last couple of months.

Starting to pile them all in the barn; we were just getting started here

Amy using a sharpie to re-label this blanket

So we hauled blanket loads to the barn, knocked the dust off of them, and then re-labeled all of them with the horse's names. Because I have so many blankets (approaching 100) to get to the lady who does the cleaning and repairs for me they have to all be neatly folded as well. There is no way I could take them to her all in one trip if I tried to just stuff them unfolded in the back of the truck. It takes awhile to neatly fold that many blankets! Then we put them in stacks of 2-4 blankets each and tie them with baling twine. Then we had to pack all of the bundles into the back of the truck. It seems like it wouldn't be a big deal but this is a HUGE task!

Folded and tied into bundles with twine

And finally stuffed into the back of the truck

It was a relief to finally drop all of these dirty blankets off this weekend. At least I am no longer looking at all of these blankets hanging everywhere and acting as a reminder to me that I will have to tackle this task. Aside from the gargantuan blanket job we were just business as usual this weekend. We did get a good bit of rain this afternoon and I could see that most of the horses had taken advantage of it and rolled in the mud around the gates. We definitely needed the rain so I didn't mind the muddy horses!

Clay and Slinky

Levendi

Homer and Leo

Trigger and Dustin were nuzzling each other

Norman completely ignoring his audience behind him

Harmony and Cuff Links

Baby entertaining himself while waiting for his turn with the farrier

Happy grazers

Teddy

Cuff Links and Missy

Winston and Trillion

Faune and Sebastian

Friday Pictures

Ivan and Apollo are best friends

Norman recuperating from a tough day of grazing; the only way I can get a picture of him doing anything other than grazing is to take him away from the grass!

Sebastian, Winston and Trillion

For all of Cuff Links' many fans here are several pictures. First, getting a bath.
And getting up from the requisite roll after the bath; good thing we really tortured him and made him stay in until he was dry.

He knows he is cute

Now on to another gray horse. Lily checking out her new pasture. First she trotted.

Then she picked up the pace

And then she stopped to eat (always a priority activity around here!)

Lily with Missy

Bella kept a close eye on things while Lily explored the pasture

We've had a busy week so far this week. Gwen, the amazing farrier, was here Monday and will be back again tomorrow. We have an extra day scheduled this week to make up for the day we missed when Jason and I were away. I was sitting in the house in an almost comatose state Monday evening wondering why I was so tired. Then I remembered that I had hauled horses to the barn and then back to the fields from all over 140 acres throughout the day to have their feet trimmed. In addition Amy and I bathed and did manes on nine horses on Monday. And of course that was on top of the usual feeding everyone morning and evening, stall cleaning, water troughs, etc. No wonder I was so tired!

The pony wars have taken some more turns lately. In a change that really surprised me Buffy took over MyLight (who of course is not a pony). Buffy has claimed Missy the pony as her very own for months, so I was quite shocked to see that she had reassigned herself to being in charge of MyLight's life (and I do mean every moment of her life!). MyLight doesn't have the option of claiming Cuff Links as her pony any more due to that change, so Harmony has now taken over both ponies (Cuffie and Missy). I don't know what brought this about as I didn't see the big shift actually happen.

To throw another curve ball into things Lily was integrated into their group Friday and Saturday and has been with them since Saturday afternoon. She has shown a lot of interest in the ponies (especially Cuffie) and MyLight. Harmony has firmly kept the ponies off limits to everyone else so she has to sneak over to them. Cuffie actually seems pretty keen on quality time with Lily so they kind of sneak towards each other. MyLight seems equally interested in Lily so whenever they can escape Buffy's notice I see Lily and MyLight together. I have to say these mares and their ponies could be their own evening soap opera, like a Melrose Place or something.

Well, I'm off to get my farrier list together and then time for bed!

I haven't posted any pictures of Cloudy in awhile. Cloudy is the world's greatest barn cat.

Jason replaced our flags last week. Of course we fly both the U.S. and the Canadian flag.

Homer went for a swim in the pond and then he rolled. The effect is just . . . lovely. If you will recall Ivan is WHITE!!

Leo checking Ivan out with his new look

This picture of Trillion was too cute and had to be posted.

Faune and Trillion were buddied up to each other. They are great friends now but they used to be frenemies.

Buffy napping with MyLight grazing next to her

Trigger and Chance; they have 40 acres of beautiful grass in their pasture and they stand here picking at the scrub around the gate.

Baby

My Brilliant Discovery

First of all, thanks to everyone for the kind comments about my blog last week. I've not done such a great job with it lately and you do have to wonder why anyone would find a blog about retired horses (i.e. horses that don't really do anything) terribly interesting. So thank you very much for letting me know that some people do actually look at this thing! Now on to my discovery . . .

I really love taking care of the horses and spending my days with them. By the end of blanketing season I will admit I am sick of taking them on and off but I don't even really mind that. I enjoy being outside in the changing seasons. Sometimes I don't even mind getting rained on. One of the things I truly dread has always been paste worming the entire farm.

All of the residents are wonderful horses and pleasant to work around, but when it comes time to stick a tube of wormer down their mouths, well, that is when you are introduced to their dark side! Most of the horses are actually quite good about it. However, since most of them live out 24/7 once you've de-wormed one horse in the group the rest know it is coming. I wouldn't stick around for that and the horses feel the same way! We jokingly have what we call our "runners," the ones that know it is coming and exit the building. We always try to get the worst runners first but they can't all be first. So on top of dragging around a mountain of halters and a zillion tubes of paste wormer, there you are chasing down the runners and convincing them that the horse cookie is totally worth having the halter put on and the dreaded tube inserted in their mouth.

Apparently I was the last person on earth to come to this brilliant discovery, but I've found a much easier approach to paste worming. I just empty the tubes into their feed and let them eat it. Wow, no dragging out the mountain of halters, no chasing the runners, the people administering the wormer aren't covered in sticky worming paste, none of it is spit out, no waste . . . I could go on forever about how much this discovery improved my life! If I only had a few horses to administer wormer to then it wouldn't really have been a life changing discovery, but we've got well over thirty horses here. On top of that a lot of them are big horses and one tube of wormer isn't enough for many of them, many get a tube and a half. You can catch them off guard with the first tube but they know the second one is coming, and of course the taller they are the more likely it is that they will put their head up in the air!

Last week was my second time administering the paste wormer in the feed. Every single horse ate it, every bite licked up. I have a bit of an advantage since I feed with feedbags. Also, we soak everyone's feed as well, so they are used to eating wet feed, and as you know it is easier to mix stuff up when it is wet. With the feedbags they can't spit it out, fling it out, drop feed or otherwise get rid of any unwanted addition to their food, they just have to eat it. A few of them eat slower than usual and try to find a way to avoid eating it, but even these horses still finished every bite. With the ones that I know are super fussy about unknown substances in their food, I sprinkled a bit of dried molasses onto the wormer paste and then thoroughly mixed the wormer/molasses paste with their feed. I guess you could say I sweetened the deal!

Anyway, I thought I would pass my discovery along in case there is anyone else out there that hadn't tried it yet. When I've mentioned my exciting news to my horse friends most of them had already tried this. Well, I may be slow but I'm hell once I catch on. At least I think that is how that saying goes!

On a completely unrelated subject Jason cooked dinner Friday night and Sunday night. In a rare occurrence I am rendered truly speechless with nothing to say. I don't have a clue what brought this on and I don't want to ruin it. Oh wait, I do have something to say. It was actually good! The smoke alarm only went off one time. Friday night we had salmon and Sunday we had pork tenderloin. Wow. Huh. Wonders never cease.

Chance

Geese flying over the farm
The baby ducks are growing up!

Cuff Links

Buffy and MyLight

Asterik

Ivan

L-R in the back Dustin, Tony, Baby; up front Levendi and Homer

Trigger

Tony and Baby

Elfin demonstrates a perfect afternoon. After taking a refreshing dip in the pond enjoy a nice roll.

And of course he has to do his famous dogwalk to roll on the other side; sorry about the tree branch in the way.

I took this directly into the sun (you probably had already guessed that from the lousy picture quality). Winston, Faune and Ogie in the front with Sebastian and Trillion in the back.

Asterik getting a bath and not looking to happy about it. I rarely remember to take any pictures of horses being groomed because I'm usually busy grooming one myself.

Lily and Norman

Jason and I were blessed to welcome two amazing new additions to our family this week. Lily and Norman made the trek from Northern Illinois early this week. Sometimes life seems to work itself out and the presence of Lily and Norman on our farm are a perfect example of this.

Lily checking out her new surroundings

I don't think Norman knows where he is yet, he has yet to lift his head

We maintain an active waiting list for Paradigm Farms. I try to go in order as best as I can when accommodating new horses, but this isn't always the way things work out. Herd dynamics are extremely important on our farm since most of the horses live outside in groups 24/7. Thus, when we have an opening I cannot necessarily go straight to the next horse on the list. I have to go to the next horse on the list that is the most likely to be a good fit with the pasture that has an opening.

Lily's reaction to the goats

Even with a chicken standing under him Norman didn't lift his head

As you all know, I really struggled with Poco's passing a few months ago. I had been talking with Kate, who owns Lily and Norman, about the possibility of them retiring with us. My problem was a lack of space. I knew I would have one gelding leaving as he was here strictly for rehab purposes. (By the way we don't typically do that but his mom has another horse retired with us, we really like her, and we were able to make it work at the time although we could not right now.) This was going to allow me to make a couple of minor herd changes and free up some space in one of my pastures that houses mares and ponies. However I had already made a commitment to MyLight (whom everyone loves!) so one of those spaces was gone.

I need to get a good picture of Lily's hind end; it is all power. Look at how far she naturally steps under herself here, and this was a half-hearted canter.

I made Jason pose with Norman so I could get a picture that didn't involve his head on the ground. Kate, check out his mane - Amy tackled it yesterday!

When Poco passed away that certainly left a hole in our hearts as well as a space in a pasture for a pony. To be honest at first I couldn't really think about it. Norman and Poco are so similar, they are both pinto ponies with larger than life personalities. As the saying goes time does heal everything, and after a few weeks I was really in love with the idea of having another pinto pony on the farm.

Lily does what I call her "morning runabout' when she goes out in the mornings. It only lasts a minute but I like to watch her.

Who wouldn't want to hug this? Norman has to stand really tall to get his head over the stall door but he gets the job done.

I am so glad that I called Kate and asked if she was still interested in sending Lily and Norman, we need both of them! I am hoping (and expecting from what Kate has told me) that Lily will take over the alpha role in her group. Buffy and Harmony currently rotate between themselves in that position. I get the sense that either of them would be happy to have a true leader come along and relieve them both of that burden! The fact that Lily is a beautiful mare with a great personality on the ground is an added bonus. And of course our world is now right again with another feisty, pinto who is 100% pony residing on the farm. Norman is just too cute with his champagne and white pinto markings, and he has that plucky pony personality which I happen to adore. Unlike Poco he also has wonderful ground manners - bonus! I know my vets and my farrier will be quite pleased by this improvement!

Lily is a Quarter Horse/Oldenburg cross who was ridden and shown by Kate's older daughter. Originally bought to be a hunter, apparently Lily made it known quickly that she did love to jump, but liked to do it big and with speed. I must say that Lily has an awesome hind on her that certainly shows why she was such a powerful jumper. Unfortunately Lily developed heaves a few years ago which is a progressive respiratory disease, and the strenuous exercise that would be required of a jumper wasn't possible anymore. Such a shame as Lily was and is perfectly sound. Some horses would be content to step down to teaching light duty lessons, trail riding, or some similar type of activity, but Lily's keen personality under tack didn't make her a good candidate for these things. As with many of the horses retired here their strengths as competitors work against them in other situations. Kate writes her own wonderful blog called A Year With Horses, and she does a much better job of telling Lily's story in this post.

Lily has her knees literally to her chin in both of these pictures. I like the expression of horse and rider in both pictures, calm determination.

Norman has been in their family since 1998. Norman was purchased for Kate's younger daughter and she started showing him when she was seven years old and continued to ride and show him until she turned twelve, at which point she had physically outgrown him. Norman is only 12.2 hands which makes him a medium pony, but a very small medium pony. Although Norman has some arthritis in his hocks now I've still managed to see what a fancy mover he is, and the pictures certainly show that he had great form over the jumps! Norman carried his rider to a lot of wins including three year end championships in their final year of showing together.

I have managed to get on Norman's nerves as his first day here I kept hugging him because I just couldn't resist. Norman kept letting me know he didn't care for all of this hugging by nipping at me and I finally got the message and have ceased with the hugs! Norman has certainly channeled the same spirit that Cuffie has as he never lifts his head from the grass during his multiple, short grazing periods each day. Again, Kate tells Norman's story much more eloquently than I do in this blog post.

Even though he is just cantering over this little jump from a long spot he still has even knees while he takes care of his young rider.

Norman shows excellent form over this jump - pony and rider are so CUTE!

Welcome to the family Lily and Norman!