Cowgirl Up on LatigoLiz.com

Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Ricky Quinn Clinic in 2009

I am pleased to announce that Ricky will be returning to the Puget Sound area in 2009. Please mark your calendar and plan to ride or come watch.

Ricky Quinn Horsemanship Clinic
Classes to be determined, please let me know what your preference/interest is
September 11, 12, 13, 14
Enumclaw, WA (specific location to be confirmed soon)

Ricky travels the United States helping people with their horses. He carries on the tradition of the Vaquero style of horsemanship, creating a true partnership with his horses. It can be difficult to put into words what Ricky does for horses and people alike. More often than not, riding with Ricky can be a life-changing experience. In COLT STARTING, Ricky rides the unstarted and troubled horses. He prepares them to do a job while addressing some basic principles of this style of horsemanship. FOUNDATION HORSEMANSHIP is an expansion of the principles learned in the colt starting. He works on getting to the feet through groundwork, hindquarters, reaching with the front, accepting a flag, ropes, slickers, release of pressure, etc. No matter which class you choose, Ricky will challenge you to better your skills while helping keep you safe with your horse.

For more information about Ricky, please visit his web site at http://www.rickyquinnclinics.com/

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Sunday, September 28, 2008

It Was a John Deere Thang

Happy 5th birthday to the Little Cowboy!

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Friday, September 26, 2008

Friday Foto Flashback

From August 24, 2005. Ariel, Buena, and Lana. More about Lana in a later post.

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Monday, September 22, 2008

Doctor Bob Does House Calls

My favorite horse vet came today. He is gracious enough to take on my goat girls as patients on a limited basis. I have access to other vets in this area if he feels he is out of his element. I love my vet and his vet-tech fiancé.

Pepper and Ginger will be fine. Temps were a little elevated and both had a bit of respiratory stuff going on in addition to Pepper’s goopy eyes. Lucky me I get to give subcutaneous injections of an antibiotic once a day for the next week. They were both really good about the shots this afternoon, so I hope that continues when I am solo.

My vet hasn’t worked on goats in a long time, but he welcomes the challenge. I love him. Have I said that before?

Julie used to work on a goat farm and knew quite a bit about them. Ginger is definitely a Boer or Boer cross (primarily meat goats). She thought that Pepper is probably a Nubian or Nubian cross (which will please Paddock Boy). They are both less than 6 months old. They both agreed with me that they are on the malnourished side. Although, their bellies are quite pudgy now. I probably will have to do another round of worming (possibly a 5 day course of SafeGuard just like we do for horses). There is a condition that if untreated can kill a goat in less than 48 hours once symptoms are noticed. It’s related to worm infestations of 3 varieties all at once. Fairly common in the Midwest I guess. Not the same as bloat, which is also a great concern when radically switching diets. I didn’t have fecal analysis tests done, but may in the future. I want to get them healthier first.

From this:

to this:

in one week.

I was so pleased with the goaties today. The work with them in the past few days made the vet visit go really well. Of course, I did resort to hand-feeding and now they are super pushy, but I figure it’s a small price to pay with little goats. :) They’ll get bigger, but not as big as the horses.

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Sunday, September 21, 2008

It Won!

Remember this book? It won the People’s Choice Award at Photography.Book.Now on Friday evening! I don’t have a lot of details yet, but when I do, I will pass them along.

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Saturday, September 20, 2008

The Muttons Were Busted

Twice! I was more than happy to spend the $10 to let the Little Cowboy ride those sheep twice. I would rather have him to that than ride the other rides at The Fair.

And he got to do a few other of the good old fashioned things, too. Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife has a kids’ fishing pond. Pioneer Farm in Puyallup has a great display where kids can churn butter, work a hand pump, use all kinds of old tools, and see some really big pumpkins.

There are lots of commercial displays, but the one a lot of the boys, both large and small, gravitated to was a big Volvo Wheel Loader.

A good portion of our local extended family and the Little Cowboy’s Best Buddy also came along. Best Buddy got 4th place in one of his Mutton Bustin’ rides!

And all us moms got our “fix” of Fisher Fair Scones!

It was a long, but very good afternoon. And we lucked out with the weather, too. Only an occasional light sprinkle. I am pretty sure it’s probably a steady shower of rain today.

The rest of this weekend here is spent getting ready for Little Cowboy’s “John Deere Birthday” (his words) next weekend. Paddock Boy has to travel for work this week so I need to take advantage of the help now.

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What Shoe Are You?

Pretty much hits the nail on the head. Give it a try.

I Am Flip Flops

You are laid back and very friendly.
Cheery and sunny in disposition, you usually have something to smile about.

Style is important to you, as long as you can stay casual.
It takes a lot to get you to dress up!

You are a loyal and true person, though you can be a bit of a flake.
You tend to “play hooky” and blow off responsibilities a lot more than most people.

You should live: By the beach

You should work: At a casual up and coming company

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Friday, September 19, 2008

Do The Puyallup

Here’s what the Little Cowboy will be doing later today:

He’s been practicing on Paddock Boy and on Buster ever since he did that last year, hoping to hang on a bit longer. He’s been looking forward to it and is bouncing around the house this morning. Hopefully the weather will start to cooperate a bit better as there is a light drizzle dampening every surface here.

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Thursday, September 18, 2008

Everything Has a Purpose

And our little goatie girls will soon be consuming the various unwanted species around our place. Most notably the Himalayan blackberries and thistles.

FindArticles - Goats Advocated as Environmentally Sound Brush Control
Cattleman, The, Oct 2006

Plants Known To Be Poisonous To Goats
GoatWorld.Com

Edible and Poisonous Plants for Goats
Fias Co Farm

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Monday, September 15, 2008

Steal Your Heart

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Harvest Moon

Summer is coming to a close. :(

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Sunday, September 14, 2008

Meet Pepper and Ginger

They officially have names now, and also have a new roof to their and Buster’s stalls. It was a good day and the weather was perfect!

Ginger and Pepper

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Saturday, September 13, 2008

Got Goats?

Yes, we do!

It was a minor scramble today to get everything done, but we did get their pen ready while they waited patiently in the back of the old Ford.

We stuck to our budget and probably could have gone a bit under, but in the end, we probably saved these two girls from a potential demise. There were TONS of goats at the auction today. Easily ten times as many as there were last weekend. We didn’t get there early enough to go back to the pens to look at the goats ahead of time, but I think we still did an okay job. These girls aren’t lame and don’t appear to be sick.

The little horned one is quite scared of people, but with a little work I think we’ll be able to get her to come around.

The black and white one is a bit more socialized to humans and will let me approach without completely cornering her.

I rather like hearing their bleating on occasion. I think this is going to be a good experience for the whole family, and hopefully these girls will stick around for many years. Now we just need to come up with some names and also have the vet check them out and maybe give us some idea on approximate ages.

Buena and Toad weren’t quite sure what to make of the new additions.

And it sure will be interesting getting Buster and the goats acquainted since they weren’t too sure of each other when we were loading the goats up to bring them home. Buster was a bit excited, as most yellow labs can be!

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Friday, September 12, 2008

New Lease on Life

One of my girlfriends saved a horse from slaughter a few years ago. The mare was heavy in foal at the time. She now is on a path toward becoming a productive member of the equine society, and a saddle horse, too. Here are some pictures of her third day under saddle. Enjoy!

The young horseman in these photos (in the plaid shirt) is Ricky Quinn, Jr. and I highly recommend that you check him out sometime if you get the opportunity. I hope to have a clinic here sometime very soon. You can find out more information about him and his traveling schedule on his web site.

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Thursday, September 11, 2008

Wednesday, September 10, 2008

New Toy

I killed our digital camera. We replaced it yesterday and will send the original one out for repairs. Here are some shots from today with the new one.

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Saturday, September 6, 2008

Mmm, Pickles!

I was inspired by The Matron of Husbandry. Picked up a handful of cukes at Tracy’s yesterday and added to them the one my dad brought over on Wednesday. After conferring with my mom and with the help of the Little Cowboy and Paddock Boy I made a very small batch of pickles tonight. No pictures as I dropped the camera one too many times and it officially quit working this week. There are only certain kinds of pictures that work well with a cell phone camera, and late night pictures aren’t one of those.

On other fronts, the family all went to the auction today. We could have brought home some goats (the reason we went in the first place). Thankfully we didn’t. Lots of goats were sold for meat. Too many went through lame. Next weekend may be another story though. Project for this week: Goat safe pen(s).

I almost wanted to bring home some calves, too. So forlorn and sold sooo cheap. The market is bad for everything right now, not just horses. Definitely have to have a strong constitution to be able to sit there and watch the proceedings. If we had the pens already set up and the milk replacer on hand...well, let’s just say that a few calves would have sold for dirt cheap and would have ended up in our trailer.

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Friday, September 5, 2008

Late Night Look Back

Went through some old files and decided they needed some TLC and also needed to be moved here. This is a recap of my trip to Buck Brannaman’s ranch for a 7-day clinic in 2007. Enjoy!

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Friday Foto Flashback

Stumbled on these pics from August 18, 2007 in my old files. Thought you might enjoy them. Taken in Kalispell, MT during a pretty big firestorm outside of town. Imagine being at an outdoor wedding reception with ash raining down.

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Wednesday, September 3, 2008

I Love Your Blog

Thanks goes to Saddle Mountain Rider for this award. I am following the rules by passing it along to the following (in no particular order):

Your mission as an award winner:

  1. The winner can put the logo on her blog.
  2. Link the person from whom you received your award.
  3. Nominate at least 7 other blogs.
  4. Put links of those blogs on your blog.
  5. Leave a message on the blogs of those you have nominated.

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Tuesday, September 2, 2008

Toad Comes to Visit

A friend’s horse is visiting here for a couple of weeks. I’ll have more pictures to share eventually.

Toad is a 27 year old registered Standardbred gelding that my friend Chelsea got when he was abandoned at a boarding facility. He’s a total love so far. I have heard maybe one squeal (from Buena) since he arrived this afternoon. He truly is a doll. And he finally decided he needed to move faster than an ambling walk tonight when Buena went racing around him. She’s missed having a buddy. This next 2 weeks will be good for her. They are grazing within feet of each other in a freshly accessible patch of grass and clover.

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Monday, September 1, 2008

Yee Haw!

The walls are done and the mats are back in! All that’s left, for now, is the wiring and to reinstall the deep cycle battery. Oh, and to fill the tack room with the rest of my stuff. I will be selling the tack truck that was in the trailer originally. I never used it and it just got in the way. I posted it in and a few other things to my new Sale Barn.

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