Wordless Wednesday: Stormy

Lope

When we were kids my mom taught us this ryhme:

The Antelope

Cantelope

'cus him Momma won't let him.

Get it? Cantelope? Can't elope? I don't know if she was trying to teach us vocabulary or trying to be funny. 

Anyway.

Stormy is living with someone else for a little while. Not that she lived with me before. (Unfortunately). This friend of mine is an excellent horse trainer, and she is teaching Stormy a few things. (And teaching me things too of course.) Last Sunday we went on a very nice trail ride, where I got very frustrated with Stormy wanting to take off with me. But it was still an awesome trail ride and I learned stuff. And after that Mrs. Trainer Friend got on Stormy and started working on her going into a canter (lope) easier. She said the trick is to work on it someplace where she likes to lope anyway, then once she learns she can go straight into a lope, start trying other places. So she rode her in her yard for a while. Telling her to go faster at her favorite go-faster spot. This is a picture of her on Stormy:

Note the loose stirrup. Whoops! And I didn't mean to cut her head off...

And Stormy's head and body aren't actually that out of proportion, I was sitting above her on top of the round pen to get this pic. 

And here's a picture of me on her. It's blurry because it was actually a video that I took a screen cap from and it was very zoomed in. Oh well. I like that you can't see my face anyway.

Boots and Scary Things

Stormy got some hoof boots. So far she hasn't acted like she even notices them on her feet. They fit very well (should fit even better now that I adjusted the wires a little more. Now the straps won't stick out so far. See picture below.) I rode her with them for the first time this weekend. We headed North on Dobbs, in the direction of the bigger gravel that we never ride on. 

So I took my horse that hasn't been ridden by herself away from other horses for months...

and took her by herself in a direction she has only gone once before, (ages ago)...

and towards the house with all the barking hunting dogs. 

Oh and I did it during the time of the day that the house just south of us holds their target practice portion of their concealed carry classes. (Turns out the gunshots are actually louder when you head north. They echo off of something.)

She did very very well. Considering. Occasionally a truck would drive past which helped me move her further down the road because she not afraid of trucks, and the noise drowned out the dogs and extraloud gunshots. But at a certain point when she was fairly calm but we were getting closer to the house with the dogs, I decided to get off and lead her. The last time I fell off when I was riding away from home she RAN all the way back home. I don't mind walking, but I don't want her galloping down the road and falling or getting hit by a car. 

We walked about 3 miles all together. Her boots did great. She stepped on them a couple times when she was dancing around at scary things like cows and burnt down barns, and they stayed on just fine. (By the way she used to live with cows, I don't know why she doesn't remember they aren't scary!) And there was no signs of rubbing when I took them off.

The only problem I had with the boots was: when she walked in the grass and brush, debris looked like it was getting kicked up against her fetlock and falling into the heel captivator (the back of the boot.) The heel captivator was nice and secure and has padding, so I hoped it wasn't actually falling INTO her boot. But when I removed them there was a big sharp sticker stuck to the padding inside the heel captivator of one of the boots...I don't know what I can do to keep that from happening again.

Wordless Wednesday: The Ears Say it All

Floating

Last weekend I took my horse to the dentist. she was due (actually past due it turned out) to have her teeth "floated." What's really happening is the vet is using a pneumatic file to grind down sharp edges that form on their molars. Horses' teeth form sharp edges that can cause lots of problems, from not being able to chew their food well to creating sores inside their mouths.

After he's done, the vet gives the horse another shot. The antidote, if you will, to the powerful sedative that kept her happy while her teeth were being (loudly!) filed away.

The vet said most horses wake up faster.

This was after he put her halter back on her.

This was after I got her in the trailer. She was awake enough to step up into the trailer, but didn't quite have it in her to get that one back leg all the way in for a while. 

Wordless

Hooves for a Cure Trail Ride

This Saturday I went on my first official, organized, haul-your-horse-somewhere trail ride. It was the Hooves for a Cure trail ride at Lake Carl Blackwell in Stillwater Oklahoma…which meant hauling the horses about an hour and a half (much longer than stormy has ever been in the trailer that I know of.)

Here she is in the trailer with her little buddy, Wisp:

   I had a very vivid dream the night before that I overslept…it was so upsetting I woke up. What a huge relief to find out it was still 5am!

   Then, all morning I had a weird feeling I would forget something. Which those that know me know  isn't really that weird of a feeling for me. (I’m always forgetting things. I really hate that. I really TRY not to.)

   I discovered as soon as we were on the road--I forgot the pink face paint and pink hair spray-on dye (for the horses, not us.) So I assumed that’s what was giving me that feeling and breathed a sigh of relief. It was disappointing I wouldn't be able to paint our horses with all kinds of fun pink designs…but not the end of the world.

   Not something that would keep us from being able to ride at all.

   Not anything like forgetting my coggins papers. Which you HAVE to show to be able to participate in things like trail rides.

   Which I suddenly remembered were still in MY glove box back in Luther once we got to Lake Carl Blackwell.

   LUCKILY my horse’s vet was willing to fax me a copy to the FedEx in Stillwater (the fax machine at “the store” at the lake wasn't working.) The FedEx was about 20 minutes there and 20 minutes back…and that was AFTER spending several minutes at “the store” at the lake before we discovered their machine didn't work.

   SO not only did we end up barely having time to tack our horses up, the whole huge group of 30 people waited on us to go on the ride. I felt so bad…but am so grateful I was able to get my coggins faxed to me and  so, so, SO thankful too that these people who don’t know me at all waited on me.

  Needless to say, now everyone who might ever haul my horses for me now has their own copy of Stormy’s coggins papers.

The ride itself was great, the trail we went on was beautiful and had a wide variety of terrain. It was cold, but didn't really rain on us like we were afraid it might. There were fields of bluebonnets in bloom, and wooded areas with trails winding up and down hill, and of course, the lake. Stormy didn't spook at anything, and she was very well behaved the whole time I was on her. And I got to meet lots of other horse people which is always fun! I didn't start taking any pictures till we were more than halfway done...because with all my layers of clothing my phone/camera was a little hard to get too.

Here is Kim and Wisp and a bunch of people we don't know. This was towards the end of the ride where there are some water troughs in a wide open area. That black horse in the pink hat is a Percheron  She was HUGE, but you can't really tell from this perspective. 

This is me and Stormy, both stopping for a drink of water. 

This is Kim and a lady we don't know and my finger. This road was the last couple miles of the ride and made for great trotting, and would have been great for cantering, but Stormy was a little tired at this point.

I kept staying back so I'd have room to run:

Stormy after the ride. I obviously I had not had time to take a picture before the ride, so had to take one after. She is wondering why I'm taking pictures instead of getting the saddle off and giving her some hay.

After the ride I was so cold..I'm not sure if I've thawed out still since then. But I can't WAIT to do another trail ride!

If I have Stress in My Life

I completely forget about it when I'm in my happy place.

Riding Stormy on the motor cross trails last night at sunset she decided to stop at the top of a hill (which usually is the case on a big hill.) The view was too lovely to not take my phone out and snap a picture.) And I don't care if anyone thinks Oklahoma red dirt and weeds aren't lovely. Put anything between a horse's ears and it becomes scenic in my opinion.

Update on Various Things

I haven't posted anything new in a while because I've been rather busy. So here's a brief summery of what I've been up to. So brief I won't even include how I was sick with the worst cold ever for a while, and went bowling for the first time in forever the Tuesday before last (and enjoyed it even though I'm horrible at bowling) Or worked on cleaning up my flowerbed this weekend, or any of that.

Painting: 

I've got a custom portrait or two in the works. They're gifts for people so I can't show pictures for a while. So there will be more on that in several months.

I finally finished this painting for another pillow pet and have started working on a few more:

I've been painting some wine and grape themed paintings as well as trying to add to my other animal paintings. (Basically I'm trying to just paint every free second I get):

 

I sold all of my horse paintings, the proceeds of which paid for Stormy's 60 days of training. Very appropriate I thought.

Pets:

Roman is getting bigger:

Stormy is getting smaller:

I've been riding Stormy a lot. This particular photo was taken at the end of the longest ride I have ever been on. About 4 and a half hours if you count time just standing around visiting. Which I do since I was still in the saddle during that time. My knees and ankles count it...

I've decided I want to get Stormy freeze branded. When there have been wildfires, I know some people have been forced to just open gates/cut fences and let their horses loose for lack of time and/or a trailer. Horses also just get loose occasionally. People steal horses. And since Stormy's physical description would be "bay" (she has no white on her at all) I'd like to add something more identifiable. She does have some scars on her face but that isn't good enough. I want something I can register.
Here's the sketches I've been working on:

Riding Horses like Motorcycles

 Last Saturday I got to ride Stormy on a dirt motocross track. The guy that owns it has a professional motocross team that trains on that track, and it just happens to be a very ride-able distance from my trainer's house. (Stormy is at the trainer's right now...did I mention that?) Since nobody was going to get off their horses and take pictures, here are some rough sketches of what we did:

There were small moguls. good for trotting or cantering over. I learned to switch between leaning forward and leaning back very fast. it was like going over tiny jumps in a row...only not.

There were also big steep hills that were fun to run up. Here's the first one we went over:

And here is what happened when we got to the top:

There were also flat areas and banks on the curvy areas. Lots of running happened

t h e  e n d.

Transformation

This is how stormy looked when I met her. She hadn't been ridden in a while but was certainly not under-fed. Note her neck...(horses get a crest of fat on their neck when they are overweight). Her neck looked like a draft horse it was so thick. 

And here is a pic I took last friday after a ride (if that wasn't already obvious from the saddle shaped sweat mark on her back) Note how much more muscular her hindquarters are. and her neck..there's definition now! Her chest also looks very different. she has chest muscles now whereas before there was no definition there, and her neck just kinda merged into her chest. I was told by a new friend recently that I should try showing her in halter classes. which makes me sooo excited to think about.

Here's another picture...and in-between shot. Taken last summer. I just think she looks purdy in it:

Grainy Small Photos

I had NO IDEA that I could instagram-ize any pictures in my "camera roll" until yesterday. I thought you just had to take the picture with instagram. I'm a little slow with technology stuff. So I've had fun since then. 

Stormy's muzzle-area is kinda old-looking and wrinkly and lumpy and whiskery and I love it. I don't kiss her on the muzzle, though. Not because that would be gross, because her whiskers are seriously itchy. I kiss her on the bridge of her nose instead.
And that is Katy the sweet mamma kitty and her two babies who are named Rascal and Dancer. Dancer is coming home with me in a few weeks (shhh!)
Next is one of the dilapidated houses on Main st. in Luther, Oklahoma.
And then Stormy again (the first time I saw that face I thought, she's so cute! Next thought was..wow...she's big.) And the last picture is Bella. Doesn't that face just cheer you up? Well it does me.

At the Farm

  Bibby's single kitten has started wandering off on his own a little. Last night he wandered a little then mom thought she could go get something to eat and he started mewing pathetically till she came and "rescued" him. I wonder if kittens who are only children are more clingy to their mothers since they don't have littermates to keep them company.

No...no clingy at all....

  Sometimes I wonder if Stormy might be part draft. Here is why. Look at that butt! This is why riding her at a gallop feels like you're riding a locomotive. When I bought her I was told she was half Appaloosa. But the "spots" that were pointed out to me as her appaloosa spots are just dapples that she gets in the summer. And she has a very VERY thick mane and tail which are not appaloosa-like at all. She also has no striped hooves, no visible sclera most of the time, and no mottled skin.

She's got a pretty shoulder, too.

Stray Livestock. And Squares.

Last weekend I was on my way home from Luther, and saw a calf in the road. He looked colorful...I think he was a longhorn calf. Anyway, I tried to kind of heard him down a gravel road--so he at least wouldn't be on the main road, but a truck zoomed past me and scarred him into running past the gravel road. The truck finally saw my reason for driving slow, and proceeded to swerve several times in an attempt to cut the calf off (he was getting sort of close to rt. 66 by this point.) Another truck came along and the two truck guys ended up chasing it on foot when it ran down into the "river" (basically a dried up creek with a small trickle of inch-deep water...like most Oklahoma rivers.)

This Saturday the neighbor to my friend-who's-house-I-keep-my-horse-at found three stray horses in his yard and thought they were my friend's. So he herded them into his pasture. Where they met our horses (who happen to be three mares and a gelding). They were together for about an hour before my friend came home and got them separated. 

Here's one of them: 

He happens to be a stallion.

Then on Sunday (on my way home again) I saw three more loose horses grazing in the Pecan grove on the corner of Luther Rd. and Rt. 66. 

I hope Stormy doesn't get any ideas seeing all these stray cows and horses running loose. Luckily there's really not a good reason for her to try and escape her 40 acre pasture with all it's nice, new, green grass.

I feel like maybe I write about my animals too much and not enough about my art, here's some pictures of some old paintings I did in college:

Wordless Wednesday

Confession Time

It's sometimes said that a dog's personality is a reflection of their owner's personality. I hope that's not true of horses. I was told this weekend that my horse is a bully.  

I took it to heart, and am working on nipping it in the bud. She has become very herd-bound, and really gets agitated when I try and ride her away from the other horses. I knew that much. However, I hadn't noticed how much she just pushed me around. She's great in the barnyard, but when I take her on the trail she's pretty bad. So I got a lesson on Friday from my farrier-who-is-also-a-horse-trainer on what to do when she starts throwing a temper tantrum. (That's the best way I could think of how to describe what she does). She demonstrated just how bad she can be, and I got told how to fix things (and that if I don't it will only get worse.) She's going to be going through horsey boot-camp now. Lots of riding like I've said before, and there's going to be a zero tolerance for outright rude behavior (she's bad about trying to rub her face on me.)

*Just to note, she wasn't actually being crazy when the first picture was taken, she was in the process of turning to look at something. And of course in the second picture she had just taken a drink of delicious leaf-filled water and was just liking her lips.

Dust Bath

Stormy rolling after a long ride, during which there was lots of trotting and even some cantering and some throwing of I-want-to-go-back-to-the-barn fits. Which I won. She got sweaty. 

When I got Stormy she hadn't been ridden in years, and she still has some barn-sour and herd-sour tendencies. What makes it worse is the herd matriarch, Sonora, whinnies her head off when any members of her herd leave. Stormy really finds it hard to resist. My goal this summer is to ride her as close to every day as I can get, and work specifically on going on rides with just the two of us. She can be such a dream to ride when she isn't wanting to go back to the barn--she's getting really good at neck reining and she even responds to my seat and legs very well now (most of the time.) 

On a side note. I'm having a BIG PRINT SALE and it ends tomorrow. 

A First-Horse Educational Experience

Almost every Saturday for the past couple (three?) years, my dad and I have gone horseback riding together. We ride out in Luther, OK. One of my dad’s colleagues lives out there and owns 3 horses. And I own one, which I bought from him, and which still lives at his house. One Saturday morning about two weeks ago we went out to catch the horses to go for a ride.  But once we got back to the barn, the horse my dad usually rides (Buddy) was breathing really hard. More specifically, his breaths were really shallow and fast. He was his normal ornery self (trying to bite everyone and trying to hold the knot of his lead rope in his teeth) but apparently about a week before that he had refused his feed. Other than that, though, he had acted fine even just the day before.

So Buddy’s owner called the vet who came out to check on Buddy and diagnosed him with pneumonia. (She ran some bloodwork, too…It was just plain old bacterial pneumonia.) She told us to watch the other three horses closely because they could catch it from him and left some antibiotic shots to give Buddy.

And then yesterday I had the vet come out to see my horse, Stormy. She had started coughing a bit; and I had noticed the last couple times I rode her that she had snot dripping out of her nose after.  It looked exactly like the horse in this article

She didn’t have a temperature and the vet couldn’t get her to cough (she coughed before the vet got there of course.) However her respiratory rate was faster than it should be, especially considering she had been standing tied for over 30 minutes. Luckily I caught Stormy’s illness way earlier than Buddy’s was caught, and she’s getting less strong antibiotics and should be well sooner.   

About 6 years ago I crunched some numbers and realized I had enough to buy a horse, and pay to board it somewhere AND feed it AND  get it’s shots and hooves done and all.  I resisted the urge at that time to buy a horse, because that would leave me with almost $0 left in each paycheck.  It was hard. It got harder as horses got cheaper and cheaper. But THIS is why I waited--these un-expected horse-sized vet bills! Now she just needs to not have anything else go wrong for a while. 

Don't ever dare Stormy to stick her tongue to a frozen flag pole 'cus she would totally do it

Trail Ride

Today was an excellent day for a ride.

This is cookie (the cat) and Stormy (my horse). This is stormy's first time wearing saddlebags...and the cat didn't really go a long for the ride. This cat is obnoxious (to say the least)--always wanting constant attention, so he doesn't mind getting stuck weird places if it means he's getting petted more frequently. I often end up setting him on top of stormy while i'm brushing her to keep him from being underfoot/climbing my leg to get to my hand. He is a sweet cat, just sweet in a very pushy sort of way.