Every day a new piece of the puzzle comes together! We talked to an excavator that was recommended to us by a couple of people because he's good and he also has a horse farm, so would be knowledgeable about that part of it. He was just who we needed to talk to. I've been thinking about doing a barn/house combo and have been in them and talked to people who live in them and they all loved it. But some of the reason I thought of that was to save money and in order to live over the barn, I would have to build a much bigger barn than I would normally. So I've been going back and forth about the whole idea. The excavator, Steve, really discouraged us from living over the barn, although he has a friend that does it and loves it. He sited safety reasons and said "You will build an outside riding ring, people will start to board here, and pretty soon you'll have people knocking on your door all the time!" So he really advocated keeping house and horse areas seperate and then told us about his farm and a run-in he had made he thought would work well until we really knew where we wanted to put things.
Steve's farm is only 5 miles from ours and we went over and he showed us a run-in, 24'x24', an open end on two opposite sides of the building with a gambrel roof where he can store 600 bales of hay! That would be quick and easy to build, possibly moveable and we'd have hay storage in an area where if it ever, God forbid, caught fire, you wouldn't lose a barn or horses, since they're free to come and go. He said his horse loved it. They had built a small house with a barn just behind it, and he wished they had built the barn much farther from the house. They had started with a wooded 4 acres in the late '80s and had slowly built their farm over the years. His wife came riding out of the woods on a beautiful 4yo Friesian stallion, and Alan was awestruck, thankfully by the horse, although his rider was one of those people that, upon meeting, you know are beautiful inside and out.
So Steve was the person we needed to talk to at the time we needed to talk to him. I do think having moveable buildings at this point is the smartest thing to do, and so the search is on for the perfect house plans!
Sunday, June 14, 2009
Horsemasters Pony Club for Adults!
About a month ago, I joined the Horsemasters group at Hundred Acre Wood, finally! I have been wanting to do this since I first heard of it about 4 years ago! At that time, Welcome Home Farm with Sam Morrison and Rachael at HAW were taking turns hosting the Pony Club, Prime Time Riders, but it got to be too much, so they split and Rachael has the meetings at her farm for people in her area, and Sam does the same.
Anyway, I am using one of Rachael's horses to ride in the lessons. She came from PDQ farm and is a 19 yo spotted Saddlebred mare named Satin. Okay, I admit to having a bit of a bias against Saddlebreds. I've seen some really nutty horses and saddleseat is something I've never aspired too. I think it just looks odd and uncomfortable for both horse and rider. JMHO. But Satin was a hunter, I'm told. She's very tall and very thin in build, not like my couch of a QH. So I go out to get her in the pasture and she doesn't look too happy to see me. The person helping me said she can be a "brat" in the stall and we should get a hay bag to keep her happy while I groom and tack up. Great! So with this warning in my head, I lead her into the stall and she tries to come right back out again! We get her tied and she is just attacking the hay in the hay bag. To me, this looked like anxious behavior, she was nervous being in the stall. Once I realized that, I felt more comfortable and was quiet and kind with her. I was alert, because they can hurt you if they're nervous, but she didn't display any defensive behavior, and I figured if she was that bad, Rachael wouldn't let people use her for lessons. We got tacked up and went to the ring and this horse knows her stuff. At the end of the lesson with Sam Morrison, she gave me the best feedback, that I had a connection with the horse and flowed well with her. I also was told I started very tense, was using my legs wrong, etc, usual things I do.
Walking back to the barn, Satin had her head lower, and her eye softer. I praised her and told her she was going to be good in the stall because I wouldn't do anything to hurt her, and she was fine. When the girls had lessons next, I went out and found Satin and gave her some scratches and reintroduced myself.
This week, we rode with Becky Morse and I picked Satin again. She was great in the stall, I probably didn't even need the hay, because she just played with it mostly. No problem bridling at all, last time she had played a giraffe and I was JUST tall enough to convince her it wouldn't work! Again I started out tense, but we got some really good trot work, some great upward transitions and worked on trot, halt. She's a great horse, and I'm coming to really like her. I spent time scratching her bug bites and trying to find her favorite itchy places. So much for my bias of Saddlebreds! I truly never thought I'd ride one by choice and now I look forward to our lessons together!
Anyway, I am using one of Rachael's horses to ride in the lessons. She came from PDQ farm and is a 19 yo spotted Saddlebred mare named Satin. Okay, I admit to having a bit of a bias against Saddlebreds. I've seen some really nutty horses and saddleseat is something I've never aspired too. I think it just looks odd and uncomfortable for both horse and rider. JMHO. But Satin was a hunter, I'm told. She's very tall and very thin in build, not like my couch of a QH. So I go out to get her in the pasture and she doesn't look too happy to see me. The person helping me said she can be a "brat" in the stall and we should get a hay bag to keep her happy while I groom and tack up. Great! So with this warning in my head, I lead her into the stall and she tries to come right back out again! We get her tied and she is just attacking the hay in the hay bag. To me, this looked like anxious behavior, she was nervous being in the stall. Once I realized that, I felt more comfortable and was quiet and kind with her. I was alert, because they can hurt you if they're nervous, but she didn't display any defensive behavior, and I figured if she was that bad, Rachael wouldn't let people use her for lessons. We got tacked up and went to the ring and this horse knows her stuff. At the end of the lesson with Sam Morrison, she gave me the best feedback, that I had a connection with the horse and flowed well with her. I also was told I started very tense, was using my legs wrong, etc, usual things I do.
Walking back to the barn, Satin had her head lower, and her eye softer. I praised her and told her she was going to be good in the stall because I wouldn't do anything to hurt her, and she was fine. When the girls had lessons next, I went out and found Satin and gave her some scratches and reintroduced myself.
This week, we rode with Becky Morse and I picked Satin again. She was great in the stall, I probably didn't even need the hay, because she just played with it mostly. No problem bridling at all, last time she had played a giraffe and I was JUST tall enough to convince her it wouldn't work! Again I started out tense, but we got some really good trot work, some great upward transitions and worked on trot, halt. She's a great horse, and I'm coming to really like her. I spent time scratching her bug bites and trying to find her favorite itchy places. So much for my bias of Saddlebreds! I truly never thought I'd ride one by choice and now I look forward to our lessons together!
Saturday, June 13, 2009
From Chicken Poop Stoop to Back on Track
We sold our house, in 24 hours! Last week I decided to stop finding excuses not to put the house on the market and turn it over to Alan. He called the agent we've used before and met with her Friday, June 5th. She knew she was going to be listing it, so at the sales meeting of her agency, she described the property and asked if anyone was looking for something like that. A fellow agent had clients that were looking for a place for a horse and had looked at "everything under the sun" but none was quite right. So they arranged for the house to be shown on Saturday, June 6th.
One June 6th the girls and I were going to Boston with the Girl Scouts to stay at the Boston Museum of Science overnight, 17 girls in our troop and 580 total! On cement floors. With two sisters that DO NOT listen and create drama where ever they go, and no, I'm not talking about my girls! (Although they can create drama at home, they are well behaved in public!) We took a bus down and back do had to take the subway to the museum and back, 17 girls with sleeping bags and pillows and 4 chaperones.
So on top of trying to prepare for the trip, I suddenly had to get the house in showing shape! We busted our butts, but did a pretty decent job of getting it presentable. As I took a last walk through with my daughter, we were talking and it echoed. I said, "Listen Macy, it sounds like we're already gone!" and I got a funny feeling.
So fast forward to Sunday evening, arriving at the bus station with very little sleep and another subway adventure under our belts. My husband kept it in half way home, then said "There's some paperwork you need to look at when we get home." "What?" With a huge grin he told me we got an offer on the house! I wanted to smack him and wipe that grin off his face! We hadn't even gotten all the paperwork done yet and I had to consider moving already? I suddenly didn't know if I wanted to move! What had I gotten myself into? And why wouldn't he stop grinning?!
After a bit of a night's sleep and some time to think, I started getting a bit excited! So much to do though. We had thought about what we wanted to do on the property, but never really settled on anything and didn't have any plan in place yet. It all seemed so far in the future, we'd had the land 2 1/2 years and I really thought we'd be here at least a year longer. I had gone riding on the trails behind the property a couple of weeks ago and written to my friend that we were idiots for not being on the land already, the house sold a week later!
Now we are scrambling to come up with a plan, but in an excited, happy way, not in a OMG, panicked way (at least not most of the time!) And some really neat things have fallen into place already!
One June 6th the girls and I were going to Boston with the Girl Scouts to stay at the Boston Museum of Science overnight, 17 girls in our troop and 580 total! On cement floors. With two sisters that DO NOT listen and create drama where ever they go, and no, I'm not talking about my girls! (Although they can create drama at home, they are well behaved in public!) We took a bus down and back do had to take the subway to the museum and back, 17 girls with sleeping bags and pillows and 4 chaperones.
So on top of trying to prepare for the trip, I suddenly had to get the house in showing shape! We busted our butts, but did a pretty decent job of getting it presentable. As I took a last walk through with my daughter, we were talking and it echoed. I said, "Listen Macy, it sounds like we're already gone!" and I got a funny feeling.
So fast forward to Sunday evening, arriving at the bus station with very little sleep and another subway adventure under our belts. My husband kept it in half way home, then said "There's some paperwork you need to look at when we get home." "What?" With a huge grin he told me we got an offer on the house! I wanted to smack him and wipe that grin off his face! We hadn't even gotten all the paperwork done yet and I had to consider moving already? I suddenly didn't know if I wanted to move! What had I gotten myself into? And why wouldn't he stop grinning?!
After a bit of a night's sleep and some time to think, I started getting a bit excited! So much to do though. We had thought about what we wanted to do on the property, but never really settled on anything and didn't have any plan in place yet. It all seemed so far in the future, we'd had the land 2 1/2 years and I really thought we'd be here at least a year longer. I had gone riding on the trails behind the property a couple of weeks ago and written to my friend that we were idiots for not being on the land already, the house sold a week later!
Now we are scrambling to come up with a plan, but in an excited, happy way, not in a OMG, panicked way (at least not most of the time!) And some really neat things have fallen into place already!
Wednesday, April 8, 2009
Cloud
Cloud got a new home last week-end. Cloud is Macy's 2 yo parakeet. She had always had a buddy, one died (post about my involvement in that incident in previous post) and Buddy, the replacement, flew away last summer. We are done replacing parakeets, so Cloud has been alone for almost a year now. My SIL has birds and takes in unwanted ones, so we asked her to take Cloud, and she graciously agreed. Saturday, Macy and I took Cloud to her new home, where all the birds are allowed to fly free. Cloud knew something was up, she preened and preened all day, cleaning each feather, puffing up, chirping to us all. She has been rather shy here, so I wondered how she'd be meeting the other birds, if she'd be intimidated. Not at all, she wanted to come right out of her cage and meet everyone, and talked away. She cannot fly well, we've never trimmed her wings, but she was very trimmed when we got her. She will fly down, Alan called her Petrie after the bird in Land Before Time who thinks he FLYED! Anyway, she would always come up to you to be picked up, and she always went to Macy's finger. We stayed and watched her get settled a bit, then Macy went to say good-bye. Cloud tried to get away from her, as if she thought she was being taken away. My SIL noticed this too, and I think we both sent a message to Cloud that Macy was just saying good-bye, because she did let her pick her up and give her a kiss before leaving. We're hoping Cloud fits right in and gets as big as the rest of the birds from all the exercise they get!
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
YES WE DID!
Back at Christmas, my sister, Tonia, out of the blue, turned to me while celebrating with our family and said, "Tim (our little brother) lives in Washington, DC, lets go to the Inauguration!" I said, "Let's go!" So we decided to take our daughters, mine, Amber, 12, and Macy 10, who's 11th birthday was the 20th, Inauguration Day and her daughter Shiann, 10, started making plans after New Year's and everything fell into place. We got cheap flights, a hotel and time off. We arrived in Washington DC at 8:45am on Saturday, January 17th after spending the night at a great hotel, Holiday Inn Express, in Manchester, NH.
We had a GREAT time in Washington! My oldest son, Ryan, lives an hour away, so he and his girlfriend came to visit Sunday. We had never met her, so that was very exciting! We all LOVED her! We all went to the concert at the Lincoln Memorial and ended up sitting right in front of a monitor without even standing in line! Some people had been lined up for 2-3 hours and still didn't get as good a spot! People had given up on the security check points and they were breached by the time we got there.
Macy has been bugging me for MONTHS to take her to a Jonas Brothers concert, I told her it would never happen because they don't come around here and we'd never get tickets. Well, they were playing at the Kid's Inaugural Concert on Monday night, day before her 11th birthday. I still didn't think they'd be able to go UNTIL I read a site that said it was for military families and my SIL works at the Pentagon. After that I was just sure she would be going, so packed her dress, shoes etc. and sure enough, my SIL got 2 tickets, one for her and one for one of the 3 girls, Amber, Macy or my niece Shiann. Well, Macy was the only one really crazy about the bands, so she got to go!!! She had a fantastic time. Best birthday present ever!
Tuesday, we decided to go to the Inauguration early, but to leave the girls home since it was 6:30, very cold and it would be HOURS before the inauguration. So my brother, sister and I hit the Metro and the trains were so crowded my brother just couldn't do that. So we decided to go back and celebrate with everyone somehow. Later, my sister and I decided to take a walk and see what was going on, so we checked out the Metro. The hallway leading into the Metro from the mall was filled with people, so we thought we shouldn't even try. We started back and then she decided she wanted to get a souvenior and we had to pass the Metro again, this time it was almost empty, so we checked it out. It seemed fine, so we ran back, got the girls and started out at 10:00 am to catch the 11:30 ceremony. We got right into the Metro, train arrived as we came down the stairs, walked on, plenty of room, talked to people and they told us to go right towards the Capitol when we got off, so we did. By then, the security barriers had been breached, so we ended up walking right up in front of the Capitol on the mall where we could see, although everyone was little and you couldn't tell who was who, but we were right under a speaker and could hear plain as day! It was awesome! It was Macy's birthday, and they spread a blanket on the lawn and everyone wished her happy birthday. I shared my binoculars and made lots of friends! One couple was from the east and had been to Deer Isle, Maine last year, best vacation ever, and the older gentleman beside me was from Philly and his son had gone to Bates here in Maine! So funny. The people on the subway were from CT and had been to Maine too. Everyone was in such a great mood, so happy to be there and helpful and patient. I've never experienced anything like that. Afterward, it was a little scary because they didn't open the Metro like they had said and people were confused and there wasn't anyone to direct you. It was a mob and it got scary for 10-15 minutes. We decided to go back to the Air & Space museum to warm up and regroup. Warmed up, used the bathroom, my sister met some women from Texas and Florida and became fast friends in the line to the potty! They sang Happy Birthday to Macy! She was wished a Happy Bday by two young men from India that had been standing in the mall for 7 hours and commiserated with the girls as they could remember going to events and being less than thrilled. They were very cute! We decided to walk back to Pentagon City over the 14th St. bridge, which was a great decision. There were many people on the same journey, still happy, no complaining, so orderly! Every color, shape, age, and sex! The city was a HUGE mess. Tonia started collecting lost mittens and is going to put them on line to see if anyone claims them! We could have collected scarves, blankets, even coats! The girls did a great job, we had Chinese food and got ready to go to the airport to fly home. There wasn't ANYONE at the airport! It was dead. We heard that most everyone tried to leave today and its a mad house! So, I have never been so convinced of the POWERFUL effect of positive thinking. We still can't believe how smoothly everything worked out for us. Its something I'll never forget, and after seeing the yearning of all these people to step up and contribute to fixing whats wrong with the country, I'm more sure than ever that we will come out of this better, stronger and a more perfect union. YES WE CAN!
We were crazy, but I'm so glad we did it!
Tuesday, December 23, 2008
First Real Snow
December 17th we had our first real snow. The horses were all snowy and frisky when I went down to feed in the morning, happy that the frozen ruts in the paddock were filled in enough to make a flat surface again! It wasn't much snow, but a reminder that winter is on the way.
How do they always know when you have carrots in your pocket?
Saturday, December 13, 2008
New Links
Check out the new links I added to Radio/TV/Video and Favorite Blogs. If you haven't read Mugwump Chronicles, she's a great writer and also an artist.
Liz Graves is saddle maker Dave Genedik's partner, I would love to catch one of her clinics someday.
Carolyn Resnick's blog is great reading too.
I'm adding Anna Twinney to my list of Authors, Clinicians, she inspired me to take the Reiki course and I've had great success with that! She will be in Connecticut in July and I hope to be able to attend her clinic there.
Most of the trainer's DVDs can be found on the Horse Flix rental list, I'm asking for a membership for Christmas!
I've listened to many good interviews on the Horse Talk Radio
and Rick Lamb's show.
I actually hooked up with one of the interviewee's on Lisa's show, she was discussing losing her horse to a vaccine reaction and I discovered she had moved from CO where she lived next to one of the authors of the book, "Acupressure for Horses" to Belfast, Maine and has gotten even more involved with holistic healing, too cool! There are many great resources on Lisa's site, I've learned so much from her shows.
Grand Adventures Ranch does Red-Light Therapy and also
uses herbal treatments to heal and has had good success with cancers in animals. For Love of the Horse
also has done extensive research trying to save his own horses from Insulin Resistance and resulting Laminitis. There's so much great information out there, and if you have a link you think I'd be interested in, let me know!
Liz Graves is saddle maker Dave Genedik's partner, I would love to catch one of her clinics someday.
Carolyn Resnick's blog is great reading too.
I'm adding Anna Twinney to my list of Authors, Clinicians, she inspired me to take the Reiki course and I've had great success with that! She will be in Connecticut in July and I hope to be able to attend her clinic there.
Most of the trainer's DVDs can be found on the Horse Flix rental list, I'm asking for a membership for Christmas!
I've listened to many good interviews on the Horse Talk Radio
and Rick Lamb's show.
I actually hooked up with one of the interviewee's on Lisa's show, she was discussing losing her horse to a vaccine reaction and I discovered she had moved from CO where she lived next to one of the authors of the book, "Acupressure for Horses" to Belfast, Maine and has gotten even more involved with holistic healing, too cool! There are many great resources on Lisa's site, I've learned so much from her shows.
Grand Adventures Ranch does Red-Light Therapy and also
uses herbal treatments to heal and has had good success with cancers in animals. For Love of the Horse
also has done extensive research trying to save his own horses from Insulin Resistance and resulting Laminitis. There's so much great information out there, and if you have a link you think I'd be interested in, let me know!
Christmas Critters
We had a little fun in the ice storm dressing the horses up like reindeer. I'm sure they were very impressed with our antics! Angel seems to love the lime light anyway, Princess Angel would be a more appropriate name I believe! Matches the personality of her owner, LOL! Click on the picture of Macy and Angel, look at the expression on Macy's face! Drama queen. Even Chase got in on the act!
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