Is it Autumn Yet?

That's about how I'm feeling about summer at this point. That is to say, its been a great and productive summer and I've absolutely loved going to an endurance ride each and every month, but I am READY for fall. Sure we haven't had horrendous heat waves or anything particularly dramatic, its just the ready-steady 90+ degrees every single day, on and and on unendingly. My taste of crisp air and sweatshirt weather on the coast really fried me on valley summer, too. I love everything about the fall, the air, the weather, the sweatshirts, the coziness and fires in the woodstove. Fuzzy horses..okay that's not as much my favorite part but they sure look cute especially my tiny Blaze man. He really looks like a little fuzzy toy in his thick winter coat. Oh man here I am dreaming on winter weather as I sit my oven-like house waiting for the sun to go down enough to make being outside tolerable. I'll try to justify my extreme whiny-ness with the fact that my skin is just not made for all this sun. I do pretty well with applying sunscreen every day, a few times a day, and my sun rash has only made an appearance once this summer which is great. My sunburns this summer have also been pretty minimal and for the most part only in small patches where my sunscreen application failed. But at the end of the day I just can't take the beating sun the way my husband can and my natural inclination to be out and about and busy, whether its playing with the horses or just working around the place, is much at odds with my ability to realistically function in the summer heat. So anyway, this is just my long-winded way of saying, is it autumn yet??!! The acorns are falling, the acorns are falling. Sign of an early fall? Sure, I'll believe any old wives tale at this point!
Blaze and I did go for an early morning ridge ride yesterday morning with some good hill sprints and I ran a mile on the way back down. So I don't feel like a total horse-slacker. Tomorrow my *plan* is to ride at the Lake for hopefully at least 10 miles, maybe more if I am ambitious, but to do so I have to drop my husband off at 4 am to meet the fishing boat he is working on to help out a buddy. Then go to the lake and start riding in the dark? Or drive home and pick up the horse and trailer and go back out to the lake. Probably the latter, but it sounds so very early...well we'll see! Tomorrow is supposed to have a high of 87 last I checked so lets just hope that is still the case and there is some truth to that forecast.
Found a barefoot trimmer to call to consult on Desire's feet etc..just have to call her...the heat makes even picking up the phone sound like too much work...good grief. I'll need a wedge of cheese to go with all this whine!

Embarking on the Easyboot Adventure

Desire in her new Easyboot Gloves

Its official, I own my first pair of Easyboot Gloves! This morning was my first time putting them on Desire; her trim is just over two weeks old and not done by a barefoot trimmer, so the fit could have been better but I did get them on and off successfully which was my first triumph. I am considering looking up a barefoot trimmer to look after Desire's feet as opposed to my farrier I am currently using, since I know that the trimming philosophies can be quite different. I have ZERO experience using Easyboots so I'm going to be feeling my way along in the dark on this whole journey but I know I have a wonderful resource in the folks at GETC, where I bought Desire. Christoph Schork, partners with Dian Woodward at GETC, just won the 100 mile National Championship in Easyboots--I'd say you don't get a more knowledgeable resource on Easysboots than that! Anyhow I am glad to see how easy the Gloves are to get on and off and Desire didn't mind my amateurish application of them.
Today is the raffle drawing for a year of free shoeing that my farrier is doing. I have 25 tickets in the raffle and really hope to win! I've decided to keep Blaze in front shoes at least for the foreseeable future since they are working for him and learning with one horse in Easyboots is enough for me for the moment--so come on raffle, lets get a year of free front shoes for Blaze!

Oh and Sheza is 5 months old this week!! Weaning time before we know it!

Sheza, 5 months old this week!

We're Home!

An endurance ride, first beach ride, week, and 500 miles later Georgia, Blaze, and I are home! It was a great trip made better by getting to camp and ride the endurance ride with old friends, a great FREE boarding spot for Blaze..oh yeah and a new saddle! The Free n' Easy from E came home with me and is now hanging on the main "boss" saddle rack. Its so much lighter than my other saddle! And such a relief that I can continue our conditioning and finish the ride season without any further damage to Blaze's back (he got a small rub spot on each side of his back from the other saddle).
The timing was also good as I was around to help my mom all week after she took a spill in a dusting hole in the chicken yard and had to be on crutches. As of yesterday she said she was off the crutches but she is such a go-getter, I hope she doesn't get too buck wild before she goes to see her foot doctor again Monday. I don't think I mentioned that on Tuesday night on my way home from riding at the beach my right rear horse trailer tire exploded! I have honestly never had a flat tire even on a car, let alone had a tire explode on the trailer while hauling my horse!! Luckily it happened a couple of hundred yards from my parent's driveway so I pulled over and ran in a blind panic to find my step-dad (did I mention this had never happened to me before, LOL). He has seen it all and wasn't very worried, just told me to limp into the yard and back the trailer in front of the shop so it could be repaired. Fortunately my backing skills were feeling up to par and I cranked it right in there the first try, then pulled Blaze out of the trailer and jumped on him bareback and rode him over to his boarding spot next door. I got a new tire and had it mounted on the wheel the next day for $120 (seemed cheap, last time we put tires on our car it was $700 for 4!) then my brother helped me put it back on the trailer that night. It would have been really unfortunate if that all had happened while out on the highway though not the end of the world since my brother was all ready to jump in his truck and come rescue me before he realized it had happened right next to our parent's house. Its nice to have men with every conceivable tool and skill set around, I have to send my husband off for training on that ;) My step-dad and brother are loggers and truck drivers so that all falls into their area of expertise.
Anyhoo we are home to the hot hot heat of August in the valley. I cannot WAIT until fall. My favorite season and such a relief after sweltering for 3 or 4 months. My Sheza filly is bigger than ever, she can barely reach down to nurse and I swear is not much shorter than her mom already!! Please don't turn into a 16 hander, filly!