OCTOBER "BUSY-NESS"

It has been a while since I last posted- due in part to busy-ness and businss.

The past month has been crazy to say the least- and while I won't share all of the "details" here- someday you can read about it in my journal...
But here are some pictures to help explain...

Caught Kyle at his last soccer game of the season- he was very enthusiastic. That's him getting ready to kick the ball in.

Kaylee was not happy that Ryan had a game to play and she didn't. So I distracted her with an orange cone-hat, which, being a girl, she liked!

We had some returning guests at the Retreat Center over UEA- their little girl jumped out of the car and ran straight back to see Patches- who was already back at the ranch for the winter. She was so upset that Tom and I told her we'd go home and get her for the weekend so she could play with her. We got home and discovered a very good reason why Patches could not go back to the Center

Patches, not to be outdone by Bitzie, decided October was also a fine time to have babies...One blue-eyed buck and a brown eyed doe. Arn't they cute?

So we invited the family out to the ranch- which they enjoyed even more because all the kids got to pet the ponies as well as hold the new baby goats!

Bitzie's pair think they look good as garden ornaments...

With the threat of winter looming- I decided Ace was growing too fast and getting too big and if I didn't make some progress in his training this Fall, by Spring he may be that much bigger and harder to work with. So-

I introduced him to the saddle pad...

Which he thought was a great toy to chew on...
But I did get it on his back with no trouble- and dragged it over his head and shook it at him- just to make sure it wasn't a scary thing to him- which it wasn't :-) I also walked him down the road- cars ARE a scary thing for him- so we'll need to spend more time doing that before the snow flies.
Moved the ponies to new pasture.

October means gettin ready for winter-

Tom went up in the mountains and got a load of wood to cut and split.

He cuts and splits- I load up the tractor bucket and drive it over and dump it on the porch and then stack it.

More pictures next post...

More Bits...

Finishing up on a few more little things going on that make up our lives:

Our wild plum tree went crazy this year with fruit- I need to find my canner I guess and put up some plum jam. They should be ripe in another week or so.

Last Monday, Graciela, a friend from my Ward who also owns horses, and I went to Ephraim to an indoor arena where on Mondays between 4 and 6 there is a 4-H riding group that meets. The gals that run it are two really nice ladies (grandma types) that help out the kids in the area that want to learn how to ride and jump. They invited us to come check it out. We had a fun time- cute kids not bigger than 8 or 9 years jumping horses and loving it! I am going to help them out anyway I can- probably bring any of my students down to ride that want to jump, etc.

I took Annie and Frankie- Graciela rode one while I worked the other. Neither of her horses are rideable at this time. I was so pleased with Annie- to my knowledge she'd never jumped before and she offered no resistance at all when we did. She even seemed to enjoy it. I'm so excited about her foal next year by Providence- should be a good little jumping pony!

Bitsy surprised us with 2 babies- one doe and one buck! Usually they have babies in the spring.

We got 2 kittens for mousers. I just call them Blue Eyes and Green Eyes- They are sisters-even though they don't look like it.

Our little neighbors (twins, now 4 years old) saw Tom and I working in the field putting up the fencing and started yelling at us- "Hello Jerri!" "Hello Brother Fuhriman!" (Since he's the Bishopric member over Primary- they know him more from there) We hollered a "Hello, How are you?" back, which only fueled the flame and they kept saying "Hi", "How's your pony, We want to see your new kittens," etc. We were about done (more like done-in) with the fencing, so Tom yelled back to see if they wanted to come see the new baby goats. They started walking across the field (after finding their Mom) and came over to see the baby goats (just born) and the kittens. They asked what were the names for the goats- I said they had just been born and we didn't have names for them. Little Adelai and Julian decided this was no good and promptly named them Rose and Rocket Ship!

Thursday we went down to watch Kyle in his last soccer game of the year. Tom had to run an errand so he dropped me off at Cari's to help get kids ready (Cari's really feeling the difference of getting 4 kids ready to go some where vs 3!) Of course they all were happy to see me-it's been awhile. Kaylee ran to me and hugged me saying "Banma"- but after one hug she looked around and said, "Bampa" She looked and looked- while repeating several times, "Bampa." I told her he had to go somewhere but will be back in a minute- She frowned and called again "Bampa, Bampa!" All sad like. Later, when he returned, she ran to him and hugged him and wouldn't let go! Needless to say it made Tom's day to be so admired.

Kyle did great in his game- he has such unbridled enthusiasm for life-it's so fantastic to see, and so rare. He is always so quick to high five someone or say "good job!" to one of the other players. I really appreciate his wonderful attitude.

Ryan showed us how well he can bounce a ball and catch it in the air with one hand- he was so excited to show us his new tricks! And little baby Kynlee is growing! She is so adorable, cooing and smiling. And she has blue eyes and, dare I say, reddish hair? We'll have to see... I took the camera to get some pictures- but after a couple of shots the battery was dead- those were too far away to see anything- so I came home and plugged it in! Better luck (planning) next time!