Random Stuff

Well I've been home sick for the past three days so when I've actually felt like being up and moving around I've been sitting quietly on the couch working on some crochet projects. I'm making a couple of blankets one for human use in my horse trailer and one for pet use on a dog bed if Catastropy the cat doesn't steal it first. 

This blanket is the one I'm going to put in my horse trailer when it's finished. 

And this is going to be the dog blanket

Here is Buddy and Jazzy kissing up trying to show how good buddies they can be. 

now here they are patiently waiting for a treat.

And the Castastrophy watching with disgust as the dogs kiss up to get special treats. 

Now I'm off to the store to try and find a different cold medication that will help clear up my stuffy head and hopefully I'll feel better tomorrow.

ACTHA ride

Well Keith and I and our horses Dream and Ladybug all just got back from our ACTHA ride this weekend. This is the second ride that Dream and I have been to this month, but Keith and Bug haven't been on the trails since about November. The first ride was in Socorro last Sunday and the second was in T or C this President's day weekend. 

The ride camp this weekend was at the Caballo State Park and was hands down the BEST camp site EVER. I mean who wouldn't want easy access to water faucets, Electric hookups for the vast majority of the participants, flush toilets AND access to showers! I know it sounds silly, but it's pretty much luxury camping. I'm so happy I got to use my horse trailer heater/AC for the very first time in the year I've owned the trailer. I'm also really happy my heater works so well.  I got a generator as a Christmas present so the next ride I go on I'll be able to use it also to run my heater.  

Here we are at the river crossing

And then again at the crossing the bridge obstacle.

What a GREAT weekend!

Doggie Chews

Jazzy and Buddy got a new bag of treats recently called CET Chews.  The chews are marketed for use in times when you can't brush your dog's teeth. Since both Jazzy and Buddy were rescued strays, they don't like getting their teeth brushed so we needed to try something different.  We got a big bag of the CET Chews for them to test out. We haven't had the chews long enough to test out their complete benefits yet, but Jazzy and Buddy certainly look forward to their new daily treat. 

The treats are coated with a couple enzymes that are supposed to help break up the plaque on your dog's teeth. The texture of the chew is rough enough to help brush or push the plaque off the teeth.  I got the size for large dogs (26 lbs up to 50 lbs) and they are just right for Jazzy and Buddy. The chews are large enough to last for a while but not so large that Jazzy and Buddy can't finish chewing them up.

These chews are similar to plain rawhide, but seems to be easier to chew. Buddy doesn't normally like plain rawhide chews, but he munches down on these CET Chews. The chews are the right size for a good daily treat and both the dogs really like them.  I think they will be a good addition to Jazzy and Buddy's list of favorite dog treats. 

The Appaloosa Horse and it's registry problems

Seriously for those of you who don't have Appaloosas, you might not want to bother reading this. I love my Appaloosas but honestly I'm totally sick of the main registry for Appaloosas. Over the past few years I'm sure some of you have seen my posts about different issues that have come up. 
Things like giving a registration status to a foal who's sire was a registered paint in Violation of the Breeding rule "No paint or pinto breeding" and the issue of allowing a person suspended from two other associations for abuse become an ApHC member and ride in the the World show. Those may seem like some pretty major issues but both were just swept under the rug. Now they have one more seriously major issue that also violates their own bylaws. Last fall, The ApHC held an election for the Board of Directors. The election process was completely ILLEGAL yet complaints from membership were also ignored.
Some of the complaints include the following:
1. First of all the election was held 100% electronically in violation of the rules in the hand book that state each member must be MAILED a ballot.  We were supposed to vote in the bylaw change with this vote, but as written, the bylaw still said a paper ballot must be mailed.
2. The election was supposed to be conducted and results compiled by a third party. The ApHC contends that the software program used to calculates the votes counts as a third party. All the Data and results were pulled out by members of the ApHC staff instead of being handed over from a third party company.
3. Individuals were supposed to be notified by e-mail and regular mail on how to vote. Problem is that some people didn't even get that information until AFTER the vote was closed. 
4. The rules for the vote stated that the voting would end at midnight on October 20th. They also stated 12AM. Problem is they didn't specify WHICH midnight/ 12 AM. So what happened is that the ApHC closed the vote at 00:00 am on the morning of October 20th while a large number of people were trying to vote because they thought it was supposed to be midnight 24:00 at the end of the day on the 20th. The ApHC refused to disclose which "midnight" they were referring to and they used ambiguous language that confused many of their own members.

http://www.nist.gov/pml/div688/times.cfm
Is midnight the end of a day or the beginning of a day?
When someone refers to “midnight tonight” or “midnight last night” the reference of time is obvious. However, if a date/time is referred to as “at midnight on Friday, October 20th” the intention could be either midnight the beginning of the day or midnight at the end of the day.
To avoid ambiguity, specification of an event as occurring on a particular day at 11:59 p.m. or 12:01 a.m. is a good idea, especially legal documents such as contracts and insurance policies. Another option would be to use 24-hour clock, using the designation of 0000 to refer to midnight at the beginning of a given day (or date) and 2400 to designate the end of a given day (or date).

One interesting thing to note is that the ApHC had more than 15,000 total members at the time of the vote. The total votes cast were less than 1000 in number. The most sickening thing of all is that some of the members actually think that the vote is legal and that anyone who didn't vote was at fault. Individuals couldn't vote because they didn't get the information through no fault of their own. Individuals couldn't vote because the ApHC didn't appropriate disclose what time the vote was supposed to close.

I decided to not renew my membership with the ApHC over this because I cannot support a club who is so unethical that they can't follow their own bylaws.

Catching up

Finally it was nice enough to saddle up a horse and go for a ride. The ground is still a bit slick and we still have snow and ice in some places. We had to take the ride slow because of the conditions, but Dream did good. We rode 4 miles and practiced a bunch of obstacles including a walk over the tarp and the bridge, the pin wheel, open gates and we even literally went and picked up the mail.  We are getting ready for more ACTHA rides this year. There are two planned for February, two planned in March, two planned in April and a single day ride in June so far. Dream is currently the only Appaloosa in the state that is in the top 10 horses and I hope to keep her in the top 10 for the ride year. 

Topper is fighting off hoof abcesses in both front feet. She's been in the 'sick' pen for almost a month now. She's getting better slowly and soon she'll be back in the main pasture with the rest of them. 

Ladybug and Booger Butt are doing fine. I'm thinking of taking BB on some of the up coming ACTHA rides to get him used to being tied to the horse trailer and get him around other horses. I've also decided that maybe I'll be selling Booger Butt. He's such a cute guy, but if I'm going to be breeding Appaloosas, I can't keep all of them. I want to breed Topper this year for a foal in 2013. I can't keep all of them and Booger is doing well in his training. He's ready for someone to take him to a higher level of training.

Snow Day

It looks like this at the house.

And it's still coming down. 

Jazzy is to lazy to get out of bed while Buddy has been out running around in the snow.

Catastrophy is attempting to confiscate my crochet. 

That's my snow day!

Stolen Horse Trailer

One of my friends had her horse trailer stolen from her boarding stable in Gallup, NM recently. Amazingly her horse trailer was specifically the target because multiple other horse trailers right beside this one were all left alone AND hers was the only one with a hitch lock on it. They took her trailer with the hitch lock and all.  The trailer was taken over night between November 11th and 12th. 

2- HORSE WHITE CM ODYSSEY ALUMINUM BUMPER- PULL

VIN #49THB112421058097

REWARD

CONTACT JACKIE AT 505-870-4671 Or Gallup Crimestoppers (505) 722-6161

Things I've learned from my garden

Okra flowers are AWESOME!

July ACTHA Ride

Last Saturday I took Baby Girl to her second ever ACTHA Competition. She did really well for her limited training and competitions. There were 64 total entries in my division, 2 riders either didn't show or didn't complete any obstacles. Three riders were disqualified for what ever reason so that left a total of 59 competitors earning points. Baby Girl completed all the obstacles but still finished 21st out of 59.

Our first obstacle was this huge white bridge and then we were to walk between two wooden long horn cows. Baby girl just wasn't sure about the white bridge. She hesitated a few times before she waked across the bridge, but she never really even looked at the wooden cows on the other side.

The second obstacle we needed to dismount, pick up a big white stuffed toy. Place it on the horse and remount the horse and then ride over to the assistant and give them back the big stuffed gorilla. Baby Girl did well on this one and didn't hesitate or spook.

The third obstacle was the vine simulator. They used a long white shower curtain that had the little magnets at the bottom of the curtain. It was a bit windy when we got there and baby girl was a bit spooked at the "vines", but she eventually went through both times within the time limit set for the obstacle.

We then rode over to the Slicker and hat pick up obstacle. This one we had practiced many times at home, but baby girl spooked a bit when I went to take the slicker off the tree limb. She settled well though and then we picked up the old hat with a stick and finished all in good time.

After that we had a log drag. We also practiced this one regularly at home, and things worked out well until I tried to get the rope hung back up at the end. I missed the branch and had to drop the rope, but we still scored pretty well. 

The next one we had never actually practiced before, but it turned out to be our best obstacle of the day. It was the Rope gate. We had to ride up to the gate, open it walk the horse through and calmly drop the rope and continue on. We got perfect scores on this one even though it was the one I was most concerned about in the beginning.

The last obstacle was a trot weave through cones. They had two silhouette cowboys at the start and one at the end of the cones we had to trot through the opening between the two, trot the cones and around the single one at the end and then back through the cones and the two cowboys. They set this obstacle up on a hard packed pea gravel road right next to a large open softer dirt area. Never figured out why they would set it up on the pea gravel when there was more softer dirt area beside it. Baby Girl wasn't to keen on trotting the gravel so we broke gait and didn't gain good scores on it. 

Overall I'm quite proud of my Baby Girl. She did well for her second competition. We do need more work, but that only comes with more time. 

Then on Sunday we attended a training clinic for another 4 hours and I got tips on working with her and practicing obstacles as we went along. It was a great weekend and I can't wait for the next ride!

Busy times here on the farm

Up until this past weekend we had not had any rain so my garden was looking pretty sad. I've been busy watering almost every day because the wind would blow and dry out the ground faster then the water could soak in. Now that the rains have started, I'm not needing to water every day. I've also been harvesting a few things here and there. We finally had some fresh lettuce for salads, the dill is ready to pick and dehydrate the leaves for dill weed. We had cooked Kale for dinner tonight. But the biggest thing is we finally got our first ripe tomato. Only one so far and it was a cherry tomato, but at least we did get a tomato. The rest of the garden is just barely getting going. Even the Rhubarb has been lagging due to the hot dry conditions. You know it's bad in the garden when even the weeds aren't growing well.

I've also got duck, geese and chicken hens all setting on nests. I've had one crop of young chicks and ducks that are at least two months old now and I've also got a new set of one gosling, three ducklings, and 4 Turkey chicks. The hens on nests have nearly 30 eggs between all the nests. The vast majority are all duck eggs, but one hen has her own set of about 8 chicken eggs and there is at least one goose egg in the bunch. I'll have to wait and see what all hatches, but if I do get over-run with ducklings, I think we will have duck for Thanksgiving Dinner. I'll also have to wait and see if I have any turkey hens in the batch of turkey chicks. I'm hoping for hens because I already have two Toms. If I get more Tom's then I guess it will be Turkey for Christmas dinner.

The horses are all doing well. I hauled Baby Boy and Dream Girl over to the vet for some wolf teeth removal last week. Then I'm off to an ACTHA ride this weekend, but Keith had some work stuff to do so he couldn't go. I got a new saddle for Dream because of her wide shoulders, but I haven't had a lot of chance to use it because I've been busy in the garden. Now with the heavy rains and thunder and lightning each night when I get home, I'm also not getting much riding done.  Pretty soon though I need to get Baby boy started on the trails. Until then I'll be in the house crocheting or reading books on my new birthday present.