stuck in the mud

Yesterday I went out thinking it was a good day to ride again after all the precipitation we've had the past month or so. We had an absolutely gorgeous day on Wednesday, and Keil Bay and I did some ground work in the arena so I could make sure he was moving well and feeling good, both of which were true. Then on Thursday we had more rain. So yesterday the sun came out and although it was still chilly, it was above freezing, and it was a decent day to ride.

I am almost embarrassed to admit this. I went out and fed breakfast and when I saw Keil Bay I just gave up the idea of riding. He was covered in mud. Mud that had dried on his fur in such a way that it looked like he'd gone to a salon and gotten a mud-tipped treatment. All over his entire body.

The idea of grooming him was just too much. There was still mud everywhere and the idea that I would spend two hours grooming, have a 40-minute ride, and 15 minutes later he would roll himself into the mud again got me totally stuck.

It's interesting because I'm feeling a similar stuckness in a writing project - actually more of a formatting for publishing project - and over the years I've learned that whatever is going on at the barn tends to be going on in my life.

Sometimes I find that when I'm stuck like this it's as much physical as mental, so today I have a massage scheduled - 90 full minutes - and I am going to come home and hope that I can get back in the saddle in all kinds of ways.

Wish me luck!

Addendum, on Sunday:

Would like to update to say that we had a nice ride today thanks to massage yesterday, daughter's very subtle nudging, and a sunny day that was warm and relaxing. Keil Bay got a triple peppermint treat at the end. :)

harrowing experience (with thanks to McLeod's Daughters)

Yesterday we had 60 degrees and sunshine and Keil Bay was coated in dried-up ground-in mud from rolling in our very wet pasture. Both sides of his face were solid mud and his mane still has little muddy tips that I simply could not get out without spending hours doing each one by hand.

I gave him a good grooming on his body and legs and opted to do some groundwork to get back in the swing of things. He was responsive and not at all spooky, which was nice after the past month's very reactive behaviors toward the woods behind our back field.

As we worked in the arena I was reminded that it's past time to harrow. There were areas where the horses and donkeys have dug with hooves trying to locate... buried treasure? gold? I'm not sure. There were also areas where they galloped and bucked and dug in deep through the sand and screenings. After finishing up with the Big Bay I served his peppermint (did I write here that I got him a huge bin of soft peppermints and he could not believe his eyes?) and let him head back out with his herd.

Later in the day I got the truck out and hooked up the harrow. It's heavy and it was flipped over to the flat side so I had to turn the entire thing over and then untangle the tines. I was looking forward to driving into the arena - I love harrowing - and opened the barnyard gate and drove through.

It never occurred to me that the barnyard was still so wet and mushy I might have some issues with the truck. I got about halfway through the barnyard and the wheels started spinning. Dear daughter poked her head out of the barn to laugh at me. There I was, ready to harrow, but stuck and getting more stuck. 

I considered abandoning the whole thing and just leaving the truck there until things dried out some. But I hate leaving things unfinished, and I hate leaving messes where there were none before, so I remembered something I saw in a McLeod's Daughters episode and went and gathered fallen pine branches and leaves and stuffed them underneath the rear tires. It helped. I then vaguely remembered Tess McLeod having to stuff actual sticks under the rear tires and that was what did the trick. Off I went into the arena.

I spent a long time harrowing, leveling the footing and enjoying the repetitive circling. The herd came to the arena fence and watched, and I had the truck windows down so I could talk to them as I drove by. I always wonder what they're thinking as they watch me harrow. They seem fascinated to see me circling around and around.

When it was time to go back through the barnyard I hoped for the best and the truck sailed right over the path of branches and leaves I'd made. The barnyard isn't as pristine as it was before I harrowed but I covered my tracks, literally, and at least it looks naturalized again and not like a long ripping wound across the grass!

Everyone in my family makes fun of me for loving McLeod's Daughters but I was grateful for Tess McLeod yesterday and who knows - once I finish my 20th re-watching of West Wing, maybe it will be time to go for my 20th of of Mcleod's Daughters. :)

Snow-vember Hill

These  photos were taken by my husband and really capture the lovely, quiet, gray day quality of our first snow day this week. It is easy for me to get focused in on the barn side of things, where hoof packs and mud and worry about horses slipping on the ice can ruin the beauty for me. 

We were lucky not to lose power this second and much bigger go-round as so many people in NC did. The day before the bigger and wetter snow rolled in, UPS braved the roads to deliver Keil Bay's gigantic tub of Red Bird soft peppermints. I don't think Keil cared a bit about anything else when I took the tub out and showed it to him, and handed out peppermints to he and his herd. 

Today the sun is out and the melt-down begins. I see that next week we are up to 70 degrees one day. I have to get the Christmas tree down before that happens! 

he dreams of Shetland

It's snowing again here, starting early this morning (as seen below) and continuing all day long. The Little Man dreams of the Shetland Isles, and forages for tender shoots under leaf piles, and lets me know that he can handle himself perfectly well in this weather.

Meanwhile Keil Bay and Cody have been galloping and bucking and doing gorgeous floating power trots in the arena. 

The donkey boys are not as happy but they are braving the huge snowflakes and maybe longing for old age when their woman caves in and brings them in the house.

Supposedly this is the one in the "one-two punch" we're getting weather-wise. Tomorrow night is two. I have a chicken in the oven and a glass of Hoppyum IPA in front of me and some dark chocolate, which I just read is the best thing for a lingering cough after a cold. 

I'm ready for spring but for now, I'm pretending we're on the Isle of Shetland with the Little Man's pony herd.

bringing the horses in

This was the beginning of the sleet/ice/snow combo we had early this week, and this was the day Cody and Keil Bay started the routine of trying to go in the house with me when I went to the back gate. I wish I'd taken photos of them standing there after I went through the gate, heads hanging over, asking to come in.

What were they thinking? That it was cold and Good Things resided in the big stall with lights in the windows and their humans walking around? That inside the big stall there were endless supplies of apples and carrots and homemade horse cookies and other yummy things?

I don't know, but the thought of bringing the horses in has always been one of my dreams. Not like in silly photos where horses lie on sofas, but in some way bringing their stalls to one wall of our living room where they could come hang out with us when they wanted to do so. 

Sometimes I make sketches of a big connected house and barn, where stalls and our living space share that wall, and where "going out to do barn chores" simply means walking to one end of the house. Where maybe an indoor riding arena is part of the plan, so that on cold icy days horses and pony and donkeys can gallop wildly and safely instead of the wild and ice-crunching galloping they did yesterday afternoon.

So far in my designs I end up with a sort of large rectangular box that isn't very aesthetic from the outside, and I haven't figured out how to incorporate the pastures around it, nor how to open it up so that it feels like a home and not a big dark box. 

Other times, high wind times, I think of converting the garage underneath us to a barn. If I put in a line of fence and put down rubber mats and created four big box stalls (and taught the horses to ignore the garage doors going up and down) I could bring the herd in when the winds kick up and they would be right downstairs, safe and sound. And going out to do the chores would mean walking down the stairs to the garage. 

I'm not sure why I want them even closer. By most home and barn standards, they're amazingly close to me already. Before we found November Hill we looked at a property where the barn had an apartment at one end and you walked through a doorway right into the barn aisle itself. But it was a tiny apartment and we were too many humans to fit into it.

Finally today we get back to the upper 40s and maybe the heavy rain predicted for tomorrow (and a high in the 50s) will melt everything down. Then we'll have a sea of mud instead of ice and snow and I'll want to bring them in to keep them out of that too. 

In 20-some years when it's just two little donkeys here, you might see me posting about little hoof boots to give them traction on hardwood floors and a corner set up with shavings where they (they really would) do their business, or maybe we would install a donkey door so they could go in and out at will. Two little donkeys wouldn't be any different in our living space than, say, two St. Bernards, but I'll always savor the image of Keil Bay standing in the kitchen eating apples out of the fruit bowl.