Hanna City Carnival

This morning after the walk, Jenis was covered by Evan and Cor by Valiant. The rest of the time was spent getting the fancies ready for the parade tomorrow, accumulating all the cotton candy supplies in the truck, driving in to Peoria to get my equine liability act sign, then setting up in Rachel's rental house yard all in the bright sunshine and heat of 95 degrees. Steven called as the last table was being set up and offered to take the boys swimming. That sounded wonderful, we loaded up on the trusty golf cart, drove it right into the boys field, attached their leads and off we headed for Diane's pond. The video camera was taken along today and a video made of the boys goofing off in the water. The truck was hitched up to the trailer and left for Karin while I headed in to Hanna City to meet the Health Department inspector. I failed one of the requirements and had to call for back-up. Luckily Diane had the only thing missing a spigot and we were good to go.

So we are charging $2.00 for a cotton candy cone and made a total of $23.00 after working there from 5:00pm till dark. Tomorrow we will have to move our stand, hopefully inside the fence. We actually gave more away than we sold. Now the pony rides did great. They worked the same amount of time using Paris and Ella and earned $134.00.

Karin drove the truck and trailer home while I loaded up the cotton candy machine and supplies. We are TIRED and tomorrow we get to do it all over again. The Hanna City Parade starts at 10:00am and is always a fun one to watch, lots of give-a-ways. Then a vaulting demo on the baseball diamond at noon.

Absolute Power? Vote them OUT!!!

This is an update on the fire at the Hungarian Handy Man Shop. Below is the burned out building:

Just a few days after the disaster, the Peoria County Zoning board placed a notice in Fedi's yard stating if he didn't take down the building he would face $1000.00 a day fine. Fedi doesn't have that kind of money so he took the building down only to get a notice he didn't apply for and pay the $100.00 permit fee to demolish a building. He will be fined big bucks if he doesn't run right down to the Peoria County court house and pay that. Does that sound like our government may be just a tiny bit out of control? Nope it sounds like they are WAY OUT OF CONTROL... Whoever is on those boards need to be voted out NOW!!! Come on voters in Peoria get out there and vote these people out of government and out of our lives. Share this with your neighbor, share this with your friends, share this with the newspapers in the area, it could very well happen to you. I've been asked to tell a bit about Fedi's story although Fedi could do a way better job. He lived in Romania during Nicolae Ceausescu's reign. Fedi had such a desire for freedom he tried 3 times to escape. He was caught, beaten, thrown in prison, sentenced to hard labor and yet still he was determined to be free. Fedi made it out of the country by hanging from the bottom of a train. He gets to Free AMERICA and is honored to become an American citizen. He worked hard to be able to bring his mom, sister and brothers over after Ceausescu was executed. He went back to Romania as a missionary for a year bringing the gospel to the Gypsy's and Romanian people. He started his own business and hired 6 workers. Does this sound like someone Peoria County should be hassling? If interested in learning more of Fedi's life in Romania and his escape attempts and finally success please feel free to contact him.

Swimming

Mike helped this morning get Cor Arianna covered by Valiant, then Jenis covered by Evan. The weather was hot today we slipped back into summer after those nice cool days and hit 94 degrees by 4:00pm. Luckily Steven Marchal came over to help cool off the horses. First to take over to Mike and Diane's pond was Jenis, Eliza and the foals.

They all went in but the babies didn't want to stay in and Eliza (the good mom)was more concerned with both fillies than cooling off. Once they were put in the cabin field the 2 boys were brought over. Evan was so funny walking in and flopping down quickly.

And this is Valiant swimming, he was so brave today and went all the way in.

Of course they had to have a splashing contest to see who could make the highest splash drenching Steven in the process.

Once they were done they were turned loose in their pasture with the camera ready. Below is Evan all clean and shiny.

Valiant had a good time running also.

The rest of their pictures will be placed on their pages on the horsemeister website. After dinner Mark helped move a round bale over to the cabin and another for Ylse & Zalena's paddock. Sangria was hosed down to cool her off and then she and her colt were put in the last paddock for the night.

How do the Legs Work?

The story below is in the pictures. Sangria's boy thinks he is pretty hot stuff. He starts galloping around his mom...

and then these funny long legs get all tangled up:

Just in case it isn't clear enough below is a close up of his front legs.

Down he goes:

Then he gets up and snuggles up to his mom with his tail between his back legs all embarrassed.

Do I seem to have extra time on my hands, not true, just all of that happened right after they were put out this afternoon. Karin came before vaulting practice to help put them away. On another note, Sarah got in a bad accident and totaled her car. Her head hit the steering wheel hard. She has a bad headache but once the accident report was filled out and dad was informed enough to know what to do with the car she went back to class.

Good News & Bad News

So our good news is Lola and Mytross are confirmed in foal both to Valiant. The bad news is Jenis didn't settle on her foal heat (not that unusual) and is in season right now. After thinking long and hard we decided to go a different direction with her. She was covered by Evan this afternoon. Cor Arainna was covered by Valiant. Prissy didn't settle, we knew we didn't get her covered at the right time but were hopeful, nope it wasn't to be. Clair was the other mare that didn't settle. Those 2 will be left here to be watched while Mytross and Lola will be hauled back out to Middle Grove.

Sangria's Colt

Jewel was moved out of the pasture behind Raven's paddock and the pasture cleaned of manure to move Sangria and her colt into it. She was in that pasture before delivery so I was sure she would be happy there. I was wrong. She was going crazy trying to keep her colt close and away from the other paddocks, finally the gate was opened and she took him into the middle of the big field before stopping, turning and facing the other horses.

Both boys were staring intently at the new colt then started moving up and down the fence line. Below is first Valiant then Evan.

The decision was made to leave Sangria and her 24 hour old colt out for a few hours.

He was having fun but Sangria was a nervous wreck. Notice how she has to twirl around fast enough for her mane and tail to fly trying to keep up with him in the picture above. They were brought back in as the day started to heat up. These black coat babies can overheat very quickly. Dr. Hoerr is coming today and will give the colt his foal shot before sonagramming Jenis, Clair, Prissy, Lola and Mytross.

Hauling Home

After work Steven Marchal came over to help get more iodine on Sangria's colt. He also helped get Cor covered by Valiant. Valiant was so glad for the work. Evan is still waiting for Avalon to come in. We headed out to Middle Grove to pick up both paints, Clair and Mytross, their sonagrams are scheduled for tomorrow. Of course the camera was brought out even before the truck was stopped. The horses see or hear us coming and come. The rain last week turned all the brown fields green, so nice to see.

They are so nosy sticking their entire heads into any open window.

The only mare that didn't want to come home was Clair, she took a few minutes to be caught. Helen is doing very well out on so many acres. After a good scratching and petting she posed for pictures.

A few more were taken of her for her page on the horsemeister website. After the mares were loaded and the others physically moved away from the truck and trailer. I started driving the long road back, look in the rear view mirror and see Killian and Indy galloping behind as if to say "don't go, don't take them." They followed until I reached the bottom of the hill then galloped back up with the herd. Once back here Mark helped unload the horses and move in a round bale for them. Hopefully they can all go right back out, that's if they are all pregnant.

Hand Cuffed

Do I have a story to tell today about the picture above! I arrived at work early enough to haul the mail down to the office. All of a sudden sirens, loud and getting louder were screaming obviously heading this way. The office door swings open with a crash and is slammed shut. Eva Jean jumps inside the office yelling "quick hide me, hide me." Too late not 2 seconds later a policeman crashes into the office, and says, "up against the wall!" with his handcuffs ready.

As she is being patted down for weapons, Of course I'm almost screaming asking "what is the matter, what is going on?" Well the story goes Eva Jean was late for work, now she works for food and if she is more than a few minutes late she won't get to order dessert. She is heading down Kickapoo Creek Rd going 80 miles an hour, the first police car tries to pull her over but no Eva Jean can only think, "oh no I can't stop now, not only will I not get dessert but they may not even feed me lunch." The first police car calls for back up and by the time she arrived she was followed in by 6 count them 6 police cars and none of the police men were happy with her.

How is that for a tall tale? That story may not be true at all, I'm just saying if you know Eva Jean you may always wonder,... is it true? Thankfully they sentenced her to hard labor down at the Berean warehouse for the rest of the morning. We were able to finish a bit early so I could get home to check on Sangria and her brand new colt.

He was fine and the placenta was completely out. That was buried in the manure pile, even with the rain we received last week the ground is still to hard to dig.

Sangria's Boy

I overslept this morning only to go out to feed just after 7:00am to see a tall black baby boy circling a laying down Sangria. Why didn't we test her? Oh well all is is well. He had obviously nursed. Sangria hasn't delivered the placenta yet but I must head to work. I'll have to ask someone to check on her later, right now I'm covered in iodine and must change. Hey it isn't easy applying iodine to such a big strong fellow.

Jewel & Sangria

Braelyn was a busy girl today, keeping me hopping. Below she is ready to drive away while her dad is loading the tiller.

Once Braelyn was on her way home, we headed over to the far fence line, staked out about 200 feet, strung it with string, marked the spot for the holes, then headed to Rhonda's for dinner.

She was very kind and took pity on us workers serving us a meal fit for a king. Home grown green beans, home grown tomatoes, home grown melon a home made cucumber sauce and gyro meat, all so good Mark is starting to covet her cooking skills. On the way back Sangria and Jewel were feeling fine and showing off. The camera was taken out for updated shots of these very pregnant mares.

Mark headed out with the skid steer and drilled the marked holes for the posts while I fed. Now I have a confession to make. Mice, 7 of the cutest little field mice had fallen in one of the empty grain garbage cans. They were just too cute to kill. When I was young I would catch field mice and make pets out of them, how could these be killed in cold blood? Mark helped carry the garbage can down the drive and across the road then let them all go. Sorry neighbors, although it is far enough away with a hill to climb for the mice to make it all the way there. The apartment is now straightened out the coffee made for morning, the water jugs filled and we are settling down with good books.

Fedi's Shop

This picture is the after effects of the fire. Nothing inside could be salvaged. Well over $20,000.00 of tools destroyed. Sure makes us realize no one better build up treasures here on earth. This happened in a shockingly short amount of time! The Davidovics and their guests the Schwinds were sitting right outside the shop, they decided to go inside the house. Fedi pushed the automatic garage door button to shut the door and inside they all troop. Within 20 minutes the shop was in flames. They believe the automatic opener burst into flames. On another note, Peoria county zoning board is a bit out of control. Fedi lost his shop to fire and the next week there is a notice from the zoning board if the building is not taken down there will be a $1000.00 a day fine! Come on... the man just had his business burn down. What kind of government do we really want? Who put these people in power? Remember absolute power corrupts absolutely. This is just one more example. Below are a few funny pictures from yesterday afternoon.