Sunday, August 30, 2009

Station Fire heading toward Acton.........

Hello friends, I should be in bed right now. We had a little party and roping for Paul's birthday Saturday. We all had a blast and of course the house was a wreck after the party and I was cleaning up and Jeremy was on the computer. Then the phone rings..........it is never good when the phone rings late at night. It was my Mom, Sallie. The fire was heading over the mountain towards Acton. She said I might want to hook up the trailer and get down there. It was almost 11pm by the time I was heading out and when I got about halfway to the pavement looking south all you could see was a red glow over the mountains. It was at least an hours drive but I got there pretty quick. Vickie her other daughter was already there and they had packed up a bunch of the valuables and had gotten them some bags packed. Sid, who is just shy of his 90th birthday, thankfully agreed to leave without too much fuss with his nephew. Sallie said she is sure it was cause I had showed up and he felt like the horses would be taken care of. That made me feel good. So it was 1am by then and we all just sat watching the news trying to decide at what point do we load up. So the three of us had just laid our heads down and had maybe gotten about 30 minutes of sleep when we hear sirens and the sheriff over the PA system saying we were now under mandatory evacuation orders and we needed to get out now! So we all jumped into action loading up Vickie's car with all the valuables and papers. Then we headed out to load up the horses. We had four huge QH broodmares and a stud to deal with. None of the mares had been in the trailer since who knows when and it was dark. We all worked as a team really well and loaded everybody without an incident and headed out of there. It was the eeriest thing ever. There were sheriffs and fire dept. everywhere. Horse trailers were lined up in every driveway. Cars all loaded up and people getting out. And by this time it was about 430am. We fueled up both rigs and headed to the ol rancho. Everybody got here safe and sound except on mare in the back of my trailer had gotten the crap kicked out of her by the mare in front of her. I had tied the kicker up as close as I could and tied the victim of the kicking all the way in the back of the trailer. She should have had enough room to get away but apparently not. It is not a huge deal but she is a bit swollen and sore. Poor girl, she will have to ride back, whenever they go back, in another trailer or a different trip. As far as the house, we got word tonight that the main house is fine as well as the couple of cows and sheep that we left behind. The small house in the back that Armondo and his family live in is gone. They are the caretakers for their ranch. Their neighbors just behind them and their very good friends Sam and Kathy lost their house. I have not heard back from Sallie at this point, she was heading over to the hotel where they are staying (Sam and Kathy) to tell them in person about their house as they did not know yet. Armondo did not handle it well as to be expected. I am hoping that at least this means they are decently in the clear since it sounds like it has already swept through their area. Their sheep had the property cleared of the brush so that is a plus and the couple of cows that stayed behind were in a huge open pen that we were pretty sure they would be safe in. Besides that, I told them I just did not feel cowgirl enough to load that damn blind cow and her calf in the dark without a good saddle horse! I hope everyone in safe and their animals are safe. God Bless the firefighters busting their butts trying to get this monster out.

Friday, August 28, 2009

Moving on.

I am sorry to all my friends that have had trouble getting on this blog today. I have had some trouble with it that I needed to sort through. I have said some things that have hurt some people on this blog. I have never meant that and I apologize to them for thinking I did. That is not what this blog is about to me. I have enjoyed sharing my life and looking into other people's lives that share the love of ranching and some that have nothing to do with ranching. The modern day penpals I guess you could say. It sure is easy to forget while typing away on a keyboard that lots of people can read what you are writing and take it anyway they choose. I would have never in a million years thought someone was reading this blog day after day looking between the lines for something that might possibly be taken out of context. But it has come to my attention that is the case. It has taken something I was proud of and turned it dirty. I allowed myself to sink to a low level yesterday when I posted a small paragraph directed at someone who knew it was for them. I will not let venomous people bully me or control my behavior anymore. I know I should be the better person. I plan to continue posting here and know that I am coming from a good place in my heart and that I am not intending to be hurtful. So I will leave this post with one of my other favorite sayings,
"If you walk into a corral full of horses thinking your going to get kicked, you probably will."

Thursday, August 27, 2009

A change is in the air

Hello friends. I have made the decision to change some options on my blog for awhile. I sure hope you still drop by and see what's going on around the ranch. I will probably do this in a few days. The great thing is all you have to do is request access once and you are all set. You won't have to do it everyday. Take care everyone and I plan to get a wonderful nights sleep tonight, I hope you all do to!

Wednesday, August 26, 2009

Patience please?

So something is going wrong with my computer or connection or something so that I cannot download pictures so instead you get a story..........hope you all don't mind!
Do you ever have those days when you just have that feeling you shouldn't leave the house? I had that feeling today.............and I didn't listen.
I had told a friend I would neuter a couple of cats for her and my dad had a bunch of bottles he wanted to me to take and recycle. Thanks for keeping us in groceries in this tough time dad! Anyway, I headed to Tehachapi to run a few other quick errands. I told Jeremy I would take the kids with me even though we are both going stark raving crazy lately. He really needed a break, he has been trying to "build up stamina" the last couple of days and his arm was hurting him pretty good today. Needless to say he had no patience. I told him not to worry I would pull more patience and understanding out of my butt and we would have fun. Besides they are just being kids. I always try and remind myself that at least they are healthy do not have some terminal illness when I feel like going crazy! Well, Steele fell asleep as soon as we headed out. Going to Tehachapi we must travel 12 miles to the pavement. Sage and I were having a fun time talking and singing with the radio. We got to the pavement and we heard a "POP!". I asked Sage "what was that?!" thinking that maybe something in the back of the truck has hit the cab maybe??? A couple of second later it was apparent that it was something and we had a flat tire. Of course we were in a place where the signal is wandering and I was having trouble getting ahold of anyone so I thought what the heck, I can change a damn tire! I wasn't exactly dressed for it but that didn't matter sitting on the side of the road. I told Sage to stay in her seat and I was going to get to changing it. I got the jack out and started getting it up and then thought that I should probably loosen the nuts before the tire rolled around. It was then I discovered the thingy was too small and wouldn't be any help in loosening the bolts. Argh!
No big deal, I think. I will call someone to bring a star wrench. Of course the phone decided not to work again. After sitting a minute hoping someone would stop with a damn star wrench I figured I had better wake Steele up and walk to the call box or I would sit there all day. I get half way there when the sheriff shows up. He didn't have a star wrench but my phone started working and I got ahold of my dad. So he dutifully comes a running with the star wrench.
The. damn. thing. did. not. fit!!! So he runs back home to get some more tools. The kids and I walk back to the truck and sit inside with the air on singing songs and having bubble wars with our gum waiting for grandpa. He got back with what we needed and we went to taking the flat off. I would get the wrench arranged and he would step on it. Darned if the dang thing didn't fling off once and hit me right on my big toe!!! I think I might get my first purple toe! And my pedicure is ruined! And I cried! Well, we got the dumb thing changed and I got to the tire store just before they closed. It was ruined and could not be patched. Never fails..........we do not have money for new tires that we desperately need right now. Thank you Lord for our health.
They are able to find a used tire and slap that on. We run to the auto parts store where I have to practically verbally assault the man behind the counter to get him to help me. What is it with customer service these days?! We got a one inch socket and the other thingies to make sure we have it next time and a air freshener cause Jeremy's truck smells like ass. We head over to make a marothon run through the grocery store cause we are late to the nut cutting party. Oh yeah somewhere in there I got the kids an ice cream cause they were pretty darn close to angels though it all. And Steele took a poop on the side of the road while we changed the tire.............to much information?
Back to my story. Then we headed to my friend's to neuter the cats and one of them only has one nut! Man! I call the guys and tell them they had better cook for themselves tonight cause I was the kiss of death and whatever I might be able to cook probably would give them buttrot with my luck today...........I neuter the other cat and head home glad for the adventure to be over. I had a minor disagreement with Steele and called him a name I am still beating myself up over it but for the most part I thankfully did find just a little more patience somewhere in my behind today. Amen......

Aaaargh!

I have fresh new pictures, stories and such and they will not load!!!! I will continue trying but I have lost my inspiration.................

Monday, August 24, 2009

"Today we visited the doctor, the original surgery date was 7-9-09 and the doctor still did not want to release him for physical therapy since he is aware Jeremy is very active and he was happy with how it was healing. He was afraid the PT would stretch it too much at this point. I mentioned how Jeremy was already moving it alot and compensating some of his movements due to the tightness and pain and I was worried about him not learning to use it normal again. So he did end up writing the perscription for the pt but I don't think we will be in a huge hurry to get him there just yet. I know I am hoping to buy some more healing time out of him! So, basically reading between the lines of what the doctor did say (which wasn't much) he can start working, but just be careful...............
Needless to say Jeremy is ready to ride tomorrow! I am insistant on him only riding Chico the wonder horse for now. Ease me in slow! Please!
Anyhow, we talked about it on the way home and he has decided he is ready to open his training book again to limited horses in October. Please call or email if you wish to send a horse out to get on the list for October.
We are excited to ease back into the game again!"

Sunday, August 23, 2009

I lost my pants!

We are just getting home and settling down from a full weekend of lessons at two different locations. We had a great time in Agoura Hills on Saturday and today we were at Moonraker Ranch closer to home.
My dad planned to meet us there and take the kids to the park and then to lunch so I could be available to help Jeremy so that he was not over working his arm. Mostly he doesn't need to take ahold of someone's horse but sometimes the need arises.
Our first lesson was with a friend MaryJo, her husband Norm brought his mule along. Somewhere along the line visiting he says he was hoping to talk me into riding her for a bit to help give her some more experience but I showed up looking like a city girl! I was wearing a skirt and sandals.......yeah I know I can't be very helpful dressed like that but it was a late night on Saturday and I was tired getting ready this morning. Katie, the owner of the ranch says "well I have plenty of pants and probably some extra boots." After figuring out we wear the same size shoe and hoping for the best on the pants I was redressed and ready to go. So Lucy the mule was already saddled and ready to go waiting patiently tied to the trailer so I put my skirt that I had been wearing in the back of their truck thinking surely I would remember to get it when I took Lucy back to the trailer......
So after MaryJo's lesson the three of us headed out for a quick ride. We all had a good time and another friend Linda agreed to keep an eye on Jeremy. We round the corner and damn it if Jeremy doesn't have ahold of the horse. Apparently they were pretty much done with the lesson and the horse had an issue with the trailer. He was one of the most beautiful Arabians I have seen. Big, tall, big boned, big feet, steele grey. He was plain handsome.
I didn't want Jeremy to be using that darn arm so Norm came and took Lucy for me and I made myself available to help with the grey horse (I wish I knew his name). Don't tell anyone but I love working horses with Jeremy. It just feels like we really connect and can just flow together without even having to talk. I love it.
Anyway, back to my story! We finish with the grey horse and get him loaded. He had an issue with getting his hind end in the trailer, what truly bothered him was backing out. So therefore he was afraid to get in too because of course he would have to back out once he was in. Of course he would throw a big fit, rearing up and all, making it look real scary to his owner. And she needed to be more assertive with him. More of a leader I guess some would say. So handsome boy was loaded and then I had grandpa to relieve, Jeremy's water bottle to fill, oh, and I guess getting him some lunch since I forgot to schedule him a lunch break would probably be nice too..........
The kids were raising heck and wanting to go swimming and I wanted them in the pool! We didn't have time to bathe them from the day before and boy were they filthy! Away we go to the pool and MaryJo and Norm packed up and headed home somewhere in the midst of all this.
It wasn't until later when I returned Katie's pants and went to get dressed again out of the pool that I realized my skirt was heading to Green Valley!!!
Thankfully I did have my bathing suit but even in my skinny days I didn't like to run around in the thing! So I draped one of the kids' towels around me and ran around like that the rest of the day. Of course feeling the need to explain to everyone why I wasn't dressed more appropriately. I am surprised Jeremy didn't tell me on the way home how it just doesn't sound good when you start off with "I lost my pants"! He probably knew it wouldn't go over well.

Saturday, August 22, 2009

Prissie

As I promised days ago.........
Honestly, can she get any cuter?!

It's raining on the rancho!!!

Sorry, I am shamelessly exploiting my hunk of a husband again. But this shot shows so much more. Can you figure it out? He can lift his arm!!! Don't tell the doctor! He isn't supposed to be yet. You can tell the left arm is still lower than the right but it is sure an improvement! Oh, and he is washing the dishes, what can be any better than that?!?! WHOOOHOOO!

This is from this morning. It was and still is raining. Beautiful rain. Not just a sprinkle. It is RAINING! In AUGUST! It is so wonderful smelling here. It started at about 630am, what a great way to wake up.


Thursday, August 20, 2009

Round two........

So my sweet baby girl woke me up last night with the same affliction as Steele had a few days ago. It is the saddest thing to see kids sick. All I can think of at least I know this will pass. I am so thankful they are healthy otherwise. My heart sure goes out to the parents of those faced with such worse illnesses. She is the most thoughtful things ever too. Wouldn't you know when I could finally get unraveled from the bedspread to turn on the light she had caught her own vomit in her hand (sorry) so she didn't get it on my bed. Poor girl, I told her to let it fly, I would be happy to clean up after her. You should have seen Jeremy turn green in his half sleep state. He was happy to be the one to jump up and get the light the 98 times after that the poor girl was heaving. I am not complaining by any means, I would do it a hundred times over for her but I kid you not, just as I would doze off she was throwing up again. None of us slept last night, well, Steele did. It was nice to check on him once and he was peacefully sleeping. The tv will have to babysit him today I am afraid! Thank goodness for Noggin!

Wednesday, August 19, 2009

What has been keeping me busy lately..........

We headed out to check on the cows a couple of days ago. Steele had been rolling around on the floor crying that his stomach hurt. He is a bear, I mean a BEAR to give medicine to and he wouldn't take anything. So I just sat on the couch holding him.
He needed to take a nap and wouldn't settle so I thought a car ride might work.
It seems my baby Priss has taken an interest in the cattle. I haven't even asked her to do anything yet. I have been too busy babying her and dressing her up in pink tutus, much to my husband and Paul's delight. Pictures on that coming soon, I promise. It is hilarious.

The cattle were fine, no new calves. We run a bull all year, what can I say...........
Anyhow, the car ride only proved to dislodge the chunks Steele blew all over the car on the way back down the mountain. The funniest thing you ever saw is Jeremy (major gagger) getting a poor spewing curdled milk little boy out of the car. Why I gave him milk I can't answer, wasn't a good idea that's for sure. So we got him home as quick as we could and settled him on daddy's lap while I cleaned out the car and washed all the soiled items. Sage, I might add the best little sweet trooper girlie ever. She toughed up and rubbed his head on the way home since I was driving and Jeremy couldn't put that arm (left arm is his bad one, although it is healing remarkable well!) back in the back seat.
He is doing great now, just a one dayer. He was up at the crack of dawn the next day. As a matter of fact he left the house before we even woke up and we paniced and ran all over looking for him. Pretty soon Paul showed up at the house to get coffee with one missing little boy in the front seat. He thought Paul needed help feeding I guess. Little turd scared the crap out of us!


Saturday, August 15, 2009



Face painting at the park

Here is my sweet dolly faced girlie before the face painting......

And after! Isn't she the darn cutest?!

And there in the background is a new age form of a bandit, with his new pop gun with which he terrorized everyone around him with.

Tehachapi Mountain Festival Rodeo

The flag hanging over the rodeo grounds as we pulled into the parking lot.
Those are the Tehachapi Mountains int he background.
Me and my rascals.

This is what happens when my girl asks to take a few pictures. It is almost a family portrait!
She informed us last night that you only have to be seven years old to be rodeo queen! "Isn't that great?" she says to me! Looks like I had better get ready next year, she already has a sponsor! Crazy girl would be perfect, she already works the crowd. We will get in the car after an event like this and she tells us about all the people she knows that she said hi to.

The Reatta Ranch Cowboy-girls. I loved watching Sage's face watching these girls. I just hope she doesn't get any ideas!

Can you see who this rascal is? Steelie on the big screen! He made a friend and they were playing with his popper gun. The camera man has a cabin up on the mountain from us.

Thursday, August 13, 2009

What's happening around here...........

We were all pretty productive around here today. Jeremy has been working on this picture for a couple of weeks now and really wanted to finish it. Steele was learning his letters. During this picture I was making dinner and Paul was feeding. I wonder what Sage was into.............anyway I thought the picture of Jeremy helping Steele was so cute, until I learned Steele had drawn on my computer with an orange crayon.........

The picture is of him and Ojos. It is from a photograph our friend Martin
took while he was here from Sweden.

After dinner this is what my living room looked like. Paul reading his email, Kate the wonder dog and Jeremy admiring his work.

The finished product. He said is was really hard to make his own face.
I think he nailed Ojos. What do you think? You could check out our website to see his page if you don't already know him.
Look for Ojos' page, for those of you that don't know who Ojos is, he is a
2007 Extreme Mustang Makeover finalist.
This is one of the things keeping Paul out of trouble. Last year we picked up some of the burnt wood from the White fire out of Oak Creek. It was all oak and pine. Paul has found some interesting knots and has been hand carving and sanding bowls out of them. This is a picture of a smaller one without the oil. I need to get a picture of the bigger one he made. And they look really neat when they are oiled.

Good words

'The will of God will never take you where the Grace of God will not protect you.'
For some reason everywhere I have turned lately I have seen this phrase. I thought I would share it with you all.
I guess I need to have faith and believe it!

more misc.......

So I got an email this morning from a concerned friend telling me my extensive email list that I send out stuff to is being reported as a new phishing scam.............jeez!!! What kind of people get their kicks scamming things? I mean really, what kind of gratification is in it for them?!?! I just can't believe there is such ill meaning people out there. So anyway, now I am crying out for help on this one. While I try awful hard, this computer is a darn mystery and not only have I not been able to figure out how to send an email to a bunch of people and not show all the email addys (cc) but now I don't know what to do about the scam thing. Do I have to change my whole email address? Please help!!!
Not only that but the guys watched some crazy barbie movie with Sage last night and now they are both singing everything to me instead of just talking like normal adult grown men!
Maybe we are in the Twilght Zone!!!

Wednesday, August 12, 2009

Swimming at Katie's

Check out that face! Jeremy and Paul were slinging him back and forth. It was so funny but I really don't think it was much good for somebody's arm!
I have the proof he was using it. As I was telling him to stop, he was telling me he wasn't using it. He was using his other arm.............hummmm.
They did have a great time though. Actually we were working just before this. We had a couple of lessons at Moonraker Ranch and then they had a nice lunch for us and then swimming! Can it get any better?!

Sunday, August 9, 2009

The day to day around here.

You never know what will happen in a day around here. I mean we usually wake up with an idea of what we will do the next day and then the day comes and something will happen that alters the plan............
Take yesterday for instance, we were supposed to get up and saddle horses and go gather cattle of ours that had gone into Tejon cause I can't close our gate. We have four gates to open, drive the car through, and close again to get out of here. And I usually have sandals on when I go to town, geez! So my stomach was upset and I hate to ride off without Jeremy and the kids, plus the area where they were is pretty big and I wasn't even sure they were still there and not heading to Arvin. So we decided to take the truck and dogs, locate them and then if need be come back with the horses. We pull up on the darn things, they catch sight of us, flip their tails over their backs and start to RUN!!!
Before anything can be said Jeremy and Paul jump out of the truck and run to the back to get their dogs and off they go. I am thinking they are nuts but at least I am in the truck! Naner naner. So long story short (and I mean long story, like where is the breeze we had yesterday, I am not in as good of shape as I used to be, where is my gosh darn dog!!! story short) drove the truck around and open the fence into our property and we get them back in.
So today we gathered to the East of here to have a couple to rope at our Practice roping we had here. Sage wanted so bad to go with me and I have never let her go yet cause I worry about her too much. She has gone with Jeremy but not with me, and specially without Jeremy there. So I am rolling around trying to get up out of bed when I hear a bunch of racket on the porch. Sage had gotten herself up and dressed at the crack of dawn cause she does not want me to leave her behind. AND she is on the porch playing catch with the dogs..........argh! At least she has stopped prying your eye balls open in the morning. Literally pulling your eye lids open. Not fun.
So I figure I will take her. I can do this. I have been riding my Poco mare and she is pretty unflappable, not yet as experienced as she could be but damn solid still. We head out and spot them all spread out on every ridge we can see.........damn, we were hoping the heat had kept them at the spring. Paul headed for the furthest ones and Sage and I cleared the canyons closest and headed them for the spring. Sage did damn good telling me stories the whole way. I didn't worry too much. Once I wanted to trot to get somewhere a bit faster and just told her to stay with me and she did but asked to just walk. I was pretty happy to hear that so I agreed. We met up with Paul and then spotted a calf that had gotten left behind and he went back for it. The cattle that had been with the calf were the same son-of-a-guns that we had cleared out of Tejon the day before. They saw Paul and just lit out running as fast as they could run. Left the calf behind and never looked back. Bad mother.
Sage and I are making our way down to the spring when I spot my german shepherd dog right near the road and then I hear the rattling of a truck coming. I freeze holding my breath cause she doesn't listen anyway so there is nothing I can do................I am frantically waving my arms to get the drivers attention, I mean there are always cows and calves out there and this truck is flying. On a dirt road and I kid you not doing at least 55 miles per hour. They are either heading up to White Oak or Tejon land. Thank God the darn dog did not keep coming toward us. Paul was up ahead of the trucks path still bringing that calf down and I am praying they don't get hit. The truck finally catches sight of Paul and slows just a bit and nobody gets killed. I plan to find out who that was. Not cool.
We get down to the spring and group up. We head them toward the pens and the renegade bunch takes one look at us and high tails it up the ridge and are heading south. Paul says to me, "what are we going to do?" I am sure he knows since Sage is with us and we are on a time crunch since the roping starts soon the situation might be different from normal. Thanks for knowing that Paul! I am a nervous basket case with her on a horse usually. I did okay today though. I say to him "we are going to hope the rest of the herd doesn't follow!" Thankfully they didn't and I am here to tell you, Sage was a huge help! Her and ol Chico did awesome. Nice and quiet and easy.
I wish I could say I had pictures to share, I just could not figure out how to carry that camera with out knocking myself out with it. Or breaking it. I also thought I had too much on my plate to think about taking pictures. By the way, my Poco did great also. At one point she had to lead since I wanted Sage behind me on a narrow trail. Sage's job was to stay right behind me without letting Chico touch Poco. They did fine. I love our horses!
So needless to say we are going to have to get some help (with Jeremy not being able to be horseback) and gather that bunch up. We will never going to be able to work that renegade bunch if they keep getting away with that. Wish me luck I am cowgirl enough on my green mare! Maybe if we live I will have to raise her price!

Saturday, August 8, 2009

Itchy

Before anyone worries, this was before Jeremy's surgery. I was just looking through some older pics and found these I wanted to post. Can you believe how soft he can get a horse?!
This was her first saddling. Looks like she is going to be a good one!
She wasn't worried about much.

Cinching her up was no problem either. What color do you all think she is going to be?
Her momma is a grulla and daddy is a grey.



Friday, August 7, 2009

Never a dull moment on the ol rancho......

These pictures are from yesterday on the way to the farmer's market. We like to take our time and drive over the mountain sometimes. This is about halfway over and if you look real close you can see the herd of wild horses that live on our side. They are almost right in the center and to the left a bit. There used to be seven horses but this day I only counted..........


EIGHT!!! Can you see the new little one? They sure are being born late this year. Generally they are all born brown/grulla looking and then they darken as they get older.

This is the herd on the Tehachapi side of the mountains. They are all spread out on the big meadow. I am pretty sure the saddle you see in the background is somewhere close to where we came over the hill.

Here is a closer up shot. What a life for a horse huh?! It is all private land and managed privately just in case anyone was wondering. No, you cannot just drive in there!
I thought these pictures were perfect since with this cold weather our horses out on pasture are acting so darn frisky. We have a fence around the main house and hay barn, corrals area. Mainly so the cows can't eat the hay but also so the mares on pasture can't get near Cody, our stallion. I started my day out hearing him screaming in the distance. I am just getting over a cold and was sleeping so good darn it!!! So I drag my but out of bed and grab a sweat shirt since it was FREEZING and head down to the corrals. Sure enough all six of the horses that are supposed to be turned out are in the corral area. Just to give you an idea of who I am talking about as this story progresses I better introduce you to the renegade horses. First there is my mustang mare that I have had forever (I think she is 20 years old now), Cheyenne. Second is Charley, Jeremy's sorrel gelding he used to ride alot and now Paul rides. Third (in no particular order) is Cat, one of my favorite mares because she is so solid and sensible. Fourth is her daughter, Poco, another of my favorites, she is just like her momma. Fifth is Min, a really well trained horse also that Jeremy uses alot. And finally a long yearling filly named Itchy. Jeremy's pride and joy. Everybody always sees her first because of her color. We are pretty sure she will turn grey but she looks like a blue roan. All of these horses are valued members of the family as well as 4 out of 6 are some of our best trained animals. Back to my story! I get them all caught up and put back where they belong and run back to the house to make coffee and warm up. Paul gets up and feeds shortly and all is happy. Around lunch time I head out to put a resume in at the cement plant in Neenach and ARGH!!! Just outside our front gate and standing on Tejon property is Min, Charlie, Poco and Itchy. Or course I am all cleaned up and trying to look presentable cause I could really use this job, we had heard they were looking for someone in the office. So I try and call Jeremy and he doesn't answer the phone. Double ARGH! I found a hay twine one of the kids had drug into my car and tromped thru the sagebrush and catch my sweet little doe eyed Poco. I kid you not, they were all looking at me like "what are you doing here?"
I uneventfully lead Poco back in and the rest followed. Closed the gate and went on about my destination.
I was excited to come home and make a couple of recipes I found on a fellow bloggers site. They were homemade flour tortillas, empanadas and cast iron skillet biscuits. I think I gave myself carpal tunnel kneading and kneading! I s l a v e d away on our dinner. Told the guys they had better eat real slow because of how long it took to prepare it! As I am cooking and washing the endless dishes the water goes out. So I go out to ask Paul if he had water on, "no" ARGH!!!!
He went down to check it out and the horses had broken down the gate and were in the corral area AGAIN! They like the grass by the main water valve and had broken it and all the water was running out.
We all peacefully ate our dinner and were sitting around watching Whale Wars when the phone rings. Our neighbor on the mountain was on his way to his cabin and there are six horses romping along with the cows way where they shouldn't have been. Now the way our property is set up is we are in a canyon with a ridge on the east and the west side. Normally the horses don't climb the hill to the east because it is too steep. Not to mention there is plenty of feed down below. So we all jump up and grab jackets and head outside. Sure enough it is our horses. We hadn't ruled out the fact that someone had set some horses out and they were someone else's. Although we are so far out chances are they wouldn't find us.
We drove up to the top of the property and threw some hay off the polaris thinking they would come down when they saw us throw hay............nope! That would be too easy! They are running and playing like they have been standing in corrals all their lives. Buttheads. So Jeremy and Paul climb the hill on foot to go and catch them. Thankfully that went pretty smooth and we locked them up in the arena until tomorrow when they will all loose their freedom for awhile. Since there are no training horses here we have plenty of empty corrals and they will each get one! I am sick of worrying about them and if they can't stay out of trouble that is what they get!
I will sleep easy tonight knowing the huligans are contained!
Thanks Tony for calling!

Wednesday, August 5, 2009

Lazy dayz...

This is what we all do while Jeremy is working giving lessons. Aren't we supportive?!
Steele and Paul checking out the hammock at one of the lesson locations.
This was a week ago or so. This is our idea of a pool.
We got in about midnight from giving lessons down in Old Agoura. We had a wonderful time and dinner with some great friends. Thank you again Mary for letting us decend on you.