Halter Training

Karin and I left for Middle Grove early, the frost was still on the grass when we arrived. We took Ripper with us and were glad we had him, he discovered the herd way earlier than we would have and saved us a lot of hiking. When we went to halter the mares, we discovered we only had 2 halters for 3 horses. Knowing 3 were packed Karin went back to look for the dropped halter but couldn't find it so we just looped the lead rope around Anna's neck. She is such a good mare that was all it took. When we got all the way back to the gate, there was the halter. It has slipped out of Karin's arms right at the start.
The horses were loaded quickly and we were home by 9:20 am. Mom had breakfast ready but when we didn't arrive at the planned 9:00 am she fed it to Joan's kids, Berlica, Faith and Mackenson. Thankfully she cooked us a second breakfast. Food always tastes better when someone else cooks it. Breakfast was delicious.
The horses were turned out for the morning then I took a quick trip to Sam's Club for laundry detergent and some supplies for the Berean office.
When I got back to the farm the foals were brought inside to work on halter training.

This training needs to be done over and over until it the foal realizes it is no big deal and this really needs to be done early. Each foal also got their hooves picked up. While I was working with the foals, visitors arrived to see Zephyr. His owner brought out some of her family to meet him. He was taken into the round pen for some instructions then Amy's son gave him a leading lesson.

Zephyr is doing very well as long as he is inside but got scared once or twice as he was being led to the round pen and tried to get away. He didn't try too hard and figured out pretty quickly that wasn't not the reaction we were looking for. After his round pen session he led out very respectfully.

Mark and I worked on the putting together the next phase of the solar system until late in the afternoon. We got most of the braces up for the next section.This is a big job but rewarding when we see our meter going backward as it did most of this sunny day.

 Of course I'd rather be horsen around. When the mares were called in today for their grain I snapped the next 2 pictures below. These are of a 6 day old foal first the front legs then the back legs.

Can anyone guess whose legs these are? This is very impressive as the feather on a foal doesn't usually show up until 3 to 4 months. This is Ayanna's colt by Evan. He is going to be one hairy handsome hunk!
Mark and I went inside just in time to meet our next visitors. Gertie and Dennis stopped in for a nice visit about the same time Jamie arrived to see the foals.
Rhoda sent an update on Rosalie's training along with a few pictures. She writes: She remembered the bow today, no problems. Still didn't get on yet though,  we mainly worked on the bag over her head until she was relaxed. Over all she did wonderful.  

As she was training Rosalie a pair of swans flew in and landed on the pasture pond. 

What a gorgeous place to spend the afternoon, and to think it is only about 10 minutes from her house.
Mark helped move in a couple round bales. Zalena and Eliza's paddock got a new one and Lily, Ayanna and Star's paddock got the other. Mark moved the last of that row of bales over to the other side of the barn so he could get to the back electrical box more easily. He counted the remaining bales, we have 33 left here and probably around 20 left at Middle Grove. Hopefully the weather will warm up and the grass will start growing SOON!