Wednesday, June 26, 2013

Horse Groom Supplies Forum: Photo Contests

For those of you who don't know about the Horse Grooming Supplies Forum, it is a really nice forum with extremely knowledgeable horse friendly people. Pop on over there and check them out!

Also, they do monthly photo contests, which I just so happen to be taking the reins on for a while!! :)  I love seeing everyone's photos and horses. Swing on over, join the forum site, and lets see your pictures!

Monday, June 24, 2013

Changes?

Sometimes, the things I think will never happen, happen in such a time span that I find myself completely flabbergasted.

Lots of cool things going on. Will and I are looking at buying a house in the spring. We went on Saturday and looked at a friends house that she is putting up for sale in the spring. It is almost 5 acres. Nice sized house with plenty of room to possibly build onto it in the future if we need to. Set back off the road. 3 nice pastures. A lighted riding ring. 2 dry lots. 4 16x16 stalls with room for 3 more stalls. A hay loft that can hold over 1000 bales of hay. 3 out buildings. A chicken coop (complete with chickens), which Gwen thinks is amazing. An in ground pool that needs some work. A huge back yard for playtime with Gwen. Two separate gardens. Can you tell I'm in love with this place?
View from the driveway looking at the barn

Inside the main barn area

Chickens!

Front Dry Lot - Connected to the barn
There is one on the back of the barn too

Small Pasture

Front Pasture - Which could actually be split into 2 large
pastures for rotation purposes. 

The front pasture looking into the riding ring

The riding ring, which could also be used as a pasture until I put sand in it. 

I am totally in love with this place. The problem you ask? Its at the higher end of our price range and .... Will needs a new truck. 

Its either fix up his current truck and HOPE that it will be able to haul whatever horse trailer I end up with. Or...get the truck her found this weekend. We ended up at the Jeep Chrysler dealership because we got one of those flyer's with the keys on it and the scratch off thing. So we thought, eh, why not? So we went. Would you believe they had a 2010 Ford F150 FX Super Crew Cab on the lot??? Its the EXACT truck he has been drooling over for the past 3 years. They aren't asking a whole lot for it, considering the KBB value is over 33K and the dealership is willing to give him $5000 for his truck. Now the question is, is taking on a truck payment going to KILL the chances of us getting the house? Possibly. 

I have sent an email to my mortgage officer in the hopes of her helping us with this decision. Do I know what the answer is, yeah, I do. But, I am also hoping that with revamping our budget and paying OFF alot of the current debt will help us in the long run as well. 

And yes, I know there are more properties out there, but this place is almost perfect. I am just really torn. I feel like I am being selfish if I tell him he cant have his truck just so that I can get my horse property, that may or may not even happen anyway. Sigh. 

On a good note, I am seeing some very positive changes with Tia. Her and I ended up have a CTJ moment a few nights ago. She was trying to be Alpha Mare and that just isn't happening. Ever! Not with me at least. So Saturday night I went to the barn to do her feet and put in some training time. When I drove in, she was happily munching grass in her pasture. As I made my way to her stall, I could see that she was already in there, waiting. I walked down and she met me in her stall with a nice little nicker. I closed the stall door and she backed right up and went over to where I have been tying her to get tacked up. It made me giggle a little that this mare, who so hated being worked, is now waiting for ME. So I put the surcingle on her and out we went. She was AMAZING. First time lunging in the outdoor ring. The sand out there is much deeper than I would like, but its not my farm and have no say over the depth of sand. Although, if I am going to continue working her in the outdoor ring, I will have to invest in some SMB boots to make sure her legs are protected. She is starting to really give to bit and round her back out. She has the cutest floaty trot and when she slows down she looks amazing. That back hip is starting to give her less and less problems and her attitude is taking a turn for the better. Everything is no longer a battle. Now, we just have discussions. She is starting to accept more lunging to the left, I truly believe she has some sight issues in this eye. She is soft, supple and willing. Very responsive to my voice and body language. It wont be long now before I can truly trust her under saddle. 

I believe she absolutely loves the new barn. She seems very calm and content. Happy to see me when I get there, which has never been a problem, but its always nice when they are happy. I have had to cut back on her feed. She is a bit....FAT.

So there is where we are at the moment. I really want to believe that what needs to happen will just fall into place. Its just so hard to see into the future...especially if the thing you desire the most at the moment may not be there. 

Tuesday, June 18, 2013

Tia's New Digs!

Life has been a bit crazy lately, so I am very sorry for not updating until now. I do, however, have some fun and exciting news!

Tia has been moved to a full care facility! I moved her on June 8th to a barn that is about 20 minutes closer to my house. The facility has two barn, the big barn and the little barn. Tia is in the little barn as the big barn is full. Honestly, I like it this way. She is out by herself in her own field. We have the small barn to ourselves at the moment. The small barn is just two stalls with a tack room and a feed room and small sitting area. Tia really seems to enjoy it at the new farm. She still has friends she can talk to over the fence, until they are moved to the other pasture for field rotations, but she is spending more and more time munching on grass and exploring her new digs then she was standing at the fence line talking to her new boyfriend.














She stays in during the day and gets to go out at night. The mayflies are horrible and she HATES to be fly sprayed. I went over Sunday evening to change out her fly mask, she got sunburn on her nose so I bought her the long mask with the ears, and I sprayed her down with Off. It seems to be the only thing that works against mayflies. Nasty little suckers! She wasn't thrilled with being sprayed down but she soon forgot about how horrible the experience was when she went out and the flies left her alone!

The new barn has tons of trails and a huge indoor and outdoor riding ring. We got to work in the indoor last week, will get to why it was last week being the last time I worked with her in a minute, and she was awesome. She walked nicely through the field with the mare eating geldings in it and only took a few minutes to settle down once in the indoor. She is really starting to come along nicely. She has started to naturally carry her head a bit lower then before and she is now rounding her back instead of hollowing it out. We are definitely getting there.

So got her feet done on the 14th. She was very good. Only gave us small issues with that one front foot...the last foot. But nothing major. She really has turned out to be a nice girl. My new schedule, now that I don't have to drive to the barn, feed, clean stalls, etc., is to go to the gym Monday, Wednesday and Friday nights. After the gym, I will head over to the barn for some training work with Tia. Every other Monday will be spent in VA giving a lesson. My Saturdays and Sundays are now clear so that I can get to the barn in the morning, work with Tia, and then head back home for some family quality time.

Speaking of family, here is the reason I haven't been able to really work with Tia. Gwen was incredibly sick. I took her to her regular doctors about 3 weeks ago. She was complaining about it hurting to use the potty and she said her tummy hurt. So, I being a half decent mom, took her in. They said there was nothing wrong with her. All their tests came back negative. She was just being a 4 year old. Welp..they were WRONG. I haven't quite figured out how I am going to handle the situation, because quite frankly all I really wanna do is go up there and snap all of their necks. But I can't. Cause that's illegal..... Anyway, so on the 9th, Will, Gwen and I were out doing some mattress shopping, which is a whole other story in itself. She kept saying it hurt to use the potty and that her tummy hurt. Now, she has been semi OK since the doctors appt. She would occasionally tell me it hurt. The way she reacted on Sunday was like something out of the Exorcist Movie. She would literally SCREAM at the top of her lungs. And of course, since it hurt, she was using the potty every 20 minutes and only doing little bits of potty-ing.

I told my husband right then that I was taking her to Patient First. Dropped off Will at the house and took Gwen over there immediately. Now I have to tell you, a lot of people haven't been impressed with Patient First. But you know what, they LISTENED. Her urine test came back positive for a severe bladder infection. She also had a yeast infection. The Dr said there is no way that it could be this bad from the start. This is a UTI that has been building over WEEKS...not Days...but WEEKS. So we start her on Amoxicillin and a cream for the yeast infection. No Change...other then the fact that its getting worse. Wednesday morning, the 12th, she woke up crying at 5:30. I helped her use the potty and put her back to bed. I dropped her off at daycare at 730. 10 minutes later my daycare lady texted me that Gwen was completely inconsolable and couldn't use the potty. I got to work a little before 8. Went in and told my Boss I was calling the Dr. They, Patient First, wanted to see her Immediately. So, at 8:20-something I left work to go get the little Chi. When I got there she was waiting for me at the top of the stairs asking to go back to the doctors. She had to walk a little bow legged because it actually hurt her to walk regularly. I noticed then that her belly seemed to be a bit swollen. (At the first visit, her bladder was inflamed.) So off to PF we go. We get there and she needs to use the potty. So we go back and pee in the cup...while she is screaming bloody murder. I then notice there is blood in her urine. Not just a little either. The doctor wanted to run a blood test to see if anything else was going on. That was fun..you ever tried to take blood from a 4 year old? Not Cool! The same Dr that saw us on Sunday, was seeing us Wed., which I was really happy about. She came in and told me that not only is her bladder worse, but her kidneys were struggling. On a scale of 1 - 10 in severity, on Sunday she was a 3, Wed she was a 5. I asked if I should take her to the ER. She prescribed a new antibiotic and told me to keep her home and watch her closely for the next 2 days. If at any time she spiked a fever over 100 degrees, had vomiting, diarrhea, or the screaming got worse, to pack her bag and get her to the ER. Thankfully, the new antibiotic did the trick. By midday Friday, she wasn't crying anymore when using the potty and the swelling in her tummy had gone down a lot. Can you see why I am mad at the original doctor? Of course she really had something wrong! But, at the moment, we seem to be OK. I am, however, looking for a new pediatrician!

This past Sunday we had a picnic at my Mom's house. My grandparents are up from Florida, so we got the whole family together. What a blast! We had such a great day!

My Brother, My Granddad, and my Dad

The Ospreys!

Brian showing us how its done!

The crew!

Sia was not sure about poor Girly. Girly wanted to lick that poor
dog so bad. (The scar on her neck is from when she was attacked
by a Mountain Lion as a weanling)

Cormac!

A very sleepy Chi!

Chi is going for her first Jet Ski ride with her Granddaddy!

There they go!


The view from the pier



My Grandma!

My Brother

Matt and Jen

Scott and Heather

Grandma and Gwen playing in the pool!

Matt and Jen/Scott and Heather


Its been a crazy 2 weeks, but I think its finally starting to calm down. Thank Goodness...I'm exhausted!

Monday, June 3, 2013

Decisions...

My husband  and I sat down last night and talked about a lot of things...one being the fact that I really really really want another child. I know the risks. I lived through them. I lost my first child at 26 weeks. With Gwen, I was on bed rest at 11 weeks, had weekly dr appts, had weekly iron transfusions and delivered her 1 month early. Still, I really want another child. That being said....

One of the other things we talked about was possibly selling Tia. I really don't want to, and I really don't NEED to, but it would make life a lot easier not having her. She still needs work, but lots of people would love a nice, young horse to finish their own way. My concern is that even though I thoroughly check all my buyers when I sell, and I always sell with a first right of refusal clause, there is always the chance that she will end up somewhere non-savory. I don't know what I would do with myself if I ever found out she went back to Camelot, or was back to being abused and/or starved.

So.... do I sell her? Do I lease her? Do I lease with the option to buy?

What do I do?????