Wet and cold rainy day

So it's nearly Thursday and I haven't written a thing this week. I have been busy with getting the house, yard and barn cleaned up. There's always something to be done and frankly I'd rather be outside on nice days then inside. Thankfully for my few readers, it's rainy and cold here today and I'd rather be inside then out today! We went from very nice sunny weather, to cold, wet and rainy. The Girls are fairing ok, but I can tell they are looking forward to the sun coming back. Right now they are outside in the rain. The stalls have been deconstructed so they can't go in the barn. They don't seem to mind too much, I gave them some hay to munch on and that helps I think. I feel bad for them, but they are tough ladies and I think they will be ok. Once the barn is done I won't have to worry about this anymore and that will be nice. We had some of the manure scraped out but now I have a pond where the mud bog used to be. I can't win. I'm hoping it will dry out once we get some sun and dry weather, but I won't hold my breath. I need to have it filled in with gravel or something so the water can sink to the bottom and the horses and I can walk on the top. I still don't understand how we can live on a hill and still be so muddy and wet.

I'm looking forward to sunny nice weather so I can maybe ride these beasts that I do so much work for. I spend enough money and time on these damn horses, I want to be able to ride them!! Soon enough, that will come. I still have the whole summer a head of me. I just don't want the whole summer to go by and me saying in the fall, "oh well, there's always next summer". At least I have a horse trailer now so I can go to a few local rides, shows and clinics.

No pictures today. It's too cold and wet for me to leave my comfy couch. Well, ok, maybe I can find ONE pic for you to look at and give this post some color.

There! I leave you with My dog Eve and Mr. fluffers on my bed. Now I'm done.

The barn is coming along nicely. The new sills are being put in and the stalls are being re-arranged. We are making a loafing shed in the back of the barn for the horses to just chill out in during bad weather. The guy who is doing the barn is amazing. He really does a nice job! He is easy to get along with too, which is nice since he is here all of the time.

This pic was taken a few weeks ago.


This pic is newer, within the past week.


We got a freak late snow last week.

We bought a truck finally. It's a Dodge Ram. It's about time we had a work truck. I like driving it a little better then my Jeep but maybe that's just because it's new to me. Or maybe it's because it's a truck.


New truck, well, not new, but new to us!


New (to us) horse trailer to go with new (to us) truck.

And yes, we did buy a horse trailer, another finally. I've had horses for 20 years give or take and I have never had one of these things! I'm like a proud new momma with my toys. I got the decals off today with the help of a hair dryer so now it just says farm and Maine. I would like it to be changed to Classical Banjo Farm, Limington, Maine. I need to find a decal person.

I know my posts have been non existent and short and scattered lately but with all the things going on around here I haven't had time to write or the attention span for it. I hope to fix that this week and catch up on here. My writing skills are lacking and I would also like to fix that as well. My goal for the week is to do at least 4 posts. We'll see how that goes! I know not many people read this blog and this blog is really just meant to keep tabs on the horses and things going on around here and record progress. I want to see things transform and be able to look back and say "Wow, I remember that! Look how far it's come now!"

Mystic's first saddle on her back

No there was no bucking, rearing or freaking out. In fact, she looked bored by it all. It was very uneventful, so all of you looking for a rodeo, better luck next time!


Hmmmm, what's this?


Ok, I guess


Whatever


After I got the saddle on her with no problems (she just stood there and looked bored), I put my weight into the stirrup and leaned on her back. Nothing. I didn't want to push it and get into the saddle all the way, plus I didn't have anyone else nearby just in case. Next time I do this I will have someone else outside with me so I can sit my big bum in the saddle. She's been really good with all of this though and I'm keeping my fingers crossed that things will keep going so smoothly. Calm, slow and short. That's how I want to keep her lessons.

I rode Gypsy on a trail today. She did well. I notice though that she gets a little unsure on new trails and acts up more but if it's a trail she knows, she's ok. She's getting there. I hope this nice weather we are having will keep up so I can get a few more rides in this week. I rode the sand pit loop today with Gypsy and even though she doesn't know the trail well, she wasn't too bad. She could have been better, but I'll try her out there again tomorrow or tuesday and see how she does. I do think she will make a nice trail horse, but we do have a lot of things to work on first. She's almost ok with water crossings, which is nice. She doesn't like dark mud though. She knows how to be pig headed but if I just ride her through it she settles a bit. I need to teach her to settle more. At least she is walking forward now! We've come a long way!

Some pictures to go with the post below.

Ok, so I got over my laziness and decided to post pictures. If you read the post below, these pics will make a little more sense.


Flowers in the garden blooming.


Pudgy, one of my many barn cat helpers.


Mystic, AKA Doodles, by the barn.


The girls by the barn. Everything is still messy, but getting there.


Gypsy nibbling what little grass there is in the paddock. Notice there is less mud? I do!


The green post is one of the new T-posts that I'm re-doing all the fence posts with.


The new paddock. Notice the green grass right outside of the brown area. The brown area is the new section, the green area is the lower pasture.


Some of my fencing handiwork. I used the stumps from the pine trees that we cut down during the winter as fence posts.


The new paddock.

A quick update

The last few days of March was awful. It rained and rained and rained. Everything was flooded. Needless to say, my pasture was also flooded and muddy. The horses were standing in knee deep mud. I talked to a lot of people about my mud problem and they all told me the same thing, just wait for better weather and wait for it to dry. Thanks for the tip. Thankfully though, better weather has come and it's been beautiful out, nice and warm and sunny. My mud problem is in fact drying up, except by the gate, and things are looking better. The grass is coming up in the lower pasture, but the horses still aren't allowed in there yet. It's still too soon. I don't want them killing the grass by putting them down there too early in the season. I'm still not even sure if Gypsy should have grass because of her laminitis. She's been symptom free for 5 or 6 months but I still don't want to risk it and lose the summer because she got too much grass too soon. I guess I'll have to hand graze her for 5 minutes a day and work her up from there. I opened another section of paddock the other day. I had done it to get them out of the mud, it's a little drier since it's up on a hill but it's still a bit muddy. It looks nice though. I meant to take pics the other day, but I forgot. There is no grass in the new paddock since it used to be pine trees. I figure they can bum around in there for the spring and turn it over with their feet and maybe I'll be able to seed it in the fall with some winter rye or something like that. I'm still learning about this farming and pasture management stuff. I'm getting there though. It's just so hard to maintain 11 acres, 4 out buildings, the house, and all the animals by myself. Other people live here, but they don't help me much. Sometimes I wish I could sit around and do nothing all day. I have plans for this place, and I want it to look nice so there are no rest days for me. The barn is coming along. It turns out that it can be saved and that's what we are doing, saving the old barn. A new barn would be wonderful, but I do love the old barn and the beams and it's history. We want to put it back as close to how it used to be as possible. I'll post pics of it soon. In fact, I'll have to post pics of the new paddock and baby chicks too. The chicklets are getting big! They almost look like chickens now. Right now, I am too lazy to deal with blogger's picture uploader. It just seems like so much work right now. I worked 9am to 2pm today and then did some raking and yard work so right now, everything seems like too much work. I am tired. I swear, when you live on a farm, you don't need a gym membership!