The LONG Trip

Yesterday was such a long day. Right after the walk I started moving round bales, 5 of them making sure each paddock had plenty before our long trip to Gulf Shores. That was finished around 10:00 am giving me enough time for breakfast before doing a deep clean on the entire house. Our Sceggel Christmas was scheduled for 5:30 pm at Rhoda and Lee's place in Bloomington but there was some problem at Meisters and we weren't able to take the van over to Phil and Anna's house to load Ben's aircondition and furnace until 5:15 pm. That meant by the time everything was loaded we didn't arrive for the Christmas party until 6:40 pm and scarfed down the Christmas dinner before handing out gifts. Pictures were taken. If you would like to see them click HERE.  We left from there for Gulf Shores at 9:00 pm driving all night and arriving at Ben and Taunya's condo at 11:00 am with 2 gas stops and breakfast at a Waffle House. It was raining the last 2 hours of driving and is still raining here.
Phil and Anna unloaded the big stuff, then Mark and I went to Walmart for groceries and just now at lunch. All the adults are tired and will be resting while the kids play with their Christmas presents. The pictures below are of our first day here. The equipment we hauled down for Ben and Taunya's condo was unloaded and in the picture Philip was removing the old air conditioner.

 Below is a picture of the beach off our balcony. The waves were huge. 

 Below is zoomed in to get a better picture of the waves.  It was raining and cold so we did not go outside to play. 

 Below the inside unit has been installed and Anna is vacuuming out any of the mess Phil made while installing the new furnace. 

We had an early night and I was glad to head to bed.

The Meister Christmas

Bill and Bethany arrived last night around 10:00 pm so Bethany joined us on the walk. Of course we had to stop in at Joan's to see...in her words..."the cutest kids EVER!" During the walk Joan was taught how to do the morning feed for the horses. She is going to be doing that once we leave for Gulf Shores tomorrow evening.  After the walk I started cooking and didn't stop until it was time to load the car with all the gifts and food for the Meister Christmas. Every one of the kids are excited about this party and it really is a wonderful birthday party for Jesus.  We have a big meal together, then games, then Spark tells the Christmas story then the singing of Christmas carols and finally Santa arrives and gives out the gifts. Below is a short video of one of the games.

The food was plentiful and delicious/

The games were so much fun.

The prizes were great. Nancy loved winning a dollar, she also LOVES her brothers. She was so pleased to sit with Spark and John.

Speaking of seating Rhonda set up 16 tables and all the chairs but there still wasn't enough room for everyone and the bleachers were used for dinner too. Below Spark is telling the Christmas story.

Santa arrives.

They would open their gift then take it over to thank Great grandma and so she could see what she bought them.

Nancy loves getting gifts.

If you would like to see the rest of the pictures of the party click HERE.
We really did have a wonderful time. A special thanks to Rhonda for organizing the Meister Christmas this year. 

2 Christmas Programs

This morning was Kensley's Christmas program for her preschool class. Anna picked me up around 8:20 am.

It is a big class and the kids were all very enthusiastic. Below is the video of their songs.

 Kensley was all dressed up and ready to sing.

After the program we were all invited to have punch and cookies in the lunchroom.

After the program Anna went to to work at the shop while Kensley went shopping with me. We first drove to Big R for grain. As we are leaving on Friday for Gulf Shores and Joan will be feeding the horses we sure don't want her to run out of grain.  Our next stop was Aldi to buy the vegetables and salad stuff for the Meister Christmas tomorrow. We came home, ate a quick lunch then drove to Sam's club for a few more groceries and a few more Christmas gifts. Braelyn and Taegan were picked up when they got home from school and brought here. All 3 girls helped organize the toys. This evening was the Christmas story program at the Fellowship Hall. That was very nice, the choir sang, Nick had the message, Heidi told a story, the Sunday School younger classes sang and we finished up with everyone holding a candle while singing Silent Night.

Of course refreshments of cake and hot chocolate were served as we were celebrating a birthday for the King.
It wouldn't be a horse blog if there were no horses posted. In the video below I was dropping off 4 of the Friesian mares at Middle Grove a few years ago (Nov 16th, 2012) and only after they were let go and I was video taping did I realize I had forgotten to remove their halters. After the video I had to hike back down the hill where they were grazing and collect the halters.

Organizing & Cleaning

Mark got up around 4:00 am and started the coffee and I must have been smelling coffee in my dreams as in my dreams an old man walked right into our house and asked, "where is the coffee?"  I had my first cup at 4:30 am then started getting the Berean meal together.  Mark was fed early then the horses fed before heading out for our walk. We had a good laugh on our walk today. Mom ran out of checks and Diane was wondering how many she should order. Someone made the crack "at mom's age she shouldn't buy green bananas" when mom said, "I only bought 2 bananas, I'm leaving Saturday. (she is going to Gulf Shores Not PLANNING ON DYING!)
We had a good productive day at the Berean office. If you would like to read about that click HERE.  There will be no Berean on Christmas Eve. We will try to fit in one more volunteer day before the end of the year so check back. Not sure when that can be arranged.
As soon as I got home the organizing and cleaning work was started.  I was SO surprised when I went up to work on the upstairs bedrooms. The grand children have a good time playing up there and I haven't cleaned for a long time. Sunday they had toys spread everywhere. Not only were the toys picked up and organized, the bathroom was clean, the closet was clean. The only thing that needed to be done in the toy bedroom was to get clean sheets on the bed and add a blanket. The other bedroom is kept locked as the Christmas presents were in there. That room needed a deep cleaning and the sheets changed. The upstairs is now ready for company.
Emma does not go upstairs but she was sure curious about what I was doing up there and each trip down with garbage she wanted to check it out.  Emma is our second English Mastiff. We really enjoy this breed of dog and we would never have known anything about them if Rhoda hadn't purchased Darcy as a 6 week old puppy. Now Darcy truly was a special dog. She loved EVERYONE and was actually pretty smart for this breed. In the video below Rhoda is showing just one of her tricks, one she learned very quickly. The Spanish Walk:

Emma turned 10 years old Sept 26th, and the lifespan on these big dogs is only 8-10 years. I'm not sure we want another big dog when we have to say good by to Emma. We had both Emma and Darcy at the Baer house where there was plenty of room and we didn't really notice how big they were.

Don't Eat Yellow Snow

On our walk this morning we were surprised by Sarah, Faith, Mackenson and Berlica shoveling mom's driveway.

Mark had actually started the shoveling getting the first 6 feet done before they arrived but with this group they made short work of it. The snow was light and fluffy this morning but by tonight it seems there is ice underneath.  This evening, after dark, the mail truck finally came to our boxes and slid off into a ditch. Mark walked down to see if he could help but the tow truck was already on the way. At least we got our mail.  As soon as the walk was over I moved a bale in for the weanlings and while working out there dropped my phone into some of the deeper snow. This wasn't discovered until quite a bit later when I needed to call Mark. I went looking for the phone but with all this snow wasn't able to find it until I borrowed Mark's phone and started calling. It had slipped under the snow and was completely buried. Sure glad it wasn't on vibrate.
Our airbnb guests must have left last night, probably to make sure they could make it home, so Anna came over early to clean the apartment.  I left for Diane's office to balance the Horsemeister checkbook for the month. I don't think any mistakes were made this month. When I got back Anna pulled up with Kensley and Pax. Ben wants an outlet put in the closet of the apartment. He is going to put in a locking cabinet in that closet for computer stuff and Anna installed that outlet while I watched Kensley and Pax. 

Above Kensly had dressed up Emma and below she is practicing her vaulting moves. 

 You know the saying "Don't eat yellow snow?" Well Emma takes that seriously. She was eating the snow off of the chairs and taught Pax how to eat snow too.

 Of course Emma is the main reason there IS yellow snow around here. Kensley and I were going through some old videos and found the video of Indy as a baby. Indy was born the 4th of July 2010:
Now at the end of this video it mentions that Indy is for sale and we had actually sold her but when the buyer backed out we were SO happy. She is not for sale so just ignore that part of the video. Indy loved swimming then and still loves swimming. Indy is the first mare due in 2020. She is due March 18th. Sure praying for an easy delivery and a healthy foal.

Snow

We had an easy Sunday morning with plenty of time to get everything done before it was time to pick up mom for church. This morning Rick Kaisner was visiting from Chicago and he had the morning service, speaking first on Joshua and Caleb then on the crucifixion. This afternoon was the Sunday School Christmas program. It is such a blessing to watch our nieces, nephews and grand children say their pieces and sing Christmas songs. As usual the Bible class and young group sang beautifully.
Israel and Elisabet came home with us after church. They were put to work coloring and using glitter glue.

 Mom was called to see if she and Karin wanted to come for dinner. Mom said she would but Karin was out at the barn.  Israel and I went right up to the barn. Magda was also here. They had already worked with Valiant and had just put him away and were starting with Evan. Below Magda is asking him to sit.

 Karin always rides first just to make sure Evan is listening and will behave.

 Israel was next on Evan. Of course I had to take lots of pictures for him mom.

 We left the barn as Magda was cantering Evan.

 Phil and Anna had arrived with their 3 girls along with Lee and Rhoda. The golf cart was used to pick up mom. We ALL enjoyed Sunday dinner of haystacks.

 By the time dinner was over the snow had started coming down. We took mom home on the golf cart with a blizzard blowing into our faces. The grandchildren all came with us and held the lantern so we could see the driveway.

 Iris was pretending to eat something off that empty plate.

 Braelyn is all ready to head out in the snow.

 After playing outside we all needed hot chocolate to warm up our insides. Mark had a fire going to warm up out outsides.

Iris was playing peek a boo with grandma.

At 6:30 pm we happened to look outside was were shocked at how much snow had fallen.  Israel and Elisabet were loaded into the car and we started our long drive home to Chillicothe on roads that were not at all cleared. I was so thankful for these wonderful snow tires on the Prius. The trip there took an hour. David and Stephanie made it home from Madrigals around 8:15 pm and I finally made it home here at 9:30 pm. The cars were going 30 mph on the interstate and only 25 mph on route 116.  The snow is still coming down and we should end up around 4 inches by morning. 

Both Boys

We had a cold morning and a cold day. Hard to get use to after that beautiful warm 56 degree sunny weather in Branson.  Karin, Kayla and Magda arrived just as the horses were getting fed.  They pulled Valiant out first. The pictures below were taken just as Kayla was finishing up riding him.  He gets a treat when he is finished IF he poses on the pedestal. He can hardly wait to do that.

 Kayla rode him next.

I ran over to mom's to get some gas for the 4 wheeler so didn't get any other pictures.  They put Valiant away and worked with Evan. Karin said both boys did very well.  

About then I left for Aldi. We needed lots of groceries, almost $125.00 worth of groceries. Do you know how hard it is to spend that kind of money in this store. I filled the trunk and all of it was food. As soon as I got home the 12 pounds of hamburger was browned and drained. A little more than half was made into taco meat and the rest froze to use later. We will serve haystacks on Sunday and plan on using the frozen ground beef on Tuesday to make haystacks again for the Berean meal. 
Mark worked on organizing the back garage while I did dishes and laundry.
This evening Ruth, Fede, Joan, Mark and I all ended up at mom's house to play games.  We sure have a good time together.

7 Hours

Other than our one stop for gas and breakfast we traveled the 431 miles in exactly 7 hours leaving this morning at 5:00 am and arriving home at noon. It was an easy trip. December is a beautiful time to go to Branson. Why Silver Dollar City alone has over 6.5 million lights. That town really decorates!
Right after I got the suitcase in the house and the laundry started the golf cart was taken up to the barn, the horses grained, Hadassah moved and a bale moved into her paddock.  She was moved back with the new bale.  We bought Hadassah when she was 2 years old because she is a Raven daughter and we were blown away by her huge movement.

We bred her to Evan and were thrilled when her first foal, a colt, was born pitch black and he stayed black.  We named him Solomon. The video below was taken just before he left for his new home at 5 months of age.

Her next foal by Evan was a filly and was another beauty. This filly was also born black and stayed black.

In 2017 Hadassah gave birth to another gorgeous filly we named Esther.

Get it, her mama's name is Hadassah so Esther was the perfect name for her. Her last foal was also a filly born in 2018.

Hadassah is due June 10th, 2020. Hadassah is sold but is still at our place. We are not sure when she will be traveling to her new home in Arkansas but if she leaves before the foal is born hopefully we will get pictures. 

We have Airbnb guests here for the next 3 nights, the first of them arrived as I was moving the bale in. She asked if we had a veterinarian that would see her dog. She had come all the way from Texas and her Goldendoodle, who was coming with her, had started scratching her ear after she left for the trip.  Hoerr Vet clinic was booked up but Malabar Vet clinic was willing to see and treat her dog.  

We had someone ask about riding bitless and I remembered Rhoda training Ella pony. Ella was given to us because she had a habit of bucking her riders off. We found Ella delightful and she ended up on our starting line-up for beginners on the trails. The video below was after Rhoda had been working with Ella and during the video she decides to take off her bridle.