The Paint in Painting

I have paints. Really, I do. I just have not discussed them in a while. I have been out playing with them, being busy, and just not blogging about them. Lady is still growing like a weed. Kid #1 has been working with her on 4-H Showmanship, where she leads Lady around, demonstrating Lady's training at leading at a walk, trot, and standing. Yep, that is Lady's tongue sticking out.Lady was not really impressed with the lining up and standing. Foxy was really great at following kid #3 around, but not so good at the standing in a line, waiting for their turn to demonstrate a straight line at a trot, stopping, turning and trotting back.


Critter was giving the showmanship lesson with 4 kids and horses.

I had Belle in the arena, too.
Shooter was helping. His eye is so much better now. I still think that his vision is compromised, but he doesn't seem to be too affected. He just runs into things a little more than he used to.

The next day we had a riding lesson. With 4 kids. And 4 horses. Belle and Lady were not in attendance, which worried Foxy, so Kid #2 discussed the pythagorean theorem with her as they worked on control, gaits, and being calm. (I couldn't get him to just talk to her, so I made him tell her stuff)



It snowed 10 inches last week, so Lady has not had a bath recently. It is supposed to get to 72-76 degrees Farenheit today, so maybe the lake will disappear and it will be warm enough for baths. Belle and Lady really need them. We also need to get a Bobcat in an scrape the outdoor stalls. Yesterday, there was still some snow in the outdoor runs. Which means that the mud and muck is not so great right now. So in my brilliance yesterday, Critter and I decided to go on a trail ride. Without kids. Belle did not like this and threw a temper tantrum. During her tantrum, she slipped in the mud. I expected her to catch herself and lunge forward. (Anyone that has driven her knows that she can drop her butt pretty far and then lunge forward like she is in the horse pulls) In anticipation of the lunge, I kept my feet in the stirrups. 1800 lbs falling on the human body hurts. As soon as my right foot hit the ground, I had my left foot out of the saddle. It happened pretty fast, but I think that the soft footing actually saved both my leg and Belle. She caught my forearm with the horn (I think, its the only thing that I can think would have caught it)but she didn't roll all the way over. She scrambled to her feet and I rolled out of the way. Mr. BPA was fixing the barn door and came running. He made me demonstrate walking before he let me get back on. He also said that if I couldn't pull myself into the saddle, I couldn't get back on. We went for a very short ride then worked for a little while in the arena. By then, the adrenaline had worn off. My foot is broken. The 1st and third metatarsals. I might also have a hairline fracture in my radius (forearm). My knee is sore. Heck, the whole right side of my body hurts. Belle is good, she never limped or even felt too bad about the whole thing. Sometimes horses can tell if they messed up and stay with you when you come off, not Belle, she took off to find the herd.

Enough Pity party, I am still going to work and I have to practice not limping before my job interview later this week.

We are getting a new paint. She is a light sorrel tobiano. She was given to a coworker of Mr. BPA and all of his kids are gone now and they took their horses this week and he did not want to keep one horse all by herself. So she is coming to our house for Kid #1 to practice on until Lady is old enough. She is really friendly and let us pick up her feet and move around her without problems. We will have to see how she is under saddle. We are thinking of calling her Rose (as in Briar Rose, Sleeping Beauty's alter ego. With Belle and Lady, I like to keep with the Disney names. Ok, Lady was a dog, but it really fits her better than TinkerBelle)The new mare has another name, but it is the same as a girl at church and that would just be weird. So now, we will have 3 paints and the one Clydesdale, at least until Bart comes home.

Dumb Dog!

Saturday, Shooter got kicked in the head. This is nothing new for him. He gets kicked daily. His job, as he sees it, is to help move horses. He loves to chase the horses from the barn out to pasture. I was out of town(of course, I was, everything has to happen when I am out of town). I was in the middle of a presentation of trains, when I got a call. It was on vibrate. I hit the ignore button and texted, wxplaining that I was in a presentation and couldn't get out of my seat until the presentation was over. The reply was, "Shooter kicked. eye bloody. Don't know how bad."
I showed this to Mr. BPA (sitting next to me). Somehow neither one of us was too worried. When the presentation was over, I slipped outside to call. It was PANDALERIUM!(word stolen from Jeff Foxworthy) The kids were freaking out, Shooter's whole head was swelling. Blood was everywhere. The only view of the actual eyeball made my brother-in-law think that the eyeball was ruptured. Lovely. Somehow, I did not feel panic, I made a few comments on facebook, but since he was running around and actually tried to herd the horses back to the barn, I wasn't too concerned.

I stayed in Casper(hey, we went to the BIG city!) and finished my stuff. When I got home, Shooter looked like something out of a horror film. His eye was so swollen that I couldn't pry it open. There was a cut right above the eye. He was pretty out of it from the painkillers, but he was thumping his stump of a tail and was happy to see me. I gave him a shot of antibiotics, and put some antibiotics on his open wound. I still did not get too worked up about it. ---side note---- I get worked up over everything. Rascal having her kittens made me crazy. Foxy having lady put me over the edge. One of the reasons why we haven't looked too hard at breeding Belle is that I would be living in the barn for the entire gestation period. By the end, I would be institutionalized. I babied Tigris when Sergeant stepped on him. When Shooter got kicked in the fall, I let him recuperate in the house. I get really worked up, hysterical about EVERYTHING, so I really am not sure why I was so relaxed about this.

Sunday, he still looked bad. I got him all doctored up and went to church. He started looking better that afternoon. He even tried jumping into the water troughs to cool off.

Monday, the swelling went way down. He had muscle control over his eye brows and around the eye. I could see that the eyeball was not punctured. The lens was not intact. The cut above the eye is looking better.

Tuesday, he is out and about helping with chores, stealing Belle's grain, annoying the cats. He even came out to the gate to guide me in when I came home that night -- he really likes to have the vehicle follow him to its parking spot. It makes me worried that he is going to get run over. He also could not settle down that night, he was jumping up, hitting the windows, trying to get his nemesis, the evil black and white cat from down the road. The cat was taunting him and eating the cat food on the porch. There was a cat fight in the girls' room, he had to get involved with that.

Wednesday, today, he opened up his eye wound again, but other than that, he is acting fairly normal. He is no longer hitting into my leg as we walk so that I can protect his bad side. He can see light and dark, but I am fairly certain that it is blurry. Its hard to tell with him because he is not real bright, anyway.

So, he is going to be fine. Heavy sigh. Good, I don't want to lose my dog. Then we would only have Harley. Not the best trail dog.