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An untitled kind of day..
Nov. 13th, 2012 10:14 pm(Sometimes making up subject headers is hard..)
I worked in ICU on Sunday and Monday; Sunday was the Rememberance Day Stat holiday, so I made double time for the shift. Very nice indeed. On my coffee break I was watching the ceremonies at the Cenotaph in Pigeon Park, and found myself tearing up on a couple of occasions. The faces of the old soldiers, and the younger ones, so proud and serious at the same time, the somber notes of the trumpet playing the Last Post, all of it moving. I think what got me the most was the little boy who spent hours painting toy soldiers and mounting them on little stands so he could give them to the old Veterans as his way of thanking them for their service. I was kind of blown away by that. I watched but didn't see Jack, although Sue said today that he was shown on TV during the march. The rain held off, so that was good.
Today I was out at the farm. It's warm again, almost 10C; it is the kind of weather that makes it hard to know how to dress; one minute I'm chilly, the next I'm sweating..it's like menopause all over again! LOL
After we brought all the horses in and fed them, Sue and I spent some time trimming manes. The young horses are learning to stand quietly while Sue shortens their manes - my job is to hold them and keep them distracted with my "everything is fine" voice and my pocket full of alfalfa cubes. On the whole, I think the hay cubes were the stronger motivator. Sera was very good; she's two years old, and OMG, so tall. If she puts her head up, I can't reach her ears. We brought in her new winter blanket to introduce it to her, and she was just a star. Sue actually was able to get it on her after a very short time spent letting her smell it and feel it getting rubbed on her sides. Putting a blanket on a young horse isn't always easy, you have to be quiet and patient and prepared for a freakout. Our philosophy with our babies is to introduce things gradually at a young age, to watch the reaction, and know when to back off. Our horses are handled from the minute they are born, and it pays off. Vets and farriers love coming to our farm, because they know that our horses are well handled, and well behaved. Hearing some of the horror stories our farrier has about people who expect him to trim three year olds who've never been handled, just put out in a field....well, it's not our way.
We trimmed Rochelle's mane, and put her winter blanket on too. She's four, and it's time for her to start some more grownup lessons; I'm going to work with her over the winter on the lunge, so when the time comes, our trainer can just get on and ride.
Kyra is looking much better since we started giving her the hay cubes at night; along with her regular hay and grain, she gets a good scoop of alfalfa cubes soaked in hot water as a bedtime snack. She knows the sound of the lid coming off the bin, and just gets so excited she can hardly stand it. She's put on some weight, and her coat is shiny, and after we got her long straggly mane trimmed today, she looks 16 again. I did notice that she's going gray, like me..her roots are showing!
Midnight doesn't get his mane trimmed; he's a quarterhorse, and looks best with a long flowing mane; it's beautiful, when it's clean, all black and white. Today it was crusher dust gray..like the rest of him. I swear he spent the whole day rolling around in the dust! Took some elbow grease to get him clean, I can tell you.
It's so nice when we have time to spend doing this kind of thing with the horses; it takes me back to the days when we first started out. Sue and I did all the work, and then groomed every horse; sometimes it would be 7 p.m. and we'd still be out there. Of course at that time we didn't have as many horses, just Caddy, Jubilee, Nimbus (Jubi's first baby), Kandance and Kismet. It was fun! We've kind of gotten away from that feeling over the last few years because the work has become a lot harder, and we've had to struggle to keep things going. Now we're doing better, and there's some spare time to do the fun things. It feels wonderful. We are so proud of what we've accomplished; all of us, the whole team. It may take a village to raise a child, and likewise it takes a team to run the farm. We have plans. Lots of plans.
T'was a very good day.
I worked in ICU on Sunday and Monday; Sunday was the Rememberance Day Stat holiday, so I made double time for the shift. Very nice indeed. On my coffee break I was watching the ceremonies at the Cenotaph in Pigeon Park, and found myself tearing up on a couple of occasions. The faces of the old soldiers, and the younger ones, so proud and serious at the same time, the somber notes of the trumpet playing the Last Post, all of it moving. I think what got me the most was the little boy who spent hours painting toy soldiers and mounting them on little stands so he could give them to the old Veterans as his way of thanking them for their service. I was kind of blown away by that. I watched but didn't see Jack, although Sue said today that he was shown on TV during the march. The rain held off, so that was good.
Today I was out at the farm. It's warm again, almost 10C; it is the kind of weather that makes it hard to know how to dress; one minute I'm chilly, the next I'm sweating..it's like menopause all over again! LOL
After we brought all the horses in and fed them, Sue and I spent some time trimming manes. The young horses are learning to stand quietly while Sue shortens their manes - my job is to hold them and keep them distracted with my "everything is fine" voice and my pocket full of alfalfa cubes. On the whole, I think the hay cubes were the stronger motivator. Sera was very good; she's two years old, and OMG, so tall. If she puts her head up, I can't reach her ears. We brought in her new winter blanket to introduce it to her, and she was just a star. Sue actually was able to get it on her after a very short time spent letting her smell it and feel it getting rubbed on her sides. Putting a blanket on a young horse isn't always easy, you have to be quiet and patient and prepared for a freakout. Our philosophy with our babies is to introduce things gradually at a young age, to watch the reaction, and know when to back off. Our horses are handled from the minute they are born, and it pays off. Vets and farriers love coming to our farm, because they know that our horses are well handled, and well behaved. Hearing some of the horror stories our farrier has about people who expect him to trim three year olds who've never been handled, just put out in a field....well, it's not our way.
We trimmed Rochelle's mane, and put her winter blanket on too. She's four, and it's time for her to start some more grownup lessons; I'm going to work with her over the winter on the lunge, so when the time comes, our trainer can just get on and ride.
Kyra is looking much better since we started giving her the hay cubes at night; along with her regular hay and grain, she gets a good scoop of alfalfa cubes soaked in hot water as a bedtime snack. She knows the sound of the lid coming off the bin, and just gets so excited she can hardly stand it. She's put on some weight, and her coat is shiny, and after we got her long straggly mane trimmed today, she looks 16 again. I did notice that she's going gray, like me..her roots are showing!
Midnight doesn't get his mane trimmed; he's a quarterhorse, and looks best with a long flowing mane; it's beautiful, when it's clean, all black and white. Today it was crusher dust gray..like the rest of him. I swear he spent the whole day rolling around in the dust! Took some elbow grease to get him clean, I can tell you.
It's so nice when we have time to spend doing this kind of thing with the horses; it takes me back to the days when we first started out. Sue and I did all the work, and then groomed every horse; sometimes it would be 7 p.m. and we'd still be out there. Of course at that time we didn't have as many horses, just Caddy, Jubilee, Nimbus (Jubi's first baby), Kandance and Kismet. It was fun! We've kind of gotten away from that feeling over the last few years because the work has become a lot harder, and we've had to struggle to keep things going. Now we're doing better, and there's some spare time to do the fun things. It feels wonderful. We are so proud of what we've accomplished; all of us, the whole team. It may take a village to raise a child, and likewise it takes a team to run the farm. We have plans. Lots of plans.
T'was a very good day.
