Life is wonderful. Busy as the dickens, but wonderful. I can't seem to find the time I used to for keeping this space as updated as I once did! Surprisingly, it bothers me none.
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Horses
January was mostly a vacation month for the horses as I focused on my jobs. 40 hours a week in the office at my "real" job and around 30 hours at the resort between Friday and Saturday keeps a girl busy. Sundays are my only "off" days this time of year; they are mostly spent sleeping in, enjoying large breakfasts and generally being lazy. Because 70-hour work weeks demand a lazy day to recharge.I wanted to give both horses some time off in January. My busy schedule aided in this and resulted in me not even seeing them for 19 days. That's the longest I have EVER gone without seeing Q and Griffin! However, having a BO who is like a family member and another boarder who is out daily keeping a close eye on all of the horses makes it easier to take that kind of a break. There was one cold Arctic snap during this time period and my two were brought into the barn with the others to weather the event a little easier. The herd made it through the weather event just fine.
Prior to the big snowstorm - a separate winter event following the Arctic snap, I made it out to blanket my two and put their tails into mud knots to avoid ice balls building up from what promised to be a lot of precipitation and wind gusts >50 mph.
Actually, the mud knots went in on a Wednesday evening and the blanketing occurred on Thursday. There had been rain on Wednesday that left the horses wet, and I knew they'd be dry after the sun predicted on Thursday. I had a tight schedule of things to fit in that Thursday, so when I went by to throw their blankets on I did so while they stood in the field at liberty.
My two are so accustomed to me and are so trusting that I was able to schlep their blankets out into the field after dark and cloak them with minimal issue. In fact, Q walked right up stood in front of me as if to say, "Dress me, human." It surprised me and was quite comical! Griffin followed her lead and let me blanket him afterward. (He'd been more skeptical about the large, dark potential "monster" blankets than Q had been when I entered the field.)
When I visited the horses post-storm, I found them to be fat, happy, and dry. I took both out for short rides in the deep, undisturbed snow. It had compressed a fair bit from it's original champagne fluff, but it was still quite deep!
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| Overlooking the farm and the back field. Jumps are slightly visible far left center of photo in field. |
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| Mud knot visible here. I adore this mare. |
Griffin and I did a loop in the back field that involved w/t/c/gallop and me grinning like an absolute fool. There is just something about speeding through deep snow on a horse!
Q and I just pranced around in the barnyard for a time at each gait. I was able to set my phone on the fence during this little session to capture some media of how deep the snow was while we were riding.
The week after the storm event, Griffin and I celebrated 4 years together. January 28 is his official "Gotcha Day".
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| January 28, 2012 |
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| January 28, 2016 |
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| I adore him <3 |
It's so hard to believe this is the same horse from four years ago!! He's come a REALLY long way. I adore him. <3
Skiing
Ski season has been a bit lacking this El Niño year. However, I'm willing to forgive a bit because the large storm system in late January did bring us waist deep champagne powder that resulted in one of the greatest (if not THE greatest) skiing days I have ever had. How incredible! If such events happened with more regularity, I would buy fatter skis in a heartbeat! I just have a hard time justifying the purchase of something I may only use a few times a year. |
| Kenai riding the ski lift with Dave and I. He's a happy dog. |
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| I've taken a photo in this exact spot for 3 months now. One left and I'll have an epic collage. |
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| Trenched ski tracks. |
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| With regard to the bottom right photo...one of us did NOT want to participate in the photo. ;-) |
Overall, that snow event helped provide the best weekend of winter activity this season. Two full days at the resort followed by another day of XC skiing with Dave and Kenai - one daytime ski and one full moon ski. Everyone had a great time and each of us was sufficiently whooped by the end!
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While the writing bug isn't biting me as hard these days, the reading bug is! I'm voraciously reading books and blogs alike. My commenting game is slacking, I'm aware, but I am reading along! And that's something.
Cheers to you all, I hope you're well -- and please, if you haven't, follow along on instagram (estout18). It's about all I can manage to keep up with these days. ☺
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