Our Pets

Just thought I'd dedicate a post to introducing some of our pets and livestock here on Moose Spitt Farm!  We have only a few animals now.  We hope to expand in the future but with the drought this year, we're really glad this is all we have to worry about this winter!  So, without further ado, here are the other inhabitants of MSF! (Warning!  Picture heavy!)
I suppose we can go in the order in which they've become part of our farm!

 Here is my Sky-boy.  He's a Tennessee Walking horse.  He's nine years old and full of personality!  He's a real jokester!

Sky-boy in the winter.

Here's Sky's new pasture buddy, Sarge!  He turned one year old this July.  He's a real sweetheart!  He'll begin riding training sometime next year.  Very exciting!

Sarge laying down, just chillin' on a hot day.

My daughter's early bday present, Octavius!  He's a Lionhead rabbit and just the sweetest little bunny ever!

Our new kittens we received from my sister's kitty's first litter!  This one is Pip.  She's very inquisitive and very bold!  I think she'll be a great mouser as she gets older!  She loves hunting the bugs and mock-hunting her sister and the chickens!

And this sleepy baby is Cookie!  She's a little more reserved but enjoys cuddling and falling asleep in one's lap.  Aw!

 And our chickens.  They were a hatching project through the local extension office.  Some kind of meat bird.  I think they are called "Rich's Meat Bird" or something like that.  Anyway, they are a strange looking set of chicks.  And they have grown very quickly!  Here they are at two weeks old.

                                          

Smile, chicky!

All of the animals seem to be getting along quite well!

I said at the first that I would list them in order of arrival but I couldn't resist holding this picture til last.  Here are our puppy dogs.  Zorro is a large mix breed.  Liberty is a Miniature Pinscher.  They are really great dogs!  We had an issue at first as our neighbor feeds his cats on his back porch and Zorro found their food!  But after some boundary training, he seems to be doing better at recognizing where he may and may not go.  Good boy!!!

And there you have it!  Our little farm, thus far.  We have plans to expand next year.  A milk cow, some laying hens, perhaps a pig...  We'll see what the next year brings!  Thanks for visiting!

A little horsey silliness in the rain!

New Look for the Dining Room!

Ever since first walking through this house, I've been thinking/planning/dreaming of what I would do with the dining room.  It's dark walls, dark ceiling, heavy light fixture, and unfinished trim were all quite depressing to look at!  With our large and somewhat (ok, insanely) heavy dining table, we really needed to lighten the room up aesthetically!
Here is a before photo:

So I went online to search for "dining room makeover" ideas.  I found many images of rooms I liked but was having trouble finding "just the right one".  There were many with great ideas in them but I didn't like the whole of the room or didn't think it would work in the room we had.  I finally settled on choosing a light blue wall color with white ceiling and trim.  Most of the woodwork in the house is natural wood or sealed with a clear varnish so the natural colors come through.  The kitchen, however, is all white trim with white doors.  The dining room trim is horrible.  I mean, like this is the bottom-of-the-barrel type trim.  Very rough, very unfinished.  And this girl had absolutely no plans on taking the trim back down, sanding it completely, and then staining/varnishing.  That was way too much work!  At least two of the pieces I don't think would have sanded well, anyway.  I would have sanded and sanded and had nothing left!  So white trim, it would be.  We also have a lovely teal buffet table that I received from my mother years ago that I planned to place in the dining room.  So there would definitely be teal accents.  And I love, adore, greatly admire the color orange, so there would be touches and splashes of that color, as well!
A picture of the room during painting:

The floor is an interesting case.  All of the floors in our house have either been rough-sanded (to remove loose paint and debris) or refinished or, in the case of one unsalvageable floor, replaced entirely.  Except for the dining room, for some reason.  It was painted brown at some point in its history, as well as perhaps pale blue or white.  I'm not entirely certain.  And there is a strange cut-out place in the middle.  And a weird rectangular spot that was never painted at all!  Very strange floor, to be sure!
So we sanded the repair patches on the ceiling and taped and plastered a huge space above one section of baseboard.  We removed (most of) the switch plates and socket covers.  We removed the boxes and all furniture except our table, which we covered with plastic.  And the painting commenced!
It took us nearly a week to get to where we are now, and that is not finished!  Between work, doctor visits, and life, we've only been able to work sporadically on the room.  But it is now usable and down to finishing touches!  Huzzah!!!
Here is where we are thus far:

The Husband suggested we dedicate the room to our Eow's memory.  And so, in one corner sits his favorite chair.  Once his favorite, fuzzy blanket is unpacked (I still have to find it!) that will be draped over the back of the chair.  And his collar and my favorite photo of him will be beautifully framed in a shadow box and hung on the wall next to it all.  It will be a sad reminder of what we have lost but also a beautiful tribute to the best little buddy I've ever known!
Eow's Corner, the shadow box is not complete yet:

So, that is where we are now with our dining room's mini-reno!  It's been real.  It's been fun.  And, at times, it's even been real fun!  The floor will eventually be painted brown, the ceiling will get a beautiful crystal chandelier, and the windows will be graced with lovely white sheers!  But for now, it is painted and very serviceable!  And that'll do for now.

Eow.... God, I Miss Him

 I also took advantage of his weakened state to give him a much needed bath. Poor guy. He just kept looking at me and meowing real low and pitiful as if to say, "Unfair, woman. So not cool." :P But it needed done. He smells stinky and can't clean himself, so someone's gotta do it! My poor baby. I broke down really bad in church yesterday. I know some would say "good thing it's just a pet." But, really, he's so much more to my heart. And my poor heart is just breaking seeing my sweet, cuddly baby like this. He's on meds for toxoplasmosis, as that's the only thing....

The above was written just a few days ago.  At the time, I was thinking maybe I shouldn't bother with a bath right now.  Maybe I should just leave him be so he can rest.  And now I am so glad that I spent that time with him.  That I took the time to bathe his body and snuggle with him after.  That I took that extra time out of my day to sit and love on my mow-mow.  Because he is gone now.  He just never got better.  The vet said he should've responded to the medicine days ago.  That he should already be back to his normal self.  Oh God! how I miss his normal self!  We took him yesterday to the vet to make the final determination as to whether more medical intervention was right or if it was time to say good-bye.  The evening before, Eow's breathing became labored.  His adorable little tongue was barely visible in between his lips.  But his eyes... Oh my God, his eyes.  They stare at me.  They bore into my soul.  It is my Eow, still alive and well inside this now worthless shell of a body.  I can see him asking me.  But asking what?  Normally his body language would assist.  He would meow in some way to let me know what he's thinking.  But, no.  This body refuses to cooperate.  Refuses to get well again.  And why?  Why???  I now believe, wholeheartedly, that it is better to know why.  And I do not.  And it torments me.  Was it something I unwittingly did?  Was it something we could have prevented?  Were there earlier warning signs that I didn't notice as we were hustling to move off-base and into our dream house?  Did I neglect my poor kitty cat?  Am I partially to blame???  This is what causes the tears to flow.  That and the horrid knowledge that I will never see my kitty again.  That I will never hold him or pet him or love on him again.  He will never ride on my shoulder, his weight making it difficult to complete my tasks but his happy purring making it worthwhile.  His beautiful, bright, green eyes will never again look into mine with that all-knowing spark that cats seem to have.  I didn't have to open my daughter's door this morning to let him out.  He had to sleep in her room as she sleeps like a rock.  And I don't.  So I will never hear him calling out from behind that door to let him out.  He'll never rub his adorable lion face into my hair or try to play with it when it is down.  I won't be tripping over him in the kitchen as he tries to race me to his food bowl.  I'll never see him hunkered down over that same bowl again, scarfing down his food.  Or come home and have him try to jump onto my shoulder, purring loudly, greeting me as though I'd been gone forever.  He is gone.  And my heart... is shattered.  My Eow is gone.

So it's been a while (think three months or so) since I've actually ridden my horse, Sky.  I know, I know.  That's not good, is it?  But circumstances and weather were not being exactly ride-friendly to this girl.  We had been boarding at a friend's house since I bought Sky last September.  I bought a new saddle and some other tack but hadn't found a saddle pad/blanket that I liked.  My friend was kind enough to loan one of hers when she wasn't using it.  It was great, as it was the perfect size and already broken in.  But when we moved Sky out to the new farm, the blanket couldn't come with us.  So I've been searching, staring, dreaming, wishing for a good saddle pad so we could resume riding.  Well, yesterday, I finally bought one.  It's a Weaver basic pad.  Nice and well-made but without any specialty or extra stuff.  Today, we tried it out.

And I must say, today's ride was a complete success!  

I was a little worried, as he doesn't do all that well after not working for a while. But he was a perfect gentleman. Well, right up to when I was ready to dismount! Then he started jigging a bit. But I walked him a bit more and he calmed down enough for me to call an end to our session. I also lunged him a bit before saddling him up. He did really well at that, also! What a smart boy! :) 
Another concern is his gaits.  You see, Sky is a Tennessee Walking horse.  He's supposed to be gaited.  He's supposed to have a nice, smooth running walk.  However, my boy?  Well, he likes to pace, instead.  And let me tell you, there is no other gait in the whole world that is worse to attempt to ride than a pacing one.  Ugh.  So I started researching ways to work with him to improve his running walk.  While searching for info, I stumbled across a neat little site that talked about things you can do to work with your walking horse to help smooth out their gait!  Little exercises, if you will.  One mentioned an old tried and true method of utilizing a hill.  And since our yard has a great hill, we were able to work on his gait a bit too. So we walked down the hill, nice and slow. At the bottom, we turned and then worked into a running walk back up. Lemme tell ya. If you've ever ridden a trotting horse or a horse that paces (shoot me now!!!), try out a gaited horse! Wowee!!!! I never realized how smooth Sky's walk really could be! *huuuuge grin* Looking forward to getting him sacked out a bit more so I can actually go places with him!  He's still a little twitchy.  But that's a story for another time!

Here's a picture of my boy after our ride!  You can see the sweat marks there.  He seemed very happy to be doing something.  But then he was also very happy to go back into his field and resume scarfing down everything in sight! ;)