A Tank for Christmas

A Happy New Year to everyone and hopes that all had a very Merry Christmas. As has been the case with us for the past few years, Christmas was kept on the light side this year. Not much under the tree and just a bit of family gift exchanging. B did get her #1 wish for the Holiday though...a new food processor whose official name is Flashy Cuts Rebel. His short name is Tank. The Flashy part seems to suit him best as his a black beauty with what looks like it will prove to be an eye catching gait. He is a 5 year old Tennessee Walker that we purchased from the N.C. Boys and Girls Home in Lake Waccamaw. That may not sound like your average pipeline for quality horses, but you can never judge a book by it's cover. They have many very nice, well cared for horses. Tank is green as a gourd relative to any type of showing and will need a good deal of training and ground work, but looks to be well worth the effort. Task one will be getting him introduced to the current residents and seeing how things work out between him and our reigning ban boss, Apollo.

Pine Rock Fun

B participated in the annual Pine Rock Fun Show this past weekend in Kittrel, NC. As usual, the facilities looked great, the hosts were super and the turnout outstanding. We got off to a slow start in the morning events without placing in our first several classes. C had planned on participating but scratched her classes as the day progressed and proved to be a rather hot day for the middle of September. In the double show format, B brought home a 5th and 6th place ribbon on Missy in the Youth Trail Pleasure Western 2 Gait. Riding Red, she collected a 5th and 6th place in Country Pleasure Western Youth 2 Gait as well as a 5th place in Country Pleasure Western Open 3 Gait. Her best effort of the day was a 3rd place ribbon on Red in Country Pleasure English Open 3 Gait. In the Games portion of the show B and Red took a double 5th place in the Egg and Spoon class.

First Show of '09 Under Our Belt

It was a long time in coming, but we finally got enough clearance on our calendar to actually sneak in a horse show. Our first of 2009. School and travel basketball as well as rec and travel softball have dominated our "free time" since last fall. Friday evening we visited Wonderland Farms for a quick practice warmup. Saturday we kept to a simple class sheet with only four entries. With very little practice or lesson time in recent months, B and Apollo came home with a 3rd, 5th and 6th place finishes out of the four classes. Not too shabby, all things considered.

A Sight Seldom Seen

Anything more than an occasional flurry or a light dusting of snow is a rare event in southeastern North Carolina. Since moving to the farm some three and a half years ago, I cannot recall even an honest dusting. This week we got an legitimate snowfall. We love it, the horses, I think, don't.

Any port in a storm......Not

It has been an unusally dry and typically hot summer for our area. Our annual rain deficet has been gradually increasing each week. The numbers will show we did a lot of catching up today. The truth is, most of it wound up in the river. I was off today, babysitting one of our house horses, Lexi, a 65 pound boxer fresh off of surgery. In the early afternoon I passed off a few distant rumbles of thunder as yet another summer shower that come close but yet so far from our dry pastures. In a surprisingly short period of time we were beset with the most severe thunderstorm we have had in this area in some time. Frequent (and close) lightning, heavy rain and hail prevailed for almost four hours. Under the conditions, it was some time before I could bring myself to wade out to open the barn and bring the horses in to what would surely be a most welcome respit from the unrelenting rain and hail. Whether it was the deafening pounding of the hail on the tin roof or the sensing of my uneasiness, the almost unanimous concensous was the world was a better place out n the storm. The only decenting vote was from Captain, our eldest Walker who was probably confused and beleived it to be dinner time. Soggy, I returned to the house, more convinced than ever that the term 'horse sense' may be a bit overstated.

Deuce Comes South

After what seemed like hundreds of emails and numerous phone calls the deal was finally sealed for us to get Deuce, our newest Tennessee Walker, all the way from Wisconsin. For the past couple of years we have been vacationing the week of Thanksgiving at our time share in Pigeon Forge. In order to make the pickup, we took our horse trailer on vacation with us and scheduled the pickup to coincide with our trip home. We met the seller at a rest stop just outside of PF, on I-40.
It was a smooth exchange with no problem loading him on the unfamiliar trailer and we were on our way. No doubt is was a long hard day for Deuce. I'm sure he will be in for some more long days this spring as he begins to acclimate to the southern climate. He come to us with a thick winter coat which he will certainly need to get rid of, sooner than later.