Happy Lunar New Year

Here's one of the things I love about the school where I volunteer : the kids come from all over the world.   On Friday there was a celebration for the Lunar New Year-- with costumes and songs, with first graders from China singing in Mandarin,

with fourth graders from Indiana dancing a traditional dragon dance,

and with a group storytelling with the Japanese kamishibai theater.

Every one, no matter what their cultural background, was in a good mood all morning, ready to begin the year of the Horse.

"Yeah," says Scotty, "MY year!  Bring it on!"

And he's off...

After admiring the horse

 and being very nice about getting covered with dirt and horse hair,

 our BIL Traveler was amused to find a German word embossed on the trash can.

Really? I guess der liebe Gott ist überall.

Having been exposed to such extremes of culture, the Traveler is now off for more experiences.

Gute Reise, dear BIL, come again soon!

Sharing the road

Horse (shown here with typical enthusiastic expression) has been laid up with an
injury for the past several weeks.

He got kicked. It was probably his own fault.
But in the way that these things often work out, he was the one with the seriously ripped open hock.
So I've been travelling back and forth to the barn more often than usual to help with the hydro-therapy, injections of medicine, and so on.

I love the road to the barn. It reminds me of Spring Valley in West Virginia where I learned to drive. It is an old two-lane highway. It twists and turns and goes up and down hills and through one wide valley. Most of it has no shoulders at all and some of it has some pretty steep ravines right off the pavement. There is only one spot marked for passing in the 9 mile stretch I drive - the rest of the road you just can't see that far ahead.
I drive this road with a great deal of caution. No matter what time of day I go, no matter what the weather is (in this picture the heat index is over 100), there is one sight I will ALWAYS see:

you can count on it. There will always be a bicyclist.

So about that foot...

You noticed in the last post the bit about going home to ice my foot? You wondered about that?

Well, in the process of putting the horse in his new stall somehow my foot got under his.

He weighs about 1200 pounds.

He stood there wondering why his person was shrieking at him. He was being good. He was standing still. He didn't notice that there was a foot under his. He didn't understand why he had to back out of the stall when he hadn't properly gotten into it, but finally he did.

The person stopped shrieking.

But she sure was walking funny. Not as bad as it could be - just cracked.

Thank you for not making that comment that just flashed through your mind.

Horse moving

Our big activity this weekend has been moving Scotty. He left the old barn and rode a trailer to his new digs - way out in the country. It's a much bigger place than his old barn.
There are lots more horses.

This farm breeds Rocky Mountain horses so there are babies of all ages - this one peeking out of its enclosure with its mom is only a week old.

Scotty's new stall is down the same aisle where the mama and baby are.
The barn is huge and has three aisles of stalls and a big riding arena.

This is more a working farm than a riding stable, so there are farm dogs to greet you when you arrive.

There is Old MacDonald, the farmer, who has collected all the various animals that populate the place. The dog in this picture is named Archilles and he is a Catahoula Cur dog.

There are the ubiquitous barn cats.
And the barn swallows who are hard to photograph.
Unlike other farm birds.

The barn is not a quiet place. There are chickens clucking and roosters crowing,

ducks quacking and geese honking.

There are sheep

and goats

and...llamas???

something like a llama, anyway.

As time goes on I'll get more pictures of creatures here, but now it's time to head home and ice my foot.

"Waait a minute" says Scotty. "You don't mean to leave me here, do you?"
Sorry about that. Make yourself at home, horse.

Not much of a ride

Saturday afternoon the temperature soared to 12 degrees F.

It was maybe not the best time to go out to the barn.

But it was the time I had.

My friend and trainer picked me up in her 4-wheel drive truck so that we could get up the driveway to the stables. Then she rode Scotty for a while to "warm him up".
They got nice and warm moving around the arena.
I sat on the cold hard bench and got colder and colder.
By the time I got on the horse I couldn't feel my thumbs or toes.
Also I hadn't ridden for about three months.
There are muscles that should be involved that just weren't there anymore.
Scotty took full advantage of the situation to misbehave.
I didn't stay on long.
No matter, it was great to get out and admire my handsome fellow anyway.

A Day in the Life

The Krentz family started it. We got to see a glimpse of their morning, school day, afternoon and evening. One can immediately observe that life is much more lively with small children and chickens....and that the drive home is much more scenic than Indiana. What else is different?
Here's a look at life after retirement...
We begin with the morning...
At least I suppose it must be morning but with DST still in effect it is pitch black outside. The alarm proceeds to go off at 9 minute intervals for a while.
Finally we give up and crawl out of bed.

Good thing it is still dark - spares you the sight of me reluctantly exercising for my bones.

The dog is an early morning riser, full of wiggles and ready for her ritual first ball chase of the day.

After one toss, she retreats into her den under the desk and chews contentedly on the ball while I go on into the kitchen.

As I begin to tidy up from last night's snacks, someone else is busily "ratting around" and providing more to tidy up.

I feel the need for some propping up - and begin popping my morning pills - this for the bones! this for the brain! this for the legs! this for the heart!

That and a cup of hot tea and I'm ready to go.

The sun is just hitting the tops of the trees as I traipse around the yard

filling up the bird feeders and noting the damage done by the night time crew of raccoons, possums and skunks.

I follow the school buses to school.

There I spend a morning checking books in and out, shelving books, and helping kids find books.

I also take down the "Nuts about Books" display in the hall -

and replace it with "Whooo loves to read at night?"

Because it's Friday the school librarian and I go off to share a lunch and catch up on the latest.

Getting to and from home is fraught with delays and lines of traffic.

Construction has started on the bypass. We'll be complaining about this for the next two and a half years - that's how long they say it will take to finish.

In the early afternoon, the dog and Granddad both take a nap.

The house is quiet.




This is when I work on lesson plans and upcoming programs, practice stories, do laundry, and take care of my indoor winter garden.






In the late afternoon I head over to the barn.














I clean up the horse, and tack him up, and on this particular day I have a riding session with my friend and teacher.

We don't look like the beautiful athletes at WEG but we have a fine time anyway.

By the time I get home, everyone is ready for dinner.

Something quick is in order.

Grilled cheese (Jarlsberg) with tomato and fake vegetarian bacon and a little lettuce and onion - that's easy and tasty and filling.

T and I look at the paper and talk about our days and plans for tomorrow. He goes off to practice guitar.




I put on some music...












read some of my new book (note the author!) and spend quite a bit of time doing what I enjoy doing most in the evening:

catching up with all of you and your families!

Keep blogging and posting you all -

it's the best part of my day!

Winners

The Horse Park is home to many retired champions - race horses everyone has seen win the Kentucky Derby as well as champions in less well-known aspects of the sport.


We wandered through their quarters admiring these now-out-of-the-spotlight winners.






We were also thrilled to be on hand for the winners in the competitions we watched.

The World Equestrian Games are like the
Olympics.











Many countries are represented by their very best athletes.










People wore their country's colors and waved their flags as they cheered their riders. Here is the individual bronze going to a US rider.







The top awards went to the Netherlands - gold in individual








and gold in team competition.

And this is the black stallion who carried them over the top each time:

Moorlands Totillas



After watching him in three different rides, I'm willing to believe that he is really the best of the best. And we got to see him live! What a treat!