Hello Day!
So I had one student have to hold off on lessons for a time, but the same day I got an e-mail from a lady who wanted her daughter to start up and potentially more to start as well. So work is going well and I'm staying very much afloat.
I just have to figure out what to do with my parents' old truck. Chris has christened it "The Tractor." They gave it to us as they just purchased a new Ford and, well, they don't need two trucks. The Tractor is about three or four years younger than my little car (it's an '02) and quite a bit newer than Greenie (Chris' '97 Chevy). However both of us HATE driving it and aren't terribly fond of the thing. Not to say it isn't a nice truck and I don't appreciate it. I just really don't like driving it. It is a 3/4 ton and can handle the horse trailer with greater ease, but it is also a diesel, which makes it both noisy and smelly and a lot more expensive to put gas in. It would be about $90/month to insure and Mom offered to pay for the registration for the next two years (which would have killed us as looking at the old one it was over $400). I don't know whether to sell it and put the money in the bank to sit on until we can afford buying a new truck, putting the money into our two cars, or just Chris' truck. Or keeping it and using it as the horse hauler and long-haul trip taker as it, in theory, is more reliable than our two older vehicles (even though both of ours have been wonderfully reliable Greenie has 120,000+ miles and Silber is at 92,000+ whereas my parents truck is barely at 45,000 and still under warranty).
So descisions to be made.
And yesterday! Yesterday was pretty good. Chris was off of work because of weird schedule happenings and we went on a trail ride. We took Panda and Ruby. Ruby was the big good lady, as always, though she wanted to follow some of the hikers rather than the trail that we were taking a couple of times (she loves love, and associates people with that, so people are like magenets for the big lady). Panda did excellent, especially considering all of the people. She barely body-twitched and even with the troupe of little girls walked by swinging and hitting their walking sticks on the ground she stayed solid. HUGE improvement, makes me so happy. She really wants to be a good, confident horse, she just needs to realize that those wild people on the ground aren't out to get her. In addition I'm starting to relax while riding her a little more. I've noticed that I sometimes get a little tight while on Panda as I seem to be hard-wired to expect her to do something, which I know doesn't help her worry-wart attitude any, but it's something hard to correct.
I applied for a new credit card today and ordered some new lungeing cavesons and a couple of bits from Dover. The cavesons are nice leather ones, ordered the full and cob size and hopefully they fit the horses. We have a variety so they're bound to fit something. I was hoping the cob would at least fit Chewy, but it'll probably be sized for Panda, and I was hoping the full will fit Panda and Strudel, but will probably fit Ruby. I can hope, though, but they're bound to fit someone. I also picked up two bits that I want to try out on Kash. both of them have the rounded, lozonge (sp?) instead of the french link. It is a three-piece mouthpiece both are made by Korsteel. The one is a loose ring, which I've never been terribly fond of, but in their defense, have never really tried. The mouth is all copper on that one. The second is a D-ring, which just has the center lozonge as copper. I was really wanting copper as Kash seems to respond better to it than simple steal and I wanted the rounded center piece as he doesn't seem to like the flat center piece found on the french link bits. You can never have too many bits! Of course the bit that I REALLY wanted was at least $80 or more depending on what brand or features it had, gag.
Time to go run errands and see if Kash is finally done eating.
Warwind's Friza. Gouache on watercolor paper.
Hollso's Tren. Gouache on Matt board.
Continuing to explore this style. I'm scared to do solid blocks of color, but I think that's where I need to go next to bring it along. I also think it tends to work better with the black to bring it together and work from there, but I'm not sure, I'll have to continue to experiment.
I just have to figure out what to do with my parents' old truck. Chris has christened it "The Tractor." They gave it to us as they just purchased a new Ford and, well, they don't need two trucks. The Tractor is about three or four years younger than my little car (it's an '02) and quite a bit newer than Greenie (Chris' '97 Chevy). However both of us HATE driving it and aren't terribly fond of the thing. Not to say it isn't a nice truck and I don't appreciate it. I just really don't like driving it. It is a 3/4 ton and can handle the horse trailer with greater ease, but it is also a diesel, which makes it both noisy and smelly and a lot more expensive to put gas in. It would be about $90/month to insure and Mom offered to pay for the registration for the next two years (which would have killed us as looking at the old one it was over $400). I don't know whether to sell it and put the money in the bank to sit on until we can afford buying a new truck, putting the money into our two cars, or just Chris' truck. Or keeping it and using it as the horse hauler and long-haul trip taker as it, in theory, is more reliable than our two older vehicles (even though both of ours have been wonderfully reliable Greenie has 120,000+ miles and Silber is at 92,000+ whereas my parents truck is barely at 45,000 and still under warranty).
So descisions to be made.
And yesterday! Yesterday was pretty good. Chris was off of work because of weird schedule happenings and we went on a trail ride. We took Panda and Ruby. Ruby was the big good lady, as always, though she wanted to follow some of the hikers rather than the trail that we were taking a couple of times (she loves love, and associates people with that, so people are like magenets for the big lady). Panda did excellent, especially considering all of the people. She barely body-twitched and even with the troupe of little girls walked by swinging and hitting their walking sticks on the ground she stayed solid. HUGE improvement, makes me so happy. She really wants to be a good, confident horse, she just needs to realize that those wild people on the ground aren't out to get her. In addition I'm starting to relax while riding her a little more. I've noticed that I sometimes get a little tight while on Panda as I seem to be hard-wired to expect her to do something, which I know doesn't help her worry-wart attitude any, but it's something hard to correct.
I applied for a new credit card today and ordered some new lungeing cavesons and a couple of bits from Dover. The cavesons are nice leather ones, ordered the full and cob size and hopefully they fit the horses. We have a variety so they're bound to fit something. I was hoping the cob would at least fit Chewy, but it'll probably be sized for Panda, and I was hoping the full will fit Panda and Strudel, but will probably fit Ruby. I can hope, though, but they're bound to fit someone. I also picked up two bits that I want to try out on Kash. both of them have the rounded, lozonge (sp?) instead of the french link. It is a three-piece mouthpiece both are made by Korsteel. The one is a loose ring, which I've never been terribly fond of, but in their defense, have never really tried. The mouth is all copper on that one. The second is a D-ring, which just has the center lozonge as copper. I was really wanting copper as Kash seems to respond better to it than simple steal and I wanted the rounded center piece as he doesn't seem to like the flat center piece found on the french link bits. You can never have too many bits! Of course the bit that I REALLY wanted was at least $80 or more depending on what brand or features it had, gag.
Time to go run errands and see if Kash is finally done eating.
Warwind's Friza. Gouache on watercolor paper.
Hollso's Tren. Gouache on Matt board.
Continuing to explore this style. I'm scared to do solid blocks of color, but I think that's where I need to go next to bring it along. I also think it tends to work better with the black to bring it together and work from there, but I'm not sure, I'll have to continue to experiment.