Mustang Mania Part 4: Brian Neubert Clinic

My son has been diligently working away with his mustang. 

Slowly but surely he had advanced to being able to touch him all over with a pole. Put his halter & 

lead rope on & off. And lead him. Doesn't seem like much but it was progress.

Then, last week, something amazing happened.

Due to the unending generosity of old friends, my son was able to take Little Joe to a Brian Neubert Clinic.

Now, if you aren't familiar with Brian, Google him.

He's an amazing horseman who was trained by the Dorrance brothers & worked with Ray Hunt.

If you are familiar with the horse world at all you recognize those names!

The clinic was 5 days of intense colt starting techniques.

The kids & I drove down to watch on the last day & I was thrilled with his progress!

WARNING: this blog post may be a little photo heavy...

He didn't lead like this & neither one of them had the confidence in each other that they show here before the clinic...

Scary car wash type tarp strips ~ easy peasy!

Scary blue tarp monster? No problem!

Loud, clompy wooden bridge? I got this.

Bringing in the cows for the horsemanship part of the clinic.

Mr. Calm Cool & Collected

The man himself  Brian Neubert

NJ doing Brian a favor by holding his horse.

LOOK!!! He's saddled!

Other attendees working cows.

WOW!

Hooked on & following his boy...

Watching the cow work.

Before the clinic Joe was terrified of cowboy hats. He wouldn't come near you if you were wearing one. Now he's a stylish hat wearing dude.

Bridled.

Brian working with our friends horse.

That scary blue tarp monster has nothing on me...

Look at that folks! He's riding!

Brian brought the boys out to do some cow work & pet the Hereford. Her name was April.

I had waited weeks & weeks to get my hands on Joe & I finally got my chance!

Brian teaching Joe about the wonders of grain...clearly his horse was already well acquainted with it.

NJ finally got to give Joe some love too.

The whole clinic was am amazing experience & it fast forwarded Joe's training schedule by leaps & bounds.

If you ever have the opportunity to attend one of Brian's clinic don't miss it!

Blessings.

Mustang Mania Part 3

So, 5 minutes after we brought home Paisley it became abundantly clear that somebody  was going to need another horse because somebody doesn't share well.

And no. The somebody was not me.

My husband decided Paisley needed to be his...

and my son decided he has always wanted a paint...

so he got online & found a super pretty 3 year old paint gelding in Susanville Ca.

We hitched up the trailer & headed south & brought home this guy.

No less than a half dozen names have been suggested & tried out on this beauty...

but my son kept waffling on who he was going to be.

Just recently he has decided (I think) on Little Joe.

(I was pulling for "The Beav" due to his propensity to eat wood. Like, the entire wall of the barn, wood...)

Little Joe is coming along nicely.We've been working him in the round pen & watching colt starting videos by Buck Brannaman & Brian Neubert. 

Look at his mane ~ isn't it gorgeous? So long & the bi-colors? Sigh. Sooo pretty.

So now we are a 2 Mustang family. The little boys want burros & I have my heart set on a Kiger so we will see what happens in our future...

Blessings.

Mustang Mania Part 2

Yes. I know. It's been ages & I haven't written anything & I'm a slacker & a dead beat.

Yep. That's about it.

Actually we've been working.

Working & working & working.

Putting up new fencing, repairing barns, weeding, mowing blah, blah blah. 

I either need to clone myself, have a few more teenage children or hire a farm hand.

So anyway...what were talking about?

Oh! 

Horses!

So...this is Paisley.

Paisley is a 2 year old filly from... any guesses?

Paisley!

We picked her up at the BLM facility in Hines.

Isn't she pretty?

This next picture was the first look we had of her at the BLM corrals.

This was actually the first picture I took of any of the horses that day. Pretty cool huh?

We actually went there looking for a gelding but they had, for some reason, just shipped out a bunch of young geldings & of the ones left it seemed like everyone was on a "list" of horses we couldn't adopt.

Sigh.

This was one of the geldings we couldn't have. Isn't he pretty?

And this. Oh my gosh THIS...sigh.

The buckskin mare on the right? She is one of the ones we saw on the website & wanted to see.

She had just foaled. See that beautiful little grulla foal in the center?

Ohmygosh.

I wanted them so bad.

So bad.

I may have cried.

But gentling a mustang is a job enough with out throwing a foal into the mix & after agonizing over it I finally made up my mind it just wasn't a good idea.

Sigh.

So we picked Paisley. And they brought all of the fillies in & cut her out.

And ran her into the chutes.

And we brought her home & now she's ours. 

But wait!

There's more!

But until I get my clone you'll just have to wait because, alas, I have to go rebuild a barn wall.

Blessings.

Mustang Mania Part 1

Life is pretty muchly never boring on a farm.

Case in point: my 18 year old suddenly decided that he wanted a Mustang. Being the slightly OCD individual that he is, his want very quickly became a need.

He spent every spare moment looking at horses online. Reading up on the different herds & their history. The workings of the Mustang Act & the BLM. He pretty quickly became an expert in all things wild horse.

And he reminded us daily, sometimes hourly, that he needed his pony.

First things first, in order to adopt a Mustang one must have the appropriate facilities. These include a six foot high pen, at least 20x20 ft with a 3 sided shelter.

As money is most definitely an object, we needed to figure out the most economical way of accomplishing this corral.

It was really one of those totally cool God things where He just seemed to provide us with everything we needed at just the right time.

We were able to buy 3 bundles of older lumber from the sawmill next door to us for $30. Out of that we got all of the boards we needed for the corral & the shelter frame.

We had several posts on the property which we were able to repurpose for our project. We did have to buy concrete to set our posts & that  cost us $20.

At this point my son was stressing spending the money to buy tin to side & roof the shelter.

Here's one of those God things: our friends were preparing to sell their place & divesting themselves of their inventory~ some of which they brought over for us. Which "coincidentally" included enough tin to both roof & side our shelter (cue the Hallelujah chorus).

The only other items we needed to purchase were the hardware for the gate, bringing the total for the entire corral to $100.

(patting myself on the back)

And since the whole world obviously wants to know how & what we did I TOOK PICTURES!

(You're shocked I know)

So the next installment is when we actually get our Mustang.

Stay tuned!

Blessings.

Best Seder in the USA

Last Sunday our church held a Passover Seder. We use this as a teaching tool to understand the culture that the Bible was written in & to see specific types revealed in the New Testament. Such as the phrases "Lamb of God" & "Bread of Life".

We learn & fellowship & just have fun. It is very much a family event & it is loud & joyful. So if your church or Bible study does one & it is NOT fun...well, they are doing it wrong & missing the point.

The point is joy in what the Lord has done for us. The point is rejoicing in freedom from slavery & sin. The point is Jesus~ what better reason to celebrate?

Elijah's plate

Cute little boys.

Explaining what we do...

and why.

Blowing the Shofar & saying the prayer & lighting the candles to start the Seder

Ceremonial washing of hands.

Eating the karpas.

Asking the 4 questions.

Bitter herbs.

Painting the lintel so the Angel of Death will "pass over" us.

A mother/daughter moment...

Calling Elijah.

 The Seder ceremony is such a great way to bring the Bible to life for your family. Instead of just reading the account you can actually eat, and do & feel & understand what the elements stand for & how they matter to us today & why.

If your church doesn't offer one it's simple to have your own Seder as a family. You can find the whys & how to's on line or in any number of books.

You need to get yourself a Haggadah ~ a text which sets out the order of everything for you.

And learn what this beautiful ceremony stands for & how this very very Jewish ceremony has Jesus Christ woven all through it.

Blessings.