Roofing Crew

We have an old shed with an old roof.  Some of the tin was blowing up so Joe had thrown an old tire and a fence post up there to try to hold it down.  Yesterday he asked if I could help him fix it. 

There really wasn't much to work with.  He had brought a piece of tin from some other old shed to repair it with.  The repair piece was only slightly better than the needing repair piece.  

Then it turned out the rafter on the end wasn't solid.  It broke while Joe was hammering in nails in the tin.  I guess the outcome was better than what we started with.  But I don't think you would want to hire us as your roofing crew.  
 

Restricted

Draper has started her restricted diet.  In an effort to keep her off of fescue I am keeping her up and feeding what is supposed to be fescue free hay.  My plan is to switch her to alfalfa for the last 30 days. 

I have reconfigured the new barn to where she can just be loose in the whole thing. I have a stall area I can move her to if I want to ride a different horse. Right now Clyde is being restricted too.  I have started limiting his access to spring grass. I think he has foundered some in the past. 

At least he can keep Draper company through the fence. Hugo is on the other end of the barn for the time being. And at some point Otoelene will need to start her restricted diet.  Maybe I should have just built stalls for everyone.  But I just hate stalls. 
 

Back In The Saddle

Looks like I took a bit of a break from riding.  Between the weather, the grandchildren and the holidays, I just didn't make any time to ride.  

I changed that today and caught Otoelene.  

The temperature was warm but it was starting to rain.  I just stayed in the barn to ride.  

But at least I did it.  I need to do better at making the time.  And there were no issues, she did great. 
 

Handmade

I received two very special handmade gifts this year. 

Emily knitted this Sophie’s scarf. She said it is quite the rage. And she did it in pink, my favorite color. 

Then Virginia made this precious cross stitch nativity for me.  I immediately placed it on the mantle.  I am so glad they are seeing the value in handmade.  

And now I can finally reveal what I have been working on.  You might recall the goat I needle felted from a little kit I got at the Sheep and Goat festival.  Well, after that I decided to try my hand at needle felting a picture. 

I wanted to start simple so I chose to try to copy a picture my grandmother painted over 100 years ago.  I think it is a pretty good likeness. And my sister that I gave it to says she can’t stop looking at it. 

Then I tried something a little more complicated. 

This was a barn on my grandparents farm that blew down in the early 90’s. My needle felting was loosely based on this picture. I added the sheep because the sister I was giving it to raised sheep and got a master’s degree working with sheep.  Then I used a frame I had made years ago out of the wood from the barn. 

And I just couldn’t stop. I made this for my boss and another one with two sheep instead of the flowers for Virginia.   I definitely have a new hobby. 

 

Panic

Clyde had some new visitors today. 

Emily and Keiran stopped by.  Emily liked Clyde but doesn't understand why I don't utilize her horse Pep any.  Pep is a great horse.  Maybe when Sadie and Allie get more skilled with Clyde we could try out Pep.  I will have to think on that more.  

Pay no attention to all of the poop.  I did clean it out, although I wish I had waited.  Allie asked to scoop poop when she came over a little later and there was no poop to scoop.  

Keiran approved of Clyde.  

When Sadie and Allie arrived, Allie had fallen asleep in the truck.  So Sadie had a long turn all to herself.  

She did some walking around but wanted to trot.  I put her on the lunge line and she was doing so well that I let her off the line to trot by herself.  She was very good at stopping Clyde whenever she got off balance.  

Allie woke up and was ready to ride with her red sparkle boots. 

Sadie entertained herself by raking the sand then writing things in it.  I have no idea how she thought of that.  

Meanwhile, because Clyde has been such an angel, I let Allie off the lead line to ride by herself.  Things were going great until Clyde spotted the hay in the corner.  He made two trips over to the hay.  I had to keep showing Allie how to run her had down the rein so she could pull him away.  The third time he ended up trotting about 12 steps to get to the hay.  As soon as he started to trot, Allie panicked. She let go of the saddle, dropped the reins, held her arms straight out and started screaming.  I yelled for her to hold on.  Instead of grabbing the saddle she leaned forward and grabbed Clyde's neck.  He stopped as soon as he got the the hay.  By some miracle, Allie had stayed on.  I got her to quickly stop crying when she realized she wasn't hurt and she kept riding, but back on the lead line for the duration.   Looks like I have some work to do on emergency stops.  

 

More Clyde

I hope you are not getting tired of Clyde yet.  I can see a lot more blog posts about him in the future.  

Since Monday was a school holiday, Sadie and Allie were able to spend Sunday night with us.   After playing some in the morning they asked if they could go ride Clyde. 

We started with brushing.  He had rolled in the dirt and needed a lot of work.  The girls wanted to comb his tail and mane too.  Then Sadie wanted to braid his tail.  I asked, "when did you learn to braid?"  She said, "Just now."   I tried to download a video of her braiding his tail but it was too long.  After his tail, we moved on to his mane.  

I don't know what age little girls learn to braid.  I think Virginia is just now figuring it out.  Sadie never ceases to amaze me.  A lot of time was spent grooming.  But we finally  moved on to riding. 

Sadie has no problem riding around at a walk by herself.  For trotting, since Clyde is so bouncy, I put her on the lunge line.  She managed 3-4 circles without losing her balance.  And the smile afterwards was huge! I told her how much fun it will be when she can trot by herself.  

After her first trotting experience with Clyde a few days ago, Allie only wanted to walk.  Sadie was all too happy to lead her around.  Afterward, Allie asked it she could ride Otoelene because her trot was smoother.  I said, no, it was Clyde's turn today.  His only fault so far has been that he poops in the barn where I have it set up as a run in shed.  Allie helped me clean it out while Sadie was riding.  I think we spent nearly 2 hours at the barn.  It was a great morning.  

 

Change of Location

Multiple factors played in the decision to transfer Clyde from Mike and Virginia’s house to our house. 

 Joe picked him up yesterday and he settled right in.  After I got off work, Virginia brought the girls over to ride in the barn. 

Sadie was able to do a lot better in the bigger space with no distracting grass available. 

Allie still needs a little more attention though. And neither Sadie or Allie wanted to trot.  As you can tell, we rode long enough to have to turn on the barn lights.  Clyde may be getting more than he bargained for. 

The Collapse

There is a small retaining wall at the door to our old barn. 

It use to look like this. But lately it had started leaning. 

Yesterday it looked like this. 

I was still able to open the door enough to squeeze through. Joe had to take off his cowboy hat to make it.  Looks like I will have some work to do this week. 

 

Two More Rides

Yesterday I managed another good ride on Hugo. 

I need to he him in better shape if I ever want to get him out on a trail ride. 

It has been so hot and humid lately that it has been difficult getting motivated to ride.  But I am always glad I did afterwards. And Hugo really appreciates his cool shower afterwards. 

It has been a little bit since I rode Otoelene last. But we had a nice ride in the barn today.  It wasn’t too bad with a little air stirring through the open doors.  It is very difficult getting a picture of Otoelene with her ears forward because she always has one or both back at me listening.  I like the listening better than the forward attention. Even with Hugo watching from one end Otoelene still was listening. 

 Draper was hanging out at the other end. And Joe was with that little orange dot of a tractor working on the driveway.  Otoelene was still listening.  It was a very good ride. 

Still Waiting

Day 363. 

I have moved Draper into the stall full time. Fescue toxicity is always a concern. I am hoping she is just at the upper end of the bell curve for gestation length and not having a prolonged pregnancy because of fescue.  As a precaution for the lack of milk symptom of fescue toxicity, I have started her on domperidone.  

I have also been working on my Birdfy camera setup.  I was surprised that I could move the camera so much closer and still get WiFi signal from the house. 

The next problem was lighting.  I had a clip on light that I put a 60 watt LED bulb in and clipped to the top of the gate.  This solved the lighting issue    The camera is on top of the post (the dark line to the left of center) 

This is what I am able to see with the camera at night.  I wonder how many times I will be checking it. 

If anyone is interested in helping me watch, I can try to figure out how to share the QR code, you can download the Birdfy app and start watching the live stream. 

Foaling Stall

I don’t like to clean stalls.  So when we built our new barn, I did not include any stalls. But that was before I considered breeding a horse. I  have set up an area in the barn as a run in shed for when the horses are in the fat lot. But now that Draper is there it seems like a good idea to set up a foaling stall. The fat lot is all down hill.  I could just see her foaling out there and it rolling down hill and under the fence. 

So today, I helped Joe with his idea of how to expand the run in shed into a foaling stall. 

Draper checked out the expansion and didn’t seem too impressed one way or the other. 

There are now two areas, one open to the outside and the other with the gate to make it a stall.  The stall measures about 20 x 24 which should be plenty big.  

The only time Draper has been stalled was when she was at the trainer a couple of years ago for a month and then at the breeder last year.  Joe thinks I should start leaving her in the stall for a few hours a day and not wait until the last minute to shut her in.  Seems like a good idea. I also need to get some shaving for bedding.  I don’t think sand will be good to foal on.  
 

10 Days In

It has only been 10 days since I decided to start conditioning Hugo for a possible limited distance endurance ride, but I can already see some changes. One thing that has not changed is how long it takes to catch him.  He still runs around in the barn for 10-15 minutes before he decides to stop and stand still.  I just count that toward getting him in shape. 

Today I went to the outdoor arena to work.  I have been doing some hill work but flat work is good too.  The area where the ride will be in South Carolina is pretty flat. 

But first, in order to be able to use the arena, we had to move the cattle out.   It turns out Hugo isn’t bothered by cattle antics. 

He is not much of a looker, but I think you can already see an improvement.  The picture on the left was August 24th and the right was today, September 1 st.

 

Hornets

Joe wanted me to help sort some cattle this morning at our farm we call BJ’s. 

I thought the sky, barn and old piece of equipment looked very picturesque. 

But on the way in I spotted something else not so pretty.

A big hornet nest was forming on a low hanging branch right near the gate.  Because it would be easy to get to, it made me think about the possibility of selling it.  So I checked out eBay and found that some have actually sold there.  

I was shocked at the prices.  You can bet if the nest is still there after it freezes, it is going on eBay.

 

Splints Are Off

It had been about 2 weeks since I put a splint on this ones right rear leg. 

I took it off last week and left him in the dog pen a few more days.  Since the other kid's broken leg happened a few days after this one I left his on until this weekend.  

Both are doing great and have been turned back out with the other 2 bottle goats.  Now they can pick what they want to eat outside and Joe and I don't have to forage for them anymore.  They are all eating a lot of grain too.  Maybe one of these days they will start to look like they are actually growing. 

Just wanted to share a pretty sunset too.  
 

Allie Rides!!!

Mike and Virginia brought Allie over after church yesterday.  Sadie was already here because she had spent the night.  Sadie wanted to go ride the horse and Allie wanted to go to the barn too but probably not ride.  On the way to the barn I had a talk with Allie about not screaming around the horses.  Sadie added that horses like to be calm.  She is a very intuitive child.  

Sadie had picked some leaves for Draper and Otoelene.  Allie did not have any desire to get closer during the treat time. 

I was able  to convince her to brush a little bit, as long as I held her hand.  The rest of the family arrived at the barn and watched Sadie ride. 

This time she went some by herself at the walk and trot on the lounge line. 

She did great.  

And then the biggest surprise, Allie said she would ride with Mommy!  And there was no screaming!  Just big smiles.  

She even asked to go faster.  Sadly, Otoelene was lame and riding was very limited.  But I think it was enough to have a good start for Allie.