Unexpected Guests.

We picked up Mackenson for church this morning as Joan needed to drive Berlica there early. Today was ACYF at Gridley. Craig Stickling had them morning message on Daniel 1 and then 3rd John. Click HERE to watch that message. Mike Kaisner had the afternoon message on the Amos 3 and 4. Click HERE to watch that. We took Israel to Sarah and Nolan's house after church. They had their pond stocked today with bass, catfish, bluegill and stripers. We drove through rain on the way home and that rain continued off and on most of the afternoon and evening. Just before supper the rain had stopped so Rhoda went to work with Tessa while Sarah and the girls rode Penny. Sarah sent back the picture below of River and Tessa. 

Joan dropped Nancy off so she could have supper with us as she needed to pick up Berlica. Amy and Ken drove over from Tremont to join us. We sure appreciate when those on the other side of the river drive all the way here to join us. Supper wasn't anything that special but by the end of the evening pretty much everything was gone. As it was rainy the crafts from Gail were brought out. Even Nancy got to make something.

Rhoda, Sarah and Amy came over to the horses with me to do a practice run of loading horses. Tomorrow morning at 7:45 am I need to have Harli, Merlin, Rosaleigh's colt and Dancer loaded and on the way to Hoerr Vet clinic. We need coggins on Merlin, Rosaleigh's colt and Dancer and both Harli and Dancer need to be sonagrammed to see if they settled. We also need Dr. Hoerr to look at Harli's tooth and her itchy skin. That went well. We loaded, unloaded and loaded them again before putting them away and going back to the barn. Then it was time to try out the new basketball machine Phil bought. 

Everyone helped clean up and I was just walking out the door when a work truck arrived. I asked if there was a problem and the driver explained, "I'm one of the workers that will be staying here tonight." I was confused because when they left last Thursday they talked about staying but never got back with me so I thought they found somewhere else to stay. I was glad I was there to turn on the parking lights, turn down the air conditioner and unlock all the bedroom doors. They stayed the last 2 weeks at the farm house and foaling apartment and would have book both again but both of those were already booked for the week. They are all really nice men and we are glad to host them.

Fred Complains Again

Our farm house guests last night came because their daughter is practicing with a Farmington club doing silks. She asked if I knew what that was and was glad to say "OH YES!" Joan's girls all did the silks. I told them about Spark's fire truck parked in the indoor arena just for that. I had no idea there were clubs doing that and just a few miles away. She shared the pictures below of her practicing there. 

I walked out of the garage door at 7:30 am to see Berlica riding Harli with Merlin following walking down the lane. She was just taken a walk around the neighborhood and Harli was happy to go.

I got the phone out to grab some video of them.

I went to Sam's Club to get the food for tomorrow's meal.

The farm house guests were gone when I got home from Sam's so as soon as the food was put away, I went right to work cleaning the farm house. The 3 guests that stayed in the barn last night needed move over to the farm house. When I was done Tessa, her filly and Rosaleigh's colt were taken to the stall. The two foals were haltered then Rosaleigh's colt taken out of that stall and led to another. He is weaned but not used to being by himself. He is sold and will be leaving this next week so it is good to practice.

I took a short video to show the girls how he was acting.

This colt sure did inherit the mega hair of his dam. Check out that tail in the video above. He is 5 months old and that tail is so thick and long his owner is going to have to spend extra time on that as he grows. Tessa's filly was also haltered and tied. She is all pretty in pink. Her owner named her Lucy.

Mark was out working on a fence when I showed him a couple nails that needed to be removed. He was glad to help with that easy job. He really does have the tools needed. All of the laundry from the farm house as hauled over to the barn and I spent a few hours washing all of the bedding and towels from both the farm house and the barn. I was still folding sheets when Philip, Kensley and a friend arrived. Kensley borrowed the golf cart and Philip showed me how to take down the new basketball machine just in case I would need to do it by myself. It is a very large machine but folds up nicely and will fit in the coat closet in front of the freezer. Mark was busy washing his car.

That car is SO demanding. Our old cars didn't care if they were dirty, this car sends out messages that the cameras need to be cleaned, or the trunk was left open or it even tells on Mark if he forgets to shut a door. We are both getting texts from Fred (the car) daily. Yesterday Fred complained about the front end cameras and wouldn't even go the speed limit until Mark cleaned them. Mark helped me this evening to take down the big clock in the barn and put in a new battery. It takes 2 of us to put it back up. Berlica was mowing with the diesel grass hopper while Mackenson was using the push mower.

I'm so thankful they will do the job. There is a lot of mowing that must be done.

Dancer Jumps

 I went over at 6:30 am to start cleaning the foaling apartment but the guests were not yet gone. I went back to the house to make a quick breakfast for Mark and I. When I got back to the apartment the middle paddock was empty. The back gate was down and the horses no where in sight. I started searching and found them in the pond pasture so when Mark came over asked him to help get the gate back on. As we were working all 4 of those horses walked back into the paddock to get a drink. We got the gate on then moved a new bale in for them.

Below Mark is taking the skid steer back to the barn.

I went to work on the foaling apartment. Rhoda arrived to work with Tessa but I couldn't watch, as both the apartment and the farm house needed to be flip. Sarah arrived with all of the children, hers and Rhoda's and they started working with Dancer. I stopped to take a few pictures of that. 

Dancer is such a sweet mare.

Sarah even took a picture of Rhoda with her.

Rhoda and Zion decided to go on a trail ride with Dancer and Penny. The trails were wet and kind of slippery as it had rained earlier this morning. Rhoda asked Dancer to trot over a log, she slipped, caught her self and jumped it nicely.

Even Penny jumped that log. We were really pleased at how well Dancer remembered crossing creeks. She did very well on the trail EXCEPT, she wanted to run up the hill. Rhoda did not want her galloping up so made her walk it. Sarah took the video below of the trail ride.

I finished cleaning both the apartment and farm house around 1:30 pm, just in time as the apartment guests showed up just then. They called to see if they could come early. We were a little worried as the drive going up the hill washed out with that 2.4 inches of rain. Mark had been spreading manure but stopped and used the skid steer to drag it and that worked.

As the horses really wanted to graze in the pond pasture I asked Mark to help get the downed fence back up. I loaded up 2 of the 16 foot long boards on the top of the golf cart.

Those were painted for the outdoor arena and not used and were perfect for this job. We had to cut 4 feet off of each one.

As soon as they were up I let the mares out the back. By the time we got back to the house we were both tired and I really didn't want to cook. Mark decided a cobb salad from Gils was the perfect supper and I was more than happy to agree with him.

Our waitress brought us a second bowl but even though we split it we still had some left. We chose not to finish it as dessert waited.

The guests from the apartment and farm house have now arrived. The 3 older Swedish men won't make it here until after 10:00 pm. They will spend one night in the barn then move over to the farm house as soon as the guests today leave and I get it cleaned for them. We turned the barn parking lights, the dining room lights, the gym hall lights and three of the bedroom lights on for them. Hopefully they won't have any problems finding the bedrooms.

Moving Manure

 We were both up by 5:00 am I had to get up then as I had forgotten to load the coffee maker. Usually Mark gets up first and starts it. This coffee maker works quickly so it isn't a hardship to wait the few minutes it takes to brew a pot. I'm using mom's old one, as it is much faster than mine and I left mine in the farm house. After the walk I finished the barn for the men coming in tomorrow. Sarah was here with Zion, Eden and River. They had been working with Tessa but when I arrived we pulled Dancer out. We did a little round pen reasoning first.

Dancer hasn't been ridden or worked with since 2023 as she was a mom last year then left at Middle Grove. 

Mike thinks she is a plug but today she showed us some of her Thoroughbred side. It will be good to get her back in work. Dancer is Jewel's daughter, Grace's grand daughter and is 75% Friesian. Her sire is Evan. I let him out to graze today.

He has the field until we get the fence fixed in the mare pasture. Today was manure spreading day. I loaded while Mark spread.

We call that our black gold. It really does a great job enriching the fields.

We sure did need to clean up when we quit on that job. After our showers Mark took me out to eat. I won't say where but we didn't have a lot of time so it was that fast food restaurant that has crowns for little customers. After we ate we drove to Skylines for the service. David had the message on Jesus the Bride Groom.

I wish it could be shared here, it really was very relevant and David explains everything very well. Of course after we needed to visit with everyone. It really was good to be there. I showed Elisabet the aviary and aquarium. The birds are so pretty.

We thought the birds were colorful until we checked out the fish. There was a bright blue and even brighter yellow fish.

We really do have a wonderful home!

 

More Harli

 We got 2 and 4/10ths of an inch of rain during the night. The lightning and thunder woke us up. This morning we lost electricity but for just a short while and I only knew it because I was cooking when it happened.

Faline was waiting for us again and followed us to the farm house drive then stopped and waited. Yesterday we started the truck while she was there and that scared her so she waited for us at Mike and Diane's drive then followed us there and all the way back.

Mark came over to the barn to help move a bale in for the mares. I had to take a picture of Rosaleigh's colt standing on top of the feeder.

The other two saw me taking his picture and came over to the fence for some attention.

They were all glad for the new bale.

Berlica came over to work horses and today we worked with Harli. She was asked to walk around first being led, then with Berlica on her in the outdoor arena then moved to the round pen for some trot. Harli did very well and we had no anxious moments.

The video is long but shows how quiet and patient Berlica was with her.

When she was done, she was untacked and put in the arena to graze while we brought Tessa, her filly, and  Rosaleigh's colt into a stall. I needed to pull hair from the foals for the registration papers. They were also given a haltering lesson and tying lesson. Rosaleigh's colt is just huge.

They were put back then the registration papers completed and taken to the post office and mailed. The rest of the afternoon I worked on cleaning the barn. I have guests moving in on Friday morning at the barn. There also have guests moving out Friday morning from the apartment and farm house and more guests moving in Friday afternoon into the farm house and the apartment so Friday is going to be very busy. The more I could get done today will help. Jozsef came to day and worked on the East door of the barn. The rain had been coming in there and damaged some of the wood trim. I was thrilled he fixed the problem. He is going to come back to help Mark hang the big net upstairs in the game room. We need to stop kids from throwing balls up and also down plus it is just an extra safety from someone falling. We left for church at 6:00 pm. Gabe Stickling had the message tonight. He has such a kind way of speaking. He spoke on Psalm 72 and Hebrews 7 click HERE to watch that. We went to Culvers for a late supper after church.

Round Pen Reasoning For Children

 Faline followed us again on the walk but took a short cut on the way home and was waiting for us on the drive to Spark's house.

When we reached Joan's she found the spilled popcorn.

I had the car already packed with the mail tubs and my purse so didn't even go in the house, just got in the car and drove straight to the Berean office. Today was Verena's funeral and a lot of the Berean volunteers went to that. Marvin went to the visitation which was held before so arrived a little late but in time for the prayer. We were busy.

Not pictured were Kathy and Marvin who were working in the other room. I stopped at the Hanna City post office to drop off the Bibles and studies going out today. Sarah was here with the girls. Sarah worked with Tessa today and once she was put away the girls were doing round pen reasoning on each other.

Sarah sent the picture and wrote, Maybe when they are done they will be trained. I never thought of using round pen reasoning on children.  I drove straight to the barn to start work there as Monday nothing got done inside. The beds were made and all of the garbage collected. The soap containers were all refilled as was all the other supplies. It was getting hot, was 92 degrees outside, so quit there and went inside to grade Bible studies and found Sarah and her girls had cleaned again. Mark is so impressed with 8 year old Zion, 7 year old Eden and 5 year old River. He said they just go right to work and when they leave it looks so nice. After the studies were graded I ran them to the post office then drove studies down to Meisters. Amanda gives them to her mom to grade. I went back to work on the barn when I got home but only worked for a couple of hours. Mark was cleaning up the manure spreader, he is getting that ready to spread manure soon. Sarah gave me some website work. She is helping clean up old pictures and how to present them. 

2 Trips to Middle Grove

 Joan, Ruth and I walked. Diane and Mike are now at Gulf Shores for a couple weeks. When we got to Joan's house Faline came running out of the woods and up to Joan who had some left over watermelon. Faline loves watermelon.

That silly doe followed us today on the walk all the way to the indoor arena. We stopped there as I wanted Joan and Ruth to help me hook the stock trailer up to the truck. After the walk Mark came with me to Mike and Diane's to help load Sally, Dancer and Denver. They were taken out to Middle Grove. The video below is once they were let out of the trailer. They were glad to go straight up the hill to find and join the herd.

On the way home I called D & H Camper Repair to see if I could bring in the motorhome. They are backed up but told me I could bring it in Oct 12th between 8:30 am and 11:00 am. There was traffic on the drive going back and forth between houses. David was hauling equipment with his Kubota and Spark, Rhonda and Tarah were walking so of course Spark had to stop to visit with David.

Rhoda and Sarah were here with the girls. They were working with Harli and as long as the stock trailer was hooked up to the truck Rhoda decided to give Harli and Merlin a loading lesson. Harli was doing so well they decided it was time to take her on a trail ride. Zion rode Penny in front so all Harli had to do was follow. 

Merlin had a lot of fun exploring everything.

We were all thrilled with how Harli behaved. She is really going to be a nice steady pony. When they got back and those horses were put away, Rhoda took out Sapphire for some ground work.

She saddled and bridled her then did some round pen reasoning with her. After removing the saddle she was loaded, unloaded then lead to her paddock.

Rhoda decided it was time for Sapphire to join the herd and learn herd manners. She was taken out to Middle Grove with Missy and while there I picked up Dancer. Below is the video of that trip out.

On the way back to Hanna City I called Hoerr vet clinic to see if I could get Dancer in for an ultrasound. The soonest I could was Monday morning the 21st of September. After parking the truck and trailer the motorhome was unplugged and driven inside. The ad was removed and I won't advertise it until it is repaired. While we were all horse-in around Mark was changing oil in tractors. Below he is changing it in the Kubota. 

He also got the small Kubota oil changed.

The rotisserie chicken from Sam's club was deboned and chicken salad made which we will have for supper tonight. I'm pretty tired so will go to bed early tonight.