I’ve been canning

No, really!  And I find that winter is the best time to can!  The added heat from the stove is welcome in the kitchen and life outside is dreary and slow, so it’s the best time to spend slaving over a (thankfully) hot stove canning.  The GBH got me started when I threw caution to the wind and sent him grocery shopping on his own.  He brought home about 60 packages of mushrooms from Aldi's again because they were on sale for 39 cents a package.  I truly apologize to anyone else that wanted mushrooms from the Aldi’s in Marietta that week.  I don’t think he left any stragglers behind.

To make matters worse, Jamie had a yard sale of donated items to help raise money for the county dog shelter.  We weren’t home for the yard sale and came home a week or so afterwards.  The leftovers had already been picked through several times over so it was with great enthusiasm (and several happy dances) that I found these babies, sitting lost and alone amongst the junk:




Go ahead and covet, I’ll understand. 

Once he had all the mushrooms canned, the thought occurred to me that maybe I should finally do something with all the frozen tomatoes from the last two years.  Since I wasn’t in a hurry I could take my time and do something new… something other than the usual pasta sauce.  I canned 8 pints of pizza sauce, 10 half pints of chicken wing sauce, and 12 quarts of plain tomato sauce.  We’ve already tried all three and love them!  When I opened a can of the tomato sauce I added roasted garlic, mushrooms, and frozen bell peppers from my 2009 garden.  Delish!  I’ve also gotten back into using the bread machine and have been living off of “french” bread pizza using the pizza sauce and bread heels from the bread machine loaves. 

Then the GBH was also given about 10 lbs of turnips.  Hmmm… what to do, what to do?  None of my canning books had any recipes for canning turnips so we made a trip to Borders for a new book (happy belated birthday to me).  The new book (Canning for a New Generation) had a pickled turnip recipe that the GBH declared to be the best turnip pickle ever.  He’s already polished off two pints and has demanded that I grow turnips this year just for use in that recipe. 

Now I’m looking for new things to can before the garden gets going and before the warm weather gets here and I dread spending time indoors!  I’m also feeling like these jars need to be on my Christmas list this year.  Beautiful!

Calypso

Thor and Xena have been gone long enough that I no longer cry when I think of them.  There’s just a small catch in my throat when I say their names.  We’ve come to believe that someone has shot them for whatever real or imagined crimes they may have committed.  It’s odd that the flyers and calls to the local shelters every week have been unsuccessful.  Hopefully, I’m wrong and someone is remaining quiet about their whereabouts simply because they love the dogs and have chosen to keep them. 

Anyways, on to Calypso.  A woman not far from us raises mules and this past winter while I was out driving with Glenn she emailed me and asked if I had any mules for adoption.  We started communicating on a regular basis and became email pals.  Shortly after we returned home and I told her about Thor and Xena, she emailed and said she had sold one of her puppies, but the woman no longer wanted her and could I please take her?  I was prepared to say no, but then the GBH saw the puppy pictures and I no longer had a say in the matter.

Please meet Calypso.  She’s a four month old Blue Heeler/Bull Dog cross and she’s smarter than me.




Heidi thinks Calypso is as much fun to play with (and chew on) as Xena.




I just want to call her Jabba.




She had been kept in a crate most of the time at her old home and had a big fat belly when we got her.  She had no muscling along her back and her little backbone stuck out.  It took a week of playing with our dogs and helping me around the farm for her to lose the belly and gain muscle.  I only wish it worked that fast for me!



While she will never replace Thor or Xena, we love her like crazy already and are glad she came in to our lives.


Even if she were as dumb as a box of rocks, she’s still adorable.

Baby #6

 

First, let me apologize for the lack of posts.  Besides running around like a chicken with my head cut off, I have not had much luck with internet access since being home.  That should start changing here shortly and I’ll be posting more often.  At least, that’s the plan.

 

This should be the last baby that will be born from the mares seized from Baracksville, WV last April.  River must have conceived either days before being seized or in the few days after when we were trying to catch everyone and get mares separated from stallions.  Amigo was born exactly 11 months from the day River was seized, on March 14th shortly after 1AM.  I had separated River from Lucille and Lucky about a week before, when her bag started filling up, but she was still right in front of the house and I could look out the window all night and keep an eye on her.

 

The GBH was home that night and was having trouble sleeping, so when he heard the horses screaming and going nuts, he grabbed a flashlight and our new puppy (she deserves her own post later), Calypso, and headed out the door to see if someone had gotten out or if that bobcat we had heard in the woods a few nights ago had made a return visit.  He and Calypso wandered around, but couldn’t find anything amiss.  He came back in, but Calypso stayed out, which is totally against her nature.  She is usually glued to us and goes wherever we go.  As soon as the GBH closed the door, Calypso started barking.  He went back out to find her standing in front of River’s foal, who had been born under the metal panels of River’s pen!   The poor little guy was about 12’ from River’s pen and was still soaking wet and attached to the umbilical and sack.  He couldn’t stand up yet, but had obviously tried since he had gotten himself so far away from River. 

We got the little guy back in with mom, dried him off, and I kept River close to the heater until he stopped shivering.   River has proven to be an excellent mother, but because her fat belly was hanging so low and her udder was so high and tight, the poor little guy had trouble nursing.  I tried milking her, but couldn’t get anything out.  Fortunately, a friend of mine raises Andalusian horses not far from our place and I knew she’d have a supply of colostrum since her foaling season starts in April.  Once he had some warm colostrum in his belly his energy level picked up and within another hour he had figured out how to turn his head to the side and practically upside down to nurse.

 

The friend with the colostrum is also the person who named the little tyke:  Amigo.  Too darned cute for words, right?

Finally, some pictures!

 

Apologies, but I haven’t had a lot of time to wander around taking pictures since being home.  Between running errands, trying to clean up the place, and getting horses groomed (probably for the first time all winter) and fed, I just haven’t had the time or energy to walk around with the camera.  However, today when Glenn and I got home from town, I found a scene that simply had to be captured.

 

An all male slumber party happening in the stud paddock.

The mud and filth on everyone just made me want to throw my brushes into the burn barrel and give up on the whole grooming thing.

 

But seriously, how cute are these two (dirt and all)?

 

The fact that Kincaid let me get so close for pictures while he was lying down was impressive enough.  He’s still skittish about certain things, and usually hops up if someone is within 50 feet of his snoozing spot.  Then to further impress me with his lackadaisical attitude, he did this.

 

The sun, it’s warm.  My belly, it’s full.  The hay, it’s comfy.  And I am simply too tired to care that you are that close.  I will smile for the camera, though.

 

I thought it was rude that all the larger horses laid down for a nap and left the littlest ones of the bunch to stand guard.

 

Or stuff his face, in Dagwood’s case.

Good night boys, have a fun sleeping in the hay.  Better you than me!

Honey, we’re home!

 

After Gilbert packed his crap and left without telling anyone (*sigh*), we had to come home for a couple of days to initiate the new guy.  However, once we were home to the disastrously filthy house (again), a few of the horses looking worse than when I rescued them (again), and a warrant for my arrest (thank you for writing that bad check on the farm account, Lee) we finally had a stroke of good luck.  Yes, really!  A friend of ours called us one night to tell us about a local driving job.  The job pays great (more than Glenn was making on the road) and he’d be home every night!  Woohoo!  More importantly, they are so desperate for drivers that they may even stoop to hiring me, even though I only have a few months experience.  Suckers!

Kidding.  I’m a good driver (said in my best Rain Main voice).

So, we’re home.  Home for good, I might add.  No matter what, I just can’t leave this farm again.  Thanks to the losers that we hired, we’ve lost two dogs, have a house that needs major cleaning and repairs, a truck that is drivable but still won’t pass inspection, horses that were once pocket ponies are now skittish, and a couple of the horses have been starved.  When we came home on the 7th, Don Juan was in the main herd instead of in the stud pen, so we’re also looking at Lutalyse shots for all the mares in a couple of months (you have to wait at least 45 days after exposure before giving them the shot).

I thought I couldn’t afford to NOT go out on the road, but it turns out that I couldn’t afford to leave the farm in the hands of lazy incompetent idiots, either!  The horses are already gaining weight and should be back to normal in a few weeks.  Poor Sketches is the worst, so I hug her several times a day while she’s eating and apologize for leaving her.  She seems to understand when I cry into her mane and stands quietly for the extra attention.  Quill and Sky were skittish when I returned, but have already reverted to the pocket ponies that I remember.  Maggie and Matilda still haven’t forgiven me and want nothing to do with me unless I have food in my hand.  Jethro ran away every time he saw me, but today he and I took a nap in the hay together, with his muzzle resting on my shoulder.

Oh, and let’s not forget the 10k worth of tools that are now missing out of the garage.  If you happen to see a tool for sale at a pawn shop with the initials G.W. etched in to the handle, please let us know.  I hope Gilbert got more than the price of his plane ticket home out of those tools.  They were certainly worth a lot more.

Then there’s Timmy, who somehow got frostbite on his penis, of all places.  Doc came out and explained to Gilbert what he needed to do to take care of the horse and said that if he didn’t start right away, Timmy might lose his wanker.  I talked to Gilbert on the phone that day and he said “don’t worry, he’s just like my horse, I’ll take care of him”.  Then he packed his shit and left the next day without taking care of Timmy’s wanker once.  We got Timmy into a foster home within a day or two, with someone that would take the time to take care of him properly.  It’s still up in the air, but he’s finally looking a little better now that the penicillin shots are over.  I’m hoping we don’t have to put the old man down, but I certainly don’t want him to suffer any more than he already has!

And I keep looking for Thor and Xena to come running home from the back pasture.  I look for them while driving down the back roads.  I listen every night for Xena’s whimper at the door, wanting to come in.   Sometimes Heidi sits, gazing into the distance, as still as a statue, and whimpers.  I think she’s waiting for them to come home, too.

I can only handle so much

 

This winter has been the hardest one ever, and I’m not talking about the snow.  Just when we thought it couldn’t get any worse after Lee, this week has proved that it can get worse.  MUCH worse.  The new guy on the farm, Gilbert, has proven to be a better choice than Lee, but only because he remains sober.  He’s feeding the horses, which is also a bonus.  With Jamie going out every week to make sure he’s taking care of the horses properly, I think the horses will get through the winter just fine.  Here’s the bad news.  On Monday, we called Gilbert to see how things were going, since he refuses to pick up the phone and call us.  Glenn talked to him for 10 minutes before asking how the dogs were doing and what we heard next had me randomly breaking out in tears for the rest of the week.  And now that I’m typing it, here I go again. *sniff*

We told Gilbert at least a dozen times to not let Heidi, Thor, and Xena outside together.  They have a tendency to take off for the day when they are together and we didn’t want them disappearing or wreaking havoc with the neighbors while we were gone.  Like most things we told him, Gilbert ignored us.  He let Thor and Xena out together on the 18th (six days before we talked to him on Monday) and they had disappeared.  It’s now the 30th and they have still not returned.  Gilbert wasn’t even going to tell us. Jamie has spread the word with the other county shelters and has put an ad in the paper for us.  But at this point, I have given up hope.  Neither of them have ever left for longer than a day.  They have always come back around dark.  It’s winter.  There is a pack of wild dogs roaming the area and then there are the coyotes. 

I simply cannot bear to dwell on what has probably happened.  So I stick to my butterflies and flowers approach and think of them in front of a warm woodstove, being fed and loved by someone new.  So this is my goodbye to them, in the hopes that writing about their disappearance and my loss of faith in their return, that fate will bring them back home just to spite me.

Xena.  Where do I start?  You were the pup I hadn’t planned on and it was uncertain whether or not you’d ever bond with me.  But, oh what a companion you were when we finally did bond!  Loyal to a fault, I was the only human you loved. 

 

The most intelligent of our dogs, you could have learned anything if I had had the time to teach you. I’ll miss the way you were there to say goodbye when I ran to town and you were always waiting at the top of the driveway for me when I returned.

 

I’ll miss the way you and Lucky chased each other around the yard.  I’ll miss the way you used to lie on your back with me in the hammock, your legs in the air and your nose on my neck.

Who’s going to lick the tears from my face now that you’re gone?

 

Thor, I will miss your 100lb body trying to fit in my lap and your grunts of satisfaction when you finally settle on my legs.  I’ll miss the way the cats all loved you and would curl up with you for warmth in the winter.  And the way you chewed on their heads affectionately when you could have easily snapped their necks.

 

I’ll miss the way you’d lay on your back in the sun, legs in the air, jowls hanging down in a goofy upside down grin.  I’ll miss playing fetch with the only dog who ever brought the stick back to me.  I’m going to cry a river when I get home and see this boot still lying in the yard.

 

I’ll miss the safety I felt late at night and alone in the dark - I knew you’d never let anyone get past you. 

 

I hope you’ve found someone new to love and protect.  You deserve it, big guy.

 

I’ll be stepping away from the blog for awhile.  I hope you understand.

Let’s play a game

 

Glenn and I were driving in Amish country today, up in New Yarwk, and came across the following scene:

 

 

Ok, students, give me your attention, please.  Make sure your Number 2 pencils are sharpened and remember to press firmly when writing your answer.

Please tell me what particular item in this photo does not belong.

Washington State

If I had my life to live over, I would live in Washington.   No doubt about it.  I have seen almost all 50 states by now and none have tugged at my soul the way Washington has.  It’s something I really can’t explain, and I’m not even sure I want to try, but it may have had something to do with the wild horse herds we saw while driving through a wildlife refuge.

We didn’t get many good pictures because of the rain and fog that day, but the GBH did get some pretty good shots of the horses.  We passed about 10-12 different herds, ranging in size from four horses to 20.  They have the ideal range land to roam, since there is ample water, evergreens for shelter, and grass year round.  They all looked to be in pretty good shape, but I have to wonder if some are domesticated horses that have been turned loose by their owners.  There was a buckskin in a herd of bays, a chestnut appaloosa with white blanket in a herd of solid chestnuts, and a couple of herds with all different colored horses.

 

Sorry this one is a bit grainy, most of the herds were a LONG distance off and Glenn hasn’t bought me a zoom lens for my camera yet.  What’s he waiting for, anyway?

 

There was also a puzzling piece of architecture overlooking the Hood river that I wanted to stop and explore, but couldn’t.

 

I’m pretty sure I want to live along this beautiful river, but I can’t help but think there are even more spectacular places to live in this incredibly diverse state.

 

Once we finally climbed out of the valleys and gorges, we found the top of the world.  Vast acreage of nothing but snow-covered crop fields.  There were open fields as far as the eye could see, with farm houses dotting the countryside every few miles.  This picture isn’t the best representation of the area, but it’s the only one Glenn got at the time.

 

This is the same river mentioned above, but this was taken above the large dam.  When we win the lottery next year, we’re going to build a house on that far mountaintop, clear, irrigate, and seed pastures, and build a monster of a barn with indoor riding arena.

 

If you’re going to dream, might as well dream big!

Who knew Utah was so beautiful?

 

I certainly didn’t.  Whenever I thought of Utah in the past, I envisioned flat and barren desert, devoid of anything but sand.  Silly me!  These days, I’m finding beauty wherever I go, whether it’s just a hawk perched on a fence post, the way the sun sets and outlines a particularly twisted tree on a hilltop, a herd of wild horses drinking from a stream, a new born calf suckling in the middle of a vast prairie, a magnificent elk hanging out near a large herd of antelope, a lone wolf pouncing after his dinner in the brush, or an emerald green field of winter rye surrounded by nothing but brown grass for miles. 

And that’s just what I’ve seen over the past two days, ya’ll.  Days like that make being so far from home just a little easier to handle.  But on to Utah, shall we?  These pictures were taken on US 6 and I-70.

 

I think we drove at least 100 miles without seeing a house.  Awesome!

 

 

 

You just knew I had some sunset pictures, didn’t you?  The sunsets out west have me wanting to stop every couple of minutes to get a picture from a different angle.  Too bad I usually don’t have the time to stop and soak up the last rays as they color the world in front of me.

 

 

 

This is probably one of my favorite shots from Utah just because of the way the light makes the mountain look like it’s on fire.  The rest of these pictures are all of the same sunset.

 

 

 

 

!

I hope these pictures make you smile.  The real thing certainly had me grinning like an idiot as I was rolling down the road!

Hello, New Year

 

I’m a few days late on this, but I saw it on another blog and thought it’d be fun to do.  These are my top 10 favorite blog posts from 2010.  It should not surprise most of you that Maverick is featured in more than one.

Stormy and Xena keeping it real while working out

Baby Riley and Tootsie videos

The bittersweet adoption of Maverick

Equine stupidisms

The unexciting Jethro assimilation

Lucille’s beauty tips

More Maverick

Calvin and catcrack

Fraggle shag

Snoozing in the sun

 

I hope everyone had a great New Year!  Our truck broke down (again) in Utah on New Year’s Eve and we’re still here.  At least this little town had fireworks on Friday night and the view from the hotel has a heated swimming pool!