Hanging In There!

My scarf gave me fancy shoulders. Also, sorry for the screen shots!

I have been a bit silent on here for a bit, and I apologize for that. Between visiting friends, working on cartoons, getting the pens graveled and sanded (yay!), hub's birthday and the holidays, it has been a whirlwind. I am almost caught up on my cartoons, so that is nice! And having sandy nice pens has been a very big blessing. The horses seem very happy, and though it may take me longer to clean the pens now, every time I walk out there I smile. Hopefully this will help Bacon's feet improve even further.

Birthday boy with his motorcycle wrapping paper.

My pig nephew, Walter, on Thanksgiving. Yes, he lives in the house.

First things first, we tried to clean to mud and muck out of the pens as much as we could. It had been raining a lot that week, so that was a bit unfortunate. Road mix was dumped and the pens were evened out. No more pee holes. Next we slapped down some mats in the most used areas of the pens, and then poured a few inches of sand on top. So glorious.

Road mix time!

Sand mountain pass.

Slowly getting there.

Supervising.

Whoa. Sand! And sad shelter, but it is better than no shelter :(

Right after that is snowed. And the sand froze (but thaws enough for safe walking and good lounging areas) and the pastures froze, So horses have been on lock down for a bit. And then I learned of an opportunity to ride in an indoor Saturday night. I know my days or very numbered for winter riding, so I jumped on that band wagon. Sure, Bacon hadn't been ridden for a couple of weeks, or turned out recently, or been in an indoor since April. With a grid and MANY other OTTBs. And mirrors and a quarter sheet for the first time. But we could deal with it.

What we should have been doing on a frozen night.

Bacon enjoys the fancy digs.

I tacked my pony up with frozen fingers and threw her on the trailer with Mr. Prisoner. I was worried about freezing (ride time was from 6pm-10pm) but once we got in the indoor, we were quite comfortable. My horse was on high alert as I hand walked her around the arena for a good 10-15 minutes. That was the spookiest she had ever been. Not at the mirrors, but at random things. Normally she calms down once I hop on her, so I thought I would give that a whirl. That was a lie. She wasn't bad by any means, just tight and tense and a bit of a locomotive. Still ridable, but not normal Bacon. There were some others warming up in there with us as well, some were not too great at steering, but we got the job done.

Vroom vroom.

Also choosing to ride in slippery fleecy breeches and winter boots not a great option.

Going through the one stride, to one stride to straight three stride or bending line.

Prisoner was being amazing. I don't know how many horses were in there with us, but I want to say 12. My horse was actually going through the grid fine. A little short strided and speedy, but having not done any grids this year, I was ok with it. Bacon was finally relaxed enough to stand still and wait for the others to go through the grid, but she was having a hard time with her feelings. Her mare side came out in full swing as she shark faced Prisoner and even had a little lunge at another OTTB. I was not impressed, but that is what I get for owning a mare. We made several passes through the grid at the lower jumps and called it a night. My knees were done and they had chili and cake waiting at the end. All in all, it was fun. Even if my horse's brain was flittering off to somewhere else.

My arms weren't up to doing a release that night apparently.

Not pretty, but ok.

I also had another doctor appointment today. I got poked a lot. And molested (yeah, that kind of appointment) and unfortunately, due to the large amount of cysts I have in my breasts, my doctor has ordered an ultrasound to make sure that they are actually cysts and not other bad lumps. The cervix looked a bit wonky too, so it got scraped (ow!) with lots of samples being sent out. There are also more tests to be run, and hopefully I can find some answers as well as rule some other things out. Stupid boobs.

Pats for the wild pony. I will also be taking omeprazole like her!