The North Wind Doth Blow

The North wind doth blow and we shall have snow,
And what will poor robin do then, poor thing?
He'll sit in a barn and keep himself warm
and hide his head under his wing, poor thing.

http://www.rhymes.org.uk/the_north_wind_doth_blow.htm

This is a traditional British nursery rhyme from the 16th century. My boys used to sing this at their nursery school. Maybe I should clarify that statement...they sang this much more recently than the 16th century!

Yesterday we had a high of 59. At lower elevations it actually hit 70. Today the north wind has begun to blow and we have a winter advisory in effect. Brrrr! Currently the forecast is for 4-7 inches (geesh - forecast is for four...I wonder how many different types of 'for' I could use in a sentence if I really tried!) between tonight and tomorrow night. 

Earlier this winter we had a brief snow storm. It snuck up on us after the sun went down. It was beautiful to watch the snow flakes falling in the lights from the house. In the morning the wind began to blow and began to redistribute the snow. At one point the average wind speed was 22 mph. The temperature was 19 F but the wind chill was only 1 F. Brrrrrr! It was not fit for man nor beast!

I tried to get a picture of the wind-driven snow but the camera couldn't seem to capture the wisps of snow picked up and tossed by the wind like the spray of water on a stormy sea. It only registered a general haze.  What you can see, through this haze of the blowing snow however,  are both Pippin and Doc high-tailing it to the barn hoping I have come out to take pity on them and toss them some hay in the comfort of their stalls!

So, I wonder what it will look like tomorrow morning? I guess I'll just have to wait and see!

A Tale from Two Sides - Bouncing is What Pippin Does Best

A few days ago our weather, although not especially warm, was sunny and bright. A good day to work the horses. OK, Pippin. You're up first!

So, there I am out in the pasture, trying to find something worth eating. Everything is dry as a bone and there's not much of it. A guy has to hunt long and hard to find a tasty morsel. Along comes my Mrs. Owner with that halter thing. I ignored her. Uh oh. She has put the rope around my neck and is leading me to the hitching post. 

Pippin is a mess! After some currying and brushing I've gotten as much dust out of his coat as I can. I saddle him up, grab the bitless bridle, and we head for the round pen. I am so pleased with how Pippin works. We play the friendly game, then I ask him to move around and he goes through his paces. He performs a delightful extended trot and changes back and forth between that and a quieter 'easy' trot. 

My Mrs. Owner seems to have grown weary of my strutting around her. I showed her my fanciest trot, even adding some bounces up and down and flagging my tail at one point. She asks me to stop and comes up and tells me what a good boy I am. I feel all gooshy when she does that. I put my head down and she rubs that spot on my forehead. It feels yummy. Speaking of yummy, I wish she'd give me a treat, since I was so good and all. My Mrs. Owner puts on the new bridle without the metal yucky thing. Then she climbs up on my back. That still feels so very strange to have someone up there.


After mounting I ask Pippin to stand a bit. In thinking back to earlier this year I realize what great strides he has made. He used to avoid my mounting by circling away from me, and then when I'd get up, he'd try to move off immediately.  We set off on a brisk walk, with his head high in the air. Within a round or two he has brought his head down and is relaxing a bit. I flap my right hand, then my left. I play with the long, western reins. Pippin only startles and hops one time. We practice stopping. We practice backing. I ask Pippin for a lateral move to the left and I am startled by his reaction. He doesn't do his 'boot scootin' boogie' but he does perform a strange kind of hop, or a kick, or some sort of unusual bounce. I chastise him. I tell him a firm, 'No' and make my 'that was ugly, don't do it' guttural sound. 

My Mrs. Owner growled at me. I didn't do a gosh, darn thing, and the thanks I get is that nasty sound. At least, I don't think I did anything wrong. I mean, I walked, I stopped, I walked some more. I turned a circle or two. I moved away from her leg and went sideways a bit, while still walking forward. I stepped on something and had a bit of trouble going forward, but as soon as I put weight on my other foot, everything was OK, except for that, "Pippin is bad" noise. I'm confused.

I ask Pippin to walk on. We continue to do a series of foundation exercises suggested by the trainer. I remind Pippin of my presence by waving my arm now and then and patting him here and there. I move the long reins and let them dangle near his legs. He settles into our work nicely. We begin a turn and he does the hunchy, funny movement again. It's almost like he's kicking at the long reins. I again let him know that I am not pleased with his actions. We continue with our exercises and Pippin seems to settle into the work. I am so happy with him. He has come so far. 

I continue to take my Mrs. Owner where she asks. We do circles to the left and to the right. We stop. We back. We do turns on the forehand. A few times my Mrs. Owner wiggles around and pats me on my butt. Hah! She doesn't surprise me with those moves anymore. Ha ha ha! You don't scare me! I try really hard to do what my Mrs. Owner asks me to do. I like it when she pats my neck and tells me I'm a good boy. Finally, my Mrs. Owner asks me to stop and she gets off. I hear her make a funny breath sound. Kinda like what happens if a person pulls my cinch up too fast. My Mrs. Owner gives me a hug. She tells me she is sorry. She tells me it's all her fault. She hugs me some more. I'm not sure I understand it, but I'm not one to turn down any sort of loving and attention! I turn to see if she has some treats, since obviously she thinks I've been really, really, really good!


Oh, I can't believe it. I feel like such an idiot. Poor Pippin. I am so, so sorry. Pippin wasn't 'bouncing'.....he was stepping on the latigo. At some point while riding, maybe while I was mounting, the end of the latigo slipped out of the leather keeper. Obviously I had not run it through far enough. The strange thing that I was feeling was Pippin stepping on the end of the latigo, which would cause the saddle to lurch a bit, and from up above felt like a funny hop or kick or whatever. I hate that my first reaction was to blame my horse! And what a fabulous horse for not reacting to the strange sensation of the saddle being jerked around. Pippin deserves some of those treats he is always coveting!

A wonderful thing about Pippin;
Pippin's a wonderful thing.
His top is made out of rubber,
His bottom's made out of spring
He's bouncy, bouncy, bouncy, bouncy,
fun, fun, fun, fun, fun,
The most wonderful thing
about Pippin is:
He's the silly one!

This is my adaptation of the Tigger "Bounce" song with apologies to the creator of the original.

Here's the original version. 

I think it would be just as cute with a Haffie bouncing around! 

Tigger and Pippin seem to have remarkably similar personalities!

Candyland Carriage Parade

Our town has had a Christmas carriage parade for 28 years. This year we helped direct trailers to parking and helped marshal the crowd and direct entries during the parade.

 Apparently this mini-donkey loves gingersnaps. He was so cute I wanted to donkey-nap him!

 Devil horns or candy canes?

Of course, no devil here!

 

I promised this Rocky Mountain horse that I would say nothing to his pasture-mates about what he was wearing in the parade! I didn't say a thing about posting it on a blog! Here's another shot of him. Do you think he's looking at his 'pants', ducking his head in shame, or just proudly strutting his stuff?

 

 Both of the percherons were intrigued by the dog. I loved the way they had turned in unison to check him out. Naturally, by the time I got the camera up and running, they no longer had their ears forward!

 Here's another pair of big boys!

 

Look at the human faces...are we having fun yet? Oh, yes, we are!

 Of course, you know that I was partial to this team! 

Doc met these boys when we went on a Haflinger trail ride earlier this year.

 

 This is the Wells Fargo coach, pulled by four quarter horses.

 

I think this guy's gentle soul is evident in this picture. What a nice guy!

Bought the Farm

Yup, we bought the new house! We closed on it earlier this week. After dealing with all of the paperwork we stopped by our new place. My husband and I stood in the center of the living room, somewhat in shock I think....no ceilings in the living room or parts of the basement; wood floor cut away on the main floor, except near cabinets in the kitchen; all baseboards removed; some sheet rock removed from walls in the basement; disgusting carpet without padding in the bedrooms and basement; a yard that hasn't been touched in 3 years; a barn full of pigeon poop. Is this a little bit of heaven or a little bit of hell? It's hard to tell at this point! There may be times in the next few months, as we labor on the house, that we may wish we bought the proverbial farm!

This is the living room. We'll need to replace the ceiling, wood floors and baseboard molding. We are going to contract with a sheet rock guy to do that work. We've done it before and it's a bear, especially with 9' ceilings. The ceilings and walls are also textured so we will have an 'expert' help match the existing tesxture. We'll do the painting. We are going to remove the can lamps (one is visible on left), but leave the wires behind a plate in case we ever want to put in some overhead lighting.

 The basement needs major work. At one point there was sheet rock on the walls toward the right, both the one near the middle of the room and the one further away where you can see insulation. Most of the ceiling was removed as well. This provides the opportunity for us to slightly redesign the floor plan; we'll put in a wet bar and a theater room, as well as frame an office/bedroom and a hallway.

 The laundry room really didn't suffer from the flooding, but they discovered that pipes were leaking so a plumber removed a 'window' to get in to fix the pipe. I'm not sure why the counter top is missing. The doors are from areas where hard wood was removed

 Check out where the hardwood floor was cut. We aren't sure how wet this area may have been. We will tear out the existing cabinets so we can remove the rest of the floor and check for and mitigate any mold damage. Although the cabinets are serviceable we budgeted for replacing them and putting in a granite counter top. Most of these cabinets will be used in the utility area of the basement and in the garage.

Can I Be Good?

Many years ago my mother gave one of the boys this darling book about a young Golden Retriever

who always managed to get into trouble. She loved the book because at that time we owned an incorrigible retriever who grew too big, ran too fast, greeted people too enthusiastically and had such joy and energy that he was always inadvertently causing problems, much like the dog in the book.

Today I was reminded of the book as I rode Pippin. I had the BEST ride on him, and it seemed to me that he was trying very, very hard to be good! He walked calmly. He trotted calmly. He listened to my aids for turning, stopping and backing. What more could a person ask?!

At the end of the ride, while my friend and I chatted, Pippin cocked a back hoof, lowered his head, relaxed his lower lip and took a snooze. I can't recall another time when Pippin has been able to lower his guard and relax while I've been in the saddle.

Yes, Pippin, you can be good!

Good Morning!

I love morning. (I apologize to those of you who are not inherently morning people...I know it has to be tough. I live with a slow riser!) I have always enjoyed hopping out of bed and beginning the day...with gusto! My usual morning routine is to pull on my jeans (and other garments), grab a coat, let the puppy out of the kennel, hop into my Bogs boots (in winter) or slide on my fake crocs (summer) and head to the barn.

I love hearing the horses call for me. Doc has a low rumbly nicker that starts somewhere deep in his chest and bubbles up. Pippin rarely nickers, he whinnies and it is high and shrill. As I sort out the hay Pippin demonstrates his ADHD traits. He walks into his stall. He makes one complete turn. He walks out of his stall. He keeps this up until I finally bring him his hay. He's the sort that wants everything right now! If he feels that I am delaying his meal, he will stop on his tour of the stall and stomp his foot. He knows exactly where to stomp in order to hit the metal piece near the bottom of the stall wall so that it makes a very loud ringing sound. Pippin knows just how to be obnoxious...to me and to four-legged critters. Doc waits patiently.

I weigh and carry the horses' hay in laundry baskets. When I enter the stalls I put the basket down, sweep a clear spot in the feed corner, and then dump the hay. Although my stalls have hay feeders, I really prefer that the horses eat from the ground. I worry that they will get chaff in their eyes, and if they feed from the hay racks the hay from Doc's stall falls into Pippin's water bucket. Doc will take one mouthful from the basket while I am preparing his feeding place. He chews his hay slowly and deliberately. Almost like he is thinking very complex thoughts. Pippin buries his head in the basket and pulls up the biggest mouthful he can manage. He chews quickly and dives into the basket again. He is very purposeful and driven with his eating. (I also have large, round stones in his feed bin to try to slow him down when he does get some feed at night.) Last year I used a NibbleNet to slow him down with his hay. After a few months he chewed through the webbing and I haven't repaired it or replaced it.That's someplace on the bottom of the 'to do' list. But since I seem to have lost the 'to do' list.....who cares?!

After seeing to the guys' immediate needs; hay, water and clean feet, I head out to their paddocks to pick up. Today I finally managed to get most of Pippin's paddock clean. Since we had some snow and a drift accumulated in his paddock, it's been hard to scoop. Either the poop is petrified and frozen solid to the substrata or it is in one layer or another of a snow drift, to be discovered during an archeological dig, or it is sitting mired in a pile of mud. The drift has melted, leaving its treasures behind. There are still a few pile remnants frozen to the ground, but I can get those later. (That's what I said yesterday.....and the day before....)

Then its back to the house, taking some time to play with Tucker along the way. There are those mornings where Tucker is disobedient and heads into the neighbor's pasture to play with the mini. Then my clean-up is interupted while I retrieve the puppy (can you call a 50-pound Aussie a puppy?)! I've begun to take him back to the house at that point, hoping that maybe he will figure out that if he stays around with me, he'll get to play a bit.

So, here I sit, enjoying my coffee and visiting blogs. My cheeks have that pinched feeling from being out in the cold and I feel happy and content with the world....at least for the moment!

I hope you all have a wonderful day!

One Word Wednesday - Panic