MKI Horse Farm's Home Page

If you want to read this in Chronological order, start at the bottom and work your way up.

We did a rearrangement on one of the gates to the pasture - it now serves double duty as a gate to the main pasture - closing the small pasture so we can roll hay bales or let the small pasture relax from the stress from being grazed. Or I can open the main pasture up to the small pasture and let the horses in to graze the grass or get at the bale.

We nearly lost one of the kittens - 4 spot - he foolishly decided the back yard was a great play place and the dogs were great playmates..... NOT!!!! Unfortunately, Ian and I were out in the pasture. However, Ken was in the back yard and was able to rescue the cat from..... All he suffered was a damaged ego and some bruising. He's recovered fully - except he doesn't really like the dogs that were involved in the altercation. This wasn't really something I wanted him to witness but he did handle it okay. He told me that you can't be mad at the dogs for being dogs.

Well... Let's see. Ian's been playing basketball. He's on the 5th grade boys team. He's showing lots of improvement in his skills and he really enjoys it. My hind end though would appreciate some more comfortable seating arrangements in the bleachers.

All the animals are doing fine. No one has come up with any more instances of Pigeon Fever.

We finally got the roof back on the shed - it took 'til now to get the tools, money, and supplies. We decided to remove the east side of the shed and to cut a vent space off the back (north side) of it so that the south or southwest winds didn't get concentrated up in that one corner. I believe that this concentration of wind force is what popped the roof off in the first place. We also have reinforced the roof with various metal strapping. We've already had a couple of tests of our handy work and it seemed fair. Over the next 24 hours we are supposed to get some nasty wind gusts (steady wind 24 to 30 MPH with gusts of up to 60 MPH). I'll be interested to see what it looks like in the morning.

Ian's also joined the boy scouts and is really looking forward to his first camping trip. He also got to go at the end of October but his basketball team had a tournament that week and he chose to honor his commitment to the basketball team.

Ian's finally given me another Christmas list. His first list consisted of one sole subject and after he got into trouble at school I nixed that list and asked for another. Here it is:

Yep, it's finally cooled off I (it's now regularly in the low 90's/high 80's instead of 104 to 107) and it's rained some - not enough to finish off the drought but enough so that the grass has turned green again. The rains of the last couple weeks have brought us here (specifically at my house) about 1.7 inches of rain. And we've had to mow the yard again - this is only the 3rd time this summer. Yes - the 3rd time. That's how dry it's been.

We are all praying that the hay farmers will be able to get on more cutting before winter. If so perhaps the hay won't be so pricey. Hay has DOUBLED in price and is difficult to find these days because of all the demand. And what hay we have found hasn't been as nutritious as is could be. Gas prices have also played a part in this - the tractors, etc. need lots of gas.

Today, I put Strider and Ayashe back in the big pasture. They'd been separated from the rest due to an instance of of Pigeon Fever. After the trip to the vet for lancing his abscess (middle of July) Strider recovered remarkably well. I had only been waiting to see if Ayashe would come down with it. I am crossing my fingers - its been 7 weeks since he scabbed over and no other occurrences have happened.

Ian is back in school and so far seems to be doing well. We do have his IEP meeting to attend this week so I am sure that if there is anything to talk about it will be discussed then.

I was able to get most of the cats and kitten's and Scruffy fixed - I definitely gave the local vet's student doctor a work out with 2 spays and 4 neuters. Poor Scruffy - she spent the entire 10 days she had the staples in a Elizabethan collar since she liked to try chewing on her incision. Because I had the student vet (regular vet attending) doing the surgeries - I could get all those procedures for $125 - think of the savings on that many surgeries. All the animals came through the various surgeries very well and I passed that info along to both the student vet and the regular vet. This particular student vet also had a good patient/owner manner which is very useful in being a vet.

It's been really too hot lately to work on the shed roof but we're planning on a work day soon, hopefully before the end of this month.

We did have an interesting visit by some locals recently. They had apparently figured out that on most weekend nights we didn't lock the garage door. We hadn't worried to much since the dogs are usually out in the back yard and alert to any activity and someone is usually here all weekend. Well, they picked one of the VERY hot nights and I had the dogs inside. I had heard some noises but thought those were just because of the wind. Also just as I was getting ready to bed I realized I hadn't put my fly predators out (www.spaldinglabs.com) and lets just say I wasn't exactly dressed for company (it was 10:30 PM).

Anyway the next morning we were alerted that something happened when the dogs were out in the front yard (not the back) because the gate to the dog yard was left open. Also - the door to the dilapidated wood shed in the dog yard was open as well - both are left closed. We thought that was odd but went about getting ready to feed the horses. I went into the garage and stopped immediately. I smelled gasoline - not what I usually smell going in there. And I also noticed that the hood to the tractor was up - again - something we don't do. We also noticed that the spout to the gas can was on the battery of the tractor - not on the gas can. We figure they were wanting to steal some gas and were VERY disappointed - the shed had no gas stored there, the gas cans were empty (bone dry) and the tractor had been on "E" the last time it was put up. So from now on the garage is locked no matter what.

Weather - Highs for a while were over 105 and did reach 110 at least once I believe. Gas going out of site (like it is every where).

Strider is back in the front pasture with Ayashe - he's come up with Pigeon Fever. Nothing serious - just annoyingly contagious between horses. This is my second case of it - my first was with Teza back in September of last year. She recovered without a problem. Strider, though, had an abscess on his chest that was fairly large and didn't look like it was going to drain anytime soon. So I made an appt. with the vet and plans with Heidi and Rob to trailer him there. However, before the day of the appt. arrived the abscess started to drain. But in a discussion with the vet, we decided that it would be better if the abscess was lanced to help it drain better. It did seem to be a good educational opportunity for the various people at the vet. While Strider was in the treatment stocks, with the regular vet treating him, we were joined by the newly hired vet, the student vet and everyone of the vet assistants. I should have charged admission! (GRIN)

When we loaded Strider it was 105 degrees and when we returned to the house, I believe the temperature was 108. After coming back home, Heidi, Rob and I cleaned and sanitized the trailer (in 108 degree weather). Anyway, it didn't take too long for me to get over heated. I ended up getting sick and was still having problems the next day so I stayed home from work. I was drinking water, but that only helped a little. I'm being more careful now. The horses are getting feed earlier in the morning and I'm getting back in the AC in the house before it gets too hot.

Since the student vet was available we had Chewy neutered and Chani was spayed. Scruffy was going out of season so we're waiting for a few more days and she'll be spayed to. The student vet does the surgery with the teaching vet attending and the procedure is done at a reduction in cost. This gives the student vets experience with handling animals of all types, problems, ages, etc.

Ian's finished his first swim class session - by the end of the 8 classes he was having fun sliding down the slide, holding his breath under water and doing good at kicking to maneuver around the pool. We talked to the instructor and asked if she had an opening in the next session - which she did but it was a class of girls and Ian turned it down. He said he wasn't gonna take a class with all girls. Oh well.....I guess he's getting close to "that" age when girls have coodies.

We've seen both the new Superman movie and the new Pirates of the Caribbean movie. Both were good.

Well, I didn't realize that it had been a month since my last entry here. Hmmmm.. this month went by fast.

We got Ian's grades - he's passed to 5th grade. Ian's going to start taking swimming lessons in July - something he's looking forward to A LOT. We've instituted a policy of internet time on the computer for any volunteered chore done around the house - time accumulates for each. So far it's worked okay - we still need to do some refinement of the process. But all in all it's not that bad.

For Ian's birthday he got to pick where to go - he decided to visit Barnes & Noble book store and the OKC Zoo (pictures to follow soon). He picked IHOP for dinner and then we returned home for some cake. When it comes to the presents - he got the whole series of Spiderwyck novels, a pair of spygear night vision binoculars, a small digital camera and some action figures and a few more dinosaur books (from Jeff and Julie). At Barnes & Noble he spent his birthday money on a couple of books and some more spy gear/CSI stuff. He had a ball there - we must have spent about 4 hours there.

Right now he's having a bit of fun on an old computer a friend gave us - he's been having fun making drawings.

To keep his school skills fresh in his mind I've had him doing math problems, reading books (one's he hasn't read before like the old horse stories). Also he's supposed to write up (in cursive) a story for me. This we are still working on - I need to refine my instructions.

It's been pretty hot here lately and I've wilted way too much too early to continue working on the shed. One of these days I'll have the guts enough to get up early in the morning when it's cool and we can finish putting the roof back on the shed.

We have finally gotten enough supplies to put the roof back on the loafing shed. This time we are taking it a little slower and putting the rafters up with metal strapping to secure the rafters to the headers - hoping that this will help in keeping the roof ON the shed during the next wind storm. We also took down the east side of the shed (so it's open on both the south and east sides) to see if that will help in keeping the roof too. And the future plan is to install another shed adjacent to this one making it into a bigger open shed and only have it open to the east. But that will be several years down the line when I can convince my hubby to drill new post holes.

In addition to the removal of the east wall, we have put two of the replacement rafters up.

I've also gotten a summer cold which limits my usefulness on the ladder - my head is all clogged up and I'm not going to climb a ladder and get dizzy while up there (not to mention that I don't like heights anyway).

Ian has has passed to the 5th grade - he had all A's and B's for 3 out of the four nine weeks - so he did pretty good for the year. He's looking forward to next year.

My luck of the previous week didn't continue - I took out my PDA to get an address and found out that it wasn't. I tried brand new batteries - nothing happened. I tried several other things and still nothing. So I tried the reset button. Well, it's working now - but I have lost all my addresses and other things that I had stored on it. I'd also not looked into sync-ing it with my primary computer (this laptop) in the past. This laptop doesn't have the proper connection for sync-ing an old PDA. Also, the computer I used to use had a hard drive problem a long time back and I'd replaced the hard drive - so... nothing to sync it up with. Oh well.... such is life. To sync an old PDA with this new computer I need a cable - no expensive but I haven't found anywhere local that carries it so I will probably have to order it off the web.

That is what Ken told me the other day. He was talking of the kittens - they're getting mobile and were enjoying playing with his pants legs. The kittens are now 4 weeks old and are just like any other toddlers - cute, curious and a lot of fun.

On Saturday Ian and I saw a roadrunner in the yard. I'd seen one several miles away but didn't figure one would be this close to the house especially with the cats and the dogs around. It is too bad that I wasn't able to get the camera out to take a picture of it. Here's a link to a website with a good picture of the Greater Roadrunner. But you will have to scroll down a bit when the page loads.

Ian got to go on his school's attendance trip to the Wichita Mountains Wildlife Refuge. He enjoyed the trip but says he didn't get enough time to really have some fun. So in the near future we will be planning a another day trip to the park.

It was a quiet Mother's Day. I awoke feeling a little bit off, so I decided my Mother's Day would be one of leisure. I continued reading my current book, feed the horses - applied fly repellent, gave shots and then just vegged out with the book. And then later on in the day I grilled some steaks and managed not to over cook them.

I was also pretty lucky with my Friday trip to Walmart in search of a replacement for my backpack purse. I found on that was on Clearance for $9.00 but when it rang up at the register is came up for $5.00. That was a good buy. I just wish I could have found a spare one. I also lucked out with the replacement light stick for over the mirror. I was afraid I would have to install a new style light but I found the last on of the style I already had - just slide and click and the new was installed on the old light brackets.

It's been raining (THANK GOD!!!) off and on for the past week or so. This is a good thing - rain means grass. It also means it's muddy - ICK!! I like the mud since that means it been raining - I hat the mud since it means I have to walk around and work in it (YUCK!).

At the end of April my digital camera went belly up and in order to have the problem diagnosed was going to cost $181 - either by sending it back to the manufacturer or by the local camera shop (who would be sending it back to the manufacturer). Well for that price I bought another new (under warranty) camera (and a few accessories).

On May 4th I arranged with Heidi to load Strider in her trailer and took him to into the vet for a Coggins test. Strider was very easy to load - we allowed him to approach and sniff the trailer, I got in and shook the bucket which (of course) got his attention. He put his front feet in quickly and paused and when I got out of being directly in front of him, he got in the trailer all the way. We allowed him a few minutes to settle in, turn around and then we casually closed the door. That was it - he loaded in under 5 minutes.

The Coggins test result was negative (Yeah!). So Strider is all set and ready to go should we find him a good home. Well that is unless he's going out of state and then he'll need a Health Certificate (something we'll deal with if the need arises).

The vet who drew the blood is also the doctor who treated him for the injury back in January. She also looked over his leg and she said the leg looked VERY well indeed. He's healed well.

We've had a real hard time finding round bales of hay. I've been continuing to feed hay so that the grass in the pasture gets a little extra time to get growing - that time the horses are munching on the hay bales.

Here are some of the most recent pictures (old camera) - CLICK ON THE SMALL PICTURES FOR THE LARGER ONES.

Learning how to set up a pioneer's tent.

Learning how to make a camp fire.

Learning how to wash clothes (the OLD FASHION way)!

I wonder.... will he remember?

Hanging the laundry out.

Batter UP! NOT!

He knocked the rug off the line.

The kids experienced a little of what life was like during the pioneer days just after the Land Run. They learned how to put a "tent" up - since the claimants had to spend the night at their claim to make sure no one else claimed it. They also learned what it was like to wash clothes and build a fire and clean the rugs in the old fashion ways.

I can see he's still having problems paying attention!

Land Run Re-enactment

The contestants are loaded and ready to go!

And they're OFF and running!

It was a white hat.

It was really was really a good day. I have to admit though standing in the middle of the "land run" area and looking up and down the line at the "runners" I decided the better part of valor was to put my backside up against a big tree - and avoid being trampled.

Chani had her latest and last litter of kittens on April 15th. She already has an appointment with the vet's office for later this spring for a spay.

Three boys (tabby, two spot and 4 spot) and one girl (one spot - next to tabby).

I'd asked him to push the lid down on the trash bin so the wind didn't catch it and open it - thus spreading the contents over the yard. This was his way of doing it.

Hmmmm... what's been going on here. Well it's rained a bit more and it's been some what warm. Thank God and Mother Nature - we have a little grass growing in the pasture - keep praying for rain. We are still way behind.

Had a funeral for Tickles (one of the cats), who mistakenly thought the dog yard was an interesting place to be.

Strider's leg is doing extremely well. I estimate that he'll be fully healed with in the next month.

Due to the rain and the forever frustrating search for hay - we have taken the round pen down to protect some of the larger/heavier hay bales that we've locate. So I haven't be able to do training. I hope to be putting it back together this weekend and starting back to training.

We've started the build up of stuff for repairing the shed - hopefully sometime soon the wind will die down a bit and allow us to put it up. Between now and then I'll be getting a few of the other things I need to make a good repair.

Ian got all A's and B's on his 3rd nine weeks report card. However, he's been suffering from a massive case of Spring Fever and he may not make that for the 4th nine weeks.

We are investigating the use of Fly Predators to take care of the flies generated by all the horse poop - I'll let you know how that goes.

We've wormed, fly sprayed, and started the yearly shots program. Due to money constraints the shot program will be a long drawn out process as I buy the vaccinations as I can afford them.

I've started the seeds for the veggie/fruit garden and Ian's prepared the soil. We'll be planting the started plants soon - if the wind will let them. We are trying to grow corn, lima bean, tomatoes, green pepper, peppermint, watermelon, cantaloupe, onion, strawberries, and cucumbers. A good portion of this is already sprouted. Oh and we have also replanted the big containers with the marigolds. We put the containers on either side of the entrance doors - we use them to help keep the flies away from the doors.

The 4 older/bigger fish have successfully transitioned back to the water troughs and I bought a few more of the cheap gold fish to boost the population. And I think I have finally figured out where to put the Bat Box.

Can you tell I have a pre-occupation with bugs? Well, it's actually a pre-occupation with natural control methods - with only minimal use of chemical remedies for control of the pest population. Ah... the hazards of owning so many animals (and the resulting production of natural fertilizer) and living in a rural area. Anybody need any more "material" for their compost pile? (GRIN)

Ian's class trip this year is to a local homestead museum - where they are offering a reenactment of a land run and other pioneer daily activities. I asked Ken if he wanted to go along with Ian and I - his comment was - why should I go there - I experience that every day just by getting up in the morning.

We got some rain - a little over 2 inches. We still need more but this is a good start. I am very hopeful that this will start the process of the spring grasses growing.

I, however, ended up wearing a good portion of the pasture when I fell once in the small pasture (straining everything on my left side) and then fell again trying (rather stupidly really) to tip one of the hay bales. There's a certain basic fact of the following - I am not as limber as I used to be and my spine just won't bend in that direction. Needless to say I strained everything on my right side and am still (now 3 days after) dealing with the strains to my back.

Chani is now in the house as we are awaiting the birth of her last litter of kittens - she'll be spayed after this one.

I found another salamander and since it was going to be freezing I snagged it into the container - this one is a bit bigger then the other one.

Due to the rain and the use of the round pen as a hay storage area I haven't been able to do much training there. I am hoping that soon I'll be able to correct this situation. We'll see if the holes in the mud created by the horses standing around the bale will cause lasting problems with the ground that had been the round pen work area.

On the calendar March 20th was the first day of Spring with the 21st being the first full day. YEAH, RIGHT! Monday's high was 46 degrees and today's was only 39. So much for it being SPRING!!!!! This is WINTER!

As is common in Oklahoma - it's been windy lately, especially today. And I also found out another interesting bit of info. Although I've known that I have an allergy to the hay I used to get as a teen (back on the east coast), I can also now add Prairie grass hay to the list as well. We had to roll a LARGE round bale of Prairie grass hay today and I had to pitch the remains of the old bale to Strider - of course in this wind I got it all over me despite the use of long sleeve t-shirt, long pants, boots, wrap around goggles and gloves. By the time I got finished with all that I was so itchy I was thinking I'd gotten a case of hives.

As for other activities - Ian and I started the veggie garden - I planted the seeds in the starter pots and Ian (as punishment) started tilling the soil in the chosen area with out the aid of any power tools. We did have to soak the ground a lot over the past couple days to make it easier to till.

Today, before the hay rolling, I took Ayashe into the round pen and worked with him. And actually saddled him. What an excellent boy he was. He was a little more leery of the saddle then Strider was, however, we worked through that. I was pleasantly surprised that Ayashe didn't buck at all when he was off the lunge line. He ran about and a minor panic for about 30 seconds and then settled down. I was then able to work him both directions and all gates for a little while. I forgot to take the camera out to take pictures. He looked gorgeous with the English saddle on him - again I used this saddle as it is a cheap well used saddle that I won't mind if the horse were to break it or mistreat it some how.

I've also come to the conclusion that I need to get up earlier on training days so I can get some training done in the mornings, feed by 10:30 to 11AM (ish) and then go have lunch and stay out of the sun (minimize the chance of sunburn) from then until 3 PM ish or there abouts. By that time I can perhaps nab another horse or horses and do some more training.

Now you're probably wondering about the punishment comments lately. Yes, Ian's been "feeling his oats" (kind of) and not making the best decisions with the choices he's been given He's had problems at school and at home with this and his attitude - so we've assigned him duties at home. He's already done a good bit of poop scooping and now he's working on the garden - have to get it started soon and I am sure that after this he'll at least appreciate the effort it takes to grow food.

Ian was assigned poop scooping duty this weekend - he did 3 loads on Saturday and 4 on Sunday as well as scooping the dog yard as well. This was punishment duty so he had to fill the trailer by himself however I organized the piles for him to clean up. I also found out that I am quite the attraction for the horses - if I'm out in the pasture - Ayashe or Shima or Tansy, Inshallah or Kano would be investigating what I was doing and generally making a pain of themselves and would get in Ian's way if I was near him. So I had to go to other areas of the pasture so Ian could work.

Today though, I took Strider to the round pen and worked with him a bit and then put the saddle on him - check out his page for info on that.

I also had the opportunity to do some desensitizing with Tansy. She was laying down enjoying the warm sun and didn't offer to get up when I approached her so I took the opportunity to do a little petting and straddling her back. I progressed from leaning over her to being able to have one foot on either side of her. And then I kinda sat down (without putting a lot of weight on her back) and leaned over and petted, talked, and touched. I was able to do this several times all without her getting upset.

All in all it was an active working weekend and a good weekend as well. I'm going to be sore and tired tomorrow. But a good kind of sore.

I got new pictures of Strider and a couple of video's of his movement while I was working him in the round pen on Sunday. I took some pictures of his wound, too, however they didn't turn out real well. So I will try to get more accurate pictures as soon as I can.

Strider was feeling real well during the work out session, enough so that he did some kicking up of his heels. He did real well once he took the edge off the rocket fuel. We worked on yielding fore and hind quarters, a little backing up, some softening exercises, and a lot of desensitizing with the lead and the stick and string. All of which was good.

After a quick nap I was back out for my parade of equines who have to supervise all the stuff I do with the electric fence. I got that back up and working.

Saturday I went to the tax accountant - Yeah! We'll be getting some back - which will go directly to pay bills. After that I dropped by a friend's house to help her with her horses while the vet was doing their yearly vaccinations. We also took the time to work some with the filly's (now 8 mos. old) on various ground exercises.

Yep - it was cold this past weekend. From Thursday afternoon through Monday afternoon it didn't get above freezing. Therefore filling the water troughs was an interesting proposition. Luckily the big pasture's 3 troughs were enough to last through this cold spell. However, the small pasture and it's 2 large containers had to be filled by bucket from the house at least twice.

We had some freezing rain, sleet and a little snow as well as the bitterly cold weather. That made driving to the feed store on Saturday for horse feed an interesting time. The other fun thing was trying to roll a LARGE round bale of hay out to the pasture. We had trouble getting traction on the ice covered ground. And by the end of the chores on Saturday, I was so cold and tired I curled up on the couch and shivered for a while.

Strider's leg looks to be healing very well. The Underwood Horse Medicine seems to be doing the trick. Now if they'd just leave the electric fence alone. They keep breaking it by playing over top of it.

Since it is supposed to be warm this weekend (into the 60's each day), I'll get pictures of Strider's knee. And I'm gonna try to get video of his movement as well. That way anyone looking to buy Strider will be able to see that his movement is not affected by his injury.

Things have been going okay here. We've been warm for a few days, however as I write this the wind is blowing HARD and out of the north. This high for today (63) was set this morning - before noon. After the wind did a 180 degree shift and started coming out of the north and the temperature started falling - fast. By 4 PM the temperature was a whopping 43 and the wind chill said it was feeling like it was 33 degrees. BRRRRR!!!!! The temp for the next 4 day's isn't supposed to get much above freezing and they are predicting a fair percentage chance of some sort of precipitation. We need the moisture - no matter which form - though I'd prefer it in the form of rain not snow, however at this point I'll take any moisture.

Strider's leg is doing well - because of the development of proud flesh on the wound we have had to switch treatment methods. I've started using Underwood Horse Medicine and leaving the leg un-bandaged. At this point it looks as though the new treatment does seem to be helping with the prevention of further growth of proud flesh and may have actually taken care of the stuff that had already started growing.

We spent most of the past weekend repairing the pasture fence and rerunning the electric fence as well. The winds were up on Saturday and by the end of the work that day I had so much of Oklahoma dirt in my eyes I couldn't see straight despite the fact I was wearing my glasses. I rectified that the next day by getting a new set of face forming safety goggles. Sunday the wind was worse and I had no problems.

For Valentine's Day we splurged and ate out at one of our favorite Mexican restaurants. Ian had fun at school where the had a little party for the holiday - I sent in a bunch of cupcakes, candy and pop. It's what I call a "liquor them up and send'em home" party. Get the kids all hopped up on sugar and send them home for the parents to deal with. Yep - he bounced off the wall all evening. I'd say that was successful.

Another point of good news - I finally received my deductible reimbursement check from my insurance company. They did well - it only took 3 months (when they'd told me it might take as much as 6 months). Just in time to pay the rest of the 6 month payments for the insurance policies on both cars.

The Parent/Teacher conference with Ms. McHugh (Ian's teacher) went well too. Despite his lack of controlling his mouth, he's done well in the past couple of months with his overall behavior and he's continued to get good grades - with a few exceptions. Overall it was a good report from the teacher. As a reward for that - Ian and I went out to Barnes and Noble where he got to choose a book for reading. He chose a Harry Potter series supplement book. He'd tried a few other "books" but I had specified that it had to be READING book.

Monday was work and doctor's appts. Quickly followed by a night of "the PUKES." Sorry, a little gross but that's what happened. I got them and spent the night with them. The "Stomach Flu" with all the accompanying symptoms. I spent both Tuesday and Wednesday off work recovering from the dehydration. Wednesday night Ken started with it and spent the night with it. He wasn't any happier to have them then I was. Thursday I went back to work and was only there for 1/2 hour when the school called and asked that I come pick up Ian since Ken was definitely not feeling well. Anyway - Ian wasn't sick, he'd decided run off at the mouth - a little to much and he was being sent home. Needless to say I wasn't happy about that at all.

So now, Ian's been at home for two days experience the folly of his ways - or having a "poopy" time. Poop scooping the back yard and shoveling sh.... in the pasture. A very "poopy" time of it. After all it's NOT a vacation.

Bandage wrapping - it seems that all the young mammals in the family have been feeling their "oats". Strider became a bit more of a pickle when I was trying to clean the wound up. So we had several "move the feet" sessions to get his mindset back to "Mama can work with my feet while I stand there quietly". He was quite tired by the finish and quite willing to stand and let me finish with the cleaning and bandaging. He was also doing some really good lunging. Oh we had a few "I don't wanna's", and "you can't make me's" - typical stuff that we worked through quickly. After all that we had a good desensitizing session.

I did remember to take some updated pictures of Strider's wound when we changed his bandage.

Strider was a bit of a pickle while trying to get the bandaged changed and several times I had to resort to making his "feet move" (making the wrong thing hard and the right thing easy) until he'd allow me to remove the old bandage, clean and re-bandage the wound. We had several episodes of "let's move your feet" until it was all done.

One other note - at least it appears that they have finished building the drilling rig 2 miles south of the house as we've not seen any big trucks rolling by in the past couple of days. We can see that the rig is up and lighted. It is also the weekend - I'll let you know what happens when tomorrow rolls around.

I've heard that several times recently, and I have to say it hits home when I start thinking about it. I've been given the gift of some very good friends. And this week I have to say "Thank You" to them. Heidi sent me a couple rolls of vet wrap which will get me through this next bandaging on Strider. And Stacy has told me she sent several things to help with bandaging 4 more times. This is really great and I am so touched by this.

Now you're probably wondering about this bandaging and why I'm talking about it so much. Well it's a simple but intricate bandage but it's a necessary thing. If the wound isn't kept bandaged it will produce more scar tissue and more scar tissue means more expense at the vet to have it removed and this will also make the scar bigger - neither of which do I want. This will leave a scar but I am hoping it won't be too bad.

So I figure up each bandage costs between $15 and $25 per bandage. As I said - expensive.

And it also looks like he has a cast on his leg - even though it is a soft and somewhat flexible cast.

Luckily, his wound is healing well and I expect to be able to back off of using the Telfa soon (a couple of weeks perhaps) and I'm checking in to some flannel wraps that may be usable to replace the gauze and the flannel would be washable/reusable.

One other thing I'm looking into is making my own boot for his leg. I only need two boots (one on his leg and one washed and ready for use) and not the 4 that usually come in a shipping boot set. It also needs to be washable with bleach to kill bacteria. And it needs to be snug and be tall enough to protect the front and side of the knee. Snug, tall and bleachable is not something I been able find in an affordable boot set. If I can actually make the boot I will hopefully be able to quit using the elastikon and vet wrap. Since the quilted wraps came in a set of 4 and all I need for padding at the current time is 2, the other 2 wraps can be used to make the boots - or at least that's my plan.

We had a little bit of rain over night and it was able to soak in to the ground a little bit. We still need some more though to really release the fire danger.

Strider's bandage isn't due to be changed 'til tomorrow and I checked it today to see how wet it was - it was dry so Strider had been doing a good job of putting his butt to wind. So we are still on track for changing it tomorrow.

One other thing we did today was to fix the ceiling fan in the living room. Apparently one of the screws holding it to the mounting box had worked itself loose and finally came out when I bumped the fan with the Christmas tree.

Now if only I can remember what the other thing on my to do list for Sunday was.......

We re-bandaged Strider's leg again on Wednesday - and again I forgot to take pictures of how it's healing. It is looking good, tissues are growing in well and there is no sign of infection.

We were lucking when we were doing the bandaging - we unknowingly picked a lull in the activity of all the 18 wheelers delivering machinery. We weren't sure what was going on at the time. All we knew was it was a lot of big machinery coming in. On Thursday I had a little extra time before going to work so I followed one of the trucks to see where it was going and what was being built. About 2 miles south of us I found my answer - a new drilling rig - probably for natural gas.

All this activity has driven Strider a little nuts - but he's finally seeming to get used to all the noise, movement, and dust.

Today was the "Spaced Out" program at Ian's school. Ian had the roll of Carl Sagan - turtleneck and sportcoat and all. I am very proud of him - he remembered all of his

And on another positive note - the teacher sent home an interim report on Ian's grades - All A's and B's - I am very proud of his work this year.

1) Strider's leg - yesterday (Saturday) was day 4 for the bandage and as per instructions of the vet, we removed the bandage, cleaned it up and bandaged it up again. Unfortunately I forgot to take the camera out to take updated pictures while we had the bandage off. And once I had the bandage off I wasn't going to stop the process to run to the house and get the camera either. However, I think it's healing real well. Strider was a little finicky about us doing this but then aren't even humans finicky when you start taking a bandage off a wound. Anyway, he settled down and with some patience we got it bandaged again.

2) We have an interesting visitor here - on Friday (1/20/06) when we went out to the garage for feeding time there was a salamander in the garage.

Now remember - it's January (abnormally warm January but still cold), it's been a VERY VERY DRY fall and winter, and my house and garage are at the top of a hill. The closest stream is about 1/4 of a mile away and across some VERY open wheat fields.

I know what you're thinking - the cats wanted a little extra protein in their diet. I don't think this is the case here. We keep the cats secluded to the garage at night during the winter since it keeps them from getting into the heating system under the house. So they couldn't have brought it in for breakfast. And since there was no damage on salamander it couldn't have been in there all night with the cats especially since I found him next to the garage door - in the open.

From what I have been able to find - it's a spotted salamander and may be a little out of it's normal habitat range (being this far west in Oklahoma). The plan is to release him in the near future - once Ian gets to show him to his class.

After the farrier visit today, Heidi and Rob came up and we all accessed Strider's leg and how it's healing. After some clean up and some discussion we decided to load Strider up and take him to the vet to have her consult on the injury, healing potential and if it could be bandaged.

Strider loaded VERY well, I was quite surprised and very pleased. This was only the third time he'd been loaded into a trailer in his life and he was being loaded alone. In addition to that this is one of those trailers that they have to step up into - no ramp. He was hesitant at first, but Rob picked up and placed his good foot on the trailer floor, he straighten, found out the trailer wasn't gonna eat him. And then with a little more encouragement (I shook the bucket of grain (GRIN)) he was up in the trailer.

The vet sedated him (and he had a GOOOOOD buzz going there for a while), cleaned and bandaged the wound, while we were watching since it will have to be done again in 4 days. She said that the injury looked good and well cared for (YEAH!) but she, like Heidi and I, were a little worried about the skin flap that was still there getting caught on something and ripping it open again. So she bandaged it up and sent him home. The doctor said that it should heal just fine but he will always have a scar. However it should not interfere with his movement. And to let you know - it hasn't affected him at all - he trots around with no problem - only a little limp if he get over enthusiastic about it and stretches the skin over the injury. That, however, will go away when the injury is healed up.

Yesterday Ian's school had their 2nd nine weeks awards assembly and we were pleasantly surprised - Ian got an award for all A's and B's for 2nd nine weeks. As a reward and a celebration for his improvement in his grades - we went out to eat at Braum's and got some ice cream too! Ian's been doing fairly well in school though there have been a few things that he's gotten reprimanded for. But all in all he's doing well.

The morning after my last entry I went out to feed the horses and noticed that Strider had a massive injury. He is missing a sizable chunk of skin on his knee. It's a pretty nasty looking thing. However, it doesn't affect his movement except he hasn't figured out a why to lay down without it hurting. It will take several months to heal from all I have read and seen. I'll be documenting the whole process (the wonders of technology and the internet). We placed Strider by himself in the small front pasture to keep him separated from the rest of the herd. But to help with the "herd" instinct we're plan to keep the round bales close to his area to keep all the horses up where he can see them. Currently he's on antibiotics, pain killers and flushing and wound dressing twice a day.

Ian's discovered the stash of movies - I've become very knowledgeable about MIB (I and II), Jurassic Park, Spiderman (1 and 2) and Batman Begins, Star Wars (the whole series) and Lord of the Rings (the whole series). Read into that - I've seen them over and over and over again. But then again - there hasn't been all that much interesting on the TV anyway - over 200 TV channels and still nothing to watch.

I spent this afternoon drag harrowing the mess in the pasture and have figured out that if I can arrange to go straight with a crosswind and always turn the tractor into the wind I can cut down a bit on the amount of dust that gets kicked up and I end up wearing. Though it doesn't totally alleviate getting dust and dirt in the eyes - this is Oklahoma (a very dry Oklahoma) and when there's a wind there's dirt in the air and it gets in the eyes.

I give Thanks to God for the snow! Even though it was just a dusting here at my place, other places got a bit more. It hasn't thoroughly alleviated the fire danger but it has at least moistened the dryness a little bit - at least for while.

On the horse front - Jack is back to being a comic - AGAIN! He likes to play hide and seek with the buckets. Heidi says he's doing the dishes. There have been times that we go out to gather the feed pans and cannot find all of them. So the search starts - it seems that on occasion Jack likes to play with the feed pans/buckets and drops them in the water trough. I've had to be inventive to get them out of the troughs when the water is too cold to reach into.

The cats have finally forgiven me also. This past weekend was "worm the animals' weekend and I got the wormer into all the animals. The cats just didn't like that I caught them, wrapped them in a towel and squirted white icky stuff in their mouths and then they suffered the indignity of being sprayed with flea and tick spray.

The fish are still alive in their bucket in the bathtub. Not for lack of Ian trying to pour them down the drain when he changes the water in the bucket. I think they are looking forward to spring when they can go back in to the water troughs. Then their world won't get bounced around so much.

Well, my New Year started with me having a cold. I made sure to get LOTS of sleep, and the appropriate amount modern cold remedies and it seems to be working its way through very well. Unfortunately, my cold kept us from taking Ian to the Natural History Museum as I had planned for this weekend. We'll try it for this weekend. When I wasn't sleeping, blowing my nose or feeding the animals, Ian and I had a DVD movie fest - while keeping my eyes, ears and nose alert for grass fires.

So far so good, we have not been directly affected by the recent fires. Keep praying for rain. I don't mind the mild weather - we just don't need such high winds (40's to 60's) and high temps (70 and above).

I have a very simple New Year's resolution for 2006 - be better at planning things. It's a simple idea, however, it's also a really large thing to accomplish. We shall see how I do. I haven't been any good at any of the ones I've had in recent years.