So the Thursday before last, I had a dentist appointment and right after, we met up with a very generous donor, Jennifer G, who through Thrivent Financial offered to help pay for a portion of a brand new Ritchie automatic waterer. What's even more fantastic about this automatic waterer, we had received a grant donation through an anonymous donor (thank you to whoever you are!!!) through Fidelity Charity and between the two, the Ritchie automatic waterer was COMPLETELY paid for by these two generous donations. Words cannot express my gratitude for your generosity. I will sleep easy knowing that we wont' have any water problems and that I won't walk out one morning (or evening) to see an overflowing waterer with parts scattered all over the drylot. So thank you!! I'll post more on this soon.
Friday night was the typical crazy Friday night relaxing and snuggling with kiddos.
Saturday I went on a trail ride. I'm in charge of the Minnehaha County Saddle Club so I had to go even though the weather was questionable. But I went and rode for a couple of hours. The winds were bad but the trails are all in a hollow so it was great riding. I haven't been able to do much riding lately and I love trail rides.
Sunday I had a get together with some moms to do freezer meals. It's nice to have some meals stashed in the freezer for emergencies! It's all not horse related but in juggling work, kids, horses, and other extra activities, it's nice to know there's a meal waiting for me (even if it's in the freezer).
Monday I had forgotten to schedule my daughter's 2 year appointment so we headed over to get her looked at. All is well as always! We all did flu shots and I was convinced I' be sick on Tuesday because that's whats happened in the past. Luckily I was wrong. But we all crashed early. To the point where I slept on the hard wood floor the entire night... and didn't care.
Tuesday I had a very good friend come out after work and do some body work called Craniosacral on Bo. It was fun to watch the difference in Bo and how he relaxed. This was all before we knew what was truly going on with him. But I wanted to see if we could do some holistic and natural means of treating his ulcers. Mike had picked up some Ramona Feed and Bo devoured that like I devour chocolate. He's now completely on Ramona Feed (I'll talk more about that too). While we were with Bo, Mike was putting on the final pieces of Ondura sheet on the barn. There's still more work to be done on the barn but it'll have to wait until spring when it warms up. Ondura cant' bend in colder temps. But with a few more nails at the bottom of the sheets, we are done for the winter. And the barn will stay dry and there should be no leaks for the next 30 years (fingers crossed). Unfortunately, while Mike was cutting the sheets to size (this is why we didn't get it finished earlier), he sliced his leg open. He said it was a good thing I wasn't there because I would have made him go to the ER (his words!) We are already paying for one ER visit this summer and he didn't want another one so he superglued the cut shut. He's a manly man some days
Wednesday I took the day off because it was supposed to be the last nice day. I sent the kids off to school and daycare and got to work scraping the barn. I had no hope of getting it all done but I spent 1.5 hours scraping the entire top half of the barn and was ready for primer. Keep in mind I didn't go after the trim or some of the other stuff. I got to work on priming the barn but knew I'd run into trouble. We hadn't bought enough primer so I called Mike up and he met me half way so I wouldn't have to go into the store (and get cleaned up). I got right back to work and had the barn primed (along with what was scraped on my tack room and the new eave of the garage (just one side)) by 12:30!! I was hoofing it to get everything done! I hadn't thought I'd get that far. Of course I wasn't exactly OSHA certified in my methods. Scaffold, resting on a 4x4 with a 6 foot ladder on top. But that's the only way for me to have gotten it done. A little ladder would have forced me to go much slower and I wouldn't have gotten it done. By 1:30 the paint was dry enough and I went out and put a coat of paint on the barn (along with the tack room and eave of the garage). The tack room still needs A LOT more work, it looks rather silly only half painted on one wall but I'll take it. So the barn is officially painted. The top half has primer and paint, and the bottom half has primer and two coats of paint. So we'll hopefully last a while. It doesn't look red neck and it makes the place look less dumpy. Granted, it's only ONE wall of the barn and not all four sides. But at this point, beggars can't be choosers. But I'm happy to see the progress.
Thursday was Bo's vet appointment. I'll blog about that later. The news really was a blow to me. But after the appointment , I kept it together long enough to swing by and pick up the blankets that had been repaired and headed home. After unloading Bo and crying another river, I went to work putting water proofing on the blankets as they were talking snow on Friday. I got all but one blanket done before I ran out of time. I needed to get to the paying job as they are keeping me hopping too.
I was sorta numb on Thursday so I'm sorry for not posting more. It was all I could do even write those two frightful words, heart failure. But I'm coming to terms with it even though it's taken me this long to be able to write those words again. Only two other words scare me more, and those are meningococcal meningitis. That's what my son battled at 10 months old and survived with no lasting effects (he's one of the strongest people I know).
On Friday, I was still numb from the news but had to get everything in order to help out with our daycare's trunk or treat. We did the cowboy/cowgirl theme. But I had to rush around at 5am finding saddles and tack and whatnot (all in the dark, cold, and wind). Of course the tack was all of what I had lying around the house! So after the trunk or treat I was pretty well played out and hung out with the kids.
Saturday was not a pleasant day. Luckily I had the good sense to blanket Bo and Rain the night before so I knew they'd be snug. Saturday afternoon we took the kids to the Big Sioux Recreation Area Halloween Walk. It was ok but Leila decided that she needed a different costume. One that involved real blood. She fell and bonked her head on the road and as she put it "I ate rocks". She gashed herself and wouldn't you know, the EMTs and an ambulance appeared within 5 minutes. Yup, parent fail. She's no worse for wear other than a scraped up nose. And just as an aside, the ambulance and EMT were there for the walk itself, not because she'd fallen.
So you can see by Sunday, I was just done. We did run up to Madison to drop off mom and dad's camper. Mike winterized it for them and got it parked but Sunday was probably the first "lazy" day that we've had in months. I did have to scramble when we got home to get some chores done. We had to put hay in Saturday after all the commotion and the horses apparently pulled the nets off two of the bales. These are the small bales so the nets don't stay on well. We still have hay to unload off the trailer. We should have done it the Friday before last but I think both Mike and I were done in.
This week isn't going to be any quieter. Today is probably the quietest day and we'll be dealing with wind, which we've been dealing with all of last week. We're not talking a 20 mph wind, we're talking Wind Advisories and 40 mph wind with gusts even stronger. It wears on a body.
This week looks like more bad weather rolling in so there's a close eye on the horses, Mike suggested taking Tuesday off to put the new automatic waterer in before it really gets cold and we have problems (there's no heater on the waterer thanks to Maverick), and then there's the kids's Halloween activities. So another not so quiet week ahead of us to prep for winter.
So if I don't post much, it's not that we aren't here, it's that we are too busy. We still need to get a bunch of stuff wrapped up before any accumulating snow appears. Hopefully this week I'll have time to actually post but the paying job has me hopping. I'm behind in everything these days.
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