Ride and Showing To The Town Of Downing

Yesterday was a pretty busy day! :)  Me, mom and Tikvah went on an 8 mile ride (we were guesstimating that number - it was somewhere around 8 miles).  We went up Jenkins and cut across some property and went up to Soft Rock, then back down the road way - Soft Rock road to Summerdale and on :)  Here are some pics - the ones of my back I didn't know Tikvah was taking - I guess she was getting me back from doing that to her a few times :P

Mom on crunch

Me and Tikvah

Showing for "To The Town Of Downing"!!!
Then in the evening we went to the showing for the movie I was in - "To The Town Of Downing"
I thought we would just eat dessert and watch the movie, and visit a little - but they sprung it on me that I was going to have to go up on stage with the rest of the cast.  Luckily I didn't have to give a speech, but I didn't like it much :P  Then I had another surprise when I was already up there - they had planned to sing a song (that I didn't know), so I was up there trying to keep up but finally gave up :P I found out later that most of the people didn't know it either....lol

But the movie was amazing!!!  I laughed through almost the whole thing! :)  You can buy it HERE

Josiah Van Kirk

Left to right: Promise, Elisa, Naomi, Shanae, Hannah, and Tikvah

Tikvah and Naomi trying to hid behind their hats :P

LOL

The boys

Watching The Strains and Plochers Start Some Wild Colts!

Last week we went over to the Strains and watched them catch and start the halter break some colts.  The colts are only 2 and 3 years old and there were 5 of them.  Three palominos, one cremello, and one paint.  The strains got the four palominos and cremello for their new wagon team - and Elisa got the paint for a new riding horse.  These horses hadn't ever been handled much so were quite wild - it took Elisa almost 45 minutes to catch her paint.  Then Tikvah roped one of the palominos - the one that was attacked by a bear when it was younger - it has scars all down it's neck, but for some reason it was the tamest one.  We had to leave about that time - but Elisa is already riding the paint and Yishai is riding the cremello.  The palominos are all too young to ride yet.  Here are some pics!

Elisa and her dad trying to catch her horse again

Best Way To Spend The First Day Of Spring!

Happy spring to y'all!  It's finally here!

Colt In For Training

The people who bought Chey were so impressed with her and Apache that they want to hire me to break their colt.  Pistol isn't even 1 year old yet - he will be at the end of April though.  He'll be gelded next month and then come over here around May.  I'll have him for a year or more - gonna do groundwork and pony him places until he's 2 then I'll start riding him.  Tikvah and Elisa have colts almost the exact same age - so when they are all 2 we're gonna do the Buck Brannaman style of the first ride up at the Sapphire arena together.  You round-pen them all with the saddles on - then the riders get on and someone round-pens the colts again with them on - that way the colts are doing something they already know how to do and have support from each other.  Will keep you posted!

Here is a pic of him when he was a tiny baby :)

 

And here is what he looks like now:

Cheyenne Sold

It's hard parting with an old friend - but it couldn't have gone better - I feel really good about her new owner - God provided (like He always does) a perfect match - and we got some new great friends out of the deal to boot!

Sunday the family came to look at Chey and the the girl (Bryla) loved her!  She does endurance racing and wanted a horse like Cheyenne to do the 100 mile race.  That is the best place for Chey that I could have asked for!  And Brlya's dad fell on love with our baby goats and bought the last two :)  Tuesday they came to go on a ride with us and take all their babies home.

Here are some pics of Chey from over the years I've had her:

Tikvah trying to jump on :P (didn't really work out so well)

Racing Naomi on Little Paint

Racing Tikvah on Canyon

 Tikvah riding her:

So on Tuesday we trailered over to the Strains and went up Jenkins from there.  Me, Bryla, Tikvah and Elisa went up Jenkins, and mom and Marlene (Bryla's mom) went along the ditch road because they didn't want to go fast :)  Apache did pretty good for not being ridden for a week :P She was a little rowdy so I took her off by herself and tried to take a "short cut", but it turns out that I don't quite know the terrain over there well enough to do that yet....lol  I took way longer than the other girls to get back and mom started freaking out and sent them back up to look for me.  I was loping down the trail when I came across them - and mom was so relieved to see me - but that was exactly what Apache needed then.

Cheyenne is doing great in her new home - I feel even better about it because Bryla texts me to let me know how she's doing and says I can come ride her whenever I want! :)