The Meister Christmas Party

What a long day yesterday was. The day started by our walk, then down to the shop where the copy machine was turned on. While that was warming up a quick trip to the post office to return the driving rein, then back to load 2 boxes of copy paper and 3 boxes of labels from the upstairs office into the warehouse office. By noon I had to quit to run to Sams to order and pay for the pizza. Back to the farm to watch Karin, Rhoda and Steven work the four Friesian mares. We heard Ben, Taunya, Addyson & Jack were coming over before the Meister party and the apartment was a mess. Quickly the 3 trainers came in to help. Steven grabbed the mop to get some of the muddy dog prints off of the floor. Karin grabbed the vacuum cleaner to start removing dog hair and Rhoda started washing off the counters & tables while I did dishes and made the bed. What wonderful help! I had to leave the place at 4:30pm to run back to Sams for the pizza and head out to the Old School Center where the Meister clan was gathering with dinner at 6:00pm. I barely made it in time, the Peoria traffic was awful. The video camera was taken out but first wasn't taping, then ran out of batteries. At least some of the performances along with the Christmas story was able to be downloaded.

What is really neat about this party is the kids would rather be up on stage performing then even getting their presents. Once that camera died, the other was brought out quickly for some shots.
The kids were allowed to go into the dining room while the adults got their presents.
There is such an abundance of girls in this family. Beth had them all working on decorations.

Below is Karin getting one of her many duct tape presents. She got a duct taped hat, coat, purse, and many other duct taped items along with rolls of duct tape.





Above mom is checking out the beautiful blanket John & Beth gave mom. The blanket has pictures of all the family on it. Below is mom opening up the gifts her loving family gave her.

Mom will be 80 years old March 30th and we thought these gifts would be perfect for her. She received 3 leaf rakes, one garden rake, a shovel and weed whacker.

I think mom is ready to go into the landscaping business. We needed something to wear out her unending energy.
After the gifts were all distributed the older kids went downstairs to play volleyball. The adults started the clean-up. Mom, Nancy, Mark and I were some of the first to leave. We were exhausted and as soon as we got home went straight to bed.
And now for a very boring but I think adorable video of Baby Braelyn Bravely crawling between the jaws of 2 giant dogs:

Trainers

All 3 of the HorseMeister trainers were here yesterday at the same time. Left to right is Karin, Jenis, Zalena, Rhoda, Ylse, Eliza and Steven. I was blessed enough to spend some time watching and listening. It is really amazing to see and hear these three people discussing their reasons for what they are doing with each horse. Eliza was so good and relaxed after being worked 3 days in a row, she stood quietly for the picture below:

Steven's dog Kylee loves to be part of the excitement and was more than willing to jump up onto the mare when asked. Karin reported that Eliza was almost lazy today, quietly doing everything asked. Even Zalena allowed Kylee to jump up on her.

Zalena is learning to bow when asked with no anxiety. Rhoda is quite the trainer, she decided to teach Darcy the Spanish Walk. How do you think she did on her first try?

Times

Yesterday Darcy woke me at 4:38am, but I thought the clock read 6:38am. After stumbling to the door to let her out, making coffee and sitting down to the computer I see the real time is early but it didn't feel early. Today Darcy wakes me, it feels like 4:30am, I can't see the alarm clock, Mark's pillow is up against it, so after letting both dogs out I'm shocked to find it 6:30am.
Today is the big Meister Christmas at the Old School Center. Sam's Club must be visited early to buy Christmas wrapping paper and order and pay for the lettuce and pizza for a hundred. We are having the easiest dinner yet. Rachel suggested ordering pizza and the rest of us working moms jumped at the idea. The rest of the family were emailed about bringing salad toppings for a big salad bar, appetizers and goodies for dessert.
The big gifts and little gifts sitting the office all need to be wrapped.
The office is no longer decorated for Christmas, hours were spent making sure every little Christmas twinkling light was put up exactly correct, then Karin came in and made fun of the decorating efforts around here. She said, and I quote, "better not let Jacquie see this!" Well with the dogs hitting them and Braelyn pulling them down, it was just easier to take the strand down. Now we are all ready for AFTER CHRISTMAS! That was saddest effort ever for decorations, perhaps next year when we are in the house we will go all out and put up more than just one strand of lights. The neighborhood association out here goes all out with decorating the outsides AND insides of their houses. No one told us when we moved out here about this!

Training

Braelyn was over today and when Steven showed up to start the trick training with the boys, she was bundled up and taken right into the barn. Braelyn enjoys watching the horses perform. Below Steven is asking Valiant to bow.

Once Valiant is done he is let loose in the arena while Steven works Evan.

Steven brought Evan up to show what he is working on with him. Here he is asking him to bow, he is not using the whip, just holding it and asking with his voice.

Notice how Evan's attention is focused on Steven. He is waiting for the next cue.

Steven asks him to sit up but not stand.

The next is really hard for Evan but he is learning to do it. Steven asks him to go back down. All of this training Steven is just using his voice.


REMARKABLE!
Those 2 stallions were put away just as Karin arrived. She got Eliza out for her undersaddle training. Eliza is very barn sour and Karin wanted another horse in the arena while she was being worked so Steven got Zalena out.

Karin found Eliza was willing to work as long as Zalena was in the arena. She asked Steven to take her out and sure enough Eliza got nervous but today was controllable and not just controllable by the time Karin was done Eliza was actually relaxed.
Zalena is such a nice mare but sometimes she won't stand quietly when a rider just wants to stand. Steven had her standing nicely.

The last 2 horses worked today were Jenis and Ylse. Ylse decided not to be caught today so Steven rode Jenis into the paddock, corralled her, and led her out for Karin.

Once the training was done Karin and Steven came in to see the new black bridles and saddle pads that came in last night. The driving rein also came in and wasn't what we expected or needed so that will be sent back. We decided to head to TSC and see if we can MAKE the driving rein we need tomorrow. We have the clips, just need the nylon.
After dinner it was time to lay by the fire and finish the started book, Dawn's Light by Terri Blackstock. I'm not going to recommend it for people that want happy endings. My eyes are swollen and red now that the book is finished.

FOR SALE Breyer

The mare below rides and drives and is bred to RAVEN. She is confirmed in foal and due August 7th, 2012. Kesha is the owner of Breyer and now finds she needs to sell her. We had Breyer here at the Horsemeister farm for 30 days and found her to be absolutely delightful. She had the best of manners, came to the gate for attention, led well and tied well. She stood very well her cover by Raven and then later for her ultrasound by Dr. Hoerr. Kesha has her priced at $5500.00 and this includes her very valuable foal by RAVEN. This is what Kesha writes about her:
Breyer's Date of Birth is April 12, 2005 she is current on her shots including a west Nile. Ive got all her Paper work from where she has Received Vaccines an she was also wormed before she was bred. I also have a Neg coggins on her.
Breyer is a Bay Clyde/Hackney Cross.. She is aprox 15hnds she is Located in Weirton, Wv 26062
my number is 740-424-5930 if you would like more info on her.
She Rides with a Snaffle bit or sometimes even a Tom Thumb.
Rides western Girth 34inch an also English 54inch :)
When she drives just to help with understanding this Loving mare, You just need to give a slight tap on her Bum or a kiss, to make a turn to the right just say "Right come gee" to turn left say "Come ha" using words like walk on then a kiss to her saying trot on.

Please contact Kesha for all of Breyer's information: Kesha's email: farmencrazy792@yahoo.com

Lunch for a Bunch

Rhoda and I had a nice lunch together on her lunch hour. We met at noon and she was back by 1:00pm. The library was the next stop where 7 books were checked out. Two by Terri Blackstock, 2 by Ted Dekker and the others by authors that look interesting. Once back Steven was there and more than willing to start moving round bales. We moved Airiah and Izadora into the first paddock with the deluxe shelter. The bale we moved in there was one of our best. The other paddocks we moved bales in were the middle paddock, the boys paddock and Raven's. Karin showed up to work Eliza so Steven pulled Jenis out at the same time. He worked on right lead canter while Eliza was just worked. She was anxious when Karin first started her but today Karin used a saddle and by the time she was satisfied Eliza was relaxed and doing well.
Eliza is such a beautiful mare but she won't be going to Springfield in March if she doesn't learn to ride quietly.
As long as Steven and Karin were still here I asked them to let Bow out for some updated pictures.



She showed off but it is almost too dark for the camera and it wasn't focusing as well as bright daylight. It is just such a dark dreary day.
We are all going to crowd into Joan & Tim's van for church tonight. That is 8 passenger and we have lots of people going from this area.

Berlica Rose

Meet Berlica Rose:



Berlica Rose is the little Haitian baby girl Joan and Tim would like to adopt. Please join us in praying this adoption will be allowed to go through. Rose was abandoned by her older mother at a hospital as she was born too little to nurse. Joan and Tim were contacted and are working at adopting her. If this goes through she would be a grandchild not a great grandchild. There goes Joan messing up the generations again.
It was sprinkling on our walk this morning. We stopped at the cabin to help Mike and Diane move in the futon Diane purchased last night.


Then continued our walk until we reached Spark & Rhonda house. At that point we decided to quit and head to Diane's for breakfast. The rain was falling harder and steady and we were getting drenched. This was a very productive breakfast, talking over our Meister family Christmas plans. None of us were in a hurry but finally all good things must come to an end and off we went to our own humble abodes.
Today 5 bales will need to be moved in. Izadora & Airiah's bale is pretty much gone, they are cleaning up the scraps as I type. We will move 2 in the middle paddock, Raven will get one and the boys will get the last. Sure wish the Yanmar was back, both Raven's and Airiah's shelters should be cleaned out first but we will make do with the skid steer.
The apartment needs a good floor scrubbing, with all the rain these last 2 days the dogs are leaving muddy footprints all over. Braelyn is coming tomorrow and this place MUST be cleaned up first. One cannot have a crawling baby over in this kind of condition. At least there is a reason for the mess, everybody always is quick to remind me, What do you expect, you live in a barn.

Anni's Accident Pictures

Eva Jean is holding up one of the T-shirts she gave me for Christmas in the picture below.

That shirt was worn the rest of the day. When Mark saw it, he exclaimed, "that's the shirt I should have given you!"
I'll wear the other one on the cruise, it just seems to fit, eat, pray, ride.

We had a great day at work today, finishing in good time, then enjoying our lunch at Denny's with Dan, Susan, Spark, & Phil. Mark didn't come, another company invited him to their Christmas lunch. On the way home from work I took a short detour and stopped in at Fede's shop to see the damage to their van from Anni's accident this morning.


Fede has an amazing man cave (work shop) its big, roomy and has just about any tool ever made or needed. Fede puts it all to great use, helping those in need, and repairing just about anything that needs fixing.

His business is called The Hungarian Handyman and handy he is. Fede is a perfectionist, he wasn't home when I stopped in but I've seen some of his artistic work and its gorgeous! Someday I'll make an appointment with this very busy man to get pictures of his more unusual creations. Besides his ability to fix just about anything he is a true artist and likes creating useful works of art. As the rain continued to fall all day, Steven had to work horses in the indoor today. When I pulled up at the farm he had 3 mares inside. He had already worked Ylse and Zalena and was on Jenis.


He was working on the walk to canter transition with her getting it consistently. Once those three were put away both boys also got worked.
Mark had a late no heat estimate after work which meant I didn't need to cook dinner. A nice fire was started in the wood burner and the evening was spent reading Signs of Life by David Jeremiah. I'm enjoying the book.

Breakfast at Mom's

The phone started ringing at 6:30am however our electricity went out during the night and our clock was reading 3:00am. Mom was letting us know breakfast would be at her house. Thank goodness she called we would have been late. Even before she says hello she starts her message by saying "breakfast at my house." The first words out of my mouth was, "is it raining?" We had no idea, it just seemed so early and so dark. So EVERYONE breakfast will be served at 7:30am today at mom's house.
Today is the Meister Christmas party and all the food and goodies we purchased yesterday need to be loaded into the car.
Jessica called her mom during our breakfast to report Anni was late and they heard a car crash. Sure enough Anni had an accident but they are ALL FINE. Fedi was with them by the time Jessica arrived. Thank goodness for seat belts.

Victorious!

Jakob's owner loaded him up around 6:00am this morning for their long 8 hour trip to home. We were impressed with how he loaded. He was led up to the trailer, the leadrope looped over his neck and he walked right in a 2 horse straight load, no one leading him and no other horse on the other side. What a great colt!

The winners of the tournament of the Elmwood Volley Ball league are pictured below.
Team Meister is now the GRAND CHAMPION of the league for the first time. The picture below was taken for the Elmwood news, sure hope they send in one a bit more in focus than this one.

Left to right: Tara, Karin, Rachel, Kari, Amy, & Rhoda. That is 2 aunts and 2 sets of sisters along with 4 cousins. Now how does that add up? Rachel and Karin are sisters and aunts to Kari, Rhoda, Tara and Amy. Kari and Tara are sisters. Rhoda, Amy, Tara and Kari are all first cousins.
The ended up playing 3 different teams, the games were best out of 3. The first team played Team Meister won the first 2, the second team they played again they won the first 2. The last team they played they lost the first game, then won the last 2. Congratulations girls well done. Just for the readers benifit, these girls have never played on a highschool or college team and yet they were playing against girls that played both high school and college. They either are lucky or talented, we will go with talented.
Braelyn came over this morning, as the apartment was cool a fire was started, then a chair needs to be put in front of the wood burner so she can't burn herself.

Braelyn enjoys pulling herself up on the sideways chair.
Steven arrived and pulled out Zalena for some work. Zalena was a little nervous on Saturday when the other horses were not in sight. He felt it would be good for her to work in the outdoor arena away from the other horses. She did very well.

He also worked Jenis, Ylse, Evan and Valiant.
Once Anna arrived to pick up Braelyn, I headed in to Meisters to pick up Mark for the Meister Christmas party shopping. We went to Sams and picked up $137.00 worth of goodies for the party tomorrow.

Sunday Sunday

Oh how I love Sunday, our day of worship, our day of rest, our day of sweet fellowship and our day of FREE LUNCH! Rachel's lunch was probably close to one of the best. Of course when one supplies home made Christmas cookies, buckeyes, along with Krispy Kreme donuts what could be better.
Willis had the morning service. He brought up that Jesus came to not just be our savior but our Ruler. We in America just don't quite get it, you know the part about bowing down to the king. Well if our Ruler is the Lord what ever HE asks, shouldn't we be willing to do? Afternoon service Craig was our speaker opening up to Proverbs 31. Of course all of us women cringe, how can we ever stack up to 'that women'? As Craig was reading, I'm listing the attributes of 'that women' thinking how many of those listed can I check off, not finding many when Craig says, "these should not be considered a list one can check off." Thank GOODNESS!
Peoria had ANOTHER engagement announcement. This time Geoff and Angie Ginzel announced the engagement of their daughter Samantha to Seth Keiser a brother from Princeville. What an exciting time for Peoria, 3 weddings coming up and all 3 will be held in Peoria. We are so happy for Samantha and Seth.
After church mom and I took Nancy out to Ruby Tuesdays. On Eva Jean's recommendation we both ordered the ribs, mom shared her's with Nancy and I took half of mine home for Mark. They really were delicious.
Jakob's owners arrived as we were heading to Morton to pick Nancy up. They are spending the night in the cabin and will leave for their long trip home early tomorrow morning.

Baby Updates

The first picture sent today was Charlie, AKA Sweet Baby and this is what his proud owner writes: "3 Weeks ago at his vet check he weighed 81 lbs, he's a huge mommas boy and loves snuggling on the couch with me"

I'm surprised there is room for her on the couch.
How SWEET, what a cute little lap puppy! OK Cute he is but NOT little. This boy is going to be HUGE.
The next picture was a bit dark but this filly is impressive. This is Lyra, out of 15.1 hand Xena and by Raven.

Lyra turned 3 years old in October and is already 16.2 hands tall! Remember her dam is only 15.1, isn't it amazing how Raven throws HIS looks and HIS height on these babies. Lyra's owner has placed her for sale for $6000.00, she is 75% Friesian. If interested let me know, I'll give you the contact information.
Rachel and Dave are serving lunch today at church, there really is a thing such as a free lunch, just show up in Peoria today between 11:00 and 12:00 and eat on Rachel. I know for a fact she made some delicious mouth watering foods.

The Demo

They started showing up early to get their horses ready. Eliza just wasn't co-operating and the executive decision was made to replace her with Ribbon. Diane and mom came walking over to see what was happening at the barn. They were put straight to work, both coming in to help cut the sparkly material for the capes. A picture of Diane's shoes was very necessary to take, she said she wanted to wear comfortable shoes today and didn't notice they didn't match until she was already over here.

The horses and riders headed to the outdoor arena. Steven wrote the script and had the riders practice a couple of times before he brought Evan in for the actual video.




Below is the finished product. Now their routine is not as long as the video, we had them run through it 2 times as there was so many different things to watch and the camera could only catch one at a time.

We were pretty thrilled with the results, to think yesterday Steven came up with the idea and today it was video taped. What an AMAZING amount of team work.