Welcome Home!

I apologize for my radio silence over the past few days - we've been running around like crazy people trying to get everything together for the purchase of our first ever home. It feels so awesome and weird to say that - we're proper adults now, with a proper piece of land to call our own! If you've been following this journey along since the beginning, you first met me as a broke kid who was barely out of college - what a crazy journey this has all been.

Our new property is awesome, and gorgeous. The house is plain on the outside but lovely on the inside, and the land and terrain is just awesome. I'll spare you all the gritty details of the property, but in terms of horse stuff, there are two pastures that are already fenced with good sturdy pipe, a huge run in shed, and a tack room/storage shed. The front pasture is good grass with lots of shady trees, and the top pasture is more rugged, complete with hills, rocks, grass, and lots of beautiful yuccas and cactus at the top of the hill. It's basically a tiny little piece of heaven.

They are super prickly and the horses don't go anywhere near them!

We officially closed on the house on Thursday, and Friday I brought the mares home. I trailered O over first, then went to go get P and Pax. Pax was a holy terror to lead to the trailer, and spent the majority of time walking around on her hind legs trying to punch me in the face. I'd be lying if I said she didn't get a solid little beating for her bad behavior. That said, it only took a moment for her to think about the trailer ramp and decide to hop right in, so that was great. She trailered super well, tucked herself right in front of P and stayed steady the whole trip.
When we got there, I released the hounds so to speak - everyone out together in the front pasture. It was the first time O had been out with P and Pax, and Pax's first experience with living out 24/7 (which should be the majority of the rest of her life). As expected, O went, "oh hello my tiny friend," and off they all ran. They ran and rolled and ran and roll, and grazed and ran and rolled. Everyone was very pleased, myself included.

"I love you, tiny friend"

I swear I saw the tiny red one come out of the big brown one!

Voila, ready to hitch!

Everyone weathered the night in the front pasture well. The following day, Future Hubs and I went and fixed up the top pasture to make it more horse-safe. 90% of the fence is good sturdy pipe fence with no climb, but there is a small section near the top pasture that is not. It had a strand of barbed wire above the no-climb at the top of the hill that had to be removed, the t-posts needed to be capped, and there was a pile of the old owner's fence posts in the corner of the pen that he still needs to come retrieve (everything is too wet right now to get his truck back there) that needed to be fenced off so the mares couldn't get in there and trash his stuff. Future Hubs and I did all of this in about an hour, and then opened the gate to let the girls go explore.

Pax is a brave little beast - she led the herd most of the way around. I love that we have a rugged little patch of proper Texas terrain for her to grow up on - hills and tough plants and rocks. She'll grow up strong and surefooted with this kind of land to live on.

I am super, super exhausted right now - I have a foster litter of bottle baby newborn kittens that is keeping me up all through the night with feedings. Between that, the move, and work, I don't have much time for anything else right now! Speaking of which, I should get to SLEEP! So much to to do, so little TIME!


By the way, here's a fun comparison: Pax on the left, O on the right. Both out of bay mares, weirdly enough!

Some Pax videos!

I am seriously, seriously sick of the rain. The barn property is literally underwater today - like, a 6" river is where the driveway used to be. I am therefore at home relaxing instead of with my beasts. We've been having severe weather EVER SINGLE DAY, and have had more rain this spring than I can ever remember at one time since I moved here. Thanks El Nino!

I know I was bragging on what a good baby Pax has turned out to be, but don't be fooled - that doesn't mean she is a perfectly compliant baby. As you can see, she likes to throw tantrums about stuff she doesn't want to do, such as learning how to lead in little circles around mom instead of follow right behind her. 

IT'S HARD DON'T WANNA

She threw several big tantrums about it (even though she has done it before, several times, without fuss), but once she tired herself out a little, she was a good baby who walked right along. 

Once the rearing game didn't free her from her predicament, she went, "oh well ok I guess we're walking now," and walked along nicely. Lesson finished for the day! She is a funny kid, when you take her halter off and let her go, she stays with you as long as you are still in the stall, but once you leave she goes right to mom. Instead of nursing and thinking it over like most babies, she rears up and pummels mom on the back with her front feet, or turns around and kicks mom repeatedly in the guts - like mom is her personal punching bag, and she has to take it out on her while she thinks things over. I can't believe that P of all horses is putting up with this. She just lets Pax kick her in the guts over and over, without care. I have a feeling that as Pax gets over, P is going to get *really* tired of this nonsense though. She'll only be little for so long!

Obviously this is why we start them early with kindergarden lessons. 5-10 minutes of this stuff a day helps cement the fact that "this is just what we do, this is part of life" into their malleable little brains. Keep it short and sweet, end on a good note, and you have a good citizen on your hands when they get a little bigger. Since Pax has made it pretty clear that she is a tough little booger, it is that much more important to me to start work on this right now. If I were to wait, she would not only be impossibly hard, but impossibly hard and huge. And that would just suck.

Speaking of videos, I have two more! These are from when she was 9 days old and in turnout. You'll hear her screaming for O, and O screaming right back. (O was back in the barn repeatedly ramming herself into the wall. Mares...) They'll all go out together at the new house. 

Pardon my witch cackling - but there are few funnier things than to watch baby horses running. Legs everywhere!

She really is a good baby. She is friendly and interactive, and while she is a huge fit-pitcher and drama queen, she is going to be a really nice youngster. 

Two weeks old! Also, tornados

Pax (yes, I think we're sticking with Pax!) is two weeks old today! She grew another 1/2" in the past week, which is quite a lot slower than the week before thank god. Slow down tot! 

She is nothing but friendly and curious now - she wants to be with the people, pesting them and hanging out with them all the time. She wears her halter without fuss and leads well, picks up all 4 feet (even loose!), flysprays, gets brushed, had a booboo on her leg doctored with no fuss, and is generally a very good little tot. She is still a total pest and completely fresh - today she decided to buck and thrash around while I was holding her for her measurement. We made a half-hearted attempt to string test her, which was not remotely successful because a) she's too young and b) she's still over at the knee a bit. The string test said something like 14 hands which is definitely not going to be accurate. I have this hope that she'll stay on the small side so she can be my pairs horse with O - she came out perfectly matching!

Hi hooman

Wet from flyspray

So good at side-eye still

Flick and swish

Hard to take conformation pics of tiny red pest

I'm pretty pleased with how she came out. She's still a bit over at the knee, but definitely straighter and stronger. When she goes out full time, and when her tendons catch up to her bones, she'll be straight legged. 

She's not Totilas but I think she's about the nicest thing P was genetically capable of producing. I am super pleased. The stallion improved all of the things I was hoping to improve, and she definitely seems to have inherited P's temperament and boldness, which is exactly what I was hoping for! She came out SO violently feral that I was worried for the first week... but I'm not worried any more!

For fun, here's a shot of Pax and a shot of baby O in roughly the same pose:

O was older there, although I'm not sure her exact age in that picture. I really like the way O is put together now as an adult, but I definitely don't think I would have bought her as a weanling if that's the picture I saw! Sometimes an ugly duckling turns into a swan!

Aside from Pax turning two weeks old, the other news is that we're right smack in the middle of Deathstorm Season. We've been hammered with storm after storm, and more rain than I've ever seen since I moved here. We put one of our couches out on the back porch to be recycled, and tonight it was literally FLOATING around the flooded backyard - a huge storm came in, and it rained so hard that everything became a huge lake. At least we're not in a drought anymore..?

Today there was a 4.0 earthquake here in the afternoon, which was then followed by a tornado outbreak. It sounds like a bad thriller movie but it's the truth. Where else can you literally get big earthquakes and devastating tornados IN THE SAME AFTERNOON? Come on down to Texas, it's loads of fun here in the spring...!

Yes, that would be a tornado heading RIGHT for the horses. They actually had TWO tornados there, back to back. Thankfully it missed L's place (barely, by only a few miles!), but others were not so lucky. Remember the lesson I had back with G about two months ago? Their ranch got hit hard and all buildings are damaged, with some buildings totally gone. All the horses and people survived, thankfully.
I feel particularly lucky myself because not only were my horses and my friends all spared, but I was spared too. The first tornado crossed over a tiny country road, one that I drive on literally every single day, at that exact time of day - except not for today, because I had late afternoon clients and had to leave the barn early. Had I been there at my regular time, I could have very well gotten caught up in that tornado. 

I'm *quite* ready for spring to be over now, thanks very much. And we have SEVERAL more days of severe weather ahead of us....!

Sterling Custom Bonnets

Let me tell you about the most gorgeous bonnet I have ever owned!

Awhile back, before Sunrise Ridge, I was searching for the perfect ear bonnet. I have a bunch of them already, including some navy ones, but I wanted to find one that was *just* right. I needed to find something that perfectly matched my show outfit, in my perfect colors. My show jacket is cream with gold flecks, and my cart is a rich and deep navy. i wanted to find something to bring the whole package together - but it would have to be custom, and perfectly matched.

That's where Sterling from Sterling Custom Bonnets came in to help me. I described my outfit to her, and told her what I had in mind - and she did the rest. She whisked off to pick up yarn, and was in contact with me when she was picking it out to make sure she found the right match. The bonnet is deep navy with a gold braid and cream trim. The cream is flecked with gold - it all flows perfectly. (I originally picked gold because my harness had brass and I was changing the hardware out on the cart to brass as well - obviously that was a giant failure, but the outfit still came out great!)

Sterling did an AWESOME job picking out the perfect yarn:

And no annoying string on it! Strings are out! 

Perfectly matches the coat!

The ensemble came out awesome at the show. We even scored a 9 on our presentation! Everyone complimented the outfit and the bonnet. And we took it on the marathon as well, where it perfectly matched our wraps/bells color combo.

I LOVE this bonnet. And I can't wait to take it to the next show!

If you're interested in Sterling's bonnets, find her on Facebook at Sterling Custom Bonnets, or on Etsy! And tell her I sent you! Thank you Sterling!

End of April Analysis; May Goals - and more!

*** CALLING ALL OKLAHOMA FRIENDS: I'm looking for a navigator for the Cowboy Country HDT in Stillwater OK on the 14th of June. My regular navigator can't attend this one. If you want to careen around in a wooden box behind a zoomy horse have a day of action packed fun, leave a comment or email me at eventingagogo@gmail.com! No driving experience required - all you have to do is sit on your butt, hang on, and enjoy the scenery at speed! ***

I have a lot of catching up to do. April was a super weird month - it went from GREAT to CRAPPY and then GREAT again, and floating around in some inbetween state the rest of the time. I blogged a lot this month, a lot more than I did over the winter, which I definitely want to keep up with. The horses are so far away right now that I have added another 3 hours of total drive time to my everyday activities. We're currently packing up all of our crap in preparation for the move - the closing date is the 15th, but we're still waiting to hear about the appraisal. It's a super, super stressful time, albeit a super exciting one. The day that I can look out my window and see my ponies, and stumble out my door to feed them while wearing my PJs, is going to be heaven. I really, really miss having my beasts in my backyard, and now we'll finally have that again. 

As for May's show schedule, it was supposed to be a super busy month but has dissolved into a simple one. This past weekend was supposed to be the Carriage Classic, but it was cancelled due to all the rain and tornadoes we've been having. The next show is the next Games Day, which I definitely will be attending. The third show I was supposed to go to was the Pine Hill HDT, which I was REALLY looking forward to. It's the 2nd leg in the Three Amigos Challenge, and I was really excited for it. Unfortunately, that happens to be the weekend my folks are coming in to help with the move. The show is a two-day one, and it's several hours away, so it would be a full-weekend kind of affair. There just wasn't any way for the logistics to work out this year. 

Since none of my equipment is up at L's house save for a longe line (which has only been used once since we moved), I'm just chalking this time up to a nice semi-vacation for O. When we move to the new house, she'll go back to work, but for now it's a great time for a break. A few lunges here and there is fine - she worked hard at the April 26th show, and she'll work hard at the May 16th show, but in the interim she'll have off with light lunges. She is now that horse that I can pull out of her pen after weeks off and just whisk her off to a show, and she's fine. She is still plenty fit and strong, and she'll lose minimal (if any) fitness while on this break - trust me, she's still getting PLENTY of bucking/rearing/galloping around her run whenever I turn P and the baby out. (Seriously though, it's embarrassing... she throws herself into the wall, screaming bloody murder, mowing stuff in her path down, working herself into a dripping lather. I tied her up to do her feet last time they were out, which she normally is perfect about - but she kept snatching her feet away and screaming, then set back repeatedly and cut her face up. Mares. Why did it have to be a barn full of mares. She is CRAZY obsessed with the baby.)

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O-Ren April Goals:

1) Make it successfully through out first HDT without killing anybody! Make it a positive learning experience! 

Success! It was SUCH a huge success. O was perfect all weekend, we had a great time, AND we finished 2nd!

2) Attend the first NTW Games Day of the year and hopefully whoop some booty!

Success! About 0.10 separated me from the person who ultimately took the Championship ribbon home - we were neck and neck the whole time. O and I ended up with two 1sts and three 2nds, and Reserve Champion! I'm right behind her for points for the HOTY awards - I still have a chance to catch up!

3) Practice cones more - and dressage tests, the Training level ones!

Not so much this past month, for all of the above listed reasons. We probably won't have a lot of time for this in May either, but we'll get back to it in June!

4) Continue to work on same training issues - relaxation, good transitions, quality of gaits, etc.

Same as above - just not enough time! But we'll get back to it when we move!

5) Did I mention not dying at our first HDT? 

Success, so much success! :)

Pangea April Goals:

1) With luck - have a healthy, happy baby and an easy birth!

Success! It couldn't have been smoother: 9:20AM, easy out in 5 minutes. Filly was on her feet in 1/2hr, latched on 10 minutes after that, and cantering around her stall within the hour (or well, running/flailing, anyway). Her IgG was over 800, Pmare recovered pretty immediately aside from some general post-foaling drainage (pretty normal). Everyone is doing great so far. I had a friend lose a colt this year, and another friend lose a mare, so I'm ultra grateful to have both a healthy mom and babe. 

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O-Ren May Goals:

1) Kick more booty at the 2nd NTW Games Day! 

2) Keep the beast from killing herself over the foal... seriously she's practically on suicide watch right now. It's a full time job just trying to keep her from hurting herself or anyone else while she obsesses over the baby. 

3) Once we move to the new house and settle in - redo show and workout schedule

Pangea May Goals:

1) Consider starting her back to light walking hacks once we move to the new house... no solid plans otherwise!

Filly May Goals:

1) Halter and lead

2) Pick up all 4 feet without fuss

3) Brush and flyspray

4) Be friendly with the people! 

5) Come up with a NAME!

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I have LOTS of baby pictures and baby milestones! I want to make sure I documents these better than I have been - because everything changes so fast at this age and she is growing right before my eyes. 

5 days old: Deciding that the humans were not so terrible after all, and coming over to investigate:

Still the side-eye champion of the world

6 days old: More work with haltering, leading, and picking up feet - being a good baby! And not even hating the humans after her little session was over. 

Being a good baby is super exhausting

1 week old: HUGE baby has grown 1.5 inches in a week! Now very friendly and social with the people. No longer rearing up to try and tapdance on the people, although her growth has been so rapid in a week that she is now solidly over at the knees. She'll grow out of that, but still... slow down filly!

8 days old: Looking exactly like O's mini me!

9 days old: Torrential rain and storms have FINALLY relented and P and baby can go outside. O proceeds to absolutely lose her mind and work herself into a screaming, quivering, lathered panic and will NOT calm down until the baby is back in the barn and asleep. Mortal embarrassment on my part as she tries to take the barn down with her in all of her thrashing. Sigh....

They'll all go out together at the new place, and live out 24/7. Hopefully we'll be moving on the 15th, if everything goes according to plan!

Baby spends pretty much her entire turnout screaming for O, who screams right back, nonstop. 

P says: LEAVE ME ALONE I NEED TO ROLL HERE

10 days old: Now wears her halter, leads, gets flysprayed and brushed, picks up all 4 feet (and even picked up the front two while loose in her stall, and had her feet painted with Hoof Alive!), and is easy to catch. Still a little over at the knee but getting stronger and straighter by the day. 

It's amazing to see how she has gone from a scrawny little thing to a giant beefer in a little over a week. She's huge! We're still trying to come up with the perfect name for her, but right now I am leaning towards a show name of Pyrotechnics, with the barn name Pax. I have a lot of other names floating around in there though, it's hard to say which one I like best! 

I'm not dead!

I'm not dead, I promise! I have tons of filly updates, goals for May, updates on the big mares, updates on everything. Alas, we are in the middle of the chaos of moving, and I have a back injury from getting trampled by a feral donkey (it's a long story). It's everything I can do right now to drag my sorry carcass out of bed and suffer painfully through the day, much less sit down and blog by the time I finally get home.

But everyone is doing well aside from that, if you call well 'acting totally insane for each other and causing me much embarrassment and much annoyance to L.' I'm sure she'll be very glad to see my screaming, filthy, awful harpies move to the new house!

More soon... if I survive, that is.