My Pretty Pony - Penny Black Challenge

I saw this Pony image on a card and I had to track it down...the pony is soooo adorable...and I know of many people in my social circle that would love to get such a cute equine card. What's funny about this little image is that it reminds me of a horse we just got in...long maned and a little chunky, her owner dropped her off to be broke out and called her a marshmallow...which is appropriate, because she's very out of shape (which is fine by me...less energy to buck with! LOL). So we've nicknamed the horse Princess Marshmallow, it fits!
Anyway, onto our card, I joined the Penny Black Saturday Challenge this week (the pony stamp is by Penny Black BTW) and this week they had a sketch (see below card for sketch). I think the most challenging thing to this sketch was the amount of paper that was used and getting everything to match up just right. I took a lot of work out of it and used My Minds Eye paper pack I picked up at HL on some super sale, so much easier when everything already matches (wink!). I added a horseshoe with some glittered ferns (ran them through my Xyron and then glittered them) and a daisy with a rhinestone...gotta have just a little bling somewhere! I also dusted off (cough cough) my felt rick rack that had never seen scissors before and added it on the bottom...perfect match! Below you'll find the sketch and the recipe, enjoy!

Recipe:

• Stamps: Pony by Penny Black (Heart to Heart), Sentiment by Hero Arts (Thinking of You Messages)
• Paper: My Minds Eye
• Ink: Staz On
• Die: Quikutz
• Punches: EK Success (flower), Unknown (fern)
• Other: Rhinestones, Felt rick rack
  
  

Tree Full of Love Card and The Sky Is FALLING!

Ok, for those interested in my creative talents, look no further...for those interested in my horse adventures...scroll past the card...with that said...

I "almost" didn't post this card here today, because I'm not quite happy with it. This was done for the Limited Supplies Challenge on SCS (make a Clean and Simple Card...ie no coloring...) and for Sharon Johnson's Stamp Simply Challenge...this weeks theme is LOVE... HOWEVER, I did post it to my Split Coast Stampers gallery last night and got THE MOST COMMENTS of ALL MY CARDS EVER on it... so I guess a couple of people like it (LOL)...so I'm posting it here today.

Really, the only thing I did to this tree was add the red hearts to it from an ANCIENT stamp I had from CTMH...we're talking 15+ years for this stamp...anyway, I think it "makes" the card... enjoy...recipe below...horse adventure below THAT...
Recipe:

• Stamps: Penny Black Fantasy, CTMH Hearts
• Ink: Stazon Black, Marvy Cherry
• Other: Organza Ribbon
  

THE SKY IS FALLING

Now most days I have the job every little girl dreams of...I get to play with horses all day. Ask any little girl what they want to do when they group up, ballerina, nurse, teacher, mommy, cowgirl are typical answers...and the romantic visions of taking a wild mustang, putting it in a round pen and breaking it out in an hour like you see in the WESTERNS...is well...a CROCK! Many long hours and wet saddle pads are put into each broke horse you see and for every show horse, many MORE hours are put into THAT horse perfecting it, making what LOOKS easy, well LOOK easy even though it isn't (like a duck on a pond...smooth on top, paddling like anything underneath!).

Now horses have "moods", just like people, mares have "hair flip" days, young horses can be spirited and the older horses can be lazy, but then there are days where they ALL have a bug up their hind end and darn near NOTHING get's done...(well nothing this HUMAN wants done at any rate)...and yesterday was one of those days. It was cold outside yesterday, but the sun was shining and warmed up the indoor arena VERY nicely...so nicely that the snow on the roof started to melt. The first horse I rode, a "barely" broke two year old (when I say barely, I mean I ride this one by itself, stearing, stopping, etc. is all PURELY OPTIONAL from the horse's point of view at this point...LOL), but a really good natured baby, gave me some problems, which is VERY unusual for my "happy go lucky" mount, but ok, he's a baby, they do that...we do some ground exercises, I get on again, end on a good note (always MUST end on a good note with each and every horse!) and put him up and get out the next charge.

THEN it happens, as the next horse is being lunged (this is a riderless horse going around in a circle to run out their excess energy before I ride it)...the snow has melted enough it SLIDES down the steel ,metal roof...it sounds like (to a horse)...THE SKY IS FALLING.... and of course it hasn't melted enough to go ALL THE WAY OFF THE ROOF...OH NO... it slides a few feet and then "rests" with the rest of the snow that is now dripping off the side of the room... Now what do horses do when they think the SKY IS FALLING? Well BOLT of course, with or without a rider...sigh....so we did a LOT Of ground work yesterday...which is WAAAAAAAYYYYYYY more work for the horseless rider, but a lot safer... the snow isn't entirely off the roof yet and we've got LOADS of lessons today, I'm hoping for a cloudy day (wink!)....wish me luck!

...it's JUST like riding a bike...

...famous last words...ha! So Kevin went with his dad to the farm show today, leaving me in charge...no problem...EXCEPT ONE of KEVIN's jobs is dragging our arena and removing the tractor each.and.every.morning. from our indoor arena. Except THIS morning...he forgot in his hurry to get on the road with his dad...sigh...
So my morning starts like this...go to feed, 2 horses are wandering about, one stall door is off...sigh.... after some jiggling and master engineering, I manage to get horses in their own stalls and stall door on by.my.self. (patting myself on the back there for that one...it's quite a feet when the doors are 10' long!)
Come in, surf, try and get dh up for the billionth time... watch him hurry out the door...
Then I go to the barn...enter the arena and lo and behold, we have a TRACTOR in the middle of the arena...sigh... ok, I remember how to start it....right? It's only been about 10 years...gosh, I THINK I can...but better get the arena door open first... that'll be easier..right? NOOTTTTTTT... the door froze to the ground over night (keep in mind the doors are 15ish feet tall and 20ish feet wide) and after searching here, there and EVERYWHERE for something to wiggle the door loose from frozen mud I came across an old pitch fork...managed to sneak it under the door and wiggle, wiggle, CRACK...broke a tine off the old, steal pitchfork...groovy... but managed to loosen the door up enough so I can slide it to bring the tractor out, if, when, I start it...ha!
So now onto the tractor, I climb on board and sit in the cold seat (it's made of steel too...lucky me!) and look down...yup, clutch, I "think" that's the brake...now where do you start it? Now the "newer" tractors have little "labels" that say such things...I'm in a 1940ish Allis Chalmers that's been repainted a "few" times...labels don't exist...sigh... I finally give up and call K...who's phone is busy...so I call my FIL..who just hands the phone right off to K and he walks me through starting it... gotta pull the start button, then pull the ACTUAL start thing, while making sure the choke is down, but gotta get that down before the tractor dies AFTER it starts...sigh... then he says.. GO AHEAD AND WALK AWAY while it warms up...yeah...right... I have my foot on the clutch not knowing that IF I let up on it, if it's in gear or not, images of tractor running through barn walls ran through my head...and if I let up on the clutch, will it die like me little car does...I just hung tight (cold buns and all...buns of steel..snort!)...THEN I had to figure out where the GAS was...it's not on the floor like in a car...oh yeah, a cobweb in my brain figured out it was my right hand...and THEN I was in business....THEN it was ALMOST like riding a bicycle... I did manage to drag the arena and not take out any walls (kudos for me!) and drive tractor safely outside door and turn off with only ONE backfire... it's only gonna get better... right?
K just called, all happy he "bought" me something...he bought me a sham-WOW...yup...it's gonna be an AWESOME day! LOL

Party Central (well if you're an equine anyway)

...since it's been awhile since I've told an amusing equine tail (err tale)...I thought I'd take a small trip down memory lane, since something similar happened to me earlier this week...

Now as many of you know, K and I own/operate a horse training business and since I'm the first one out of the bed in the a.m., I just, in pj's and all, go straight to the barn and feed first thing in the a.m.

Now yesterday morning I am GREETED at the doorway by a horse on the loose...SHE's easy enough to catch, go back to her stall, figure out WHY she was loose (worked the latch) and fed...although she had already had her "pre-breakfast", but this brings me back to the time where there were SEVERAL loose!

It was one of the mornings where I woke up on the wrong side of bed, now in the a.m. the hounds of hades come with me...little extra time to potty and they just enjoy going out in the a.m. to sniff and mark their territory, so as I open the door to the stall area and the hounds romp in, I hear barking...more so than usual, THEN I hear scuffling....sigh.... and running .... another sigh... and then banging.... really BIG SIGH... and then I turn the corner and my eyes POP out of my head and I think my jaw dropped open. I had not one, not two, not THREE, BUT FOUR, YES FOUR horses running amock down our aisleway (it's 12' wide and about 60' long) and the hounds of hades hot on their heals...they were "helping" don't ya know...

Now while they are running amock, I'm assessing the situation, I have stall doors in the middle of the aisleway (we just use simple pipe gates that are fairly light, but large for one person to maneuver), manure and urine EVERYWHERE and squeeling horses in stalls....

So I grab the closest halters and try to corner one of the wayward equines...to no avail...they have gone into "herd mentality" and ALL run into the closest stall (4 horses in a 10X10 stall does not a pretty picture make)...so I make my way into the stall trying not to get trampled, pushed and attempted to grab one...to no avail, they all head OUT of the stall, with the hounds helping...sigh... this goes on for "awhile" and I somehow manage to get all 4 halters on the wayward horses into stalls.

...and there I stand, with all the horses hungry (and pawing and whinnying), trying to figure out HOW to fix the gates, feed and how I'm going to clean up the wall to wall manure.

Now this is one of those times where it's awesome that my in-laws live next door, although I usually don't take my cell phone with me, I did that morning and called in for help...my FIL was there lickity split and helped me with the gates...

And from the mess that I cleaned up and the detective work I saw, the horses had been out at least 2 hours and it all started with one horse that scratched itself on the gate and lifted it off...then moved onto the next horse and they pushed that gate over, and so on and so on...kind of like a domino effect... the aisleway pretty much looked like a horse New Years Eve party...only manure instead of confetti...but hey, one must make do with what one has....right?

We're Back...

...and I had a great and horrible weekend all at the same time!

The great part was, we had a fabulous horse show, everyone was so relaxed, we worked hard, but it all paid off. EVERY client walked away with either money, points or prizes (and some of them all THREE!), so I'm pretty sure everyone went home happy. We had a pitch in Thanksgiving dinner, which was fabulous! No one left hungry, that's for sure!

And the horrible part, my grandmother passed away while I was at the show. I knew she was not in the best of health, but she was an awesome grandma! She's the sole reason I'm into papercrafting...she introduced me to Mrs. Grossman's stickers (she worked at Hallmark, which I thought was the BEST JOB IN THE WORLD! and brought them home), she'd sticker up all the envelopes when she sent me cards and this is the grandmother that did the birthday calendars. She's also the grandma that would take me to Knott's Berry Farm and ride the rollercoasters with me...how cool is that? So many memories, I will miss her terribly.

And for those wondering where I get my sense of humor...

This is my grandmother at her 80th birthday party (always clowning around)...and below she was queen for a day!

I'll have a thrifty Christmas item to show later today, that I don't have quite done yet, but I have returned... until later! Ciao for now!

Spare Ribs

Many have asked, so it's time for an update on my poor, broken ribbed dh... He is doing much better and is actually almost back to normal tasks...it's been 4 weeks today (wow, it seemed like it happened YESTERDAY!) I still won't let him ride some the younger, ranker horses, I still do that, I don't want one to twist him some way that he won't heal properly.
The big horse show (it's called Congress) took a heavy toll on him (well, both of us). Mentally draining, physically draining, quite frankly I'm amazed he's healed as well as he has. Luckily for us, MOST of the clients were very understanding of his dilema, in fact a few of them took REAL notice of him and monitored his health (aren't they sweet?). We really do have a great group right now, a bunch of fun people looking for a good time...LOL...
Anyway, he's doing much much better.

We have RETURNED...

...a day earlier than expected, but only because I really wanted to COME HOME! LOL...
K got to show his "debut" horse and was seen by a lot of the "right" people, he didn't place, but got some good face time in on a great horse. That same horse made the semi-finals with her owner (quite an accomplishment) and we had another finalist at the show. Now this may not seem like a "big" deal, but we're talking classes of 100+ people/horses and some of the best in the country were there, so it really is a big deal.
The hours were horrendous, my sleep schedule is completely out of whack and I'm still a walking zombie.
K's rib is better, but since the colder weather has come on, bothers him more right now. He IS able to bend over now...it was really touch and go the first few days of the show.
We were so busy while we were there, we were looking at horses to buy, showing horses to sell, and then just getting ready to show. Some nights we only managed 3 hours of sleep...and never really got a full 7 or 8 until last night when we pulled in the drive at about 10ish.
It's a small miracle we didn't come home with another dog. I've always wanted a mini aussie and there were people at both ends of our aiselway selling them...I consider it my biggest accomplishment (not buying one)...one of the clients was telling me she was getting us one for Christmas (I think we dodged that bullet LOL). Our friends weren't so lucky and they purchased the cutest english bull dog and at my urging named her "Beans"...strange name you think...not really, when their other dog is named pork (and trust me, THAT's an appropriate name for that dog! LOL)...so now they have Pork n Beans... (I'm so clever...ha ha!)
Well, I have about 10 days worth of laundry to catch up on, and K would probably like something more than just Mustard for lunch/dinner, so I must visit the grocery store.
So until I've regained my sanity...LOL...

We're Outta Here...but a card before I go...

...broken rib (K) and all, we're going...we'll be gone until October 25...that's ONE LONG HORSE SHOW with really STRANGE hours! We'll be riding during the day and into the wee hours of the morning (like 3 a.m. to 5 a.m.). We do this to get our horses familiar with the show pen and this is the only time that there isn't a show going on! It makes for some really weird sleeping habits. I have learned how to sleep upright in stadium seating (and unfortunately, I'm not the only one that does it! LOL!)



Anyway, here's the card as promised... I made a circle card, I thought that would be fun! The center of the pumpkin is a circle cut down, first I cut out the circle and then I recut it into the shape it is...it was really easy and really fun! The leaves are from some silk flowers I have for just this type of occasion. Enjoy!







Recipe:

• Paper: My stash
• Stamps: Autumn Leaves Swirls
• Embellishment: Making Memories (happy halloween), Leaves (from silk flower) ribbon from HL

Bronco Billy Strikes Again

Several weeks ago, one of the two year old horses (i.e. young horse, 1st year in training), bucked me off...and I felt like a complete idiot, didn't hurt anything really but my pride and got the wind knocked out of me (I was also sore for a couple of days)...well I dubbed this horse "Bronco Billy" (I got this name from a character in a stamping set...see scrapping/stamping are in my life all.the.time.)
Anyway, Sunday, K and I decided to take a few horses over to a friend's house, we had one horse for sale and 2 younger horses (Bronco Billy being one of them). We rode, and then it was Bronco Billy's turn, and boy was he looking GOOOOOOD, and then it happened, another horse was playing and Bronco Billy thought that looked like fun, so he went to hopping and broncing (think Bronc horses...it looked very much like a postcard), K stayed on for the 1st two rounds, but the 3rd round as K was coming down, Bronco Billy was going up and they met...we heard an OOOOF...and then K pitched off the side and landed fairly softly on the ground. Bronco Billy headed for the hills...
K now has a broken rib (11th rib on his back for those of you "in the know") and it's basically painful to BREATH...soooo....everything has fallen to me, and I mean everything...down to picking his shoes up off the floor because it's too painful to bend over to pick them up, to cleaning all the stalls, riding all the horses, packing everything for the upcoming horse show...well you catch my drift.
We leave for a 2 week horse show Friday, I'll have to prepare all the horses, pack and possibly show his "debut" horse at this horse show (that's killing him more than anything)...
So if I'm noticably absent from my blog...well my plate's a bit full for right now, but not to fear, I'll return soon...in the mean time, say a little prayer for K that he heals quickly and is able to show his "debut" horse...this horse could really boost his career and our lively-hood.

Fly like an Eagle

So a client and I went to look at a horse...in Minneapolis (the horse actually lives in North Dakota)...however we needed to get to Minneapolis (that's Minnesota for those that are geographically impaired). My client tried all the airlines, without a non-stop flight that was resonable...I'm sorry $700ish EACH from Indy to Minneapolis is NOT reasonable. So she did the next best thing...she chartered a plane...this is the lady with connections...remember? So yesterday we flew in a Cessna 3-seater plane from our little town to Minneapolis... it was really neat, a little chilly and loud, but really neat non-the-less.

The above is me, at our fuel stop in Wisconsin...it was REALLY cold in Wisconsin!

Here's what I learned about flying in a small plane:

• They are noisy and thank god for noise cancelling earphones!
• The back seat is COLDDDDDDDD, I had a blanket, yeah!
• The scenery is AMAZING.
• Our plane was made in 1948 (so it was older than all of us! new engine though)
• We flew 500 miles...4 hours going, 3 1/2 coming back (tailwind made the difference)
• Going to Minneapolis we stayed around 1400 - 2000 feet, coming back we were at 11,000 feet

Here's a few pictures from our "trip" yesterday:

This above is of farm ground around Indiana/Illinois...notice how SQUARE it is?

The above is farm ground in Wisconsin...MUCH more interesting...but they are also very hilly! The reason they do this is because their soil will erode away without some creative farming. I think it looked almost elegant, it reminded me of pictures I have seen of english gardens.

And the above is the REASON we went... and yeah, she bought the horse... Jacks R Really Lucky and Janet...Jack and Janet...doesn't that have a ring to it? She's hating every minute of it, can't you tell (wink!)

I know we got her a GREAT horse, the owner was bawling, they love him so much...he's getting a great home with just as much love....1, 2, 3.....AWWWWWWWWWW LOL

For Pity's Sake, Smile ALREADY!

So over the weekend I had to be the photographer for one of our client's horses we are putting for sale on the internet (yes, you can sell a horse on the internet...just not ebay). So we primped the horse, put on it's most silvery, sparkly apparel and took it to a somewhat scenic area to take it's picture. Now when you take a horse's photo, there's more to it than just standing the horse there and snapping away. First you have to make sure it's body is symmetical, it's standing square, and that it opitimizes what you're advertising, for a western pleasure horse you want the horse standing with it's head kind of down...for a halter horse, it's head needs to be up. And for all of this, the horse needs to "SMILE" in horse language (i.e. it's ears need to be pricked forward...that's a smile in horse language).

Our horse was rather bored with it's whole photography session. I tried having the client getting the horse to smile or at least look somewhat interested...she tossed dirt in the area, flipped a rope around, made strange sounds...to no avail...so we switched places...I tried tapping the horse on the nose, made a ribbit sound, picked a weed and tried to bribe such a horse...NOTHING... and then I took the weed and waved it BEHIND my head (in front of my head didn't do a thing)...and we had the horse's attention...for about 5 seconds....which was good enough for session one... and about 2 pictures

Ho hum...one bored horse....

Then we had the second session to go...and I got the brilliant idea of getting a scoop of grain...oh we had the horses attention then...and the client forgot to turn the camera on...so we try again and this time the horse knows what's in the scoop, so we REALLY had it's attention, so much so that it wouldn't stand still long enough to be photo'd...why is it we go from one extreme to another...LOL...well, we did get some good pictures...we only had to take about 100...LOL

See how well grain works? I have her total attention!

Well that was a short show!

We got rained out...we had hoped against hope that the rain would recede and we would be able to show, but it was not in the cards this weekend. So a few of the customers came over today (after we left the show) to ride and had a small pizza party. How disappointing on the show end of things...well, we've always get NEXT weekend! LOL!

More Pictures from Last Weekend

Here's some pictures my MIL (the unofficial photographer when I'm too busy) from last weekend...enjoy!

Myself and Janet discussing her show strategy.

Myself and K watching students ride.

A TRUE man isn't afraid to take a spin on a pink scooter...this is my FIL who borrowed one of our students wheels for a couple of minutes...

Here's our "unofficial photographer" in the bright blue along with the rest of our students...this is also the same group we're taking to Congress... they look like trouble makers don't they?

We will, we will, ROCK YOU!

Can you tell by the title we had a GOOD weekend? Let's see, we took 8 horses and came home with over 20ish points (I quit counting at some point)... Kevin and Elaine were big winners on her horse Sable. Kevin was 2nd and 3rd in the Green Western Pleasure, 1st and 2nd in Senior Western Pleasure and Elaine is still UNDEFEATED in Novice Amateur Western Pleasure. Kevin finished up an ROM (Register of Merit which means he put 10 points on the horse beating at least 50 other people), this increases the horse's value...so it's a GOOD THING! We also got 2 offers of purchase for the same horse, one was flat turned down and the other is an open ended "when you're ready to sell, call me..." LOL...so we know we're on to something. What really makes this winning so sweet is that K had this horse 5 years ago when she was only 2, and really only showed her 3 times and had a trainer tell him, "that one's never gonna make it!"...that same trainer 5 years later asks "what's that?"...never remembering that this was the one that "wasn't gonna make it". HA!

This is what undefeated looks like! :)

My showmanshippers ROCKED! Charlotte won under both judges in her Novice Amateur class, Janet was 1st in her Select Amateur Class, Kaytlyn was 2nd & 4th in her Novice Youth class and then came back to be 4th & 6th in the 14-18 class...which is a BIG deal because she placed RIGHT BEHIND WORLD/CONGRESS Champions...and this was the 2nd show she's showed this horse at...pretty nifty! And let's not forget our newest student Sydney, who was 4th & 6th in Novice Youth and who showed her tail end off... I'm so proud of all of them, they really stood up and showed for all their classes!
So we all came home happy and tired...even the horses...they are pretty much sleeping today away!

Horsing Around

My mil caught some great pictures from our horse show this last weekend. Enjoy!
Fashion decisions are tough! Wear the belt, don't wear the belt? Wear the blouse in or out? One of the funnest parts of showing our horses is the fashion...it's like playing dress up, with all the rhinestones and gorgeous fabrics...it's one of my favorite parts! Now squeezing and zipping ourselves into our chaps...well that's a whole 'nother story in itself! LOL

Everyone needs their own mobile fan club...the one above is ours! LOL

Kevin and Elaine with Sable (the horse) and a job well done. Elaine won under both judges and Kevin was top of his class (I forget the placings, but enough for some points at any rate)

Kevin (the very right) on Sable waiting in the line up for the placings.

I'm on Phoenix actually showing...see...I clean up ok! LOL

Another Nice Weekend

It's Monday, we're tired, but had another good weekend showing. This time I actually had some competition in my class (1 other horse), but my horse (I use this term loosely as he is a clients horse) was a little better than the weekend before. So I'm happy. The clients did well, K did well, and I won my class under both judges. Above's a picture that our client took (her horse) of me warming her horse up before we showed.

All in a days work.

We just returned home from a fantastic weekend of showing. Our barn collected 30ish points on all horses combined (and for those that aren't in the "biz" you have to beat 5 horses for every ONE point...so we beat over 150 horses!) K won some major classes over some trainers he's been showing against for years...it pretty much put him on cloud 9!
I showed two nice horses, one I had to school as it was being naughty for his 13 y.o. owner in my class, so I didn't place (although he rode better for her later, mission accomplished!).
The other horse (shown below) is one in the barn K has been training, but asked me to show for the clients. I did and won my class under BOTH JUDGES! (of course I WAS the only one in my class *wink!*, so if I didn't place first, then I fell off, LOL), but it was good exposure for the horse, and gave K and the clients some insight of things to come from the horse...his name is Phoenix by the way and his coloring is "red dun". The man I'm talking to is our old farrier and he's quite the chatterbox...anyway, we had a good weekend. Everyone is tired...the horses are exhausted (in fact one was so tired she ate her breakfast laying down this a.m.!). So, I'm gonna catch up on my email and my other blog. Enjoy the pics!

The Green Sprinkler

Dealing with a horse's recent health issue reminded me of this story I thought many of you non-horse people would enjoy.

K & I had several clients at a show a couple of years back, including one couple, she rode (& her horse in training with us) and her husband showed halter (think swimsuit phase in Miss America, only for horses...), however her husband, to this point, had never SHOWN. And none the less, they brought a horse from home that had never shown. So the morning of the show, they check on their horse and his manure, is, ummmm, a little runny and has run down his back legs. So a quick run to the wash rack, and the horse is clean, however his intenstinal needs requires that the wife "stand by" with a clean rag and some baby wipes until his class. This is a young horse that was slightly nervous. The husband was also slightly nervous and while didn't have intestinal problems, tried to calm his nerves with a beer or two while barking orders at his wife, who at this point is holding horse, a semi-green towel, the groom bucket and barely her sanity. Husband disappears for some last minute stuff and wife and I are standing there, killing time until his class starts. Her conversation to me is something like "if anyone ever told me I would be wiping a horses a$$ for fun last year, I would have told them they were insane!" ha ha ha... and THEN it happened, her husband reappeared and the horse had shooting diarrhea, which of course unnerved all of us! She was holding his head, while trying to clean up the back end and while she was going for the back end of the horse, the horse of course, followed her, thus making the largest green sprinkle I have ever seen...LOL... all I could do was giggle...they did end up winning their class, but boy was THAT a LONG morning! LOL

The Coveted Plaque

Ok, I have taken 3 pictures from different angles of this plaque and for the life of me can not get it right itself...so here's the plaque (pretty isn't it?) albeit sideways... gosh he worked so hard for this one! This one was 5 years in the making...

And you thought MY legs were hairy....

...it's the night before we leave for another horse show (this one for only 6 days...only...hahaha!) So today was a flurry of activity, washing horses, clipping faces, clipping their hairy legs...and the next time I gripe about shaving my legs, I'll think twice, I don't have NEAR as much hair as the horses....and mine are MUCH easier to shave! I also stand still while I'm doing it.... tee hee! So let's see, everyone got their whiskers shaved off, their grandpa ear hair removed and their legs waxed (err I mean clipped) and then several of them got Bob Marley dread locks (ie got their manes braided). I wish we were done, I have ungodly amounts of laundry to do and a house to clean (I hate coming home to a dirty house)...and we still haven't found a horse sitter for the remainder of our equine charges. Nothing like leaving it to the last minute...it's fair week here, so all of our help is at fair showing their animals. You'd think someone would want to earn $25/day for 1 hours worth of work...(rolling my eyes)...you would think, wouldn't you? Good thing grandpa lives next door and we are taking 75% of the barn with us.
Oh well, I need to get going, loads of laundry is calling my name...and probably SHOULD go and shave my legs, no need to be hairier than the horses eh?