Friday’s Hunt July 30th

Can you believe that in 2 days its August?
Already?
Summer is flying by…
I’ve finished first cutting of our hay, and have more in my first cut that I had all last year. I’ve broken my baling bin, and Hubby’s plan today is to build something to do the task for me. Which is good, because I have my last few bales worth finishing drying and will be ready for baling this afternoon.

We’re coming up on 4 years here.
August 16th makes 4 years of Farm life.
And yet, it feels like a life time. 🙂

In 4 years we’ve gone from our little urban “farm” to a rural one, raised pigs, meat chickens, hennys for eggs, and cared for 4 lovely equines.
In 4 years we’ve redesigned this property to produce food for us, with a 24×40 garden (and this year, I actually got much of it planted!), 9 smaller raised beds, and a whole bunch of fruit trees and bushes.
Last week, I savored the first 2 honeyberries that came off our bushes.
Today I’m planting 2 red currant bushes, which, should they do well, will be propagated into a nice little orchard of currants.

It’s been a lot of work, and we’ve got a long way to go to get to where we want to be.
I still don’t have a milking animal, and we are still planning on bison. Those are adventures still to be written about…but for today, I have my images for Friday’s Hunt hosted by Teresa at Eden Hills.

Prompts are Starts with D, Favorite, and Photographer’s Choice.

Starts with D

The lilies are blooming, which in my world means a photo shoot with horses. As always, Astrid gets excited to join in on the fun, because humans and bug juice and pets and scritches and oh my!!
And then, when it’s her turn, she begins to wonder if this is all as fun as she though it might be…

“Uh, wait…
This isn’t what I thought was going to happen!”
~ Astrid

I figured, since she was relaxed, and enjoying the attention, that putting the lilies in her mane would be easy peasy…nope, she turned into a big old dork and kept flinging her head up, saying “No! I don’t want that!!”
Silly Girl. 😉

Favorite

This one… ❤

And this one… ❤

And this one… ❤

Photographer’s Choice

❤

Friday’s Hunt x2

I figure after making all the way through the alphabet last round, I should make just as much of an effort to do the same this round.
I make it sound like it’s hard work, but it’s not, and this really is one of my favorite link ups to join in on.
Life just gets busy at times, so some weeks will be double prompt weeks…like this week is. 😉

We’ll start with last week’s prompts:
Starts with B, Unbalanced and Door

Starts with B

I don’t have a horse whose name starts with b, however, we did go to a rodeo last weekend, so I have a photo of a bucking bull for this one.

The air this bull got was amazing.

I am in absolute awe of the athleticism of these bulls.
For the past few years, we’ve seen the same bulls over and over again, and it’s obvious these guys know their job is to buck, and they enjoy it.

Unbalanced

No matter how many times I watch a horse get up, I hold my breath just a little bit. They look so unbalanced, and legs can be so fragile.

Lookin’ a little drunk there, Astrid. 😉

And then they’re up, and we’re all fine. 😉

Door

Heh, when it doubt for a prompt like this, I go back to images from the Stable…there’s always something I can use!
Like this:

This young lady and her trusty steed silhouetted by the light from the big door.
They stood like this for a few moments after their ride, just enjoying the view and each other.
❤

This week’s prompts:
Starts with C, Building and Something I Wear

Starts with C

Are you expecting a Cookie picture?
Ha!
This time, it’s a cat…my GhostCat.

Being adorable…

He had found a length of rope in the grass and was playing with it. Rolling and singing, tossing it in the air and pouncing.
Happy, normal cat things.
Wonderful things to see from my former feral tomcat.
Guy gets neutered and remembers how to play.
🙂

Building

We finally gotten all of the winter straw bales moved to around the pig yard. The last two were the one’s on the north side of the garage, which made for a small cubby beside the building where the horses could hide from southern winds. Rare around here in winter, but still happened enough to place a couple of bales as windbreaks.
Ruby figured this was a great place to sleep in the sunshine:

All that’s missing here is her horn.

Something I Wear

It’s that time of year…
Outside a lot, sun shining, cutting hay and weeds and working with animals.
A hat is a must…but hats get sweaty, so they need to hang to dry.

You can tell which one is mine, by the hook it’s on. 😉

Sharing with Friday’s Hunt hosted by Teresa at Eden Hills.

Where There’s Smoke…

There’s Ruby, in there like a dirty shirt. 😉

Last night, close to sunset, the bugs were bad…like carry you away, drain your blood, drop your carcass for the horse flies to finish off, bad…B.A.D.

So, we lit a smudge for the horses.

As close as she can get…

I learned fast with Ruby, we cannot have a smudge fire with out it being inside the corral panels. The very first time I lit a smudge, I did it on the concrete pad behind the garage…figured it was perfect, because that’s where I had piled manure all winter. Manure smolders and smokes beautifully for bug control.
Well, Ruby decided to stand in the smudge, and then roll in it.
Now we make sure she can’t hurt herself, but still gets the benefit of the smoke.

So nice with out the bugs buggin’…

Even Astrid was enjoying the time without bugs all over her.

Oh, but the best was Ruby making faces…

Licking the smoke out of the air…

Absolute bliss…

Strikin’ a pose…

She stayed in the smoke for a good 45 minutes, and then wandered off to eat. Over the evening and well into the small hours of the morning, everyone took turns standing around in the smoke.
Doesn’t take them long to figure out that the scent of smoke on them keeps the bugs off even after they move away from the smudge.

Sharing with Friday’s Hunt hosted by Teresa at Eden Hills.
The new round has begun, and all the prompts are highlighted in my post. 🙂

Friday’s Hunt July 2nd

I made it.
Wheeee!!
I absolutely freaking made it…
Okay, I may have had to do a double post or two, but I did all the letters of the alphabet this round of Friday’s Hunt hosted by Teresa at Eden Hills.
There’s a prize for that, right?
No?
Okay, I’ll be happy with bragging about it. 😉

This week’s prompts are Starts with Z, Week’s Favorite and Dessert.
I’m also going to sneak in an image for The Daily Post’s prompt of passenger. 🙂

Starts with Z

Astrid ❤

Doesn’t she look completely adorable catching some zzzz’s?
Some day, I’m going to catch a video of her snoring. 🙂

Week’s Favorite

2 of them…
My 2 images for Canada Day.
Which was yesterday, and yes, I’m late posting them due to computer issues, including the need for an entire new tower. Now we’re fixed, and back to work.

Ruby

Cookie

Happy 150th to our wonderful country! ❤

Dessert

A little while back, we were given a watermelon to share with the animals. Piggies? Not impressed. But they were younger and unsure of this new food we were offering them.

Hennys was a much different story…

Can you see the watermelon in the fray?

Less than 3 minutes and the hennys polished off their watermelon dessert.

Oh, and yesterday, Astrid had a passenger:

Hubby and Little Red

While I was introducing The Cookie to my brother (she’s really not a people horse 😉 ), Hubby decided to hop up on Little Red and go for a walk.

Catching up on the Friday’s Hunt

All right, so I missed last week.
It’s been gray and gloomy and rainy here.
Not much for pictures, and even less energy…but this week, I’m catching up with prompts from last week as well.

First set of images are for the prompts Starts with X, Week’s Favorite and Insect.

Starts with X

When you have no idea how to approach a prompt, you hit the google and type in “words that start with x” and read the Scrabble websites for ideas.
That’s how I hit upon “xenobiotics”…though, now that I think of it, I coulda just used Xena, my warrior princess barn cat. LOL! Mighta been too easy…

Anyways…xenobiotics are something we use on the Girls. In fact, we spend quite a bit of money on them and a ton of time trying to apply them…a xenobiotic is a “chemical foreign to or not produced by an organism” such as a pesticide…’round here we call it “bug juice” and we slather it on the horses as much as possible.

After a healthy (or maybe not so healthy) application bug juice, we see this sight a lot!

Bug juice makes for happy horses, because sleeping is so much easier. ❤

Week’s Favorite

Ruby ❤

Do I really need to explain why this is a favorite? I’m sure I don’t. 🙂

Insect

With the rains, come the mosquitoes…and that’s our insects. Many, many, many insects.
Which is why we spend so much money on xenobiotics (I’m loving using that! lol!) so that instead of running and stomping, we see this:

Nice face, Roo 😉

Much better than dropping weight running from bugs, or messing up hooves and legs from stomping. I’ll give ’em toxic skin coatings to save the other parts of them. 😉

Now, for this week’s prompts. They are Starts with Y, Week’s Favorite and Splash.

Starts with Y

Ruby does some morning yoga stretches, while eyeing me. Just in case there’s some sort of horse treat coming to the fence…

(there were no treats to be had this day…because Round Ruby does not need treats. 😉 )

Week’s Favorite

This:

The Cookie having fun.

After her bout of achy, painful joints keeping her down, this was wonderful to see. Her playing, leaping, bucking, kicking and cantering.
Does this woman’s ❤ good to see.
The near daily application of the ointment is helping her.
I’m loving that.

Splash

Splashing and playing in the rains…

Oy! Dirty girl!

Taken out the livingroom window while the rains were coming down…they were just having a grand time running and playing.

Sharing for Friday’s Hunt hosted by Teresa at Eden Hills.

Friday’s Hunt June 11th

Well, it’s been an interesting week here.
I swear, I’m just itching to have a boring-as-the-day-is-long week, I’m telling you! lol
But, the grand news is, I have finally got some tomato plants in the garden…as well as all my peppers are in, both some hot and some sweet ones.
I have a few more tomatoes to get in, then the carrots, beets, beans and peas. If Hubby manages to get more tilling done, then, I’ll stick a pumpkin or two and some leafy greens.
All in all, it’s not going to be the huge garden I want, but, its way better than last year’s nothing.
And next year…well, next year, I’m going to make it work all over. 😉

Prompts for Friday’s Hunt hosted by Teresa at Eden Hills this week are Starts with W, Week’s Favorite, and Pastel.

Starts with W

What is that I see over there, in the shade beside the fence?

Why, it’s a pile of piggies having a nap.
And oh, what a piggie pile it is!!

Andy Piggie says “Listen Food Lady, if you aren’t bringing us food, then why are you waking us up?”

Well, I wasn’t trying to wake them up. I only wanted a few pictures of them being cute, but when they hear me coming, they jump up, looking for treats and scratches (mostly treats).

Week’s Favorite

Once again, my dear sweet horse spent a week not quite herself.
With the impending rain storm, I thought she might have been in the process of that very unpleasant “C” word that horse owners don’t like to use because we don’t ever want to give that word any sort of Power over our equines…
There has also been a wealth of flies and a few mosquitoes hanging about.

I spent the grocery money on bug juice…between the Konk sprayer in the shelter, and a Konk spray I can use right on her, she’s getting some relief.
But she’s sore. The damp is kicking her right in the arthritis (and last night during beet pulp, I found a mark where someone *ahem*Astrid*ahem* landed a kick on her hock), and we’re looking at adding some new supplements.
I’m trying to manage things as much as possible without using pain meds.
I have good reason for that.
I’m not saying I won’t give her pain meds, but I’m hoping to avoid that for as long as possible.

So, last night, after giving her a good once over with the new bug spray, some stretches and a back rub, I left her to her own devices. Which was the overwhelming need for a nap. I hadn’t even made the house when I heard her heave a big sigh…I turned to see her laying down comfortably, dozing. I went for Voldemort…

Near onto 10 at night, bugs are horrible, and she’s napping…<3

Look at that bottom lip. That’s a sleeping Girl.
I almost let out a shriek of triumphant joy…almost. But that would have woken her, and I didn’t want to do that.
Instead I went back to the deck, enjoyed a glass of wine with my eau’d’equine parfum lingering and watched her sleep.

Pastel

As I sat there, listening to my horse snore (by gosh and golly gee, that’s a beautiful sound…Black Horse snoring. ❤ ) I watched the moon rise. It had a lovely pale red glow to it, and I wondered…could I get away with using that as “pastel” this week?
Then I thought, it’s my blog, of course I can! 😉

Moon over the Farm

Through the trees…

Today is another day…
I’ve spent the morning with my Girl, cold hosing that leg that took the kick, and she’s feeling better. The dampness has eased off (since we’ve had 2 days of rain!) and she’s getting a hoof trim this afternoon.
Hubby dug out a few samples of Absorbine horse liniment that we were given, and I massaged that into her back and pelvic area…
So far, so good. 🙂
And now, I’m sending him and The Kid out driving…they can go to the nearest pet/tack shop and price out a bigger bottle of the liniment. While she gets some driving practice in.

Have a great week ahead, friends.
We’re working on a better one here.
❤

Friday’s Hunt June 4th

So, we’re well on our way to having the garden in…
Yesterday, The Kid and I got our last few small beds planted. She put in 300 kidney beans. Sounds like a lot, but you pretty much plant them, and then ignore them until the pods are finished and dried. The joy of a dry bean. However, that also means they don’t produce continuously, like most other beans. Bush bean, pole beans, they’ll produce more flowers and pods the more you pick them. Which is why we’ll also plant 2 types of pole beans, and a purple bush bean…for fresh eating and putting up for the winter.

Today, the plan is to work on the main garden bed…I did say, I will have a garden this year. It’s just going to take a whole lotta heavy lifting. 😉
Good thing we’re not afraid to get out hands dirty.

This week’s prompts for Friday’s Hunt hosted by Teresa at Eden Hills are Starts with V, Week’s Favorite and Inch.

Starts with V

Now that we’re in June, summer vacation is coming up for The Kid. Already. The school year has flown past, I tell ya…
We won’t however, be taking any sort of family vacation. That’s just not something we can do…not with these guys:

My toddlers.

Truth be told, I’m not much of a vacation person anyways…I like to stay close to home, and I do love my Farm. 🙂
(And yes, Sable is doing exactly what you think she is…)

Week’s Favorite

3 horse down…flat babies in the sunshine.

Life rarely presents fully finished photographs.
An image evolves, often from a single strand of visual interest – a distant horizon, a moment of light, a held expression.

~ Sam Abell

Inch

My helper cat, Sir Maximillion…helping me do what I do best…take pictures of the horses at sunrise:

Thankfully, he helped without his usual stance of having his butt an inch from my face. It’s really hard to take pictures like that.
LOL!

Friday’s Hunt May28th

Yet another day of rain.
Last weekend it rained for 2 days straight, and we didn’t get the garden tilled.
Yesterday, we were at the Stable, and by the time we got home, it was too late for yard work…well, once chores were done…and I was ready for wine.
So, tilling got shoved off to today. And now? Rain.
*sigh*

Next week, after work, we’ll have to get it done. I have tomatoes, and peppers that need a big dirt place to grow. 😉
They’re out-growing their little pots, and ready to branch out.
Oh, and The Kid’s sunflowers are already 2 feet tall…in the house.
lol
We need to get things planted…
We’ll get there.

This week’s prompts for Friday’s Hunt hosted by Teresa at Eden Hills are Starts with U, Week’s Favorite, and Kids.
I’ll also be sharing this with The Daily Post, who’s prompt today is Radiate.

Starts with U

It can be difficult to come up with an idea for U…
Luckily, I was out taking pictures behind the barn at the Stable yesterday, and the sky was a gorgeous blue…shades of ultramarine perhaps?
Maybe I’m grasping at straws with the colour.
Henry sure looks upset with Remus…they were just playing though.
Horses don’t always play nice. Oft times teeth and hooves are involved…and sometimes the photographer (me!) is lucky enough to capture the shot.

Remus (left) and Henry

As an aside, Henry was the very first horse The Kid rode at the Stable…she fell head over heels in love with him and we started down our path of horses. All this *waves arms around her* can be blamed on the delightfully silly black gelding.
Not that I’m complaining. 😉

Week’s Favorite

Tough one this week.
I had a very good week with my camera.
Yay!!
So, I’ll give y’all these 2:

Waking up from a nap…

We’re having tea together in the mornings.
Every spring, with the planting going on around us, she has allergy issues with her eyes. So, we share a cup of sweet tea while I use the cooled tea bag to clean the crusties out of her eyes.
In the fall, with the harvest, we’ll do it all over again.

I love this one… ❤

All the dust is from our neighbours, who have a race track in the back of their property. They race beater cars for fun on Friday and Saturday nights.
It’s all in good fun, and the dust makes for a grand back drop for black horses. If you look close, she has 1 long piece of hay hanging out of her mouth…she carried that with her from the west side of the pasture, trotting around in a tizzy because of the cars on the track…a 1/2 mile away.
Silly horse. 😉

Kids

I always call my horses 1200lb toddlers.
Horses are just like kids.
Yesterday at the barn, Marty, that adorable little paint gelding, showed just how much like kids horses really can be…
Every day, the horses are brought back into the barn for their grain, and to be tucked in for the night.
It’s been beautiful out this past week, so they’ve been staying out later and later, and wanting to come in less and less.
Poor Marty, the last thing he wanted to do was to come in…

“I’m just eating this bit of grass here first, ‘kay?”
~Marty

And then, when the stablehand went to get him, he turned around and trotted back out to his corral…where he discovered everyone else had already come in for their grain.
LOL!
So he turned and reluctantly came in and went to his stall.
He was just like a little kid crying “I don’t wanna go to bed!”

And finally, another favorite from the week:

Cookie practices her unicorn poses as the sun rises.

“People are influenced by what we are, what we radiate.
This has greater appeal than what we say.”
~Maharishi Mahesh Yogi

She has most definitely been radiating peace and calm energies lately.
That is a wonderful thing. ❤

Friday’s Hunt May 14th

Happy Mother’s Day.

If your kids have 2 feet or 4 feet…
If your kids are no longer with you, for any reason…
If motherhood in your world is complicated…
If you’re the picture perfect Mama…

Happy Mother’s Day.

I see you. ❤
I feel you. ❤
I love you. ❤
Thank you for all you do.
You got this. ❤

Happy Mother’s Day.

This week’s prompts for Friday’s Hunt hosted by Teresa at Eden Hills are Starts with S, Week’s Favorite, and Family.

Starts with S

Hmmm, I don’t know what we could use for S…
Might be too hard of a prompt for me. 😉
LOL!
Of course, starts with s would have to be our dear sweet Sable.

Someone once asked me if I was going to dedicate myself to the service of Epona since I have horses… I said, “Since I have horses, I am already in Her service.”

Our amazing golden Girl, who someone dropped at auction with no explanation why, but we were Blessed to meet and fall in love with.
She is meant to be here.

Week’s Favorite

Another one who is meant to be here…
He came here from who knows where, feral and frightened of all humans.
It took The Kid and I near onto 2 years to convince him that humans can be trusted. He’s become my FarmYard pal, following me all over, talking up a storm. We just recently got him neutered, so he’ll stop heeding the call to find a willing female to spread his rugged handsomeness around the community. 😉

Ghost

Dang, the boy knows how to pose for a picture.
He’s so good-looking!

Family

Here we have Miss Xena…

 

This little missy is one of 3 of Ghost’s kittens who are still here.
Of our 5 remaining barn cats, 4 are family, and 2 in the house are related as well (Nancy and Daisy Mae).
Xena is a fantastic huntress.
This kitty took down a seagull on her own!
Of course, all the Ghost babies seem to have skill hunting…
Xena with gulls, Gabrielle is an expert with rodents, and Trouble?
Yeah, Trouble has taken down smaller geese.

That’s pretty darn amazing!

Friday’s Hunt May 7th

I must admit, we are all feeling much better.
Thank goodness! It’s been a tough couple of weeks, with all of us being down in some way.
This whole farming lifestyle does not play well with being sick, I tell ya! 😉

I did get out last week to take some pictures, and yesterday, we had a wonderful afternoon of grooming and pampering the Girls.
That was so great for the Spirit…even if I did scare Cookie a time or 2 with my coughing. lol

And, I’m even on time for my offerings for this week’s Friday’s Hunt hosted by Teresa at Eden Hills.
The prompts are Starts with R, Week’s Favorite and Window…

Starts with R

Who else but our loveable Ruby?

She was such a great Girl yesterday! ❤

See?
Purple halter…not her red breakaway, because she’s been a very good Girl about getting haltered to work, and then being released.
She’s come a long way, our Ruby Girl has, and we’re super proud of her. ❤
Now, if only that Cookie would give up her breakaway…*sigh*

Week’s Favorite

Speaking of The Cookie…

❤

My beautiful Girl having a nap…in the pile of hay.
Of course!
Where else do you nap, but in the pile of expensive food that Mama puts out for you to eat?!?
Brat. 😉

Window

I had a very small window of opportunity to capture this next image…
I was scratching Astrid’s withers, and it was a darn good scratch. So much so, she reached out to groom Ruby (because we don’t allow the horses to groom us…) and in order to catch it, I had to dash backwards and push the button in time, before Astrid stopped.

“Oh, such a good scratch!
Feels soooooo good!”
~Astrid

I’m glad I was able to capture at least one shot!
Have a great week friends…