More Horsin Around

 We were all able to walk although Rachel flew out to Gulf Shores today. I think she needs a vacation. Not just us 4 girls walked. Mike brought along Roseberry for the first round.

She got a little spooked at Joan's electrical service box but didn't do anything other than sniff it.

He put her away and on the second round he had out Shadow.

After the walk and after breakfast Mark and I went to work in the popcorn machine. The top was taken off of it so we could check out the wiring.

I was almost 100% sure it was a loose wire. That really was the case.

Of course I had to pop some corn to make sure it really did work.

Mark and I both enjoyed some then the rest was taken over to mom's house. We put the top back on it and I cleaned it up. I'll use it on Friday for the co-op picnic. Rosaleigh and her colt were brought in for their grain. The colt was haltered, tied and his hooves picked up. He is a pro at this now. When I turned him loose he wanted his mama's grain.

I took a video of him getting into her bucket and chowing down.

When they finished the bucket they were turned out to graze in the big field. Rosaleigh wanted to graze but the colt wanted to check everything out first.

They were left loose while I brought in Star Temple and her filly. Star no longer worries about me working with her filly. The filly stood for her haltering but fought when I asked her to lead. She was tied back up and her hooves picked up.

She is a fiesty little filly but is starting to accept the tying and is good for all for of her legs to be handled. They were taken out to the outdoor arena. Mark was busy mowing around the outside of the fields and the horses pretty much just ignored him.

 I took a couple pictures of Star's filly. She has such action when she trots.

My next job was to go get Dahlia from the cabin field, give her a leading lesson then put her in with Missy and Cookie so they can teach her some manners. When I got to the cabin field they were all the way at the bottom. Dahlia saw me first and started coming but Roseberry actually beat her.

I then drove to the DMV in Pekin to renew the license plate sticker for the 2 horse trailer.

Sarah arrived with her three girls and saddled up Cookie for them. The girls did the grooming.

They also fly sprayed her.

Zion rode first.

The other 2 girls got to ride but I needed to check out the batting machine then drop off a hat for Joan to give to Faith as it was left at the barn during the bachelor party. When I got back Zion was ready to walk the trails. We followed with the golf cart.

Mike wanted to go to Middle Grove to pick up Bulu and her colt and I wanted Basilea and Thalia here to start teasing them. We left for Middle grove about 5:30. As soon as we arrived I haltered Oliver the stallion and had Mike tie him to the trailer. He really is a good boy. He stood quietly for haltering and his leading is top notch.

Once Oliver was tied up at the trailer. Basilea and Thalia were haltered and put in the front of the stock trailer. Then Bulu and her colt were put in the back. Mike took Oliver back to the truck to give him a carrot for standing so quietly.

Above is another picture of Oliver and below is Madiera and Harli.

Above is Harli and Dancer, below left to right is Tessa and Sheena.

Above is Oliver going to check out the trailer and below Jury is watching Mike hand out carrots. She got hers first. 

Above is Dancer, Madiera and Harli, below is Aiken.

Above left to right is Sheena, Oliver and Holly. Below is Lily, our first Friesian cross. She is the matriarch and the boss of the entire herd.

Below is Mike giving Oliver a carrot then walking around the trailer to video some of the mares.

We drove home and could see storm clouds coming. When we got back Basilea and Thalia were put in the paddock next to Valiant. Bulu and her colt were driven over to the cabin field. Below is the video of them unloading.

I took a picture of the colt before Mike put him in. He is half Friesian, his sire is Valiant and his dam is a big 16.1 hand Thoroughbred mare Bulu. This colt is going to be another big one. He is also for sale but he needs to be named and registered first.

Below the 3 yearlings are very curious to see who is coming into their paddock.

Below is Rosalie, coming up to greet me as I was leaving for home. She is as kind as she is beautiful. She is a Lily daughter!

I sure did a lot of horsin around again today, I'll be glad when bedtime arrives. Right now we are hearing a lot of thunder but so far not much rain.

Wonderful Day Wonderful Life

 Mike sent a text that he wanted Evan in the pasture so he could clean out the front of his paddock this morning. I thought he meant after church but he wanted to do it this morning before church and had it done in about 20 minutes. Evan loved being out on the pasture and the grass is long enough he was left out. His back gate is left open so he can come or go. We picked up Rhonda for church and arrived a couple minutes after Joan. Randy and Kathy brought Nancy and she was SO wound up and excited. Randy was making more than duck calls this morning, according to Nancy he also sounded like a cow and a few other animals. She was thrilled to go down to Sunday school with Joan. Gabe had the morning message. Today was also the senior breakfast and he had taught them all 4 years so knew them all well. This was officially his first message off the pulpit. If you would like to watch it click HERE. Tim Roecker had the afternoon message click HERE to listen to that. Amy and Ken were in Peoria as Amy is helping at Sarah's wedding shower and the meeting on that was at lunch. Joan needed to stay late for the Jamaica trip meeting so she took Mark's car home from church and we took mom's wheel chair van with mom and Mackenson. We only found out later Mackenson was supposed to go to that meeting as he is also going to Jamaica. I stayed at mom's house until Joan made it back at 2:40 then went over to start cooking the Sunday meal. While I was doing that Rhoda and Lee along with Sarah and Nolan and the 5 grandchildren were here. Rhoda was working with Valerie 

Sarah took the picture above and the video below of the training session.

I'm sending her away for training later so anything Rhoda or I do will only help. She is not a spooky horse but is so big and had not been handled much as she spent most of her time growing up at Middle Grove. I so much appreciate Rhoda being willing to work with her. 

Sarah took her daughters over to the cabin field to visit with the yearlings, Rosalie and Sally. Mike and Diane were there with carrots. They even did some grooming on Roseberry getting some of that winter coat off of her. The pictures are from Sarah.

Above River is grooming Roseberry. Below Eden is coming with the curry to help.

Above Eden is feeding Sally a carrot. Below Zion is feeding 3 of the yearlings carrots.

Above Zion is petting Rosalie, below Zion is giving the yearlings attention.

Diane helped load all the food up on the golf cart. I had to go back for butter and strawberries and when I did saw 2 pairs of geese parents each with 4 goslings heading to the pond pasture. By the time I got the camera out the first pair had made it to the water followed closely by the second pair.

Supper was served at 4:30 at the barn. Amy and Ken arrived after the prayer but made it in plenty of time to join us at the table. We were missing 3 families although Phil and Kensley came later. The evening was beautiful and Joan made a big fire.

Almost all of us migrated to the fire, even mom came out to enjoy the evening.

Rachel was telling us about her experience with an Airbnb guests that pretty matched my experience yesterday and it turned out to be the SAME guest.

Mom was laughing so hard tonight at some of the funny stories.

Andrew and Faith joined us at the fire in time for s'mores.

Above Faith is cooking marshmallows over the glowing coals. The new electronic door latch came today and Mark was able to install that and he put the old lock back on the master bedroom door in the barn. I'm thankful for the wonderful day in church, the delicious meal at dinner and the wonderful fellowship at the campfire. What a wonderful life we live out here.

The Glad Game

 I was ready to leave for Goodfield by 7:10 am and arrived at 7:50. The tables and chairs were unloaded first then all of the supplies. Brian helped me get the popcorn machine over to the table.

I put the first batch of popcorn, oil and salt in the kettle turned everything on then waited. The lights came on, the warmer on the bottom came on, but the kettle did not heat up. I tried a few different options but nothing I tried worked. What a bummer. Nolan carried it back to the car and helped load up everything and I was on my home by 9: 15 but only after stopping at Sarah and Nolan's booth to buy some wash rags from Zion, scrunchies from Elisabet, a cake pop and another scrunchie from Lilly. Next stop was to check out Rebekah and Brian's booth. Jordan was selling rabbits and cages while Rilley and Blair were selling home made chapstick, soap, and burn lotion. Only after driving away did I realized I had walked off without paying Zion for her wash rags. Tomorrow I'll for sure have to pay her for those. I still can't figure out how that happened. I was busy paying for the other girls things and was holding the washrags. She worked very hard on those so I think I'll need to pay double. I was just glad they didn't call me a shoplifter.  I stopped at Sam's club on the way home to pick up some food for tomorrow's meal at the barn and made it home by 10:30 am. After watching the PollyAnna play the co-op put on I knew I needed to play the game and find something I was glad about the popcorn machine breaking and I did. I was glad I made it home in time to help move the airbnb guests out of the barn before the next group arrived. They would not have been out in time. I used Mark's Prius to load everything into that car and bring them over. The foaling apartment had a hole in the door where the new lock will go and that won't be installed until it arrives on Monday so blocked it off for today and tomorrow. I explained to the renters there was no hurry to leave. We had rented the apartment to 3 people last night but this morning when I picked them up there were 5. The two girls were horse lovers so I introduced them to Evan first. He loves attention and especially when they bring fresh picked grass. 

I took these 2 and the taller one's mother. (she was the lady that came to help the actual renter) the yearlings. They liked them but Rosalie was a favorite. Below Rosalie is thoroughly enjoying the attention.

They were taken back to the apartment and I ran over to the barn to get all the laundry and get that started here at the house. I happened to look over at the barn and saw what I thought was Cookie out until I realized, "That's NOT Cookie!" Ruth had ridden her Arabian mare Grace over.

Grace will spend the night here. Ruth also left her saddle and bridle so maybe tomorrow someone can take her on a trail ride. Evan thought she was beautiful.

I needed to be at mom's by 5:00 and when I arrived Faith was busy making spaghetti for supper tonight. It was good! Andrew was having his bachelor party tonight here at the barn. Just after supper, while I was busy cutting up vegetables for tomorrow's meal, Mark arrived to ask me to go back to the foaling apartment explaining there were a whole lot of kids all by the apartment and he was afraid they would not follow the rules and go into a paddock. There really were a lot of them, both boys and girls. I told them the rules but really couldn't understand why they were all here. The airbnb renter had a car problem and I think the entire home schooling group from Springfield came here to wait with her until she could get her car towed which had died in Washington, IL. I had explained to them that there was going to be some shooting in the field. Not only did the shooting go on but I think a few of the guys here for the bachelor party were related to Spark. There were some BOMBS going off. After the first mom and I jumped, after the second I went to the door to see if the barn was still standing. A few more were set off but all was fine. This gives our neighborhood something to talk about. Hmmm just what kind of family is Faith marrying into? I am glad they are all having a good time and I'm glad I could help out a family and really glad that the apartment was left in good shape. Mark ordered a new toggle switch for the camper and a new door lock and handle. Now we just need to get the popcorn machine fixed.

Problems Problems Problems

 Lots of problems today and only one of them was able to be solved. The others, we at 9:00pm, were still working on. Ruth and I walked this morning. Joan had co-op and Diane is flying home from Gulf Shores today. The tiny white flowers on these bushes have a very sweet smell. These bushes are all over our area.

I left right after breakfast for Sam's club to buy a 50 pound bag of popcorn, some popcorn salt and the bags we need to pass out the popcorn. Only to find they don't have it in stock anymore. I was still glad I went as the meat I'm going to serve at family night was on sale and I bought what was needed saving at least $30.00. From there I drove to GFS and they had exactly what was needed. That was our easy problem to solve today.  The next one wasn't terrible but we did not get it fixed today. We were going to move the last two campers over to Joan's house. I backed the truck up to the first one but the electric jack would not work. I thought the battery was probably dead, Mark drove the golf cart over to mom's to borrow her charger and hooked that up but nope it wasn't the battery. The jack itself is not working.

Mark decide to leave it for today and work on that tomorrow.

Because this camper is right in from of the other one we couldn't move either of them. Instead Mark helped me get the popcorn machine out of the foaling apartment and into his Tesla. I also packed a folding table, 2 chairs, the popcorn, oil, salt, bags and all the other supplies needed plus made two signs for free popcorn. Ruth rented a motel room for tonight that she was not able to use but since it was non refundable she needed to drive there, check in and get the key. She gave the key to Sarah's family. I was with mom when the foaling apartment booked. Mark came and stayed with mom while I ran over to clean up any mess we made while taking out the popcorn machine. After Ruth got back the two mares with foals were brought inside, grained and each foal got haltered, tied, and hooves picked up. We left around 6:30 pm, drove in to Bartonville to the new Wendy's to use the gift card for our supper. We both bought cobb salads. Gils has a much bigger cobb salad that we can split and that tastes so much better with actually more food for less money. We still have $10.99 left on the gift card. When we got back the 3rd problem arrived. Our guests were trying to lock the foaling apartment door and it would not lock. We worked on that and even found the instructions from when we bought it but nothing worked. Mark finally went over to the barn, took the lock off the master bedroom there and brought it back only to find the handles had been switched. I finally just took our guests over to the barn. They were VERY happy to move over there. They agreed to move out by 11:00 am as that is when Jack's birthday party starts. By now it is almost 10:00 pm. I'm leaving early for the home school resource in Goodfield tomorrow so Mark will get to fix those last 2 problems by himself. He has been watching youtube videos and thinks he has figured out the door lock. Unfortunately he will need to take the electric jack apart to figure out why that isn't working.

PollyAnna

 Another cold morning but by the time we walked the windbreaker came off and during the walk the sweat shirt came off. We had so much rain that 3 of the canoes left the beach. We laughed it looked like there was a ghost fisherman out on the lake. 

Last night on our way to church we stopped to buy potting soil and a couple more pots for the tomatoes that really needed to be transplanted. This morning that was done. 

The soil was 4 bags for $10.00 and I only used a half of a bag so there will be plenty to put in the tomato boxes once Mark get's them built. His big job today was to work on the drive. The trench needed to be dug back out as did the culvert. That was blocked so instead of going under the drive and down the hill the water went down the drive carving out trenches and dragging the gravel down to the bottom of the hill.

I was very efficient with the horses today. The two mares with foals were brought in, grained, each foal worked with and while they were eating I drove the golf cart over to the cabin field to grain those horses. Rosalie and Sally heard the golf cart coming and by the time I pulled up they were waiting at the fence.

The yearlings were down grazing yet. They were called and came trotting up.

The next job was to put Rosaleigh and her colt out in the big fields to graze for an hour. An hour was all the time I had left before needing to go in, clean up, pick up mom and leave for the co-op play PollyAnna.

I watched them graze a bit and saw the colt try out some of the grass.

Evidently he didn't like the taste.

Mom was waiting for me when I arrived. We left for the Connect church in Washington, IL about 1:10 pm. We arrived as they were setting up for the dress rehearsal. Berlica came over in her costume.

Marsha is the director and Justin, her husband is her amazing helper. The plays are always well rehearsed and very entertaining. The kids do a wonderful job learning their lines and the performances are always top notch. 

Below is the start of the show, the first song!

Justin videoed the entire play and is willing to share it once it is finished. Once that is in hand I will share it here. On the way home mom decided we should stop and bring home some supper. We called the Bartonville Diner and ordered 2 of their walleye dinners. It was ready by the time we got there and we were home in 10 minutes after that. Ruth had the table set and Mark had walked over to join us. We enjoyed dinner while telling stories of the play and stayed visiting with them for a while after dinner. It was raining off and on when we left for the play and was still sprinkling when we got home.