Weekend

Well I didn't get as much done as I had planned this weekend (hardly a surprise, huh?) but it WAS nice.   Thanksgiving dinner at Janet and Mike's place was wonderful.  She made her specialty oyster dressing, of course, but she also made a really yummy mashed acorn squash that was really special (hope that one turns up again sometime) and brussels sprouts in a really good cream sauce.  Oh, and cranberry sauce with lime and fresh cilantro that was really REALLY good.  And simple enough that I plan to remember that for myself next time we do turkey!  I, of course, made that layered salad I always make, but the pumpkin bread pudding I planned to make as well I never got to -- I ended up buying a couple of desserts instead.  (Sorry, Janet!)  Just spent too long at the barn the night before, I'm afraid.

And speaking of the barn, Torri and Daniel bought four of those huge round bales yesterday - one they put in the barn to use in their hay bags.  The second went out to the side paddock for the beautiful new grulla Welsh pony/quarter horse cross who's now in the side paddock with Seeker.  Seeker is a mare who belongs to Al's friend down the road (who's working on his fences). 

The new girl, named Gracie, is absolutely GORGEOUS.  For those of you not familiar with the color grulla, here is a definition of grulla with pictures.

Unfortunately, I left my camera at home yesterday, but here is a picture I found that looks a lot like Gracie - except I think Gracie's face is actually cuter!   But Gracie is just as stocky as this horse -- she's short like Bug but she definately has a quarter horse build.

Anyway, Seeker is soooo happy to have some company finally - not to mention enough to eat at last!  Then the other two bales went out to opposite ends of the big pasture for Torri's and our horses.  I'm glad I won't have to bring them inside EVERY night now that there's no grass just so they'll have enough to eat.  I HATE cleaning Lizzie's stall -- she is the horse version of "Pigpen"!  (Mark calls her North Louisiana trailer trash.)   But where was I -- oh, yes . . . so the hay got put out last night and then it POURED down rain this morning.  Sigh.  When Mark comes home he says he will definately drive over to Houston to pick up that HayHut I found online.  Seeing that nice fresh hay get soaked immediately definately reinforced our decision to buy one of those things to keep the hay dry and to keep the horses from using the stuff as bedding.  We're going to put the HayHut over at Al's until the horses come home, so maybe after using it there for a while everyone else will come to see how effective it is and he or they will replace it once we're gone.  We'll see.

The HayHut "dealer" who was supposed to be up in Shreveport is apparently out of business, so we will be getting ours from an equestrian center over in Houston instead -- which works better, actually, because the owner lives on site so we can go pick it up on any day at any hour of the day or night, as opposed to worrying about getting there during standard business hours. 

We had hoped to use Al's tax id to avoid taxes on it since it's going to be at his place, but it turns out he doesn't actually HAVE a tax id.  He just uses his S/S number as a farmer, so I don't know if that will work or not in Texas.  We'll have to see. 

Mark's time off this hitch is going to be really busy yet again.  Because of all the new rig regulations, he's going to have to go to rig jacking school down in New Iberia for five days, even though he's been jacking rigs for decades.  And he's planning to continue work on the fencing including setting a new end post and support post for the vinyl part in concrete when he gets home so it will have set up in time for him to finish that part of the fence before he goes back.  Then Vickie and John will be coming down for Christmas the weekend before he heads back to work so they can have a chance to visit with him while they're here. 

Which reminds me - I am going to have to spend my evenings this week straightening up the house and getting rid of things like all those magazines older than a few months (LOTS of horse magazines -- anyone want those?  If so, just let me know.  If you're around here, they're free.  If I need to mail them, just pay the postage and I'll be happy to send them to you.  They are Horse and Rider, Equus, and Horse Illustrated.) 

Okay, time to head for work and drop off Joey at therapy this morning.  He's ecstatic!  The boy absolutely adores going there.  He was extremely upset on Wednesday and Friday last week when he didn't get to go.  He seems to know the days when he would normally go and he got really bent out of shape when he didn't get to.  Sorry, sweetie -- everyone needs to take a vacation occasionally - even folks who love their job as Jennifer does!