Bought and Moved

It's official!

Orion is mine! :D

(He actually has been since Wednesday; I just haven't had time to get on here and blab for a while.)

Chelsea picked me up at the library (where I am now, coincidentally) on Wednesday at 3, and we headed up to Elkins to do some horse stuff shopping.  New (green!) halter, lead rope, fly spray, Swat, wormer (because Linda wanted him to be wormed as a precaution before we brought him over), a bag of grain for the other horses (my first official contribution to the barn), and a bag of treats (apple and carrot flavored) for Orion.  Whew! Oh and a huge bin to keep all of that and the 5 bags of feed that go into Orion's daily grain safe and sound from Kit (who is known to break into the barn occasionally and tear into any bags that aren't sealed up somewhere she can't get to them).

I don't have any tack yet because I don't need it right now, and I don't see the point in buying something that I'm not going to use for months.  I can do that later.  I am looking at things though.  See previous blogs for more details on that.

Anyway, we got him on the trailer (after about 10 or 15 minutes of "Hmm, I don't think I want to get on that." from Orion).  He finally decided it was worth it to go in, and Chelsea and I followed him to Linda's.  He was very social and nodded to every single car to go past. lol  As much as he loves to eat (it's his favorite past time I think), I'm surprised he didn't try to grab a branch or two when they passed by trees.

We parked at the end of Linda's road because there was nowhere for Barry to turn around out at the house.  Orion then decided he didn't want to get off of the trailer.  He stood in the doorway and observed everyone, but wouldn't set a hoof on the ground.  Finally, Barry hopped, both feet at the same time, off the trailer, and right after, Orion hopped, all four hooves at the same time, off the trailer.  See a pattern here? Yeah.  He knocked Barry's sunglasses off and stepped on them, scratching the side of Barry's face with the glasses in the process. *sighs and shakes head* Not that it has to be said, but Barry wasn't very happy with him.  Liz apologized and handed Orion off to me, and I started to walk him back to the house.  About 5-10 minutes later we got there and - oh no - a bright blue tarp was covering a pile of wood.  Big, bright, blue, flapping (slightly) scary tarp.  Orion stopped about five feet away from it, ears picked, eyes wide, inhaling deeply as he tried to figure out what this monster was.  He seriously had an "Omg, wtf is this?" face at that moment.  I talked softly and walked forward a few steps, and he didn't budge.  Tugged a little on the lead rope - didn't move.  Swung the rope in circles to make a whistling sound - still didn't flippin' move.  After a minute or two of just standing there, he finally let loose this great big sigh and walked forward on his own.

Typical horse.

We got to the barn without any mishaps after I fell on my butt right before we got into the paddock.  Orion was a gentleman and stopped until I got up.  I actually think he was more confused as to why I was on the ground than anything, but oh well.  The point is, he didn't run me over.  Gooood horsy. :)   Liz brought out his new halter and we switched mine with her old one to "make it official," as she said.   Then she got some pictures of me with him, and Chelsea left to go to Caleb's show.  I stayed, and Liz and Carly went out for a ride on Skip and Kolijah.  I spent over an hour brushing and combing him, getting him all clean and pretty and soft.  He was like a giant teddy bear when I was done.  I walked him around the paddock and out in the field for a few minutes to get him used to place again.  He was out there before, so he already has friends with the other horses.  Spending so much time there that night (I was there until almost 10:30 or 11), was more to get used to each other than to see how the other horses reacted to him.

He was great.  We're still getting used to each other and coming to some understandings of what is expected of each other, but I think it's going to work out great.  He was already responding better to me by the end of the night, and I had figured out a couple of his quirks.  It's definitely going to take a lot of time to build that bond, but it is going to happen. 

I'm excited for the future. :)