Nice weekend . . .

While we were over at Janet and Mike's this weekend, I took some pictures of them and their horses.  Mike isn't actually riding Dixie at the moment because she was spayed just a short time ago and is still in the process of recovering.  (That's why she's shaved like that on both sides.)  But she obviously loves hanging out with Mike anyway!  

He would walk in and out of traffic cones and walk slow, then fast, then stop suddenly.  No matter what, she would stay right by his side.  What a sweet girl!

Whenever I took her picture up close, she would look at me like she was
trying to figure out what the heck I was doing pointing that "thing" at her.
But she's obviously sure Mike will protect her.

Those furry nose pieces on their bridles keeps their Dr. Cook bitless bridles from putting too much pressure on their noses.  Both Jan and Mike have been using those on their horses for the last month or two -- and they're doing so well in them that I ordered one for Lizzie today! 

She'll probably need some ground training, but I think she'll be just fine with it eventually.   She will as long as there's another horse with her anyway.  But if she's riding with Duke and you try and turn away from him, she throws a fit, rearing and trying to turn to get back to him.  It's been possible to correct her by pulling her head around and making her stop, then keeping her moving in the other direction.  But without a bit . . . well, we'll have to see if that's a problem.  Actually, I don't think I would try and ride her alone anyway anywhere away from our place.  She's pretty shy without another horse to accompany her.  But we'll see how it goes.  (Won't we, Buddy?  ;-D  )

I have a lot more pictures of  Mike and Dixie than of Jan and Digger since Jan was RIDING Digger.  A lot of the pics I took of her turned out blurry if they were moving quickly past me.  But Digger sure is a cutie, isn't he?  He and Knight aren't very fond of each other so she has to keep them separated, but he does love Janet already and that's what matters.

I did get some pretty clear pics when she rode down the space between the pastures directly toward me anyway.

 

Ranger -- one of their dogs -- likes hanging out with them, too, obviously.  Their other dog, Betty, a Great Pyrenees, is more of a nocturnal guard than a playful dog.  She has apparently decided that we're not a hazard to the horses, so we see very little of her on our visits.   

Well, time to go try and find a sliding barn door hardware kit SOMEWHERE online.  Not sure exactly which kind we need since we've never actually used them before.  So I'll have to do some serious checking around.  But we have FIVE stall doors we need to be able to close when necessary.   We were going to build dutch doors, but the bid we got to build sturdy steel door frames to support those doors was exorbitant! (A 4' X 9' wood door is HEAVY.)  So Mark plans to just build a nice big flat door that will SLIDE closed when necessary.  We don't plan to close them ordinarily, but we want to be able to close them during a storm, for instance, and be sure they'll hold up.  So -- time to check around and see what we need in the way of hardware.