I have a winner for giveaway number three! The winner is Duckie!
What does she win, you ask?

A set of rein connectors I made. That's the best name I can think up to call them without stealing a term from a famous trainer. (Rein rope not included, it's useless anyway, only a couple feet long.)

I like them because they're easier to switch back and forth than slobber straps are and they don't clank against the bit like a metal snap. Also, when you use them as a lead rope snap, if your horse pulls back, there's no dangerous broken metal projectile to fly and hurt someone. They're also lighter weight than a metal snap, which comes in handy sometimes. In vertical flexion I sometimes found myself accidentally hitting my horse with the snap when I released tension on the lead rope. Kind of an annoying release...

Here's a picture of them in use on Tonka:

(Click if you want to enlarge)

Duckie, send me your mailing address and I'll get them to you.
andreav at turbonet dot com

Thank you all for your thoughts on warm winter wear!

These guys don't need no stinkin' long underwear:



Scout's sticking out his tongue!

Giveaway number three commences!

After some random ramblings and pictures.

The old barn didn't fall down after the first snow:

We had a lot of birdie visitors today. I love the sky here:

Finnegan acting rather strange. I think he's been eating too many little birdies.

This was the bravest of the birds eating seeds in the barn.
Brave, or catfood? It's a fine line, I suspect...

Here's Tonka's frozen stiff halter. This reminded me of when I was a kid. My grandma had this dog leash that had a wire in the middle, with a dog collar dangling from the end. We used to love walking our invisible dog. Now I have an invisible horse.

Tonka's soaking spot. He thinks gremlins lurk behind him.
(And when my son is around, they do...)

I've been having a bit of a problem with my gloves. My fleece lined goatskin gloves were far too cold, and my ski gloves were so bulky I was constantly taking them off so I could work, then my fingers would get wet and stick to anything metal. I was going to ask you all how you dress your hands for work in the cold. Then today I found some that are working GREAT so far. Tonight I wore them for over a half hour in 5 degree weather and my fingers didn't get frigid. And I didn't have to take them off to open gates, dose my horse, put his halter on, tie him up, etc.

This is where our hobbit friends live.

Well, really it's only inhabited by wasps in the summertime... Creepy story about this building - One day when I was out in the field below the the front door of "the igloo" I was convinced there was something in the doorway staring down at me. A coyote? Something... I couldn't tell what, but it was definitely watching me. My hair was standing on end, I was heading toward the cusp of decision, "fight or flight?" It's a long ways back to the house, nowhere to hide. Then I kept slowly walking, trying not to alarm the thing, and I realized it was just light coming through the door from the back window. I was laughing with relief, feeling kinda stupid, all full of adrenaline for nothing.

Okay, for giveaway number three the prize will be something horse related that is made by me, but it's not a halter. To enter leave me a comment. I'd love to hear what kind of gloves you wear to work around the farm when it's frigidly (is that a word?) cold out. I was thinking of buying some of those silk glove liners before I found these gloves today. Have any of you tried them? Do they add warmth? I'm confused about silk and whether it's supposed to be warm or just wick away moisture. Oh, and if you wear a "base layer" (I've been told that's the new term for long johns or long underwear) do you prefer polypropylene or silk or something else, and why?

And the winner of giveaway number two is Jessie! Her prize will be an old Dutton bit. Specifically a "High-Wide Correction with Copper Rollers Bit" as it is currently listed for sale on NRS. But this one is used and more suitable for display than use. I think it would look cool mounted on an old barnwood picture frame. My mom thought it might be neat to string a wire between the bottom rings and some letters spelling "Howdy" or something like that. Or it could be heated and bent back into shape and used. Jessie, send me your address. My email is andreav at turbonet dot com.

The new ones look a little prettier and currently sell for $70:

And now, to share our first snow of the year with you. Rather late for a first snow, but it's a good one!

Wee Scout should be in a Budweiser commercial.

Sharing mama's hay.

More of those two. They were more willing to pose for the camera than the other horses. Tonka was all about eating and Soxy was afraid of the snowblower.

I thought this was a neat picture our drummer and the old woodshed:

The drummer is the only "sculpture" we kept on the place. Some of the others were creepy, with threatening pitchfork hands and such. Or just a weird waste of space in some cases. The woodshed needs to come down and be rebuilt, but bigger. That may be our big project next summer. When this place was Meadowbrook Farm, 60+ years ago, they used to keep pigs in a corral at the end there.

So far the "big storm" has been rather anti-climactic. But I'm not complaining. Not one bit. It's supposed to get worse later. I'm ready though, and the horses got a lot of extra hay tonight to keep them warm.

I had to make an afternoon dash into town to do a bunch of things, most important of which was picking up my bottle of SMZ's (antibiotics) for Tonka. I walked into the vet when the snow was really starting to come down and the roads were getting slick. I was itching to get home before it got really bad. The receptionist said, "Oh, I'm not sure that came in yet." But it had, thank goodness. I wasn't wanting to spend any extra time in town waiting on it.

Tonight I found myself praising my horse in a very strange way. "Oooh, great pus buddy!" I have been seeing blood but not pus when I do his compresses. It is still draining, but hasn't seemed to have gotten any smaller for a while now. I hope my vet is back from vacation on Monday so we can talk about options. I wonder if they can cut it open so I can get in there and flush it out to help it heal faster.

"Going out at night." It no longer means going dancing, out to dinner, on a date, to a concert. No glittery dresses or even makeup. This is what it means:

I was very warm.
Except for my toes
And the end of my nose.
Also my left thumb.
Amen.

I double-dog-dare you to post a pic on your blog of yourself on the way out to feed. Even if you're wearing your PJ's. I bet you look better than I do.

Da Boyz:

I realized I better hold my breath so ghostly images wouldn't appear.

Isn't Cisco cute? He was a very good boy.

Unfortunately Levi was tying up and my sister left in tears. I think she's going to have to retire him.

The Northwest Extreme Mustang Makeover has started! I was going to wait to post this when I had more blog addresses to share, but apparently not many of the trainers are blogging. If you find any of their blogs let me know.

Tracey, Tonka's almost-adopter, is blogging at Mustang Diaries.

Kevin, from the Portland area, is blogging at Mustang Gentling.

Keith Danielson is doing it again, and his website is http://hoopercrossingranch.com/, but he's not blogging this time as far as I can tell.

Now, not to confuse you, but there is another new adopter that is blogging about her boy, but she is not doing the makeover. Her fella is from Tonkas HMA and he has Tonka's almost-name, Coyote. Actually, his full name is Coyote Bay. Good name, huh? He's going to be a dressage horse. Her blog is here: Mustang Dressage.

Today, in about an hour, we're headed out to ride at the arena, John and I and Cisco and Tonka. Although it's not a bad morning, it might be fun to ride here, and it doesn't cost anything either... I might have to ponder that some more. Then a quick dash to Spokane and back to get some furniture that my mom is giving to Katia. Sometime during the day either John or I needs to go to the grocery store, we have a huge storm coming and I want to make sure we don't run out of anything. Luckily we have a huge Costco thing of TP, so we won't have to worry about that. That's one modern convenience I'd hate to have to do without.

Giveaway number two! Just leave a comment here telling me about your favorite bit. Horse bit, that is. Unless you don't have horses, then tell me something else. Like your favorite healthy lunch. I could use some healthy lunch ideas. Or just tell me how gross the rest of the post is if you like. The prize this time is horse related, but that's all I'm going to tell you.

Well, my morning has been rather interesting. I think I'm sick again. I've been weak and shaky and breathless all morning. Which I wouldn't whine about, but this bug also comes with indecisiveness apparently. What was I indecisive about? (Grossness ahead - warning for the queasy. Be glad I didn't take a picture!) What the heck to do with a dead deer I found right next to the horse fence! He's not small, this deer. Looked rather heavy, bloated as he was. I don't know why the poor thing died. He wasn't stuck in the neighbor's barbed wire fence, which was what I assumed when I first saw him there with his legs in the air. His side was leaking a little blood, but I don't think it was a gunshot, I think he was just getting leaky from being bloated. Maybe he caught his foot as he was jumping the fence and broke his neck. Whatever it was, I hope it was quick. Poor thing.

After sitting around in the house being indecisive for about an hour (and waiting for the vet to call back about a refill for Tonka's antibiotics) I decided the vet would have to just leave a message and went out to take care of business. I wrapped a rope around his leg and dragged him to the driveway. He was surprisingly not all that hard to move. Then I wrapped the rope around my hitch and dragged him away to another part of the property for the coyotes to enjoy. I hope they eat him up quickly. He's kind of smelly.

The horses seemed rather alarmed when I dragged him past them. I hope they know I wouldn't do that to them.

Now I have a big trail of hair all down my driveway. Gross. At least it's not flesh. I don't think I could have handled that.

Gotta love country life!

(Don't forget to leave your comment. Deadline will be Friday at 8pm.)

Sorry, I didn't mean to worry anyone. It was exciting when I turned everyone out together, but no major injuries. I'm sure they're sore though. Bella and Cisco went at it at least four times. I was pretty sure that would happen. They're just going to have to work it out. It was hard to watch though. I kept picturing broken legs, gashes, and hematomas. Nothing of that sort, praise be.

I turned off the camera in the middle of this one, had to check to make sure Cisco was okay. Apparently I can't take video and look at the same time. Check out Tonka's nifty evasive maneuver in the second one. And it's interesting to watch how the herd moves, who goes where and does what. (You probably want to turn off your volume. My dog loves to bark when the horses are acting up.)

Seems to me, watching how these battles played out, Bella went in and started it, then was first to leave. Cisco didn't seem to be the direct instigator but was quite happy to put the smackdown on her. He got along fine with the others. Tonka was told to back off a bit but they did share some hay. Scout and Cisco seem to be good buddies. Soxy and Cisco have been living together so they're fine. You can see she's trying to stay out of the way, poor old girl.

I was going to load another short video and some pictures, but I think I'll save them for tomorrow. I'd imagine these picture and video-heavy posts load slowly for people with slower connections.

But I will leave you with a picture that shows Tonka didn't manage to stay completely out of the way.

Plenty of excitement today! I'll write more later. So far no broken bones or anything...

We had a beautiful sunrise this morning. Looks like we might have some sun today.

Yesterday my sister and I went to ride over at the arena. It's that time of year again. We turned the horses loose to play before we rode. They had a blast! I took 186 pictures. All sort of impressionist thanks to me not knowing how to use my camera's settings.

Here's Levi. He's a Quarter Horse. He has a cute face.
My sister gets offended when people ask if he's a mustang.
I guess they think that because of his color?
He's more of a buttermilk color in the summer.

A nice trot.

Putting on the speed!


As my sister said - Look at those gaskins!

Warp speed! This one looked a lot cooler full size. You can click on it to see it bigger.

Tonka and Levi have been on quite a few rides together, but never turned loose to hang out. They got along surprisingly well.

Levi doesn't usually put up with this kind of behavior.

Thinking about having another roll:

Enter Tonka, the pest:

"Excuse me, I'm trying to roll here."

"Jeez, nevermind. You sure are a pest."
And off they go again. Levi looks like a carousel horse here:

Levi really wore himself out.
I feel bad for my sister. She's had this horse for 7-8 years now, since he was a weanling. He's been a real pain in the butt to train, which has made their bond even stronger because of all the work they've done together. Things don't look good for him spending many more years in this world, unfortunately. He's been tying up on long rides, drinking a huge amount of water, and just generally uncomfortable with hard work. She took him in to WSU last summer and he was diagnosed with kidney failure. He should do okay as long as he stays hydrated (which for him means drinking huge amounts of water) and isn't worked too hard, but a time will come when his kidneys shut down completely. He can never be medicated in any way again, so pray he never hurts himself or gets sick. He can't have anything but grass hay and water. It's breaking her heart. After he was diagnosed she could barely stand to spend time with him, it was too painful. she started distancing herself from him. Got a new horse. He went from being ridden every day, which is something he needs if he's going to behave himself, to being ridden a handful of times through the summer and fall. And soon after his diagnosis her yearling was diagnosed with severe arthritis and she was told to put her down. She waited though, not being able to handle the thought. That filly was very, very special. Everyone who met her recognised something deeply touching about that horse. A few weeks later the filly slipped a tendon and her vet told her she no longer had a choice. She had to put her down. I don't know if it was her breeding that caused her to fall apart at such a young age, but she was line bred.

Loving horses sure can break your heart.

Sooo... On to happier things. My back is better! It's still tender but no longer out of place. And my cold is mostly gone. That was a hard one to kick. So today I'm going to get back to my exercise regimen. And if the weather holds I'm going to take Scout for a long walk. I might even saddle up Tonka and see how we do with ponying. Then my tack shed needs cleaning so I can get all the junk out of my trailer tack room, which seems to have sprung a leak. I'm also planning on turning all the horses out into the pasture together for the day. I'm a little worried about someone getting into the middle of a sparring match between Bella and Cisco. Scout may have to stay with me at first just in case.

Boy, picking a winner here is so much easier than on one of those high traffic blogs where they give away the big gifts. I asked my daughter to pick a number between one and seven. She looked at me a little weird and said three. So the winner is Lea!

What does she win? Cowboy Tom's Flapjacks mix! You know it's whole grain because you can see the whole grains right there! (You need a blender to mix it.) It promises to be the most light, fluffy, and wholesome flapjacks you've ever eaten. I sure hope they're that good. And better yet, this is a genuine product of Idaho.

Lea, I'll bring your prize to the party on Saturday. Hope you like it!

I'm going to dig around and find some more prizes and do another giveaway this week.
I'm sure I can find something horse related for next time.

I think I'm going to need two big cups of coffee this morning.

Today we're thinking about calling my friend who offered to let us cut down a Christmas tree on her property and see if she's busy. We might just load up 3 horses and all ride out to find the perfect tree. Only problem is there are 4 of us... I thought I could probably put Liam on behind me because Tonka has been so good lately, but you never know, he might really be weirded out by a squirmy kid back there. Katia was rather opposed to him riding with her, but that may just have to be the way it goes. I was thinking we could go get Coda since my niece isn't riding him anyway, but I'm not sure we could fit 4 full size horses in our 3 horse trailer unless we took the tack room out which I don't really want to do.

Yesterday we did some Christmas shopping down in Lewiston/Clarkston. John got a great deal on a work and riding coat at Corral West since they're going out of business. Only $40 for a $100 coat. Still, it makes me sad they're going out of business. The farm store didn't have the bit I wanted. I just need a plain old Reinsman sweet iron loose ring snaffle. I'm pretty happy with those, have two, but need a new one so all 3 trained horses can have one. I did buy some horse detangler for my stocking, some tiny work gloves for Liam because he's dying to have some, and some very specific Wranglers for my brother in law. Then we went to Costco. On a Saturday. And we didn't buy more than 5 things. Mostly kid gifts, but I also got a new calendar.

I forgot to get Probios for Tonka! Urgh... It's horribly expensive around here in little tiny tubes, but they usually have the big ones that are much cheaper in Lewiston. Dang it. I'll have to order some from Jeffers.

Okay, time to get on with the day. Hope you're all having a great Sunday!

Givaway alert! Read on for more info! But first I must babble at ya.

So much for not getting hurt last night when Tonka knocked me over. You remember I mentioned having a rib out? Well, it finally had gotten better (I think, at least it wasn't bothering me anymore) and now thanks to Tonka I have the same sort of pain on the other side. The chiropractor insisted that he fixed it, but it still feels the same. Money down the drain... How does one fix their upper back when it insists on doing things like this? I'm feeling that the chiropractor isn't the answer. Stretches? Yoga? If I could just get it in place I promise I'd be more dedicated with my exercises to strengthen it. I'm not sure I should work out when everything's out of whack though.

On to another non-horse-related subject. I have been more in the sprit of giving this year of my life than ever before. I LOVE it. Even though most times what I give is small, it may make a big difference in the larger scheme of things. Ripples in the pond. Today at the grocery store the Salvation Army bell-ringer was there with his red collection thingie, and instead of slinking by because I have no cash, I happily folded up a dollar to give and told the man "Merry Christmas!" I am going to make a major effort to at least have some change on me whenever I go out.

So, in the spirit of giving, I'm going to have a few little giveaways this month. Small things, but hopefully fun things. And hopefully in return the winners will "pay it forward" with a small giving gesture of their own. Just leave me a comment on this post and I'll pick someone randomly. Consider yourself ordered to leave a comment if you're here reading. Say "cheese" or "rumplestiltskin" if that's all you can come up with. If you are tempted not to comment because you don't want the gift, I promise you I'd be happy to donate to a great cause in your name. There are many options available for giving at this site.

I'll announce the winner Sunday night.

Happy Holidays!

My darn horse ran me over! Well, almost anyway... I was soaking his jaw, squatted down next to him while he munched away on his hay, thinking sweet thoughts about what a nice picture he made out there in the dim moonlight. My mind wandered to John's riding lesson and I don't remember exactly what I was thinking about when suddenly - wham! Tonka's leg slammed into mine, and I would have stayed on my feet except his lead rope (which I didn't even need on him, but had left on after giving him his antibiotics) was kind of part way around my leg on the ground, so down I went, Epsom salt water flying. Boy did I cuss. I'm probably lucky I wasn't hurt, and with nobody here to save me... Good thing Tonka was bolting away from me, not over the top of me.


We had a good but short ride up at Melissa's today. I found one of my tires almost flat when I was going to leave, then she had a few things to work on with one mare and a tack issue with the other, so we didn't actually ride for very long. Which was fine. Tonka took a long time to relax, so it's probably good we didn't just get on and go. He was tense and twitchy and not listening. Too much inactive time while he was in quarantine.

The sheep wandering through the trees seemed to be something he wasn't too sure about, even though he's seen them before. They sure look sinister, drifting from shadow to shadow...

Definitely need to keep an eye on those creepy sheepies.

And when we got back Fiona and Wilbur were there to greet us.
John and Cisco's lesson went really well yesterday. The trainer likes Cisco and thinks he's a good match for John. Said he probably wouldn't be winning any races, but that's just fine by us!

Attack of the Giant Dinosaur Turkeys!
(I should have posted this on Thanksgiving)

Here, if I was creative, I would have added some creepy music, like maybe from Jaws. But I don't know how so you'll have to imagine it.

This post was inspired by Kara's turkey post today. Turkeys are so neat.

I had the weirdest day today. I don't know many people, but I swear I ran into most of them when I went to town today. First I saw my former hay guy walking down the highway away from his broken-down car, about 10 miles from home. So I gave him a ride back. Boy was that kinda awkward... I'm shy, I've probably mentioned that before. Very shy. But I managed to make small talk! I was proud of me. Then I had lunch with my sister and her husband, looked around a store in the mall, found a very cool little gift for John, and went grocery shopping. Where I saw 3 more people that I know! Very weird...

This afternoon I ran out to the local saddlemaker's shop with my sister. He had a "cheap old saddle" that wasn't pretty but was real sturdy. I brought it home to try on Tonka. No way no how! It rocked right on his spine in the middle. I'm bummed. It was right in my price range too, with no need to stretch. Oh well... Now I have to hang on to it until he gets back from some big ropers or rodeo thing in Vegas or something... Y'all who follow that sort of thing are probably laughing at my not knowing about such a big event.

Tonka's abscess is about half the size it was yesterday. I'm hoping my boy and his iron constitution will prove my vet wrong and we won't have to do the antibiotics for long.

Before I got that happy call from my vet I went out and spent time with Bella and Scout. They've been kind of neglected lately. Bella was doing that "if I don't look at you, you don't exist" thing again. Scout was getting kinda big for his britches, trying to come in with his ears pinned at feeding time. They were both angels today. Bella did a little groundwork and then got groomed and had her hooves trimmed. Scout just got taken out for a good grooming session. They both worried about each other while the other was gone. They were also both very muddy. I renamed them Clumpy Mud Mama and Clumpy Jr. Oh, and I measured Bella. She's 14.2 hands. Which is a bit short, especially since she's not real stout. Hopefully she'll grow some more, she still has time. Maybe.
Below is Tonka's abscess. Not that gross, really. The raw part is the size of a quarter, and the swollen part is about the size of a ping pong ball. I asked the vet if I had to do the antibiotics, because they make me nervous, and he kind of got irritated with me. Not that he showed it, really, but there was a long pause there... He basically said I had to if I didn't want my horse to have to have surgery eventually. Good news is we're keeping him on the mild antibiotics for the first two weeks, and hopefully we won't have to use the "big guns."
See Tonka's bad haircut on his forelock there? He got a cockle-burr in his forelock that got stuck in his ear and he must have rubbed it and felted it in there. Nothing I could do but cut it out.
This here picture is just plain weird. Looks like a two headed horse with one head attached backward, with the ears at the shoulder. Actually it's Tonka making a face and Scout looking at him. Tonka was so glad to be free. He ran and bucked for about 10 minutes, but of course he waited until after I had gone inside.

So I guess Tonka's problem isn't a fungus, but it acts like one or something like that. It's a bacteria called actinomyces. The vet wasn't at all worried about it being contagious. I don't know if it's from the same thing as it was a couple years ago, or if this was a new piece of cheat grass or splinter.

John asked me to hitch up the trailer for him today so he could practice loading Cisco before they go to their lesson on Wednesday. He's showing a serious interest in working with his horse! I love this! Cisco was a good boy. He is worried about the trailer, but he loaded well many times. The only time there was a problem was when I hooked his lead through the Blocker tie ring. He just backed right on out of the trailer when I turned to leave him there. So then I hard tied a rope and John loaded him and snapped it on his halter and shut him in the divider. He did some serious leaning trying to back up, but it helped when we stood and petted him, me at his head outside and John rubbing his back inside. I think he's afraid of being alone in there.

I have a head cold and I'm alternating between feeling pretty good and staying busy, then feeling awful and wanting to crawl in bed. I think I better get Tonka's compresses and medication done early so I'm not exhausted and feeling sorry for myself later. Have a good night!

Tonka can be a horse again! I am soooo glad. He's been crying from his quarantine, weird noises that don't even sound like a horse.

The good news is that it's not strangles, the bad news is there is a type of fungi in there that is hard to get rid of. They're having me put him on antibiotics for a month. A MONTH! With my sister's recent kidney failure diagnosis in her horse, due to antibiotics, this scares me. Granted, these are not the heavy duty antibiotics, but he hasn't told me yet what kind we're going to use for the majority of the time, just to use what I have until we get results back on what will work best for this contaminant.

I'm elated and bummed at the same time. But it will be so great to see him back in with his buddies! I'm going to head out there right now to move him.