The day before yesterday, I rode Chikala again.  We went out for a ride on the dirt roads that we have been riding on, but we went a different route for part of it.  Instead of turning around and heading back towards the house, we kept going “around the block” when we reached the halfway point.  This included two roads that we haven’t ridden before.  It was a GOOD ride!!!  The only problem I had with her was when I was trying to mount, again, and she kept backing away from me, but I am working on that here and there, and have an idea that I will hit it pretty hard either later this week or early next week to see if I can break her of that bad habit.  Chikala has finally settled down about as much as she’s going too, I think.  And she seemed glad, in a way, to not have to take the same route that we have been taking.  She embarked on the “unknown” of the new roads with a curiosity that is a sign she would make a GOOD trail horse for someone.  We crossed two or three different bridges on this new route, most of which had a hollow sound when she stepped on them.  The sound did not seem to bother her at all, and neither did the road signs.  She passed the road signs by keeping her eyes on them as we passed, but she didn’t shy away from them.  Then we road the shoulder of a more travelled, paved road.  Out of the 8 or 10 vehicles that passed us, the only one she even laid her ears back at was a semi with a rock bucket…..and she heard him coming because he let his jake brake engage several times as he came up behind us on the opposite side of the road.  But laying her ears back was ALL she did, even when he passed us.  All in all, Chikala has proven herself to be a good horse, in my opinion, for trail riding for an intermediate rider.  I am just taking a guess, because it is SOOOOO hard to compare beginner and intermediate riders sometimes, but I would have to say that a more…..inexperienced intermediate rider would be acceptable for her.  I would have to guess that, except for the problem with her backing up when you try to mount, she would and will prove herself a good mount for someone who is just wanting a good, steady horse who doesn’t spook at all of the horse-eating mailboxes and such.

Anyway, we had a good ride on a BEAUTIFUL day!!  Hope to do it again SOON!!!

God Bless!!!

The gal that owns the most of the horses that are here on our property sent me an e-mail the other day and wanted to know if I would evaluate a gelding that she’s got to see what kind of a rider it would take to ride him.  She brought him over late Saturday evening.

Boomer is a red sorrel gelding with a blaze down his nose.  He’s over 10 years old, but, after riding him, I find that he’s still got ALOT of spunk left in him, which means he will make someone a GREAT riding horse for several years, if he’s taken care of and things go right.

Boomer was kind of excited when he got here.  Of course, it’s probably been a little while since he was trailered.  I found that he was trying to walk past me when I led him over to where I saddled him.  That was about the only thing from the ground that I didn’t care for, but with a little training, someone should be able to get him to stop doing that.

I rode him in our North pasture for about 20 minutes, to get the feel of him.  I don’t think he’s used to having a hackamore bridle used on him, but he was doing alright.  He neck-reins pretty decent.  I did find one quirk that could get someone hurt if they didn’t understand what the “problem” was….I found that when I nudged him with my heels to get him into a trot, he would do a baby buck or, as my Dad called it when the Mother to my mare did it, a “crow-hop”.  It took me a couple of times to figure out that someone has trained him to NOT take the nudging of the heel in his side as a cue to go faster…….instead, he has apparently been trained to take a “verbal” cue…a kissing sound.  I have NO doubts that Boomer would buck someone off if they attempted to use their heels instead of the kissing sound to make him go faster.  After I figured out that little quirk, I have to say that we had a pretty good ride.  I took him down the dirt road from our house for a little ways after we got our time in in the North pasture to see how he moved with more space.  My partner followed me in his pick-up as an insurance policy, in case anything happened.  It was a BEAUTIFUL sunset!!  His gait is nice and smooth, even in the trot.  I even got him to canter for a short distance.  We went through a marshy area coming back towards the house, and he didn’t once hesitate stepping into the water.  We had a car come up behind us at one point and that didn’t bother him any.  We also had a diesel pick-up with a long, gooseneck trailer meet us at the corner of two roads.  I got Boomer off the road a little ways, and turned him to watch the pick-up, and I found that he didn’t really want to stand to watch it go by.  But that was really the only thing that I found him “bothered by”.  We went by some sheep, lamas, and a couple of other horses, and he was as cool as a cucumber.  I would have to say that he likes to get out and go, because I let him set his own pace most of the way, and he went at a trot.  Got him warmed up nicely!!  We probably rode about 3 miles or so out on the road.  I was really pleased with his performance, since it was in question about his ride-a-bility.  Supposedly, the gal that owns him was told that he’s been in parades and such….I kind of doubt that he’s been in very many parades, but he HAS been ridden quite a bit from the looks of things.

We had a GOOD ride!!  Thank you, K.C., for bringing him over!!!  I think he will make someone a GOOD riding horse, as long as they understand his quirk.

Time to get moving, all…..Have a blessed day!!

Just got done riding a mare that goes by the name of Chikala again, for the second time this week!!!  Chikala is one of the horses that was here when we moved in, and we have become a sort of “foster home” for them, and I work with them and see what they know and what they DON’T know, in hopes that it will help the woman that actually owns them.

I first rode her for this Spring this last Sunday afternoon.  My son, partner and I all got outside to enjoy the NICE weather, and my son and partner worked with one of the donkeys that is here that goes by the name of Jasper.  We have adopted him as ours.  While “the guys” worked with Jasper, I combed and saddled Chikala.  Then we walked up the road and back, which was about three-quarters of a mile, and then I got in the saddle and we rode up the road to the corner and went West for about a mile, and came back home.  When I got in the saddle, Jasper got put away and my son and partner got on the 4-wheeler and followed me, just in case there were problems, but mainly to run interference for the traffic on our road.  Chikala didn’t think anything about the 4-wheeler, or my partner’s dog that went with us and was running up in front of us and back behind us….she didn’t think anything about the 1 or 2 cars that passed us, or the horses in the pasture that we passed, or the barking dogs that we went by that started to come down towards the road.  She was calm and collected, and a pretty good ride, except for the fact that she holds her head ALOT higher than what I like when she’s trotting.  The biggest problem I had with her was when I went to mount…she has a BAD habit of backing away when you go to get in the saddle.  I would say she’s had some bad experiences with saddling and mounting at some point in her life.

Today, we had a BIG problem with her backing away when I went to get in the saddle.  Not sure how to stop her from doing that, but I WILL figure out something.  Time to do some research when I get a few minutes and see what kind of ideas I can come up with.  I got frustrated with her today when she backed away from me, but I HAVE to remember that it’s probably NOT her fault that she does that.  She learned to do that because of some other stupid human.  If I have it figured right, we rode ABOUT 4 miles today, in just about an hour and 20 minutes or so.  We had 3 or 4 cars pass us, and we went down past another horse of the male portion of the species and he got ALL excited when we went by, and Chikala started to show her attention in that direction, but I was able to bring her attention back on me without too much problem.  We went through a marshy area in somebody’s pasture that’s not fenced today again, just like we did on Sunday, and she hesitated, but she did go ahead and step into the water without any problem.  I took the lead rope off of her halter today when I rode her.  Up to now, I have been leaving it on as a “back up” in case I came off and needed something a bit longer than my reins to hold on to her with.  But I took it off today, thinking that the weight of it was the cause of her holding her head so high when she trots, but she still held her head high without it.  So I figure that’s just the way she is (and some horses are).

About time to grab something to eat and maybe a shower before I have to leave, so you have a BLESSED afternoon!!!  Maybe I’ll post a picture or two of the horses one of these days!

It seems like it’s been a LONG week and should be at least Friday by now!!!  Of course, it doesn’t help that I’ve been running all week either!!  Not sure if I’m running tomorrow or not, job-wise, but have a couple of different engagements to attend,  so may decide to bow out on the job for tomorrow.  Will see what morning brings, I think.  Maybe I’ll be recuperated and ready to go again?

Haven’t had much time at home this week, but have gotten some things done here, as well.

I had hands on a little filly that’s about 18 months old (from what we are told) yesterday and the day before.  This is the FIRST time this filly, which we affectionately named Pheline, has had someone touch her, from what we’ve been told.  Pheline has JUST enough curiosity in her that she has gotten a bit of courage and just a TAD of trust towards humans over the last 6 months or so since we’ve lived here.  I have been watching her over the last few months, as she has been getting closer and closer when I have been out at their stall.  (She is still in the same “run” that she was born in with her Mother, H.B. Alice, though that “run” has increased dramatically in size over the last few weeks!!)  The day before yesterday, I was feeding Alice and Pheline a bit of grain, and Pheline came close enough to let me feel her breath on my hand.  I stretched my fingers out (of course, she is doing this from as far away as possible), and she sniffed my fingers and barely rubbed her nose against them.  LAST night, though, I was just standing out there talking to them from outside their gate, and both Alice and Pheline came up and was standing there.  Pheline stepped closer and was sniffing my arm.  When she pulled her head back slightly, I VERY slowly extended my hand out towards her.  She again sniffed my hand and bumped my fingertips with her nose.  She didn’t pull back any farther than she was already, so when she moved her head to the side slightly so that she wasn’t touching my hand anymore, I ever-so-slowly matched her movements with my hand.  I then intentionally touched her nostrils as she moved her head a bit more to the side.  She didn’t bolt…she didn’t back up…she didn’t even lay her ears back at me!!  This is a BIG step for this little filly!!!  A few more days of that, I think, in between rain storms, and I will have hands all over her and I SHOULD be able to move towards her to pet her, if only to her forehead to start!!!  It has been a LONG 6 months or so with these two horses…..such pretty girls and SOOOOO close, yet SOOOOOO far away right now because of their “history” which has seemed to have made them “untouchable”…at least until we moved here.  I didn’t get to go out this evening to see if I could touch her again because it started raining JUST as we hit the house after school.  I didn’t even get to the mailbox from the driveway before it started raining.  But there IS tomorrow!!!  As for H.B. Alice, well, she is going to take a bit more time and patience, but she, also, has come a LONG way since we moved in!!!  No longer does she lay her ears back whenever anyone comes near her or her “run”.  No longer does she try to grab hay out of our hands when we are trying to throw it in to her!!  No longer does she go to the other end of the “run” when people come near!!  And no longer does she try to “protect” Pheline from us!!!  It’s amazing what a difference of attitude towards a horse can produce sometimes!!!

I got the final panel put up on what was going to be our “third run” which is now our “second run”.  I took the gate that was between the two runs down, such as it was, on Monday and let Pheline and Alice in there to munch what little grass there was.  That was Pheline’s first taste of grass that she didn’t have to push her nose under the fence to get too!  And Lord only knows when Alice had a taste of grass that she didn’t have to get through the fence!!  They BOTH seemed to enjoy the extra room!!  Now, my “round pen” is all set, except for a different gate between the two pens!!!  Now all I need to do is get the weather and the schedule to cooperate and I will have hands on Miss Alice!!!  One step at a time!!!  This next week, if I’m not working on a remodelling project, I SHOULD have a couple of days to work with Alice AND to ride at least one of the others that are in our pasture!!!  I’m kind of getting an itch to be back in the saddle, which is probably a GOOD thing, considering the number of horses I have lined up to work with throughout the Spring!!!  But, I have to get Alice and Pheline to where I can move them around in the pens, if need be, so I can have my “round corral” to work these other horses if I need it.  That, in itself, has kind of moved Alice and Pheline to the TOP of the list….at least to get halters and such on!!

Other than that, not much going on here….as if that’s not enough!!!  It’s about time for bed, me thinks, since it’s raining and windy outside again tonight.

You all have a BLESSED rest-of-the-week!!!

And it’s not even CLOSE to being over yet.

Was up before daylight this morning again, and basically had time to grab something to eat and check my websites and jobs and such, and then my day started with a rambunctious boy and some visitors for the day.

Once the day started, it’s been non-stop action with our visitors and my son going non-stop, as well as getting some the majority of my cleaning done this week and checking up on the status of my jobs.  This afternoon has been sprinkled with a smattering of phone calls and car excitement.  NEVER a dull moment around here!!  Soon it will be time to get dinner on and a shower for myself, as well as a bath for my boy and a shower for my significant other.  Then it’ll be a matter of feeding the animals and getting things cleaned up in the kitchen from dinner, and then off to bed to try to grab some rest and then start it all over again come daybreak.

SUCH is my life this week, and my God IS providing for our EVERY need…ABUNDANTLY!!!

God Bless!!

After a LONG day of earning money, I HAVE to say that I am GLAD that I’m just finishing things up here at home, for the most part, and it’s about bedtime!!  It wasn’t a bad day….just a LONG one, and tomorrow promises to be just about as long.

Read Luke 21-24 early this morning to try to get more morning off to a decent start.

About an hour after that, I started earning money, and looking at my other prospects for the end of the week.  All this while I was cooking dinner this afternoon, getting some of my stories found and into a format that will open on my newest computer, and playing with my son, too!!

But now I think it’s about time to say “God Bless” and ya’ll have a GOOD night!!!

Faith means you want God and want to want nothing else….In faith there is movement and development.  Each day is something new.
Brennan Manning

Spring has sprung here in Kansas in the last week or so.  We have a few days where the temperatures were just warmer, and we actually had a bit of SUNSHINE!!!  And then it started raining a couple of days ago.  The flowers by the walk up to our front porch have probably grown about an inch and a half in the last 2 days.  I guess I should get the ones that I dug up from my other house in the ground, huh?  Well, we will….that is on the plan for this afternoon!!!  We planted a rose bush that I dug up from the other house last night.  I’m not sure if he will survive or not, but we are hoping he does.

Speaking of roses, my significant other and I were out burning the ditches in front of our house the other night, and found that the ditch on the North side of our house is FILLED with irises that are starting to come up!!!  The ditch should be AWESOME if they bloom this year!!  We also found 2 rose bushes hidden in amongst some saplings that have been allowed to take over that part of the fence/pasture.  I am hoping that they bloom this year too!!  There is another rose bush out in our big pasture that I would like to see bloom too!!!

GOTTA love Spring!!!

Been cleaning stalls a couple of days over the last week or so.  Have an acquaintance that wants some of the manure.  Will feel SOOOOOO much better about the horses that are here when the stalls are clean and such!!!

Part of that cleaning stalls has been in an attempt to make a “round” corral, so I can start working these horses on the days when I’m not running all over the country.  Have taken down part of a fence, and are going to use the panels that I took down to make the back fence of another one, so I can do some separation and such when needed.  I have two horses that I NEED to get hands on and halter broke in my “round” corral, so I can move them around a bit, and be able to have my “round” corral empty when I need it.

Going to have a rock-pickin’ party in another one of our pens.  But it won’t be today.  I am going to build a rock border around the flowers that are up here by the porch, I think.

Will be working on a couple of websites here in the next week or so too!!!

And all of this is in addition to the extra jobs I’ve been able to pick up over the last couple of weeks and keeping house!!!  Yep, my days never seem to end.

God Bless, All!!!

I received a new book in the mail the other day.  It’s a “day brightener” book and has one for every day of the year.  I am going to share some of them with you, here and there.

God Bless!!!

The true way of softening one’s troubles is to solace those of others.
Madame De Maintenon

That is SOOOOOO true in most cases, I have found!!!!  When you are trying to help someone else deal with their problems, your’s don’t always seem quite so big.

Have a blessed weekend!!!

Ahhhh, what a prompt for this week!!!  So many different directions I could go with this entry!!!

I guess the fact that a friend of mine is in the process of making some of MY “big dreams” come true is a good way to go today!!!

I have ALWAYS wanted to live out in the country and train horses.  I always imagined that they were mine, and we aren’t QUITE to that point yet, but I can see it happening in the next 2 or 3 years, at the MOST, if we so desire it.  Granted, I don’t think I ever imagined starting out like we are now….stalls and pens and buildings needing cleaned out….weeds needing pulled (like the ones that I was pulling last Fall that were taller than I am)….pasture in pretty sad shape, grass-wise….buildings needing lights and repairs and such….NASTY trees needing cut before they take over the rest of the pasture….  But you know what?  I wouldn’t trade ANY of the last 6 months or so for the world!!!  Even WITH all of the hard work that we’ve done…and are CONTINUING to do with the Spring-like weather coming!!!  Granted, it may get to a point, this Spring, where it’s going to be a question of whether we will EVER get the place cleaned up like we want it, but I think it will be worth it.  That’s kind of like the last two days of warm weather….I took it upon myself the day before yesterday when I was out screwing around in one of the pens to take down some hog panels (a fence separating two of our runs), and dump a water trough that Lord only knows when it was dumped and cleaned last.  Well, I got it done.  Yesterday, since I had already started taking down the hog panels, I figured I might as well take the rest of them down.  So I did that, and pulled one of the posts out of the ground and filled in the hole.  I was on a role…the weather was NICE….and Lord knows that there is ALOT to do outside, including cleaning out the runs/stalls, so I grabbed a shovel and started shovelling manure over the fence.  It’s too muddy to get the wheel barrow out into the back pasture when it’s loaded, so I just started throwing manure over the fence, deciding that I could move it further out into the pasture at a later date….at the least stalls/runs would have a START towards being cleaned out.  I was out there for probably 3 hours or so…..shovelling manure over the fence almost the entire time.  I didn’t think about how much there was to do….I just kept shovelling…thinking about one shovel-full at a time.  Today was just about the same way, though I ache JUST a little bit from yesterday.  I grabbed a shovel and started shovelling again….for about another 3 hours today.  Would you believe there is concrete down about 6 inches in places out there?  I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t seen it myself.  I am HOPING that I can work on it some more tomorrow.  I actually got started in the stall area on one side today!!!!  Only 15,000,000 more shovel fulls to go in that one stall!!!  Shovelling sh*t is her “big dream”, you ask?  Well, let me put it THIS way….in a way…YES!!!  It gets me outside…and close to horses (which, with the two that are in our front run area, close is about all you are going to manage at THIS point), and it’s improving the living conditions for these two horses!!!  What can I say?  Achy muscles that aren’t used to being used….sore hands and joints….and a BIG pile of sh*t works for me!!!!

On a more private note, we had one of our ducks eaten by…something….the day before yesterday.  We suspect it was a coyote, but we aren’t sure….the possibilities are endless as to the possible varmits out here…..We are exploring the possibilities as to “varmit” control.

God Bless!!!

Not much time this morning, I’m afraid.  I’m running most of this week…in ALL different directions…but hey, at least I’m earning a bit of money while I’m doing all this running!!!  Getting tired, though, and it’s not even Wednesday yet.

Thank you ALL so much for the notes!!!  I appreciate it, and I’ll get around and leave some….one of these days.  I’d say maybe next week, as I only have one “job” for next week so far, but I KNOW that will more than likely change before next week gets here, so I think I will just say that I’ll make it over to leave notes….ONE of these days, and leave it at that.

Have a GREATLY blessed day, all!!!