Where is spring??

Yesterday we ventured out to the barn in nearly whiteout conditions! Ok maybe they weren't whiteout, but I couldn't see more than 1/4 mile in front of me. That meant our 40 mile trip took us close to 50 minutes. Usually we can zip out there in 30-35 minutes. Why did I venture out in the snow to see my ponies? Well because I hadn't been out there since Saturday. I was not about to not go on my day off. I am pretty sure someday it will stop snowing. Due to the snow we had to change our plans of riding out to playing in the indoor. The new indoor is small, probably a 1/4 of the size of the old barns. But I am not complaining because at least on snowy days we have a place to play.

We took Char and Willow out first. This was Chars first time out of the pasture since we moved them last week. We let her settle for the week cause she is kind of a nervous horse in new situations. Much to our surprise she was very relaxed. Maybe the week of settling in worked. She stood nicely while tied inside the tack barn and then did very well in the indoor arena. We got to practice feet handling also! She still isn't comfortable with us picking up her feet, but we have made huge strides. We were able to pick up her fronts a few times yesterday! We worked at liberty and online she stayed relaxed the whole time! This move may have been the best thing we could have done for her. I hardly ever saw her this relaxed at our old place, but she had a lot of stressful moments there.

Willow was a champ and we look forward to riding Willow out and about today! Willow has taken this move in stride too! She is such a good girl! Speaking of Willow when we first took over managing the other barn we had to clean out the office. While cleaning out the office we found old papers from when it was a Tennessee Walking Horse show and breeding barn. In fact Willow spend many years there as a broodmare. It was a huge operation back in the day and a stunning facility! I only knew it in 2010 and after by then the owner had retired from showing. He was still breeding some and had a few horses still for sale. We have always known Willow was bought in Tennessee by the owner of the barn, we just never knew her worth to him in dollars. We found out when we stumbled across the papers that had the asking price for all his horses at the time. She was listed at $8,500. To me that is a lot! Not because she isn't worth it, but because I would never have that much money to pay for a horse! She did win at Celebration in Tennessee as a yearling and as a two yr old undersaddle! She was an outstanding broodmare for him for six years before she was offered for sale. And in the end she stayed until he completely retired and listed the ranch for sale. Which meant we got to buy her for what the old barn manager paid for her from the owner. We got her for $500. She fell into our laps and we are blessed to have been given the chance to own her!

We only have one horse that is having a hard time settling down and you can guess who. Yep, it's my Pixie Dust. She is my heart horse in every way down to the fact that she hates change! And in her pasture she is as calm as a cucumber :) In fact she loves loves her new pasture! All the grass and hills to play on. She only is nervous when I take her out. And she calms down, but she is not my super calm horse that I know she can be! She will get back to being the super lazy horse with no cares in the world soon enough, so I guess I should take advantage of her wanting to offer some more energetic play behaviors.  Okay maybe I shouldn't word as if she is a wild child. I mean we were able to ride out and about bareback and in a halter only by ourselves. I just have gotten used to perfection, lol! Needless to say my bridle-less riding has been put on hold because that I know we could not achieve that  right now, well maybe in the round pen. We will get there soon enough :)