Click the link: treadlightly.org/responsible-horse/recreation

   Trying to teach my Granddaughter safe, and responsible behavior on the trail has it's challenges at times. Twelve year old girls seem to have no concept of the dangers of equine ownership. My next priority is teaching her safety on the trail. No matter where we travel.

Hay shortage in Texas...

   Findly we have enough hay to make it til' the next season. Early June we put up enough for two horses. Since we added the other horse, we had to get some more. We picked up another forty bales last weekend from Tractor Supply. I think the number is around 150 bales total, plus two round bales so far. We may pick up 3 or 4 more to set out this winter. Since the winters in Texas aren't that harsh, we may get by without them.
  
   I've been checking out local resources and hay has nearly doubled in some cases since we intially picked up our first batch. We payed $6 a bale for Tifton 85 in June. Last weekend, we payed $8.25 a bale. This weekend it's almost doubled. I don't know what some folks are going to do about feeding there animals. Ron had a gut feeling it may be a bad year, so he didn't waste any time putting up enough to feed our livestock.

  

Real endurance riding...

Living in the city makes it harder these days to ride safely. Cars whizzing by, the lack of respect for pedestrians, much less riders on their horses. People making a big deal out of you crossing an intersection. Hell, I had a lady come out of her house a year back. She picked up a sign of sorts, carrying it along with her as we were riding on the median across from her house. She yelled across at us. "do you speak english?" Now my Grandaughter was accompanying me along the way on her own horse. Replying to the woman, "yup, I speak english. What kind of question is that?" She began telling us, that our mexican friends were always using her pasture as a short cut. I'm not Hispanic! lol But, we do live in an area where the population is probably 70% Hispanic. Do I care? Nope! They're people too. But, she obviously didn't mind sharing her unsolicited opinion.
Now personally, from my street experiences, while horseback riding, 'people are crazy! and some folks have no respect for, public or private property,' no matter what ethnic origin they come from. How ever, I understood her concern. She certainly wasn't aware, I do respect folks property and I to, don't want horses on our manicured yard. And it was, after all her property, and she didn't want the horses crossing it. But the way she was wagging that sign around made me think, she might, wave it in the horses faces and cause a unwanted or needed incident. Ranting on that we need to tell our other rider friends, "stay off my property" was a little bizarre, since in my mine, we had nothing to do with any of it. As we were crossing towards where our cut off was, she got closer with that sign. My horse particularly, was getting nervous at her presence. High stepping with her head in the air, and my Grandaughters horse was side-stepping the other direction in the street. I finally had to get mouthy and tell the lady, "you better take your unhappy ass back-up to your house or I was going to be unpleasant in the end. Still continuing to follow us, her nasty behavior and disgusting mouth, we just ignored her til' we passed her property. Well, I almost never! The things we had to endure just to ride down the road these days.

Photo Editing

I found the coolest online photo editor. It's called LunaPic. I was amazed at the capabilities and it's totally free! Can't beat that...

 This is a color bar image.

This gives a painting on canvas appearance. Then I turned it into a button. I put on the corners and edges using Snapfish.

There is no relief from this hot weather!

Ok, so I know, I shouldn't wake up in a bad mood. I really try to get motivated in the morning with a warm shower for my aching muscles, a decent breakfast and checking out the animals before work. This morning I found myself moody and stressed. No expected relief from the weather forecast makes me cringe. I've had a terrible case of cabin fever. It's unbearable to spend to much time on the outside. The high of 108 today, means I'll be cooped up again. The animals on the place seem depressed as well. The horses are already standing lifeless in the back pasture area. The dogs don't want to get out of the air-conditioned kennel even long enough to do there nature call. Now that's friggin hot! Work has slowed down to a crawl, I get off earlier than usual, and I still can't spend time outside. All of us are moping around at the home front.

Experimenting with Windows Paint...

   Messing around this morning with paint, got under my skin. I see a lot of cool designs and I want em'! Here's my first attempt at making a jpg. design I can use. I'd like to learn to make website templates for the horse minded folks out there. Any how...take one! haha

Saturday feeding time...

 Mouse always the beats the other two to the gate when it's meal time. He sure did get use to this place quickly.

 Waiting on his grain.

 Look at that happy horse face! hahaha

 Handsome found out it was time for eating.

Jerzey dragging up the rear. She never gets in a hurry to go any where.  

They almost all look alike from behind.

We feed Purina Stradegy, with vegetable oil and electrolytes in the summer. If we ride daily, they get all the hay they can eat, and plenty of water. It helps to maintain a good weight.

It just seemed to be cooler, NOT!

We turned the horses out on the pasture after our ride this morning. As I was looking around at the grass, taking pictures of the areas surrounding the hay ring. As I looked above, there were bright blues skies, and lifeless clouds scattered about. The atmosphere seemed hazy. Dust covering the ground like consistency of powder makes it hard to breath. I hadn't even remembered seeing any creepy crawly things running about.

   

 The only pretty things left on the place are the flowers in pots I water daily.