Glorious Weekend

It’s February and we are having our faux spring that we often experience this time of year. The boys were pretty surprised the day Eric, the shoer, showed up; in fact, Brady was laying down and Shirley put his halter on him and he still just looked at her like, “What?” Anyway, the boys got shoes and we went riding both Saturday and Sunday. It was glorious.

Of course the horses are all muddy and wearing their winter coats so they tried to tell us they were on vacation. It didn’t matter, we brushed the mud off and put cold blankets on their backs and then the saddles. Brady put his ears back and turned toward me as if to nip to show his displeasure on Saturday. I brought him some Oreos today, so he was a little less cantankerous. Star has been a little out of sync, but he seems to have gotten over whatever it was; Lynn thinks maybe he strained a muscle rolling around and got caught up in a downed tree branch. Ziggy is Ziggy, tongue hanging and all. He’s such a sweet thing—huge, but sweet.

Brady was a little stiff today, but he still considered having a little run up the meadow—after all, we have to be in the lead. Ziggy drank at every crossing of water we came to and we decided maybe with that tongue hanging out he gets extra thirsty! Star cracked me up because I saw it coming and held Brady back, but he went into the creek after Ziggy finished and proceeded to paw at the knee deep water and send it spraying everywhere. He loves to splash. I am just happy I saw it coming and held back or Brady and I would have been soaked.

Shirley has been sore and stiff with her neck and back keeping her cooped up. She rode with a neck brace both days and she says she feels better now than before. I agree there is nothing better than being out in the mountains ahorseback! I think I will be able to make through this next week after all.