Saturday, July 31, 2010

Another Mini Visit

My niece Stephanie is working a summer program for kids and they had a "rodeo night" finale on Friday night. Pictures mostly speak louder than words so thanks to my helper Leslie and here you go:
Lots of folks wanted to help feed Cupcake!




This young man spent the whole evening with us, ignoring the other activities. When asked he said he wants to work at the zoo when he grows up!

This lucky baby has a GOOD mama who feeds him :)

The horses got some carrots too

Peter Pan was so excited to "meet" grass!


All 3 baby donkeys were a big hit


And Leslie took a couple of pictures of me with Cupcake since I didn't have any yet


Peter Pan wanted to know what Leslie was doing!

We had a fun night!

Friday, July 30, 2010

Day 4 and Cupcake's Doing Great!

Got a squeeze cute set up here and first thing in the morning, and again after work, I lock Abigail in there and let Cupcake help herself while I am feeding my crew. She gets a good hour of opportunity both times. Hilary doesn't want to mess with mom much so is mostly doing bottles.

All comfy in her pen, until she sees Hilary coming...


I KNOW you have a bottle for me!!!!


Hilary said she ate 5 1/2 bottles yesterday... plus the 2 I gave her later, besides eating from mama!


This one is my favorite - eyes closed, tongue out... don't you just want to kiss that little nose???


I can still feel ribs but since equine babies are basically bones with skin on when they are born, I am not surprised... and they are NOT as prominent as they were the first day, so I am happy about that. She continues to be alert and active and with every day that goes by I am more comfortable about her future... unfortunately no change in attitude from mama but if we force her to stand in the squeeze chute, she has no choice but to feed the baby, so we will just keep on keepin' on!

Thursday, July 29, 2010

Peter Pan's First Therapy Visit!

We took Foxy and Ozzie, Sarah Beth and Alvin, and of course Peter Pan, to Grandview Care Center yesterday.

Alvin was not in the mood for visiting, he made poor Sara drag him all the way across the parking lot, she was sure worn out! On the plus side, he is too small for the bun bag but NO ACCIDENTS yay!


Peter Pan learned all about wheelchairs, walkers and other contraptions!

Darned camera anyway, but this was too cute not to publish even if it did come out blurry!

Ozzie is SUCH a good therapy pony!

Sarah Beth chose this man as her special friend - handler Barbara said she didn't seem to like anyone else but she stuck close to him for quite a while!

Even the maintenance man had to stop and pet the minis

Ozzie and handler Jackie

Alvin and Sara, Sarah Beth and Barbara coming out of the elevator

This woman's husband couldn't be there for the visit but he was quite insistent that his wife have her picture taken with Foxy - she has one from a prior visit that she loves showing off to visitors. We made sure she got Foxy's foal in the picture too!

Peter Pan was really fascinated by something on her chair, he kept sticking his nose in there!

Wednesday, July 28, 2010

Cupcake Update

Our sweet little girl is holding her own!!! She ate for a good 20 minutes yesterday morning for me, again for Hilary during the day, Mary fed her a couple of bottles in between, then she nursed 40 minutes last night and almost an hour this morning... I took some pictures of Abigail in the squeeze chute:





CRANKY mama!


At this point I am fast losing hope that Abigail will come around, she is getting worse instead of better darn it. I feel bad for Mary as she depends on Abigail to listen to her troubles and will really miss her, but she broke down last night and told me she can't handle this situation, her blood pressure and pulse are up, she isn't sleeping... so at her request I am bringing both girls to my house. That will give me time to spend making sure Cupcake is fed more often rather than the extra half hour driving time each time I have to go to Mary's to do it... and with Hilary home a lot during the day, she can do it more often too if they are here.

Meanwhile the rest of my life is falling apart! Well not really, it just feels like I don't HAVE a rest of my life right now... but Peter Pan is going on his first nursing home visit this afternoon so I will hopefully have some cute pictures for you tomorrow!

Monday, July 26, 2010

Sweet Little Cupcake


Remember last fall, the donkey whose owner died, and the dogs that Mikey and I tried to save? Well Abigail ended up living two houses down from her old place, as the neighbor lady who called me originally missed her so much she decided to try adopting her. She'd never had an equine and didn't know anything but we are here for a resource, and thankfully so as Abigail turned out to be pregnant. This morning I got a panic call, mama was KICKING the baby and not feeding her...

Now how could ANY mama not love this?

It seems that Abigail is EXTREMELY jealous and possessive of Mary, because she actually DID feed the baby, seen by Mary's husband and daughter... but once Mary came outside, and ignored her to go straight for the baby, that was all she wrote.

Lots of drama and trying different things, but so far so good for baby Cupcake... and me, well, I will heal ;) Yes I got stepped on and knocked down... and kicked a good one in the thigh so HUGE hoofprint bruise. And the finger I pinched trimming one of my own this morning also got twisted so is even more swollen and bruised... {sigh}

We would appreciate any and all prayers, best case scenario mama calms down and takes over, summer babies are hard anyway and with mama not wanting to feed her we are worried about her getting enough and keeping hydrated. She has already figured out the water bucket so that helps. First call I made was Mikey of course, she was already at work herself so she sent Wade, bless his heart, to rope the mother and get hobbles on to keep her from kicking. And Hilary went out later in the morning to make sure baby got a meal, and also milked a full baby bottle out for Mary to try later, which Cupcake did well with. Randy went to the store for me and got a calf bottle and milk replacer but she doesn't like that big nipple yet - I am sure she will grow into it soon though! He took the hobbles off mama because she was STILL kicking at them and had taken off quite a bit of skin... Tonight I took panels out and set up a pen under the shade to keep Cupcake out of the sun,and a squeeze chute next to it, and so far THAT is working really well BUT - and it's a big, big BUT - neither Mary nor her husband are physically able to put Abigail in the chute. She is being QUITE the toad, trying to bite and kick, but once I get her tied into the chute, Cupcake can nurse to her heart's content. Which means several trips a day 12 minutes down the road to Mary's - thank God she is close. Hilary is going to take one trip also, and if anyone who lives near here reads this and wants to help we won't say no! It's not hard if you know donkeys and are quick on your feet, if you get after Abigail and are not afraid she does ok, and once she is in the chute, you just have to stand and pet and talk to her while Cupcake helps herself :)

But we will do whatever it takes to see this little darling is ok! Welcome to the world, Cupcake!

Sunday, July 25, 2010

Hay Meadow Trip

Spent the weekend at Hay Meadow (Blue Ridge) near the Mogollon Rim, what a lovely area! We left EARLY Friday morning so we'd have a nice long weekend, and the truck did well hauling 3 horses and a barrel of water. We got a nice long rain shower Friday afternoon but it waited until we got back from our ride. Great food and great company, lots of laughs around the campfire, gorgeous riding trails, only one accident which wasn't bad - a gal rode her horse into the cow tank and he SANK into mud pretty deep, in lunging trying to get out he hit her in the face with his neck, but lots of bruises and two jammed thumbs are the worst she got. And wouldn't you know it, rolling up the canopy on the trailer to leave Sunday, it ripped totally off - well it was almost 10 years old so I guess it is time for a new one...

My camp


The view from the top of Blue Ridge


A Jasmine earcam...


Lots of doggie play time - here with Neo. There were probably as many dogs as horses on this trip!


Cisco telling Rose's dogs to come out of the truck and play


Sherman and Rocket got to be trail dogs for a short ride both Friday afternoon and Sunday morning.


Our new friend Evelyn, on Aries - this horse stands 18.1!


Aries again, I was fascinated by this big boy. Took this picture of him next to Teri's 14 hand horse for comparison...


The End :)


Thursday, July 22, 2010

"Just A Dog"

Got this link in an e-mail and just had to share it with you... easiest way is just to go to this other blog, and click on the video... TISSUE WARNING!!! But it's so good...

http://richmondpetlovers.com/blog/just-a-dog/

Wednesday, July 21, 2010

Uppercut to the Chin...

Well I've never been in a bar fight, nor a boxing ring... but thanks to Hemi, as of this morning I know EXACTLY what an uppercut to the chin feels like! GEEZ! With the cow-boys being so little, I have to bend over to hang on to them... I started working with one of them a few minutes each morning, it's too hot for much more but I've GOT to get started... they are fairly wild and unhandled so it's going to take a while. This morning I had hold of Hemi, was petting him and scratching his poll, he actually stopped trying to run away a LOT faster than the first time (Monday) so I thought I would try to get him to eat something out of my other hand, with no warning he just reared up and CLOCKED me right in the chin with his poll. Yeah, I lost my grip on the halter and he was gone, I saw stars and my EAR hurt! I hate to let the critter "win" but at this point I was NOT feeling like starting over so I opted to walk away... and SIT DOWN!

I think I'm ok now... just waiting to see if my chin turns purple, black and blue!

Monday, July 19, 2010

Wahoo! Portable Panels for Camping...

A gal had posted these about a month ago on AzBCR for a friend... when they still hadn't sold, I asked about coming down a bit in price and HE SAID YES! So tonight after work I went to pick them up. Randy had said, when I mentioned them on Friday, that we couldn't strap them to the top of the Jeep... so I didn't tell him {tongue in cheek} until I was almost home...

But hey I had a blanket to keep the luggage rack from getting scratched, and good tie-down straps, and I knew from the measurements in the ad that they wouldn't overhang too much...





I'm thrilled, I've been using my 4 mini-safe SEVEN RAIL panels for camping, but they are heavy enough it is quite a chore to load and unload them... these are nice and light, in fact I can pick up TWO AT A TIME! And whatever horse I take will have more room as there are 6 of these! Since I started endurance with Katie, I like to give her an actual pen since I have asked her to work so hard, so that she can lay down, stretch, roll, or whatever. She hi-lines and ties to the trailer with no problem, but she's such a good girl I like to spoil her. And Jasmine does NOT like to stand tied to the trailer... in fact even WITH dinner in a bucket, she banged her knee on the trailer Saturday night at Mel's, hard enough to split it open {sigh}.



I think I done good huh?