A Happy 2015 to all y'all!!

Happy New Year!  Things have been going alright out at our place.  I'll try to be brief and catch everyone up on what's been going on in my neck of the woods.

My horses:

Pam was leased out as a broodmare for the year.  She is currently living life as the diva she is.  Stalled, blankets when its cold, fed twice a day - she's gonna hate coming back to live on the farm.  She's bred and expecting a foal this next spring.

Rachael and Buck are best of friends as of lately and living it up here at home.  Due to a hectic work schedule and my health not being what it should be, they have become pasture ornaments.  I have plans to change that this year.  In the meantime, I feed them, and they look pretty.  That's about it.

It is with sadness that I report the loss of Nellie this year.  Her health has been in a slow decline since she ingested a whole bunch of hay net a few years back.  This year she was extremely lean on the nice spring grass.  We did all we could to find out what the problem was, but we ended up losing the fight a few months back.  The vet said his best guess is that the hay net either damaged her intestines, or were still wadded inside them, making it difficult for her to absorb nutrition.  This was the worst news of the year.

RIP Nellie

A barn???

Plans for Phase 1 of my barn. 

This fall I started building a barn.  The end result will be a 36 x 36 barn with 3 12x12 stalls, tack room, hay room, and feed/storage room, with a large center aisle.  In order to make this a reality,  I broke it into 3 phases.  Phase 1 - a 12x36 run in;  Phase 2 - another 12x36 run in, mirroring the first; Phase 3 - connect the two run ins and enclose it all.  See the process below.

More poles in

First poles

All Poles in the ground

Framing in work

Framed, with horses!  :)

I had some great help!

All framed up and ready to go!

Phase 1 is now all framed and just waiting on metal roof and siding.  I'm really pleased with the results so far.  Not too shabby for my first barn.  We also get the satisfaction that comes with the fact that we did it ourselves! 

A new puppy

A month ago, while out unloading a pick-up full of rock into a rather large pothole in the driveway, I turned around and was greeted by a pup.  He'd been dropped off out in our neck of the woods.  He just sat there, watching me work.  It was going to drop down into the low 30s that night, so I brought him home with me.  His name is Duke, and he now has a home with us.

The night I found him.

He's made himself quite comfy at our place.

Christmas Wagon Rides on Park Street

This year I didn't have my horses and wagon ready for the wagon rides.  I was pretty bummed that I was missing it for the 2nd year, but then I got a phone call.  The folks who were bringing the wagons and horses needed a driver for one of the nights.  I got offered the spot, and gladly took it.

A nice team of paint horses pulling a home-made vis-a-vis.  Great night!

I got to work a team of awesome paint horses.  they were much smaller than my drafts, but they pulled like a dream.  These horses loved to trot.  I've never driven a team with so much get up and go.  It was pretty awesome.  Much much different than the death march my Belgians do when pulling for the 2nd - 3rd hour.  Had a great time.  Next year I plan on being back, but this time with my own team again.

Plans for the future

The biggest plans I have are to get the horses working again.  I gotta get these horses out of their "pasture ornament" frame of mind and back working.  This will also mean training Buck.  All he really needs is hours on him.  This year I plan on doing that.