The Wedding

Brrr it was cold this morning. The horses were fed early and the foals checked on around 6:00 am. All was well. Sangria's colt was next to his mom practicing the Spanish Walk on his own. He was throwing first one leg out then the next trying to get Sangria to play but she was more interested in grazing. I only had the phone with me and they were way down toward the bottom of the field but had to snap this picture anyway.

Mark was out spraying the pond so instead of starting breakfast I sat on the front porch waiting for him to bring the canoe in when the fox came trotting up my driveway not 20 feet from me. No camera and no phone to get the proof of that. The fox stopped at the fenceline, waiting until Mark walked up to the drive then slipped into the pond pasture and headed to his den.
Mom, Karin, Mark and I left at 8:15 am for the Forest church where we were to celebrate the wedding of Gary and Marie. It is a good hour and a half trip and we arrived just as the singing started. Forest had 3 visiting ministers, one from Athens, AL, one from Champagne and one from Peoria. The minister from Champagne had the morning service then Tim Funk has the afternoon wedding service. The elder from Forest had the actual wedding. It was a very touching wedding in a very full church. We walked across the parking lot for the reception which was held in the Commons. We left for home around 3:00 pm, stopped and picked up Chinese for dinner. We ate at mom's and were joined by Phil, Anna, Austin and kids but we didn't know they were coming so Phil drove in to Bartonville and picked up McDonalds. There is just no fast food restaurant around here. They had a full group for volley ball. Joan had Bill and Bethany here from Bluffton to play plus a bunch of the regulars. It is still very cold and Joan started a nice big campfire. It was hard to leave the warmth to ride the golf cart back but now that we are in the house we all smell like smoke.
There was a nice message waiting from the lady that owns Ella's filly by Evan we named Scarlett. She writes:
Judy, Check out the pictures I took of Bella (Scarlett) taken last week. She turned 2 last month and is an incredible joy to have. She is curious, intelligent, brave, and has a wonderful disposition. The pictures were taken on her first trip away from home and she was being handled by a 13 year old that is just beginning to work with horses. There were other horses (including "Uncle" Jesse) and she behaved herself through all the distractions. I love her so much!

She turned into a lovely mare and is going to be much much taller than her dam Ella. Good job EVAN!

Playing

It rained during the night but only about a quarter of an inch then we had a softly falling drizzle pretty much all day but again just over a quarter of an inch. The fields got a good soaking and the grass is shooting up as we speak. It went from warm today to down right cold this evening with the temps hovering in the 50s and the wind gusting. The only mare teased was Luna and she is not sure about the boys yet. She is missing her herd at home and not quite sure if the horses around here are friendly. We have electric wire going around the top of the paddocks and she has already been stung once so is afraid to get too close to any of the fences. At least she is eating well.
This afternoon during a break from the drizzle the foals were checked on, there were only 4 visible so the golf cart was taken into the soaked field down to the tree line where Sangria's colt and Sheena's colt were laying side by side taking a nap. About 10 minutes later the rain started back up, Sangria's colt jumped up, snorted and danced in front of Sheena's colt for a few seconds then took off like a shot galloping just as Sheena's colt jumped up to accept the challenge to race and the 2 of them galloped up the hill around both of their dams then slammed to a stop. We'll call it a tie! It is fun watching the foals play together. Ribbon's filly was playing with Indy's filly even though Indy's filly is 2 months older. Indy's filly is rarely with her mom, she is too busy hanging around the other foals and only finds Indy when hungry. Zoey, Zalena's filly and Emma's colt were hanging around their dams but they too snorted then danced a bit to show off. They are all feeling really good now that the hot sun was covered up and the cooling rain refreshed the air.
I had a lazy day, Mark worked on removing the old aluminum siding off the front of the house and taking the off the front storm door. He decided we needed a front storm door with screens for summer and one that is airtight for this winter.

Pony Party

The film crew for Lake Life wanted to video a pony party for the Hermans which Horsemeister could provide. That meant I had to get up earlier than usual to get the chores done before they were due to arrive at 11:30 am.
Emily helped get Ribbon covered by Valiant and Indy covered by Evan before taking off for Forest.
After she left, the indoor arena needed to be watered as it looked like rain would hit right around the time the party was to start. There was also a mare coming in for breeding today so a stall needed to be prepared and the barn swept up. Sarah Reinhard arrived around 10:00 am to help with transporting Larry and Paris the 2 horses we decided to use. All of our riding mares are at Middle Grove and even though we have 40 or so horses we needed to borrow a couple from Ruth for this party.
When Sarah arrived I had Sheena and her colt in the indoor arena getting a few pictures for the website.

They were put away and off we drove to Ruth's house with a couple of halters, lead ropes and most important a bucket of grain. Once we got back they were tied up in the arena and I went down to the house to finally get some breakfast but had just taken a few bites when my Sarah dropped in to tell me the film crew was already up at the barn. They arrived before 11:00 am. It was just starting to spit out a light rain so we started up with the rides in the indoor. Sarah led Larry and Hannah led Paris.

The sun started peeking through so we moved the whole party over at the playground.

Around 1:00 pm the horses were taken back to the indoor so some of the kids could ride without a leader. Some of them wanted to see Ribbon's filly so they were brought inside and the filly got a tying lesson. Below Shaeya is holding a lead rope while petting her. This filly is only 12 days old.

She reminds us so much of Ribbon's first filly Princess. She has the same face and the same build. Below is a picture of Princess at age 2. Wow is all we can say about her.

The horses were taken back to Ruth's once the kids left the barn to go back to the playground. Right after I got home, Kathy arrived with her Friesian mare Luna.

Luna made the 6 hour trip here to be bred to Evan when she comes into season. She is a big, tall, baroque mare and will be a great cross with him. This foal should be amazing.

Anna and Taunya took my grand children over to Diane's pond for the afternoon. Below Jace is getting almost too tired to get up to walk over and see Taegan's toad.

Taegan caught the toad and all of them were fascinated by the poor thing. He ended up in the pond, sure hope he can swim to shore before a big bass scoops him up.

We are going to have an early night tonight. I'm SO ready for bed.

Wedding Shower

We had a truly amazing day at Berean. I was sure it wouldn't go well, no wrapped Bibles and not enough helpers. That along with trying to do this on very little sleep after our long heart breaking day yesterday. But..God provides. Helpers started to arrive and each was greeted enthusiastically.

 Above Diane is making copies while Rachel is reading the letters, our new helper Jayden is opening mail with her grandmother Roma and Eva Jean is working on studies. Below Eva Jean is showing us her brace. Eva Jean had surgery and is suppose to wear this but usually forgets, today she remembered.

 Wes and Terren are busy opening the mail.

 Below is a touching letter.

 Jayden looks over to get her instructions while Chuck is busy reading the letters.

 Rachel took Wes and Terren in the conference room to fold the studies 1 through 4 along with a letter explaining the studies and a postage paid return envelope. These will get stuffed in the Bibles before the Bible is wrapped. Usually the Roanoke and Goodfield young groups do this for us but today we had to do double duty since we had no wrapped Bibles at all. 

Once the Bibles were delivered this same group single-handedly (well they each used both of their hands so technically it was 6 handed wrapped, labeled, stamped and hauled out over 350 Bibles. We don't know how much longer this can go on at our shop. This program is getting so big we are needing more volunteers than the office can hold. We are in desperate need of Bible wrapping. If anyone wants to volunteer a few hours a week please shoot me a text or email. I'll hook you up with a good job that includes out of this world pay. Why stick around and we are more than willing to double or triple your pay. Actually we make people around here work for food, today we brought in pizza to feed our hungry crowd. Mark dropped the Bibles off at the post office while I ran to Rabers to pick up the pulled pork for the shower tonight for Sarah and Nolan. As soon as I got home Emily helped get Ribbon and Indy covered. Both are still in and stood well but both stallions were a handful tonight. They were both too anxious to get the job done and both ended up rushing the mares.
After I cleaned up I headed over to Ruth and Fedi's house arriving early for the shower just in case I was needed to do something but Stephanie, Taunya, Anna, Rebekah and Ruth had everything covered. Ruth and Rebekah had the house decorated beautifully. The food was colorful and delicious.

 Below Sarah and Nolan have just opened a gift and Sarah is trying it out. While we were eating we, everyone was told to write 'words of wisdom' for the engaged couple. As they were opening the gifts those words were read to the guests.  That was a great idea. 

 The dessert bar was the favorite spot of the evening. There were hot brownies with cold icecream and a number of toppings just waiting to be drizzled over the ice cream and brownies.

 Below is the most unique gift of the evening. A weding cake made out of towels and utensils. Cute!

Taunya had all 3 of her kids there and favorite Aunt Rhodie was determined to carry all three.

 What a heavy load!

After the guests left Fedi got the snake out for Ben and Taunya's boys. They were impressed.

We had a busy productive day but now it is WAY past my bedtime and have another busy day scheduled for tomorrow.

Poor Eliza

Right after the walk Emily and I took Emma to visit Rick James. Today they tied the knot.

If she conceives the puppies will be born the end of July. We picked up a prize for Joan's kids and dropped that off after dropping off Emma.

This turtle was crossing the road and going to get hit and smashed. We stopped the car, Emily picked it up and put it on the floor of her side of the car then when all was finished with Emma we jumped back in the car looked down and no turtle. It had crawled under the seat. It was just a good thing we remembered. The turtle was let loose in the lake.
 From there it was down to the shop to finish typing in the Bible requests while waiting for Mark to make it back to the shop. I was able to finish just after he got back. We left for Bridlewood with his meter to check the electricity on one of the stalls and also check for a water leak. Mark was able to show Cathie the problem on the stall but the water leak will have to be hired out.
When I got back from the shop Emily was mowing but had to stop to show me the kittens.
The cat had 6 kittens while she was in Mexico, 3 boys and 3 girls. Their eyes have just opened.

Next we decided to get a few pictures and videos of the foals. Sangria and her colt were first out as they was closest to the gate. Her colt was haltered and given some handling instruction before heading out to the arena.

He is such a big boy at 3 weeks of age. He really does have amazing movement. Check out the video below taken May 27th, 2015. He is for sale please visit our website for more information www.horsemeister.com 

Next out was Ribbon and her filly by Valiant. She too is huge. She is 11 days old.

She has very nice movement too.

When we were putting her in we were going to pull out Emma's colt when we saw that Eliza's colt was not well. He was hosed off and put in a stall and the vet called. By the time Dr. Hoerr arrived the colt was not doing well at all. We thought it was pneumonia but when the blood work came back it was obvious the colt was in big trouble. We hauled him straight over to Dr. Hoerr's where he was worked on for the next 3 hours trying to find out what was wrong with him. Finally Dr. Hoerr decided to do surgery but the colt died before the surgery started. We wanted to find out what could have caused his death. Dr. Hoerr  performed an autopsy and discovered the colt was full of infection. It turned out that he had an umbilical cord infection which must have been barely there for the last 2 weeks then exploded today with infection filling his belly.
As Emily is in training Dr. Hoerr had her stitch him back up for transport home.

The gurney was then wheeled outside to the trailer and the colt loaded into the back. Eliza had to ride in the front of the trailer with her dead colt in the back. We finally got home well after midnight.  Eliza has been stalled, the colt left in the trailer until morning. We will bury him here. This colt was sold so I will need to contact the buyer to refund his money. How sad for Eliza, how sad for us. The loss of this colt is kind of heart breaking. He was such a friendly fellow from the day he was born. Rest in Peace little guy!

Rhoda reported that the puppy is now sold. We knew he would sell quickly but didn't expect it quite that quickly.

Many Hands Make Light Work

Joan couldn't walk today, she had her 2 grand daughters this weekend and needed to drive Aubrey to school. What we didn't know is that she went straight from that school to the shop and put everyone to work stamping envelopes. By the time mom and I arrived at 9:00 am they had been working for close to an hour. We have no Bibles to work with today but Tim Martin has promised to bring a bunch tomorrow morning for Thursday's workers. It was also a smaller than usual mail day because of the Memorial Day Holiday. Below mom, Shirley and Eva Jean are busy with letters and studies.

 Joan's crew is hard at work in the conference room stamping envelopes and stuffing boxes.

 The letter below was kind of pitiful, we can't imagine how scared and lonely it must be in jail. This inmate is asking for prayer. Please pray for him that he could find peace and learn to know of Jesus.

 Chuck was busy working on applying labels to envelopes then envelopes to studies. 

 Dave and mom were busy reading letters.

 Below Joan had everyone working on stuffing boxes while she kept the copier going. We had a wonderful crew and were able to finish all the letters and studies by noon.

We went to Denny's for lunch then after lunch all were able to leave for home instead of working the afternoon. The saying Many hands make light work, really did apply today. We had many willing hands and because of that the work load was an easy one for everybody. Of course the fact that it was a light mail day may have contributed to us getting done by noon.
I took Emma over to visit Rick James again this afternoon but still no success. I have a plan for tomorrow, hopefully it won't be too late. At least I know Emma is willing to stand.
Once Mark got home he helped with getting mares teased and covered. All of the mares we are teasing now have a foal by her side which makes it a two person job. Sangria was teased but would not show, I believe she is in but is too worried about her colt at this time to focus on a stallion.

Ribbon was covered by Valiant with no problem at all. Her filly is so sweet and also smart. She figured out quickly once Mark opened the gate how to get out the opening and run to mama.

Indy was covered by Evan. Indy is a mystery. 

I only knew she would be in season by the ultrasound we had done on her 19 days ago. That showed she had just ovulated. I took her over to both stallions and she would not show. Finally I just tied her up at Evan's breeding stand took him over and he was convinced she was in. By the time he sweet talked her enough she finally did show but not until Mark had to come help with the lead ropes. Her filly has the WOW neck and WOW movement. Hopefully I can get a few videos soon of some of these foals now that Emily is coming home. Tonight the episode of Lake Life shown on television is the ti-pi village.

This is the one Horsemeister provided the horses for. We took 2 Friesian mares, 2 paint mares and 2 foals for this one episode. Since it is on a channel we don't have we will try to watch it later.