Saying Goodbye to the Steer & Hello to the Beef~!

Two years ago at our county fair in the petting barn there was this most adorable Jersey Steer! I believe he was a few months old at the time and well my Hubby being the sucker that he is agreed to buy the steer and bring him home after the fair. DD decided to name him Bob...They all had a blast playing with this little guy and halter breaking him. Well the two years have blazed by and Bob was no longer the cute *little* guy he once was, he is now BIG and still kind of cute!

I don't seem to have any pics of when he was itty bitty!



He was definitely a character! Probably higher maintenance than most of my horses LOL!! He was always first in line for feeding and forever chasing the horses off from their food with his treacherous horns. So the decision was made that with Bob grown and becoming a danger to the horses was ready to be housed in the freezer...While I love having good home grown beef I always do get a twinge of sadness when it's time to drop them off. So Bob is hanging out at the meat locker now *pun intended* waiting to make his final trip home...

Last summer grazing the pasture



Over the Winter he decided he wanted to bust out of our horse pasture that he was in and go be with those of his likeness LOL!!




Time to load..









Yes the Hubby did admit that it makes him kind of sad to see him go...









You think maybe he's trying to tell me something?!?!



Goodbye Bob...

Rodeo Season Kickoff

Friday night marked the start of one of our local rodeo circuits that DD runs in. We were all excited and of course quite nervous as this was her first "real" rodeo on Krissy, she did a fun show about a month ago and they did excellent!





We arrived Friday evening and got her all signed in. Got Krissy tacked up and ready to go. They warmed up in the arena and I was relieved to see Krissy was quite comfortable with all of the other horses and riders around her. When we did the fun show Krissy was a bit on edge, she never "acted" up I could just tell she wasn't liking the place and wanted to throw a fit. I have figured out she is a very sensitive horse and does not like people hollering and carrying on around her. She doesn't do anything she just tenses up.

My nephew and my niece are also doing these rodeo's, my nephew has done them as long as DD has but this is my niece's first year riding by herself. So that was very exciting for her and us!





I actually missed some of DD's goat tie as I was watching my niece in the big arena doing barrels and it was quite the cute show! DD had a bit of trouble dismounting and didn't get her string tight enough so the goat broke loose, she had a big look of disappointment on her face after that...

Barrel one went pretty good for my niece!! *you can enlarge these pictures by clicking on them, they are hilarious*!!



NO she is NOT falling off of her horse!!! She literally has her feet jammed in her stirrups and is pulling as hard as she can to get her ol horse back on track as he veered for home after barrel two! She did get him back on track and finished her run! She was SO proud of herself, as were we!!






DD came out for her barrel run and I knew from the start she wasn't right. She totally blew the whole run! I cannot even say what she did wrong as it was pretty much all wrong LOL! Basically same story on poles and flags...DD was a bit frustrated with herself and told me "mom it was not Krissy, it was all me! I kept telling myself no don't jerk the reins, this isn't Pete and Krissy knows what she's doing...But I just couldn't stop"! POOR girl! I felt so bad and frustrated for her!! She wanted so badly to start the season off well and didn't meet her expectations! She is ready to practice some more and do better next time..

So I'm posting first her barrel video from Friday night and then her barrel run from the fun show from April so you can see the difference in her...



Fun show run from back in April she was wide on barrel 3 but the rest was pretty clean..

Not Much Of This Around Here!

Being out here in the country I truly do forget all of the *annoying to me* noises that go on. For instance we were in the city the other night for my nephews Birthday party and some neighbors across the street were banging dents out of the trunk of their car! OH MY GOODNESS I thought I was going to go bonkers! They just kept on and on! I was reminded just how blessed I am with my peace and quiet here on the prairie...Maybe to much so?!

Another noise I have thankfully forgotten is airplanes! Nope we don't have them...Hardly ever! So I tend to forget that maybe some of my horses don't get desensitized to certain sounds then when we go somewhere and a certain noise pops up I always watch and wonder what they will do... The last time we had a "plane" fly over we ended up with a catastrophe on our hands! I posted about that here, early that morning we had a crop duster fertilizing a field next to our pasture and some of my horses just went nuts! Leading to shown injury! Luckily she healed just fine!

So needless to say the other morning when I heard the loud rumble of a crop duster over my house I ran outside (of course grabbing my camera first LOL)! And was so thankful to find all of my horses perfectly fine with this monster roaring over their heads! YAY!! Some of them are yearlings and have never heard a plane much less have one right over their head! I was one proud Momma!



You can see their horsey butts next to the barn there...








Eating away with not a care in the world!!


Krissy was hanging out in her house!










This evening we took DD over to a local arena to exercise Krissy some more before her rodeo debut tomorrow night and as she was riding across the field to the arena a train came blasting through about 200 yards from her train horns and all and she didn't even bat an eye! I was thrilled with that!

So Sorry To Have Gone Missing!

So I realized it's been a week since I last posted! I first off must apologize for not stopping in and saying hi to everyone!! I have been reading just haven't had enough time to post comments for everyone...Hopefully I will get back into the groove soon!

So for now I will quickly tell you what's been going on here! First things first, Maggie (the pig) that I posted about here is not getting any better!! I cannot even begin to tell you how frustrating this is for me! I hate for an animal to feel sick and she has had the runny gumption's for a while now. I have literally tried a dozen things, from some home remedies including giving her Kaopectate, oatmeal, I have dewormed her 4 times, given her a couple of different shots that the Vet recommended, some medicine that went in her water...And the list goes on! She is literally half the size she was when we got her, right now I am waiting on a different medicine that the Vet had to order in. Hopefully this will be the cure! She doesn't act ill other than the diarrhea, she runs and plays, eats and drinks. I'm so puzzled with this!

Our Memorial weekend was a bit different than most people's! DD's dance recital was held on Sunday so Saturday was taken up with rehearsal which is an absolute blast if you ask me!! Rehearsal is the day we are allowed to take pics or video which I am extremely thankful for. Sunday's recital was an exciting time for DD, she has worked so hard for this and we were very blessed to have my Mom, my SIL and two nieces, and my FIL & MIL there to watch her. She is a very lucky girl with so many great family members who love her to pieces! Every year there is a special award given out to the girl who (actually two girls) is always excited to be in class, took time out of their busy lives to practice, always had a smile on their face and never complained....SO guess what....My DD won!! I was SO very proud of her, I literally had to fight the *ghastly* sobbing and just let a few tears trickle! The award that is given is free tuition to their Summer Dance Camp that is held at their main studio in Oklahoma. When I asked her how she felt when she got the award she told me "well as Miss Mindy was talking about the *girl* that would win this award and the things they have done to earn it, I thought inside that OH I hope I win cause I do all of those things" LOL!! My sweet girl! So just a bit of Momma pride here!

Tap dancing!



Ballet, she loves ballet!






Jazz dance!



And the "Finale Dance" that everyone does together!



For some reason I didn't get any gymnastics pictures... :(

Flowers DD got from her Grandma, Aunt and Cousins after her recital!



Flower's Daddy bought!




J has been out of school for 1 week and I have seen him maybe a total of three times! Gosh I miss that kid! Last Thursday he went to the city with 2 of his best buds to see Jason Aldean and Brooks and Dunn in concert. I treated the boys to the concert as a gift since I had taken DD and her bestie to see Taylor Swift, they were so thrilled and sent me many messages while they were there about how awesome it was! Then J left Friday and went south for Memorial weekend to a mountain house and spent the weekend fishing in the river and getting really sunburned! He got home late Monday then was off Tuesday morning for Football camp which he was so excited for! We have a new coach and are so thankful for this mans enthusiasm for our program, the old coach kind of had a raw deal. He was a young guy thrown into "head coach" position before he was really ready for that so there have been some changes made. We're really excited to see what the football season will bring as J already knows he will be starting Varsity!! Then bright and early Wednesday morning he left on yet another FFA trip to K-State in Manhattan and won't be home till Friday! Gosh I feel so lost without him to make me smile and laugh!!

Rodeo season officially starts up for us again this weekend so tonight we spent some time exercising DD's horse and getting her geared up for the weekend!




DD and her cousin who will start riding all on her own this year!

Wordless Wednesday

Can you see me?!

This Cost Me My Power!

Spring time storms here in KS can be...well frustrating to say the least! Now I love a good rainy, stay on the couch watching movies kind of day but that isn't achievable when these Spring time storms steal your electricity! I honestly think we have had more power outages out here in the country than I had my whole city life!! The longest we've gone without was 2 days, which obviously isn't the end of the world unless of course your like me and have freezer's full of yummy home grown meat! So tonight as these storms rolled through and I was nestled away watching my DVR'd *Bachelorette* it happened...Yep the storm stole my power! I was not a happy camper! I mean I am a night owl for goodness sakes! What the heck am I gonna do in the dark?! Then to top it all of the Hubby is out of town working! But he had power...

So this is what I did...

I watched a pretty awesome lightening show! And just shortly after the first round ended 3 hours later the power came back on!! However it is still storming like crazy! Not sure how J is even gonna make it out on these roads when the sun comes up!

Spring Time Wedding!

Friday night I had the sheer pleasure of shooting an outdoor wedding! Only the second wedding I've photographed so I was well....Just a wee bit nervous! I am not one of those super creative wedding photographers! However I had an absolute blast and this couple was just a joy!