The Three R's

Not to be confused with Reading, 'Riting and 'Rithmatic. But rodeo, rain and recuperation. Everyone at church put so much into our ranch rodeo for the church kick-off and now we're all pooped! I didn't explain in my last post about the WRCA..my sister called and asked me what that meant. It is Working Ranch Cowboy Association. The events in the rodeo are similar to what a working cowboy would typically do on a ranch..bronc riding, team sorting, branding, cow doctoring and wild cow milking. Each team is made up of 4-6 members and these teams came from all over..some from Nebraska and Kansas. They were qualifying for the world this past weekend. As soon as I get some pictures, I'll be posting. Should have some pretty good ones.

With all the rain we've been having lately, which by the way is wonderful, it has made the grass just start popping up. It's not so good for Bridget, the little horse we have for the grandkids, because she founders so easily. That's a term for laminitis, which is really too much blood flow going to the horses feet and it's very painful for them. So we have her put up in the round pen to keep her off the grass and out of the mud, which irritated them more but with the rain this morning, she was in more mud than the others. Poor Bridget, she's such a sweet little horse.

Then there's Jess and Cinch...see how clean they are? They are two compadres and are always leaving out Bridget. It's funny to watch the hierarchy with these animals.

Speaking of animals, have you ever seen such an ugly dog? He's got eyes like a mule.. very sad eyes. I hate to admit it, but he's so ugly, he's kinda cute. Gosh, did I just say he was kinda cute?! Living in the country near a college town, we are the ones that end up with the critters that someone has no use for anymore and they dump them. This is some kind of chow mix..not quite sure what he's mixed with though! Haven't had the time lately, but this guy has to find a new home. He's on the unpredictable side. We've had three dumped out here this year.

Remember when this one was dumped last year? Yep, this is Jasper. We ended up keeping him. The second dog dumped out here, my neighbor ended up keeping. So this new dog will have to go somewhere. I'm not trying to be cruel but we are not a rescue and cannot keep taking in these animals. It makes me angry when people dump them out here to let us deal with the guilt and the feed and vet bills. If I could, I would keep them all but that's hard to do.

Now that the rodeo is over, I'm looking forward to getting back to normal around here. As soon as I get the pictures, I'll be posting again.

Happy Trails...

This old gray mare is still pluggin' along

I have no pictures to share but only an update. First of all, thanks to those blogger friends for emailing and checking in on me. It really means a lot to know that so many of you truly care. Yes, it's been a long while since I posted. My reason? don't know...no umph to blog. Most of the time, I feel like what I do is not so interesting to others.
I have been busy working because there are some things that we want and, I figure, the only way to get them is with cash in hand...duh!..amazing how that works. Buddy and I are also involved in a new church. It seems like a year now that we've felt in limbo with a church and have prayed for direction. I think the path God led us on gave us a clear picture as to the end of our search. Let me tell you... we tossed around the idea of visiting a newly planted Cowboy Church in our area and decided it was time to visit. The preacher and his wife just moved from Alpine in west Texas where they had started a church and were there for 6 years. They were then sent to our area to start another. They moved here with all their struggles and a huge pile of faith. The church had only been meeting a few months and still in the baby stages of getting started. Let me tell you how God works... we walked up one Sunday morning and the preacher's wife saw me, reached out for me and gave me a big hug and said "You're here. I've been praying for you". She and her husband had been praying for us specifically to come. At that moment, I knew the reason God led us there. Wow, what a ride!
Let me tell you... even for those of you that might not know Christ, someone is out there praying for you right now just waiting for you to open your heart and accept the Holy Spirit and share in the peace and joy of salvation.
Our church is getting ready to have it's big launch the weekend of the 26th and 27th so we've been hustling to get ready. We're having a two day ranch rodeo with a sanctioned WRCA on Saturday and Sunday with breakfast, church service and then an open ranch rodeo.
We know now that God is using us to minister with what we know - our horses. Buddy will be roping with several of the youth on Wed nights after Bible study. I don't rope so I'm just along for the ride on that one. As a side-note, I wonder if I'm along for the "ride" because the other night I took a tumble off my horse and landed right on my tailbone..yep, I do believe it's cracked or broken. My git-up and git-down is a bit on the slow side but I am still gittin' it! YeeHaw! Praise God is wasn't worse!
Anyway...that's pretty much what's been going on. Whether I've been at work or busy with church activities, I've been on the go. I will try and stay motivated to blog and, hopefully, add some pictures in my next post.
Happy Trails...

End of July Update

I'm still here but been terribly busy. Let's see...the grandkids have gone home. They were so homesick to see their mom and dad and little sister. I know they are so happy to be waking up in their own beds.

Since they've been gone, I've been working a few more days trying to catch up. Where does it go? It seems like everything is getting more and more expensive each day. I've got to make time to work on things for the store. Buddy and I have so many ideas that we've got to get busy and get them listed. And Christmas is around the corner, so will be getting things ready for that.

We did finally get some welcomed rain here. We've had a couple good showers since I last posted. As a matter of fact, it's getting nice and dreary here now with expected showers. We got a little bit this morning to settle the dust. Last Sunday a twister came through my cousin's place over towards Madisonville along I45 and took out this wonderful old barn. Remember when I posted pictures of it last October? Well, it's gone.

It also took shingles off the roof of his house, ripped two holes in the roof and did damage to his new barn/hanger. He has his office in there along with his plane. The building used to have two 40' doors on it, one of which is gone and they can't find and the other door was sucked in. Now get this...the plane was turned around in the hanger but no damage. The news reported cars being spun around on the highway which runs alongside his place. It was fast and furious. Fortunately, no one was injured.

Dottie went and had her surgery yesterday-thank goodness! I've never heard of a female cat coming into heat as much as she did. It's awful! Anyway, there is this wonderful low cost spay and neuter clinic in a neighboring town...very affordable! So, off she went to her appt yesterday. And look what she got...a tattoo! Okay..I'm a nurse and do not promote tattoos on humans but on animals..it's okay. I won't even get on my soapbox about tattoos and subject ya'll to that. I'll save that for another post.

Last weekend we hiked (drove) up to Vernon, TX, for a wedding. It took us 5 1/2 hours but was great to see a change of scenery. We drove through the very edge of the Waggoner Ranch...550,000 acres! It would take a lifetime to cover all that! As we were driving up there, I pointed out to Buddy to look over at these trees that looked like something out of Africa. All the trees were eaten off to high level...perfectly even. I tried to get a picture.. There wasn't a high game fence so we were puzzled.

As we drove a little further, Buddy saw what was eating the trees like this....

It was camels! Hopefully, you can click on the picture to enlarge it.. I haven't mastered how to do that yet. There were about 20 of them that we saw. What? In Texas, you're supposed to have horses or buffalo or Longhorns..but camels? I guess if you have 550,000 acres, you have to find something to put on there!

Happy Trails...

Did I Mention We Live in a Barn?

I was trying to be nice to the girls this weekend and let them come in the yard since there's no grass in the orchard and this is where they end up...right on the back porch.

I looked out my kitchen sink window this morning and Jess was standing there like she was walking through a drive-thru ... I'll have an oat burger, hold the onions, with a barley wheat slurpie...make it snappy...

I hear her out on the front porch...caught you! Poor Eve.... the evidence is in your mouth!

Then she turns to me as if to ask..

"Wha-at?"

Happy Trails..

Outside Heat Brings Indoor Projects

It's been so hot here that the only time to get anything done outside is at sun-up or near dark. The ground is so dry is cracks under your feet. It seems that even the dirt is brittle. Since there's no grass left out in the back for the horses, I decided to turn them out in the yard yesterday since I was home. As you can see, there's not much grass in the yard but they loved what was there.

Ahhh, yes, a day to stay home and get some things done. I didn't have to go anywhere and it was wonderful. I got a chance to get some more things done in the house. Buddy and I have been going out to the storage container early on Saturday mornings when it's cool enough to even attempt to go in the container to get more boxes to unpack. No, we're still not completely unpacked but getting there. Buddy is so anxious to get things up on the walls. Since this house is much smaller than our last one, it's deciding what goes up and what gets kept in boxes. When Buddy and I go antiquing, I'm always on the lookout for good old linens. I recently acquired a bunch so dug through them and found that some of them go perfectly in my house. The kitchen valance are vintage napkins draped across a tension rod. Maybe you can click on the picture to see that there are red embroidered strawberries on the points.

These old lace tablecloths worked great for the bedroom. I still have two more windows off to the right side that I will have to find something for. I'm one of those folks that nothing has to match...the more mixed up it is, the better.

In the next few days, I'll be going through all these linens and adding to our store so stay tuned...

Happy Trails...

Do You Ever Wonder?

Is it just me or do any of you ever wonder what your day or week would be like if something that took place didn't happen? I'll come back to that. As I sit here thinking about all that has gone on in the last two weeks, nothing just real exciting comes to mind. I wonder how so many of you find such interesting things to blog about. This blog initially started out for a way for my friends and family to keep up with what's happening with life on the orchard. So, here's my past two weeks...

It's been hotter than blue blazes here..everything is pretty much fried...except for anything that I've been eating. Excuse me, my mind is wandering.. my thoughts are on a big chicken fried steak right now and mashed potatoes covered with thick cream gravy....okay, I'm back.

Did I say it's been hot here? We have not had any significant rain in the past several months. Last week we got an inch one day...Thank the Lord for that! The pecan trees are producing pecans but a lot of them have fallen to the ground prematurely because it's so dry. Wednesday we had a wonderful little stormy shower come through that settled the dust on the ground and, yes, more winds that blew more pecans off the trees.

We're also getting a lot of fallen branches. They are so dry and brittle, they are snapping off and hanging there. That is an ongoing chore here of cleaning up limbs and branches. Check out the ground in this picture..there is NO grass!

There is no grass in the chicken pen either so to keep the girls happy, they are still getting their treats of carrots and a few potatoes.

Can you see that they love it?

Okay, now back to back my question... I'm sure everyone has had some of those days that nothing seems to go right or you sit and ask yourself "why me?" or "what else can happen?". I've had several of those days this week. As this 'ol grandma still has two of the grandsons for the summer and dealing with their antics, it's given me times to reflect on the raising of my own kids. Do I have regrets? Would I have done things differently? As I look back I would say that I definitely would but you know what? At that time with all that was put on my plate and not knowing what the future held, I would probably do exactly what I did. And as it is, I'm pretty darn proud of the way my kids turned out. I am a firm believer in Jesus Christ and read in Eccleciastes that there is a season and place for everything. Why things happen when they do, we will never understand but I know that there is a reason for it. I know that I am blessed with this parched orchard and fallen branches. I truly know that I am blessed to have my children and my grandchildren.

Alright, readers, ya'll are just gonna have to deal with me on this blog.. it's all bumbled jumbled and I rambling but, like I said earlier..this blog was initially started as a journal and it's a huge blurb of my thoughts. It's just been one of those weeks for me..well, truthfully, a couple weeks and I know in my heart some things have happened for a reason.

Okay, now I'm still trying to figure out why this had to happen..other than the fact it lets me show you how pretty and orange those carrots make the yolks...

Or why stepping in dog poop as I'm getting to get in the truck to leave for work had to happen...I'll save ya'll from being subjected to that lovely sight.

Well, I'll sign off for now. Thanks for hanging in there with me on this one.

Happy Trails...

Winged Creatures

I've enjoyed several of your blogs with a weekly challenge of particular pictures. This past Sunday was "things with wings". It's funny how a couple of my pictures for today ended up being with wings. The boys happened across this gorgeous moth last night - it's probably about four inches across. I'm hoping you can click on the picture and get a better close up of all the turquoise colors in this moth.

I know now that I'm asking Santa for a zoom lens for my camera.

My next winged creature is my broody hen. Why in the world she wants to get broody in triple digit temperatures, I have no idea. I'm all for letting her sit on a batch of eggs and see if they hatch out but this hen can't decide which nest box she wants! Seems every time she gets out to eat and drink, she returns to another box. I'd let her keep some of the eggs she was sitting on but then she changes her mind. Too heck with that...I just gathered up all the eggs last night. She seemed content to be left on a nest.

I'm open for suggestions on how to keep her on one nest to let her hatch some out.

I've given up on the back garden except for the watermelons and I think I'm gonna have to let the chickens have them too. I have watered and watered and it is so blasted hot here, the heat has literally sucked out all the moisture from the plants. And whatever is produced seems to turn bad in a day. Even the watermelons are splitting. So it's back to the drawing board on how to improve the garden for the next go-round.

Dottie doesn't have wings but she sure can fly up to some high places. There have been days when I have searched and searched for her and she eventually shows up. I think her favorite spot is back in this far corner above my kitchen cabinets.

If she's not up high, she's learned to open drawers and cabinets and get in there. I had no idea I was going to have to "child" proof my home for a cat.

Happy Trails...