More of Darling Darla

I was first on the list for Dr. Hoerr but wasn't sure exactly when he would be coming. Chris was sent a text that I needed a warning and was surprised when the answer came back Dr. Hoerr is ON the WAY! 
Oksana and Darla were put in the stall and Darla haltered. They were left inside while Jenis, Zalena, Galena, Indy, Rosalie, Anna and Ayanna were brought into the indoor arena and tied up. I started down the row grooming the mud off as fast as I could go but only got 8 done before Dr. Hoerr arrived. Last year he took pictures of each mare for the Coggins papers but this year he only needed to take pictures of those that hadn't been done last year which just happened to be the two I didn't get groomed, Darla and Evan. Oh well I guess mud shouldn't matter too much. Darla surprised me with how well behaved she was for the blood draw. She wasn't even tied, she stood still and didn't even move until Dr. Hoerr was finished. No pictures of any of that, there was no one here to help and my hands were needed to hold lead ropes. As soon as Dr. Hoerr left Darla was tied up and groomed.

We needed new pictures for the website and Darla needed a refresher.  Oksana was taken back out to the paddock to get Darla used to staying in the stall by herself. At the Horse Fair she will need to be left in the stall while Oksana performs. She did reasonably well with that. She was then taken out to the round pen for pictures. She is SO fuzzy.

 She had a ball running around.

 Darla is the baroque style of Friesian, thicker, heavier and lots of hair. 

 Her mane is so thick it was sticking pretty much straight up. 

Darla inherited her grandma Eliza and her sire Evan's thick long mane, tail and just check out the FEATHER on this 4 month old filly! She has more feather than some full grown Friesians.

Darla should end up taller than 16 hands and will truly be the fantasy Friesian everyone desires. She is for sale for $8000.00 and will easily pay for herself with her very first foal. As soon as she was put away I headed over to Phil and Anna's to pick up Taegan and Kensley. They were given scissors and paper and made all kinds of neat things from hearts to boxes, crowns and buildings. 

 I was careful to watch Kensley as Taegan told me the last time Kensley played with scissors she cut her hair. Today she only cut the paper. When Anna sent a text she was on her way to pick up the girls we got busy and threw all the scraps of paper into the fireplace then lit it on fire.This was a great way to get the floor cleaned up.  Below they are waiting to see flames. 

 When it burst into flames we all cheered. 

Mark got home just before 6:00 pm, we left right away for RiverPlex. We had an interesting evening there. I recognized a lady but couldn't place her, I finally asked who she was and it turned out she was Rhoda's first grade teacher from Pleasant Hill, Mrs Pierce. When she retired from Pleasant Hill, she and her husband sold their house and bought a sail boat then for the next 10 years sailed all around Florida and the Bahamas. She had lots of stories to tell about their years at sea. 

Valiant

Today was a day for paper work. The 2003 truck's license sticker needed to be sent in but before that can be done I had to find out who we have it insured with. That took a trip up to the barn to find the proof of insurance and thankfully it was in the glove box. The next bunch of paper work was the release forms for the Illinois Horse Fair. Everyone coming down from here that will be handling a horse AND those performing in the Horsemeister play must sign the form. Karin was able to get most of them but I needed to drive in to Bridlewood to give Amy Koch a couple for her daughter Sarah and Sarah's daughter Olivia who will both be helping us with the play.

From Bridlewood I started driving to Big R to pick up the shots the horses need and passed Mark just leaving Meisters.  Big R only had 5 of the 5-way so I had to also buy the higher priced Prestige brand which also has the West Nile vaccine added. The great thing about going today was if I bought a Big R bucket for just $1.00 everything was 15% off. That saved Horsemeister a ton of money. Those shots are expensive. 

At 3:45 pm I was sitting in Phil and Anna's drive way waiting for Braelyn's bus and as soon as that came and Braelyn was in the car we drove over to Dennis and Gertie's house to pick up Taegan and Kensley. On the way back to Phil and Anna's I passed Mark again as he was heading home.  

It was such a beautiful day with a high of 52 degrees and sunshine. The horses were all laying down soaking up the sun but that means every horse will need grooming before Dr. Hoerr arrives tomorrow morning to draw blood for the Coggins test. 

I have been posting so many pictures of Evan lately that Valiant was being neglected. As wonderful as Evan is, Valiant is our go to stallion. He is tall, majestic, sweet and throws all of that in each of his foals. He is always ready to do his job. We have been brought mares that were not able to get in foal by other stallions and Valiant always seems to get that job done. He has amazing conformation, a beautiful jet black shiny coat, his neck is long and set on perfectly and he has great movement. Valiant is the complete package! 

But he is also related to a lot of our mares. 

We wanted a colt out of Jenis by Raven to keep but her first 2 foals by him were both fillies. When Valiant was born we were rejoicing big time. Check out his movement at just 21 days old.

Below he was taken to his very first show August 30th, 2009, the Northern IL Horse Fest. He is 7 weeks old. He was the hit of this show. The organizer of the show asked if they could borrow Valiant to show colt handling. He had a ball galloping around showing off for the folks watching.

Valiant has sired lots of foals, I use to keep count of the foals born by our stallions but gave up when we passed the 300.
We actually bought Evan right after weaning Valiant. We knew we were keeping some Raven daughters so needed a stallion not related to Valiant plus we wanted Valiant to have a companion growing up. Evan and Valiant were the best of friends for 3 years.

We took both boys to the IL Horse Fair, Steven had them trained to line drive that year.  

They were 20 months old in this video taken March 2011

In the picture below they are ready to perform at the 2012 Illinois Horse fair. 

And in the picture below they are getting ready to perform in the 2013 IL Horse Fair. 

2013 was the last year the boys were friends. In 2014 the hormones kicked in and these two stallions who had been best friends became mortal enemies.

Their behavior which use to be in play became violent. 

 We had to separate them into different paddocks and soon realized we could not even use the same breeding stand for them. Valiant has his own breeding stand and Evan has his. Valiant got to go to the 2015 Illinois Horse Fair where Emily showed him and Mitchel enjoyed riding him.

Next year if the state of Illinois ever gets the coliseum repaired we will consider bringing Valiant to the 2019 Illinois Horse Fair.

Darling Darla

We were having such a good discussion on our walk today that I was almost late for work. I actually made it to the Berean office with 1 minute to spare. Cindy was already waiting there for someone to unlock the door. Between the 2 of us we had the Bible requests entered and printed out before 10:00 am. Robin arrived, printed off the postage and got the Bibles labeled as soon as the labels were printed. We three worked like a well oiled machine.
I was glad to have the afternoon free as there was a lot of work waiting at the farm. The first job was to get ready to move 3 round bales in. Evan's paddock, Ayanna's paddock and the middle paddock all needed a new bale. I got Ayanna's paddock done, the other 2 ready to move in then waited for Karin to arrive to open gates. The arena also needed watering and that took quite a bit longer than expected as part of the hose was frozen. We try to drain it and thought it was drained well but somehow if we don't bring the hose in the house no water gets through. I had just gotten it going and started watering when Karin arrived. We quickly moved the middle paddock bale in then when she took Evan to the indoor the last bale was moved. Always good to get that job done. Karin had a very good session with Evan today.

 Below she asked him to bow and he went right down. 

 Then made himself comfortable on the ground. 

 He held the sit until Karin asked him to stand.

 She was praising him and scratching his neck when he reached over and started grooming her back giving her a back massage with his lips. 

 The next trick she asked him to perform is to kneel on both knees. He also held this until she asked him to lay down.

 She gave him lots of scratches and praises for minding so quickly. 

 Karin sat on his back and Evan didn't move until Karin asked him to sit up. He is such a good stallion and if he performs as well at the IL Horse Fair as he does here, the audience will enjoy watching him. 

 Evan was put away and Ayanna, Indy and Oksana were brought out.  Indy was the first mare worked. 

 Next Karin worked with Oksana, then when I took Indy out I brought Darla in to see if she would follow her mom as Karin was working Oksana. She did very well. 

 Ayanna was tied at this point and was watching Darling Darla and Oksana cantering around the arena. 

Ayanna was the last mare worked but while Karin was working her I was busy finishing watering the arena. I was so thrilled to see Ayanna recovered from being cast yesterday with no issues at all. 

Once the horses were put away I ran down to make supper. Mark brought home fresh asperagus, sweet potatoes and thin sliced smoked turkey. Supper was delicious. Mark drove mom and me to church. Tim Funk had the message. Another good day!

Ayanna Scare

We had another good but cold walk. I had to quit after the first round in able to get the Berean mail at TEMCO and get to the Berean office before 9:00 am. We had a good crew of volunteers and was able to get everything done by 11:30 am including unloading a pallet load of Bibles.
As I drove up the hill to my driveway I could see a horse in trouble. At first I thought it was Rosalie but it was her full sister Ayanna who was cast against the back fence of the paddock. Rosalie was standing next to her not willing to leave her sister. I grabbed a lead rope and ran down to try to move her but even with my new aortic artery pumping a hard I just didn't have the strength to even budge this 2000 pound mare. I called Joan to ask her to come help as I was running to the barn to grab a hammer. I was going to try to pound the railing off the post with that. Joan arrived just as I got back with the hammer, at first we both tried to pull Ayanna away from the fenceline but even with two of us pulling we couldn't budge Ayanna. Joan kept hold of the lead rope while I got on the other side of the fence. I was able to move her leg under then gave the railing a good whack with the hammer at the same time Joan pulled. That worked, with Joan's help Ayanna was able to get both legs under and heave herself away from the fence. She stood up and took a few tentative steps, obviously stiff. I'm not sure how long she was down but within a few minutes she seemed to be walking ok.
Only then did I drive back down to the house to unload the car and change out of my skirt.
Karin arrived after work to train. It was only 31 degrees outside with a stiff damp wind so all the training was done inside which doesn't make for good pictures. She took Evan out first to work on his routine for the horse fair. Studley got to come today and had a ball believing he was helping.

 Evan was glad to lay down in the nice soft arena to roll when Karin asked for that. 

At the end of the training he was following her around like a puppy.

Once Evan was put away we brought in Rosalie, Jenis, Zalena and Galena.

After the initial round pen reasoning with all 4 mares Karin starts the individual training. She spent some time with each mare just petting and grooming a bit.  Rosalie picked out a nice soft spot to roll.

Karin rode her first as she is going to be one of the canter horses in the play. Rosalie has a very balanced canter. 

 The next mare worked with was Galena. 

 Nolan will be riding Galena for the fair. Last year was Galena's first year showing and she wasn't as well behaved as we had hoped but this year she is much quieter and much farther along in her training. Nolan shouldn't have any trouble at all. 

 Zalena was next. Caleb will be riding her and she is another canter horse but always has a lot of energy. Karin's job with her is to get her to relax. 

 Jenis was the last horse worked today. I think Karin likes to save the best for last. This mare is so smart and so talented. 

 She finished her training with a rear.

The horses were taken back out and the truck put back inside.

I barely had enough time to get back to the house and start supper before Mark arrived home. He stopped at the Kroger at Madison Park to look for bargains. That Kroger is closing in a couple weeks. It is sad to see that store close.

A nice update came in from Diane M, she brought her mare here to be bred to Evan 4 years ago and wanted to update us on the filly her mare had 3 years ago. She named her Catalina, started her under saddle this past summer. 

 She just came back from her very first show with a FIRST place ribbon.

Diane writes: Catalina went to her first horse show after sitting in the field for few months. She had 3 months under saddle and then placed back in the field to grow. She did great, first place in her first class. She is such a smart and athlete mare. Goal this summer is to start dressage and jumping. Such a smart girl. She even did wt class bareback. She reminds me of Evan, she definitely got his hair and such a good brain on her. He really does throw a great mind and lots hair, I was very pleased with her. I hate to say but she is more athletic then my full blooded Friesian and would probably go further in dressage. I have seen her do three flying lead changes under saddle without being asked and she did it with no effort.

What a wonderful update. It thrills me to hear updates like this. We knew Evan was special when we picked him out as a weanling and to see that he throws beautiful, athletic, HAIRY babies that grow up to be sweet, well behaved GORGEOUS show horses is just icing on the cake. 

We have lots of Raven daughters we kept which was the reason we bought Evan in the first place. We only have 1 of Evan's grown up daughters which we sold as a weanling and just got her back this fall. Check out the hair on Tatiana (Evan's daughter out of Marika) as a 3 year old.

We bred her to Valiant and she is expecting a foal Sept 11th, 2018. This really really makes me want to keep Indy's filly Envy who is by Evan.  She too will grow up with the mega hair, has that amazing movement plus she will be very tall. 

I keep telling myself, "don't get attached to the inventory" but it is really hard when the foal you see outside your window is EXACTLY what we always wanted.