Dogs, Dogs, And More Dogs

Miscellaneous Cuteness!

Blogging the other day, looked down and this is what I saw (Darci and Vada):
Darci and Sherman playing tug-of-war with the puppies' new rope toy
My fingers trying to get a cute face shot of Vada...
Sherman's ears deciding whether to stand up... or not!

Sherman in daddy's favorite position - on his back with his belly ready for rubbin'
Darci and Sherman again
Sherman and his mama Hannah

This one really got me... my toe as Vada's pillow :)
Grace, Shasta and Tank all vying for attention
Shasta and Hannah
Vada again!
We get lots of puppy love around here :)

Riding Box Canyon

AZBCR had a great ride in Box Canyon on Sunday, I enjoyed it so much that I hope to take Randy and his Pro-Hauler back this coming weekend so he can experience it as well. I was so sad to hear him say that unless the VA can do something about his back, he probably won't be horseback riding any more :(
Heading up the canyon
The rest of the bunch following behind
Shirley and her mare Meleah
Teresa and Apache
Through the huge trees to get a look at the actual "Box"
Inside the "box" looking up
Lots of water right now!

This is Linda and her mare Kate. Kate likes to straddle a bush and scratch her belly by shifting her weight side to side and front to back - sure wish I had video for this one, it was HILARIOUS! Use your imagination...
Wickenburg in the distance
My friend Mary's horse Buck - isn't he handsome (sorry it's sideways, I fixed it on my computer but it still came through sideways here!)
Can you say "hot dog"?

Blog #100!

Wow. Seems like there should be something special I could do to commemorate this milestone... got it! I changed my ID photo, which has been the tractor shot from my initial blog post, to one that depicts me a bit more accurately.

Boo!

Today Hilary and I participated in a De-Spooking Clinic, me with Luna, Hilary with our guest Cimarron. It was not like we thought it would be, but the purpose made a lot of sense once it was explained. Most likely none of the "obstacles" on the course would we run into out on a trail ride, BUT the point was, to take a horse that was afraid of something, and work it through. The point wasn't WHAT it was afraid of, but HOW you worked it through. So we can now take what we learned out on the trail with us and work them through anything scary they find out in the world.

Here is my friend Linda with her horse Logan, refusing to cross the "bridge". (She kept working on him and he did eventually walk on it but I was elsewhere.)

Hilary and Cimarron, he is also refusing the cross the "bridge".
It took a few minutes of circling but he did finally go over. Of course the tiny delay on the camera meant I missed him actually ON the bridge...
One of the biggest monsters of the day was the "tarp curtain" - especially with the wind we had, those strips were whipping every which way...
Cimarron going through the tarp curtain.
This white tarp was rubbed and dragged all over him and he did real well with it!
Me with a camera in one hand and a lead-line in the other didn't get many pictures of Luna but she did, after a few tries, walk ON the bridge... and even stood still long enough for me to back up and get her picture! And in the background you can see another gal working with her horse on the blowing blue tarp...

All in all a very successful day!

Score!

Yup, SCORE! Saw an ad on the board at Serenity Farms a couple of weeks ago, contacted the folks and went to look... got a SMOKING' deal on some fence they wanted to clear off their place! Picked up the first load last night, the portable panels...

Randy will go back Saturday for the other load, which was a more permanent type of fence that they cut down to move and never put back up... but looks like it will serve our purposes quite well! YAHOO!!!!!

Due to the trip to Wickenburg to pick up the fencing, fed kinda late... came inside to find this:
AAWWWWW

Oh - - - My - - - Gosh!!!

My main riding horse is a paint mare named... OMG yes, I am not kidding: Paint Mare. Well, she has a registered name (Merit's Top Hand), but the guy who had her before me called her Paint Mare for 14 years and that's the name she knows and answers to. Names to me are really important so this drives me NUTS! So much so that Randy's first suggestion for a name for Hannah's pup was SPOT and oh yes, he did get quite a reaction...

Anyway Paint Mare went to the breeder last year and was there a LONG time. Turned out great though because she was lame all winter and when she came home after 3 months of "stall rest" at the breeder, NO MORE LIMP! She is now semi-retired as we are trying our best to keep whatever the problem was from coming back. I did take her to an equine leg specialist, the first test to the tune of several hundred dollars determined that it was her front knees... and it was NOT bony (i.e. arthritis or bone spurs). The next test, to check tendons and ligaments, would have been several more hundreds of dollars... and if that was not conclusive, the NEXT test, to check her spine, was well over a thousand dollars. Randy being the smart man that he is said to me, they are going to tell you not to ride her, so why don't you just NOT RIDE HER... and after losing Justice I wanted one more foal from her anyway so decided now was the time...

This is her first foal, my colt Justice, who got sick at 2 1/2 and long story short did not make it.

At Mormon Lake the summer after he turned 2.
Having had Paint Mare through her two pregnancies I was sure, from her behavior when she came home last May, that she was pregnant. I was so sure that I didn't even have her vet-checked. Then in October she started flirting with Thorn, Lindsey's gelding, and I was equally sure she had lost the foal - when she is in season, she is so OBVIOUSLY in season... I was bummed all winter thinking we had lost the baby.

Here is Paint Mare with her second foal, my filly Luna who turned 3 this month. Same stallion for a father as Justice had (Tru Vanity)... when she came out solid we looked back and realized that the dams of both TV, as he is called, and Paint Mare are solid. So Luna looks like Grandma I guess. No matter, it's what's inside her head that's most important, and she is exactly like her mother which is exactly what I was after...

However I do love paints so decided to use a different stallion this time, a black paint by the name of C Tiger Emphasis (barn name Cody). Cody is homozygous for paint although not for color, but we have seen a bunch of his foals and they are gorgeous. And I liked his personality. And as a plus, he lives just down the street so Paint Mare was close enough for me to visit often!

She has been back at the breeder for 3 weeks now and - get this - WILL NOT LET THE STALLION NEAR HER! The breeder prefers not to do anything intrusive at this point and I agree, but I did contact my friend Bonnie Fogg the animal communicator for a pregnancy check and all of a sudden I am on pins and needles. After all winter of thinking no foal, Paint Mare told Bonnie that YES she is pregnant! So, what all that flirting with Thorn was I have no clue, but Bonnie has an awesome record of being correct as to yes or no... and a pretty good record on predicting sex too, so I am hopeful this IS a filly! Last breeding was late May 2007 so within the next month or two we will have TWO MORE BABIES!

Yes TWO, because Skeye:

and Trooper:
yup, they were also fooling around last spring ;) (PS this one should be a girl too!)

Now all I need is to figure out how to sleep between now and when they get here... I'M SO EXCITED!!!!!

My Kinda Guy...

Got this e-mail joke, just had to share with y'all:

The psychiatrists were attending their first seminar on emotional extremes.

"Just to establish some parameters," said the leader, "Mr. Nichols, what is the opposite of joy?"

"Sadness," said the student.

"And the opposite of depression, Ms. Biggs?"

"Elation."

"And you sir, how about the opposite of woe?"

Bubba replied, "I believe that would be giddyup."

Gotta love Bubba!! And what better way to rid yourself of woe than to go for a ride ;)