and baby makes 3......

Did that title get your attention? NO, we aren't expecting an addition to the family....but this past weekend we kept my 11 month old nephew as my brother and his wife went to Atlanta for a wedding. He's a good baby and goes to sleep without a lot of fanfare and sleeps pretty well. We also took him to the Hitchin Post for the trail ride on Saturday. Mom got to ride Goldie and Goldie didn't try any of her usual tricks. I took Shelby on a "trail ride" where I walked her on Blackie thru the woods and made a loop on a nice little portion of the trail. When we got back I let Shelby have the reins and she and Blackie and I went to the outside arena and we played around weaving in and out of some barrels for a bit. Then Jessie and I went for a ride on the same loop with me on Hannah and her on Blackie. He got lazy halfway thru the loop and I had to take Hannah behind him and prod him along. He is a great "speed" for Jessie right now but she will be back up to full speed in good time. She is asking me let her ride Blackie with me on a real trail. I may take her to Oak Mountain for a little ride and change of scenery for us both. Also, the arrangements were made for my Grandfather and the funeral was set for Monday the 20th with viewing and graveside services all in one. We also had to secure pallbearers. On Sunday, Callie - Richard and Allison came over for us to take each other's pictures for our family CHRISTmas cards. We picked the coldest day of the year - brrrr! We took their photo using Blackie and got a cute picture of Allison on Blackie. I really need to take more pictures of the girls with the horses - the one of Allison turned out so cute! My brother and his wife came to get James and soon we were back to our family of 4. He's a great baby but it's such an eye opener to what life would be like if we added another. Chad missed a part of our time of having James at our house as he wasn't home Saturday night to go hunting with his Uncle and didn't get home until almost 11:00 on Sunday afternoon. He needs to have the full weekend to really understand the impact! I think we will give it a few months before we "pretend" again!

Trails to Ride.......

This past Saturday lived up to all my expectations and much much more! I awoke earlier than I do for work during the week and began getting my stuff out to the truck and trailer. Chad got up with me and was a huge help also. A big thanks to Nee Nee (Chad's Mom) for keeping the girls on Friday night so we had no little ones to contend with - but they probably would have slept right thru me leaving as early as it was. I didn't leave or get up quite as early as Chad does for fishing tournaments but I had a little drive ahead of me similar to some of his fishing trips. (Our exit was actually the Lay Dam exit!) At any rate, Chad helped me load Hannah up and I think the high temperature on Saturday had been reached when we were loading up at 6:00 a.m....with the humidity and 65 degree temperature, I was "glistening" (HA!) as I left for the first leg of the drive. The temperature would only continue to drop as the day passed and it dropped rapidly. The first leg of the drive meant a quick detour off of 65 South onto 459 North to pick up Kristan and her horse Foxy, who I had "met" on an MSN message board, AL/GA Horse Lovers. I have jokingly called it my "blind date"...now I have told everyone that my blind date went well and I think we may "go out again". She was super nice, so easy to talk to and not a "weirdo"! That's just a joke...since her husband had asked her how did she know I'm not a total weirdo? and she said, how does SHE know I'm not a total weirdo! I told Chad he ends up in his boat with a total stranger everytime he fishes a BFL tournament as they have to draw for a partner and is most always someone he doesn't know....then they are in a boat from daybreak to 3:00pm fishing together. In my case and his, you are at least with someone you know you share one common interest with and for both of us those "interests" are something we are very passionate about. With that in mind, it's easy to make friends in those settings that you might not make in a different setting. So, I had a great time meeting Kristan and was glad to have some company for the ride to Clanton. Kristan and I headed to Clanton and got there with time to spare! The place was absolutely beautiful. It's called Creek Valley and the owner, Les Hope, was a super host. You can see my day's pictures in my shutterfly album. Take a look, Creek Valley was a beautiful place to take in and spend the morning....the Outback Riders gathered for a quick meeting and then they split up into a couple of groups. We went with the slow group and started our trip. I was quickly in my "la la land" as it has jokingly been referred to.....when I get on the trails, it's like nothing else is going on. It's so peaceful and just a great time to clear your head. But we were in a good size group and I stayed in check as much as possible. Hannah was doing great and wasn't letting anything bother her other than she was playing with her bit for most of the ride. Pretty soon, we found ourselves at one of the first hills on the trail. The next thing I knew the riders in front were all-out running their horses up this hill. I am totally not accustomed to that because the guided trail rides at the barn do not allow people to run their horses. I have to say, the first time up was a little shocking and I was wide awake by the time we got to the top....but I couldn't wait to do it again.....and we did - again and again and again! Poor Hannah will probably never want to get back on the trailer again. She and I are so out of shape and several others were commenting that their horses weren't ready for that either. Well, I want to keep Hannah and shape and I can't wait to do it again. When we got back to camp, we ate lunch and they were going out again. Kristan and I had decided our morning ride would be it for that day and we were going to load up. Several others were going to call it a day as well. The temperature was rapidly dropping from the morning temperatures we met when we first began. Earlier that morning, I was SWEATING as we loaded up and suddenly we were freezing! Back at camp, I saw the owner again and he asked me what trail we went on.....I told him that I thought we went out on the yellow trail and came back on the red trail. In a questioning tone, he said "I don't know how y'all did that....well, if you did you would have been up and down, up and down (doing his hands like a roller coaster and shaking his head)" I said - We Were! and I just laughed. It was absolutely the most fun I have ever had riding. I am looking forward to going back as soon as possible. This weekend we have a ride at our old barn where we used to board. I am keeping my 11 month old nephew this weekend so my Mom is going to go with us so we can all ride and keep James Adam. Next weekend, I plan on going to KC Ranch in Double Springs with the Outback Riders Club and am shooting to ride on Dec 2 back at Creek Valley. A view of the pavilion and one of the ponds My trailer and Yukon on the right and miles to ride out in front! Me and my dirty but good girl Hannah! Group taking a break on the trail!

Horsey Scare!

On Monday of this week, Chad called me and told me that Goldie was not getting up. Goldie is Jessie's horse who is her "dream horse" - a Palomino! He said he could get her up but she would go back down and for any non-horsey people, that is not a good sign for horses! He called me several times with updates and I was on the phone with vet and a few friends of ours getting advice. I also called my Mom to head that way to help Chad since he works from home and needed to be "working". He also didn't want to leave to go get Shelby from Kindergarten. I finally couldn't take it anymore and asked to leave work. I picked up Shelby and my Mom headed to the Hitchin' Post Stables to get the medicine that the vet said we needed. I made it to the house a little before her and headed out to see about Goldie. It was not good! When Mom arrived we gave her the medicine and kept her up walking. All speculations were that Goldie was colicing. An hour after giving her the medicine she was acting very sleepy and almost drunk. Spoke with the vet again and concluded with needing to keep a close eye on her and use a little salt on the tongue to encourage her to drink. She went down again one more time but then gradually improved over the remainder of the afternoon. We put her under the "almost finished" stalls and used our round pen panels to make an enclosure. There she would stay dry from the approaching rain. The other horses were staying close by and it seemed as though they knew something was going on. We were trying to keep the severity of this from Jessie. She was supposed to have lessons and when Courtney arrived she asked if Goldie was colicing? Jessie's radar went up because she knew colicing is what killed her friend's horse last year. We were going to do lessons on Sparkle but she was feeling way too frisky for Jessie to ride. We used the lesson time to talk with Courtney about where Jessie is and what she needs to be working on as well as Courtney rode Sparkle. Courtney really liked Sparkle and told Jessie that Sparkle would be her barrel horse if she gets to that point. I stood close to Goldie's temporary stall and kept an eye on her. Throughout the evening I kept tabs on Goldie and when we fed the other horses, she was very vocal with us that she was there too and obviously wanted feed. She couldn't have any yet, Dr's orders. But it was a good sign that she was whinnying to us. I was instructed to give her a half dose of the Banamine at bedtime and so I did (in the rain and mud!). As I went to sleep, I asked God for peace of mind through the night about Goldie. I didn't wake again until 4 a.m and got up a little later and headed out to check on her. She craned her neck over the top of the stall and whinnied at me. That was the best sound I could have ever heard!!! As I log this, she is doing great and we are all happy we made it thru this scare. But we only made it thru with the help of a few great friends, each other, our vet and lots of prayer!

The Fall Ball has come and gone...

The much planned for "Fall Ball" has come and gone. I had hesitated to call it our "first annual" because I just knew after my husband missed a day of fishing and all the work that went into it...he would say NO WAY to another Fall Ball. But last night he surprised me and said something to the effect of we know things we will do different for next year and I said, "so that means there is a 'next year' ?" and he said "yeah - I had fun and we can do it again". Yippeeee- I just knew he would be wanting to kill me by the time the day was over but he was a real trooper in all the prep work, setting up, saddling the pony and running the hay ride....which was a huge hit. I told one of the mom's that I was going to owe him big time for this one and that he would want to fish every Saturday for six months after this day!!!! But I truly think he had a good time. We certainly would not have pulled it off without the help of our families who all pitched in to set up and keep things going. I think at times I felt things were a little more chaotic and less organized than I had 'planned' for them to be....but I think everyone had a great time. One of the dad's said he thinks this will be talked about for a long time. Shelby's pony, Blackie, was also a real trooper as I walked him probably 200 times around the round pen. He has not been ridden in at least a month and when Shelby does ride him - it is not for very long. I should have had a step stool out there to help the bigger kids get on him....I did not know I could lift that much weight....my back is telling me today that I shouldn't have. I am so glad Blackie is not spooky....because a baby was on him with her Mom holding her to pose for a picture. Someone outside the round pen decided it would be cute for the baby to put on a cowboy hat and threw it in to us....it landed right on Blackie's head and slid down his nose. There are many horses that would have flipped them out so I am so thankful for that not happening and safety for us all! The games were fun as all the kids enjoyed the cake walk, bobbing for apples, hunting thru the hay for candy, a ball toss and a duck pond. I had a great time even though I didn't get to mingle too much. I am just so thankful God has blessed us with the setting, the friends and the means to do something like this.....I will post pics as soon as I have them. Looks like I can safely call it our "First Annual Fall Ball"......