Mementos

 I believe I mentioned months ago that I had sent off some hair to be made into a few items; hair from Beamer, Coyote Belle, Gussie, Jayne and my first stallion, Chipper. It took a while to complete the order as the lady is a very busy and well known horse hair artist.

Yes she does make items for folks from the US and I think Australia too, check her website. 

The package arrived in the mail a couple days ago, and I eagerly opened it- and didn't I burst into tears as I saw the beautiful work she did for me. 

She did everything exactly as I requested, and sent me a letter explaining whose hair was in each piece. 

The hat band looks perfect on my grey felt hat. 

The stampede strings are for my palm leaf straw hat, which tends to come off if it is windy or if I am loping. 
The tassels with the tin stars (one for me, one for Shayla) are made from Belle and Gussie hair, as bff's they are now always together. The little tassels, made from all the combined horses hair, are perfect for everyday use- the zipper pull goes to Shayla and the key ring for me. 

I highly recommend Donna's work and professionalism. If you want anything made, though, plan ahead as it takes about 4 months for her to get to your order . I must also say, her prices are very reasonable. 

Having these special pieces means a lot to me. I can remember the horses through my photos, but having a piece of them to wear or touch is so much more meaningful. 

Sunday Stills - Eye(s)

 

The eyes of a horse can tell you so much... about their basic temperament, their mood, their level of pain, even their age. Beamer is showing his age now as you can see above his eye.

I have always wanted to do a drawing of a horse's eye, and also wanted to try colored pencils- so I did this one of Rio based on a photo I took years ago. I have a lot to learn about this media, so I am going to try an online tutorial.

For more Sunday Stills - Eyes

Wordless Wednesday

Peaceful....

We had a lovely quiet Christmas day, just me and Ted  for our first Christmas in our new-to-us home. I went for an afternoon ride on Beamer first time he has been ridden since one short ride last summer.

Just walked into his pen, put his bridle on and climbed on bareback, and went and explored the back end of this property. Sure is pretty back there in the snow.

Thea came along for company. She does fairly well, just ranges out a bit ahead, then circles in behind and does a fly-by bite at Beamer's tail (bad dog!) so we worked on that and she quit doing it, she just gets excited.

We came across fresh deer tracks- and fresh human tracks which I thought was a bit creepy, as most people walk along the dyke which has a view of the river, but this guy was wandering through the trees. Hopefully just enjoying the beauty!

Scenery always looks better when viewed through those l'il black ears!
After that it was ham, mashed 'taters and brussels sprouts, and we watched the Magnificent Seven.
Perfect day!

Ted bought me coloured artist pencils for Christmas. I'm retiring at the end of this week 😤 Yippee!
That will give me the leisure time to get my art supplies all set up and get down to some serious drawing. I have tried (and failed) painting over the years but always come back to just drawing, that's what I like to do the best, so working with coloured pencils seems logical to me. It's going to be a bit of a learning curve! I also got a set of art pens so I can do that again.
Here is a photo of a photo of an ink drawing I did waaaaay back in '87. I haven't done ink drawings for over 20 years so it will be fun to try again.

Who can this be?

Some of you wanted to see the finished work of the drawing I was doing- here it is, all framed up and hanging in my living room.

Sunday Stills- goals

I'm not calling them resolutions or intentions, goals works better for me.
First of all- more time with my butt in this:

Looking at the world through these ears:

Well- also with my butt in this saddle:

and spending more time on the back of this redhead!

Easy enough? Well perhaps, but it involves time management, overcoming ennui after work, and managing my money because riding here involves hauling, unless I just want to tool around in the round pen or ride down the gravel road to the one field that I am allowed to ride around. So it requires planning and dedication to fulfil that goal.
The next and only other goal I have: take advantage of rainy days by doing more of this:

 That should keep me busy for most of the year when you add in work, gardening and all the chores!

Finally my own space

It's been a long time coming but I finally have a dedicated space for drawing. Our place is pretty small, there was nowhere I could make room to set up until we cleared out part of the addition this past summer. Yesterday Ted drywalled the ugly wall and today I painted it and set up my gear. I need to buy a lamp to put above the table and get a few supplies and then I can start getting creative!

If this spring is as wet as I think it's going to be, I foresee a lot of time spent in here!

Not too bad

I only bought a couple of things at the auction, and have rehomed them already. I did good! Ted did even better, he only bought one tool. And Buttons- yes, there was a ladder in the auction, I thought of you as it was selling! Since I was clerking, I didn't take any photos, but here is one of the Roy Gene Franks print I bought, which I have already found a home for.

The big storm that hit Alberta and caused many road closures and power outages didn't affect us much here. We're down on the valley bottom, and the town of Creston is just above us. You can see the snow line in this photo I took when I turned Beamer out this afternoon.

Yes those are mud knots in his tail; it drags on the ground and I want to try and keep it clean.
By mid afternoon the wind had come howling in from the northeast (Alberta!) and Beamer was talking to me; he wanted back in his nice snug shelter!

Even the cats didn't want to be outside; when I had Foose out, he stretched up my leg, pleadingly....

and almost tripped me trying to get picked up to go back in the house.

I was supposed to go pick up Tess today, she is about done romancing her boyfriend Moss, but it's a 2 hour drive and they really got nailed with snow. Janice figured up to 2 feet with the wind drifts, so I'll likely have to wait another day or two to bring Tess home.

I bet the wind emptied the feeders, hopefully tomorrow it won't be windy, these little guys need all the help they can get!

Fair Photos

I know I said I'd post these photos on Monday, but.... better late than never!
There were some really neat entries in the students section, and I thought these vegetable sculptures were really creative.

What would a fair be without a giant pumpkin?

By the way, red ribbons are first place in Canada; blue ribbons are second place. The black ribbon denote champion in its category.

I loved these little teddy bears in the craft section.

There was a quilt with horses.....

I liked the name of this vendor.

The Creston Valley has a winery, The Skimmerhorn Winery

There were plenty of other displays, and lots of creative people around here. I may enter a few more categories next year. 

A few stories

We went to Idaho last weekend for the International Draft Horse Show and Sale. Overall it looked like the entries were way down, probably because of the cost of travelling in a poor economy. I used to see the barns bursting with heavies, but this year there were only a few hitches. We didn't stay to watch the classes, but did tour the barns and the trade fair. One of the highlights was sculptor, Gabe Gabel. Here is a link to her website .

Absolutely wonderful pieces! The fawn on my Sunday Stills post is one of hers. Since she lives close by I plan on a visit to her place; in her brochure it says "She and her Master Gardener husband, Emmette, also concentrate on the sculpture garden at her gallery and their innovative vegetable garden where they demonstrate alternative growing methods to visitors". Sounds like it would be a really interesting place to visit!

That is Gabe in this photo with one of my favourite of her sculptures.

There were some lovely horses that drew my camera like flies to honey, like this big soft eyed Percheron stallion.

There was a hitch of Belgians all dressed up;

A Gypsy Vanner who was there for sale- I love these horses, someday I'd like to have one of these!

This big boy was also in my Sunday Stills:

He was huge, it's hard to tell from the photo, but I had to look way up at him.

Mrs. Mom, I took this photo for you- feel free to rant!

All in all it was a lovely trip and a nice way to spend the day with my husband.

The calf in my wordless Wednesday post is indeed a new addition to our menagerie; a pail-bunter that will be in our freezer someday. World, meet Url (my husband named him and that's how he wanted it spelled).

The horses all get along with him, I turn him out with Beamer during the day and he lives with the mares at night.

Chickory decided to remain hard to catch, so I turned her world upside down. When I kick the mares out to pasture, and Beamer and Url out to their pasture, she spends the day in Beamer's pen. It is about the size of a large round pen, so we had a "conversation" in it yesterday afternoon. It looked like this at the start-

and a whole lot of considering on her part

and about an hour later I finally got her to realize that I wasn't going away, that I could control her feet and direction and speed, I finally got join up- but it took getting join up 3 times before she completely surrendered and was my pony.

I am getting impatient to ride her again, but until I have her mind, there is no sense in continuing the rest of her training. I was kind of waiting for her to regress as I haven't been working her consistently, and now that she is a lot more physically mature I can work her more. Today she is still separated from the herd, and this afternoon we will see if she learned anything yesterday.

Sunday Stills

The letter S....

It's all about my Stallion.....

We finally had some Sunshine which made for some good photo ops with Beamer.

Do you like his Soft eye?

Striking a pose

Well- maybe it's not all about my stallion- how about this stallion- all 2300 pounds of him can be yours for only $2900! He was at the Draft Horse show and sale we went to yesterday.

I'll leave you with this Sweet Sculpture- looks real, doesn't it? It's by North Idaho artist, Gabe Gabel, and she does the best Western Sculpture that I've seen.