I'm sorry for not writing last week, I was sick. Colton, Emmah and myself were sick last week but are starting to feel much better.
Today Choncho and Spirit (the ornery horses) decided they needed to get extra exercise...outside the pasture in the 100 acre wheat field behind our house. Brandon walked outside just as they were getting out. I'm very glad that our old lady of the herd didn't get out. After the rain we've had, she would have lamed for good, for sure!
So off Brandon goes for the boys. I get Colton down for a nap and go outside to see if I can help. That was a big fat I DON'T THINK SO...I'll wait 'til Brandon gets them headed for home...across the 100 acre mud lolly. Now, Brandon has a way with horses, they love him and he is calm and easy with them, which in turn, makes them respect him (and that's always a plus when a 1200 lb horse respects you;o) I see Brandon walk over to Spirit (remember, he's lead pony) and then hunker down and wait a minute, let them chill. Then he would stand up, walk to Spirit and about the time Brandon had his mane...OFF he would charge...Choncho in tow, still with the stupid look from last time, just runnin'.
Finally, they get headed back to our property...into the ROAD!!! Here are two horses that will spook if a bird drops poop on them or a pheasant flies off, but when it comes to cars/trucks...CHARGE 'EM!! So here I am watching from the house as my dear horses are almost hit by a COUPLE cars (traffic both ways, ya know) and they are so scared. Tears are coming to my eyes as I see a car turn into Choncho to steer him from the road. He does turn and go back towards the field with Spirit behind him.
By this time the two guys in the car stopped to help me and Brandon. Then Choncho starts heading to the pasture, so Brandon gets the hot wire dropped and I head off any ideas of road trotting again. I'm not very big or scary, so when Choncho decided to head towards me and the road instead of the pasture, I start looking like an idiot waving my hands and jumping up and down (did this one other time, 6 months pregnant with 8 draft horses running straight at me...BOY did that ground shake!!), trying to get him to stop...it didn't work...into the road AGAIN he goes. By this time, I can't breathe a lick, Chonch is running goofy in the road and I'm looking for the cops to show up anytime with a *horses out too much* ticket...they never came, thank goodness.
The boys end up in the wheat field again and as Brandon and I are walking over, one of the guys helping us has Spirit caught...just walked up to the knuckle head and caught him. Brandon gets a lead buggered up on Spirit to take him home...of course Chonch is following, probably glad Spirit got caught so they could go home. Brandon get's Spirit put in and Chonch decides he wants to eat the grass outside the pasture and not go in. The idiot comes out of me again and I start to yell at him and try to get him to go in...he doesn't. My last idea before I had to halter him up to get him in was to point. All I did was point and he went...I should have thought of that an hour ago...just pointed at home;o)
That is how our Monday went...shoot, can't wait for the rest of the week!!
I will start writing soon on the topics that are in the news. Give my thoughts, ideas, ramblings. If you have any topic you would like to hear about, just let me know.
Monday, November 12, 2007
Sunday, November 4, 2007
When one thing breaks...
...it seems A LOT will break. What a week I have had. It all started last Friday when the frig broke. We've had problems with it in the past but after pulling everything out and finagling it outta the kitchen, the landlord jiggled a wire in the freezer and it started again. This is a new frig, mind you. So, we'd load it back up and it would work...for a while. On Friday, we whip out the 'ol redneck frig (a.k.a. ice chest) and get everything loaded in it and call the landlord. He brings out a new one and takes the broken one back to the store. Finally, our frig works ALL of the time...for now.
We get that done on Saturday and then on Sunday, the washer decides it doesn't want to spin anymore. The washer/dryer set I have was my Nana's that I received when she passed away. It is at least 10 years old, so it has done a great job keeping MANY families in clean clothes. It would have been nice if the washer chose a better time for breaking...like when I won the lottery and got a brand new set. But I was stuck with a washer that didn't work. We went and picked out a washer we will be paying on for a year, but hey, I'd spend that much washing clothes at a public place and I get to forgo the weirdos at the laundry mats (or driving all over town looking for one and finally finding one after an hour of looking...not a small town either, they have more;o). I don't like the washer, should have gotten the other one I wanted, but it will do. That concludes Monday, though we didn't get the washer delivered until Wednesday, hence the journey to find a place to wash clothes (see above).
Tuesday rolls around and it's looking like it will be a great day so far...then there's a knock on the door. It seems while we were enjoying a little quiet time in the house, the horses (all three of them) decide it's time to take the fence down and run around like idiots and we needed a passerby on our busy road to tell us the horses were near the road...though by this time they had moved to the 100 acre wheat field behind our house. Now usually if we can get the Mustang haltered up, the Appaloosa will follow. This time the odds were different, we had a new horse in the mix, our mare Star who's an older lady. The closer we got, traipsing through the muddy field, the further Star would run and the other two would follow...the App running around with a goofy look on his face, tongue stuck out, wondering what they were doing...just following. A neighbor offers Brandon the use of their quad to catch them. I head back to the house and am headed off by a police officer with some questions. It is illegal in Idaho to have your livestock running at large (Arizona where we are from is open range...=you hit a cow or horse, you pay BIG TIME!!). He has to know our name, where we live, all that good stuff. Get that done and get back to the house. Brandon heads out with a halter and lead. He calls me on my phone and tells me that the horses are at the back of the property and to bring the carrots...he had lost the bag of carrots and lead he had took. I get out there just in time to see the horses jumping the canal behind our house and still looking generally rowdy and not wanting to come home. Brandon finally gets a halter on Spirit the Mustang and the other's follow him to their pasture, though Choncho the App didn't want to cross the downed hot wire and took off for another run along side the canal. He finally goes in. I get all the hot wire put back on the insulators and turn the fence back on. I go check the horses for any cuts or bumps. They are all sweated up big time and Spirit is almost panting. I take his halter off and look over and see two more cops watching us catch the horses and get the fence fixed (and about this time, here comes Montanna's bus from school, packed with kids, having to slow down to pass the two cop cars next to our house...FUN!!!). The cops leave, the horses roll to dry off and as the afternoon passes, I notice that the horses are limping with Star being the worst. I guess after running around like chickens with their heads cut off, jumping stuff and sliding around, they are a little sore. And Star pushin' 18 is no spring chicken!
The horses have gotten out a handful of times since we moved here a year ago. The most memorable one being the night the cops knocked on the door at 4 am to inform us the horses were out (only Choncho and Spirit this time) and we needed to get them corralled. GOODY...it's 4am, 30 degrees below 0 and we have to go catch our horses that are freaked out from the cops chasing them with their lights...sounds like my kinda fun there!!! By the time we caught them, my fingers, legs, ears, nose, pretty much everything was NUMB. I thought I had frost bite and that was through the beanie, jacket, gloves and pants, the whole attire required for chasing horses at 4 in the moring on one of the coldest nights of the year.
I guess we have been lucky when it comes to the horses getting out and catching them...it could be worse.
The rest of the week was pretty good considering how it started. The kids dressed up for Halloween. Montanna went with a friend and we took Emmah and Colton trick or treating. We really missed Montanna (her first time going anywhere with a friend). All and all, it was a very nice, uneventful evening.
Now it's time to go unload some hay for horses that like to take us on adventures...o-and did I mention that the water heater has somehow flooded the basement?
We get that done on Saturday and then on Sunday, the washer decides it doesn't want to spin anymore. The washer/dryer set I have was my Nana's that I received when she passed away. It is at least 10 years old, so it has done a great job keeping MANY families in clean clothes. It would have been nice if the washer chose a better time for breaking...like when I won the lottery and got a brand new set. But I was stuck with a washer that didn't work. We went and picked out a washer we will be paying on for a year, but hey, I'd spend that much washing clothes at a public place and I get to forgo the weirdos at the laundry mats (or driving all over town looking for one and finally finding one after an hour of looking...not a small town either, they have more;o). I don't like the washer, should have gotten the other one I wanted, but it will do. That concludes Monday, though we didn't get the washer delivered until Wednesday, hence the journey to find a place to wash clothes (see above).
Tuesday rolls around and it's looking like it will be a great day so far...then there's a knock on the door. It seems while we were enjoying a little quiet time in the house, the horses (all three of them) decide it's time to take the fence down and run around like idiots and we needed a passerby on our busy road to tell us the horses were near the road...though by this time they had moved to the 100 acre wheat field behind our house. Now usually if we can get the Mustang haltered up, the Appaloosa will follow. This time the odds were different, we had a new horse in the mix, our mare Star who's an older lady. The closer we got, traipsing through the muddy field, the further Star would run and the other two would follow...the App running around with a goofy look on his face, tongue stuck out, wondering what they were doing...just following. A neighbor offers Brandon the use of their quad to catch them. I head back to the house and am headed off by a police officer with some questions. It is illegal in Idaho to have your livestock running at large (Arizona where we are from is open range...=you hit a cow or horse, you pay BIG TIME!!). He has to know our name, where we live, all that good stuff. Get that done and get back to the house. Brandon heads out with a halter and lead. He calls me on my phone and tells me that the horses are at the back of the property and to bring the carrots...he had lost the bag of carrots and lead he had took. I get out there just in time to see the horses jumping the canal behind our house and still looking generally rowdy and not wanting to come home. Brandon finally gets a halter on Spirit the Mustang and the other's follow him to their pasture, though Choncho the App didn't want to cross the downed hot wire and took off for another run along side the canal. He finally goes in. I get all the hot wire put back on the insulators and turn the fence back on. I go check the horses for any cuts or bumps. They are all sweated up big time and Spirit is almost panting. I take his halter off and look over and see two more cops watching us catch the horses and get the fence fixed (and about this time, here comes Montanna's bus from school, packed with kids, having to slow down to pass the two cop cars next to our house...FUN!!!). The cops leave, the horses roll to dry off and as the afternoon passes, I notice that the horses are limping with Star being the worst. I guess after running around like chickens with their heads cut off, jumping stuff and sliding around, they are a little sore. And Star pushin' 18 is no spring chicken!
The horses have gotten out a handful of times since we moved here a year ago. The most memorable one being the night the cops knocked on the door at 4 am to inform us the horses were out (only Choncho and Spirit this time) and we needed to get them corralled. GOODY...it's 4am, 30 degrees below 0 and we have to go catch our horses that are freaked out from the cops chasing them with their lights...sounds like my kinda fun there!!! By the time we caught them, my fingers, legs, ears, nose, pretty much everything was NUMB. I thought I had frost bite and that was through the beanie, jacket, gloves and pants, the whole attire required for chasing horses at 4 in the moring on one of the coldest nights of the year.
I guess we have been lucky when it comes to the horses getting out and catching them...it could be worse.
The rest of the week was pretty good considering how it started. The kids dressed up for Halloween. Montanna went with a friend and we took Emmah and Colton trick or treating. We really missed Montanna (her first time going anywhere with a friend). All and all, it was a very nice, uneventful evening.
Now it's time to go unload some hay for horses that like to take us on adventures...o-and did I mention that the water heater has somehow flooded the basement?
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