My Week in Pictures

It's Saturday, and since I'm spending the weekend with one of my best friends and doing all kind of fun stuff, I thought I'd just share a few pictures from this week.
Enjoy!

I splurged a little bit today and bought myself some new books.  These are pretty much the only things I splurge on the past few years - books and horse things.

Chelsea's cat, Ginny, is obsessed with shoes.  My flip flops became hers temporarily last night.

This is why I love WV...because just an hour or so from where I'm staying, there's this.  And this is just one of the countless amazing sights my state has to offer.

My old church sent me a get well card.  I received it yesterday.  Thank you Philippi Baptist Church!

Who needs a puppy when your little brother does this?

Grainy, crappy quality picture of where I've been doing my proofreading and blogging for the past couple of weeks since the accident.

Snippets From the Weekend

Funny moments:

Grandpa (as he jumps up and runs for the door): Did you hear someone knocking???

Me (in confusion): No? Grandpa, that was thunder...

In KFC:

Uncle: Hey, who's that guy in the picture over there?

Me: Colonel Sanders.

Uncle: And where's he from?

Me: ....Kentucky...?

Uncle: Oh boy, you're good! (laughing at his own joke)

Ha..haha..nice try, uncle... :P

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Blurry, but he was trying to pick up a peanut so he didn't have to lean over to get it.  Silly kitty!

Harry likes peanuts. Om nom.

Pretty boy. :)

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Grandma is still hanging in there, though the doctor said on Wednesday that she probably only had about 48 hours left. She's very weak and exhausted and sleeps most of the time. She opens her eyes but can't really seem to focus on any one thing, and we're not sure if she sees us or not. She knows we're there; she moves toward sounds and sometimes tries to speak to us (usually in protest to being moved or awakened or fed...or sometimes when we leave).

Everyone keeps saying how she's doing better some days and not others.  I honestly couldn't see a difference from day to day while I was there this weekend.  Sometimes she eats more than at other meals, sometimes her eyes are open more...but those are such tiny things that it doesn't seem like a big deal to me anymore.  She's constantly drugged up because of the pain, but she's still in pain when she's moved.  I really just wish it could be over so she doesn't have to go through this anymore.  I don't know if that makes me a bad person or not..it kind of feels like it, but it's only because I hate seeing her go through this.

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It's less than a month until I go back to school!  Before this day is over, I hope to have all the little last minute details taken care of.  Books ordered, loan stuff (ugh) taken care of, some stuff for my senior project prepared so that I can get right into the experiment part of it when I get back...   Yeah, I've got my to-do list next to me right now.  I'm hoping to finish it and be able to throw it in the trash by tonight.

Family Meets Orion!

Got to introduce my grandad to Orion today. My grandad walks with a cane...I was amazed that my normally fidgety horse stood still the entire time unless asked to move and was very careful where he placed himself.  Even when he checked Grandad's pockets for cookies (the first time I've seen him do that to anyone but me lately), he was gentle and not pushy about it.  He was the same way with a 6-year-old last fall and a 2-year-old this past spring.  He's a good boy. :)

The crack that has been developing in his right front has actually chipped off. :(  A farrier is supposed to be coming out Thursday evening to trim him, so hopefully we can get that all figured out and fixed.  It doesn't seem to bother him, but it looks horrible.  And of course I'm like an overprotective parent and can't stand it when anything is even slightly wrong with him.  Just hoping it's not anything serious.  He's developed some smaller cracks in his other feet too, but they're all in the regions that will be trimmed off on Thursday.  

He made me proud today.  I love him! :D

Wordless Wednesday - New Reins and Cracks

Happy Belated Father's Day to All the Dads Out There!

My cousin's awesome wife made this for him for Father's Day.  He's such a great dad, and it's obvious that Cooper absolutely adores him. :)

Blue and Gray Weekend, etc.

Orion

He's doing great!  At the end of last week, I went out and practiced longeing with him.  Found out pretty quickly that a lot of the problems I have with him bolting and generally freaking out are due to the lunge whip.  He's never had a bad experience with one that I know of, but he hates the sound of it.  I've noticed it before, but this time, he bolted across the paddock and didn't calm down for a good five minutes or more, the whole time of which, he was running around like a madman and nearly tried to jump the fence into the field.  At that point, Chels decided to put Kit back into the field for the day for everyone's safety so that we could really focus on figuring Orion's weirdness out.

After he had calmed down, I started him again, this time with the longe whip safely in the barn.  I just used voice, body language, and the line itself to motivate him and direct him.  It was pretty frustrating at times, but by the end he was responding better and moving pretty smoothly.  We ended it on a good note, he got a good scratch and brushing and some grain, and everyone was happy.

Today had it's own issues, but he responded better to just using the line and seemed to understand better some of the different signals I had started trying to use the last session in lieu of not having a whip to use.

I'm currently uploading videos from tonight, so I'll talk a little more about that tomorrow when I post them.

 Blue and Gray Reunion

...Was fun. :)  I got to see some of my friends from school and spend time with my family.  Of course it was fun!

Here are some pictures I took and edited with Instagram while I was there:

My grandpa and uncle - Like father, like son. :)

Confederate soldiers

Union soldiers

Grandma's Birthday Photos

We celebrated my grandma's birthday with her in her nursing home on Saturday after the reenactment.  She's been doing so well compared to what the doctors had originally said she would do after her initial stroke before my freshmen year of college.  It was one of the hardest things I've ever experienced, seeing her go through what she did, but she had persevered.  She'll never be like she was or get to come home, but I'm thankful for every day that we have left with her and for how well she has progressed against all odds.

Uncle Bobby

Bobby and his awesome girlfriend, Steph.

Grandma and Grandpa

Dad

Babysitting

It's been going pretty well!  I got some cute pictures while we were outside yesterday, so instead of talking about things that probably wouldn't be that interesting to anyone outside the family (sorry guys!), I'll just post those. :)

Target practice with his bow. :)

Our huge tree in the middle of the back yard - one of the reasons my mom wanted our house.

Snack time!

Hunter decided my chair was his, too.

Wordless Wednesday - Playtime

Forest Festival, Friends, and Horses

Toss in family, and that's an awesome combination. :)

Yesterday I went up to Elkins to catch the Grand Feature Parade (or most of it anyway) and to see Orion and Kit with Chelsea.  

Sorry, most of my pictures are of the bands, seeing as that's the only part of the Forest Festival parade I was ever a part of in high school.  It's the only part I'm ever really interested in, lol.

My band. :)  Elkins High

Buckwheat Festival Queen

Anyone need a Snow Bird report? :)

E.T. heehee

St. Mary's

Tucker County

Strawberry Festival Court

Really?

And again, really? Aren't there better ways of advertising for this stuff?

Magnolia

Petersburg

Lewisburg

So, the parade was fun....but around 4:00, Chelsea and her roommate, Ashley, and I left to go see our horses.  I was excited and nervous because I haven't been out there for a month.  Orion and I are still new to each other.  What if he had forgotten everything we'd worked on?

Well.  We got out there, and what do you know, Orion and Jake are in the paddock.  Piece of cake.  No running or being a pain in the butt - just walked up and reacquainted myself, then went into the barn and started mixing feed....and then had to go tie Orion anyway because he tried to follow me into the barn.  Baaaad idea.  I was getting the "Hurry up" look from him once he was tied at the fence because he knew exactly what me going into the barn for the first time during a visit meant. lol

While he was eating, I set to work getting the burrs out of his mane.  Ugh.  Didn't take 40 minutes like last time, but it was still bad.  He had these little seed-looking things stuck all over him too - anyone know what those are and how the hell you can get them off? Because I don't.  They wouldn't budge from a brush, and when I tried to pull them off, I was pulling hair, which made Orion jump and look at me with a "What the hell???" expression - pretty funny, but obviously not helpful.

Chelsea lunged Kit with less than stellar results, and once she was finished, I took Orion out for his turn.  He had a little swelling in his RF knee, but it wasn't too bad.  He wasn't favoring anything, so I felt it was safe to exercise him a little bit.

Unfortunately, he had other ideas.  As soon as I tried to send him away to get started, he moved off about six feet and stopped.  Would not budge.  I had planned on not using the lunge whip because he normally responds fine without it, but I had taken it out just in case, so I picked it up to snap it behind him, and as soon as it touched the ground, he started rearing and throwing his head and rearing some more.  

Completely took me by surprise, as he has never acted like that since I got him.  I let him calm down a minute and then tried again.  Same reaction.  I put the whip down and tried to get him moving without it, slapping my leg with the lunge line (which usually works with him) and being all aggressive.  But instead of going around the circle like he should have, this time he reared and took off in the opposite direction.

This is what happens when your horse runs away and you try to stop him.  It doesn't work.

I held on and got pulled a few feet before he stopped.  He was snorting and still tossing his head.  I walked over to him and wound up the line as I did.  My hands were burning like hell, and I wanted to stop, but didn't want to end on a bad note, so I walked him back to where we started and tried to calm him down as we walked (by that point, we were a good 30 feet or more away from our starting point).  From that point, I think he might have reared one more time or so - it's honestly a little scrambled now, it seemed to take so long to try to make this work.  Mostly after that, though, it was like we were "dancing".  I'd try to get to be facing his side so I could get him moving around me, and he'd turn to face me head on again.  I'd move around him, and he'd move with me.  So for at least ten minutes we were doing this whole moving around each other song and dance instead of him moving around me.

I finally gave in and walked him back to the paddock where Chels and Ashley were with Kit and Jake.  I still didn't want to end badly, but nothing was working, I was frustrated (which probably didn't help matters because I know he could sense it), and he just seemed to get more and more confused.  We couldn't figure out what was so different from before.  He's always been great when I lunge him.

I was so disappointed - I don't know if it was me or something else.  I honestly can't figure it out.  Chels and I talked about it, and it's not the same as her problem with Kit.  Kit will intentionally disobey and do the exact opposite of what Chelsea tries to get her to do, and yesterday when she lunged her, Kit outright tried to challenge Chels.  When Orion was acting up, he didn't seem to be doing it at me.  He never tried to approach me or come at me when he was acting up; it was always at the same distance away.  Then when he was not rearing and carrying on but just standing and not wanting to move, he was just watching me - not in a threatening way, but more like an "I don't want to be out here." kind of way.  I had problems getting him the right distance away starting out because he didn't want to leave my side.  I'd send him away and he'd try to come right back.

I'm so confused right now.  And he seemed to be too, which makes me wonder if I was doing something wrong, and I just don't realize it.

Any ideas out there from my horse friends?  Any input would be greatly appreciated.