Yeeeeee Haw!!

We've been to so many rodeos this summer - which makes me happy all through my soul!!!  Only a couple of them did I remember to take pictures and those were the two where Asher tagged along (a very ornery, cranky, way past his bedtime Asher).

Chewing on a Sno Cone straw in an attempt to make him happy...in turn this face made me happy:

"Whyyyyyyyyyy do they gotta do this to me?  Uggggghhhhhh." 

Asher was so tired due to an early afternoon nap due to the fact that he wakes up at 5 am and he refused to nap between then and the rodeo so he so sleep-deprived he refused to be held by anyone but me.  It was a long night.  But truthfully, I didn't mind...he's my baby :) 

Draper Rodeo, last Friday the 13th!  Asher was much better rested but still refused to go to his Aunts or Uncle.  So testy that he couldn't even appreciate his bunny ears: 

Am I crying or laughing??? 

LOVE the Draper rodeo grounds.  It was a perfect night.  The T-storm cleared up just as the rodeo started making it perfect hoodie weather, but not too cold.  It was really fun! 

Zoyie had been begging Paul for some quality sibling time and so we towed her along with us.  It was her first rodeo and she was so excited! She had her hair all done and a cute little black cowboy hat :) 

County Fair

Bronsynn's last 4-H show of the year was this past weekend, the 5th and 6th. It's a two-day event because it's County Fair time...YAY!!!!!!!!! I always loved the last show.

The first day was all the show events so again, we had to make the horse look super pretty and shiny!

He cleans up real nice!! I love him. We spray stuff all over him and his mane and tail called Show Sheen. It's a pretty decent size bottle and I remember that one bottle used to last three of us the entire year or more. This horse went through one bottle in two shows. That's how slick that sucker is. Amanda makes sure that he's the shiniest horse in town for sure!

Speaking of Amanda...she and I busted our guts all day long. It was a day for mishaps and laughing so hard you cried! She bent down to start putting hoof polish on BJ's front hoof and three seconds after she started, he bent the other front hoof and his knee knocked her hand...the hand that held the bottle of black paint...which splashed all over her. OMG I laugh again just writing this. She popped up so fast and at first I had know idea it happened, I just saw him move his leg. But the look on her face when she came up and looked like this:

Priceless!!!! My baby gut hurt SO bad from laughing!! It was on her face and in her hair...good thing she wore black! The only thing that would get that stuff off was the baby oil we use for the horse and a whole lot of rubbin'!!!

Then we went to go sit and watch Bronsynn do her Western Pleasure. I took this umbrella and popped it open...only I guess I'm too strong and I popped it too far!!!

We were done pretty early that day as Bronsynn doesn't compete in the Bareback show event and she was first in line all day. Phew!!!

Saturday was all the speed events...always my favorite part of the show. Because it's County Fair, all of the contestants participate in a grand entry and get to ride into the arena, as announced. They all dress up and have fun with this day so it's fun to see the stuff people come up with. Our club did the 80's and since Bronsynn is such a fashionista, I think she took this part more seriously than she did for the actual stuff of importance.

Amanda and I took the job of dressing BJ up very seriously as well. Since side ponies were all the rage, and Bronsynn had one, BJ needed to have one, too. So here he is getting his forelock extension put in....

...with his neon colored mane extensions AND crimped hair!!!!....

...a scrunchie to match Bronsynn and, yes, it's off to the side!....

...can't forget the tail...

...with pink 'leg warmers' to complete the look!! Ta da!!!!! He was seriously the coolest looking horse!

Alright, maybe not as cool as the giraffe-painted horse (gotta admit that's pretty cool!!!!):

But cool none-the-less!! It was a VERY long, hot day. The club ended the day and the year with a potluck BBQ and we headed home. I was barely moving by the end of this event. I can't even tell you how many times I was stopped so people could ask me what on earth I was doing outside on a day like today, when was I due, etc. etc. Have to admit, I was wondering both questions myself.

4-H

Once upon a time, I used to do 4-H. Four of the five of us did actually. I did it until my freshman year when I could go into rodeo and I left the show biz behind for the fun stuff :) It's been about a gazillion years since then (seems like) and my niece decided that she wanted to give it a go. Imagine how weird it is to get back into something like that...it is very nostalgic for sure. So a lot of my time has been spend riding my horse, trying to train him even further and training Bronsynn on all the stuff she needs to know. She's a first timer and BJ, the horse, will be first timer for this so it was new for both of them.

I was up at 5:30 Saturday morning so I could get over to the padre's house and get the horse all washed up and trimmed and polished. We got over to the arena where Bronsynn, looking fabulous as shown below, went off to take her test:


While she was testing, Amanda and I put the finishing touches on BJ. Here he is getting baby powder put on his white stripe so that it will stand out more:

Isn't he pretty???

This horse did very well for his first pampering. He was shampooed, combed, trimmed, sprayed with shiny stuff, baby powdered, baby oiled, and painted!! Here he is pretty much all done, right before I painted his hooves black. He cleans up nice, eh??

It's a day long event so we set up shade and get the coolers out and we camp out at the trailer unless she's up.

Bronsynn got a red ribbon (2nd place - not second out of the whole class but each person is judged individually) on her two first show events, which was great considering this was a first. She almost got a blue ribbon (1st place) on this event (Western Showmanship), but she broke gait once and so she had to go home with a red. Still very stellar!:

Unfortuanely the speed events didn't go as well. BJ uncharacterstically bucked Bronsynn off during her run so she had a no time, and then that made her miss Scurry, which was a shame because that's a fun race with jumps in it that she rocks at. And Poles was done alright but she was a little nervouse after the Barrels and I couldn't get her to go any faster. She has one more show this August and I think it will go even better....we shall see. But it was a re-learning experience and she did really well. Fun day :)

Get On, Li'l Pony

I don't have very many days ahead of me left where I can ride until after my baby comes, so on this rare day of no rain and minimal wind, Bronsynn, Fajjjer and I headed out to the desert with the ponies. My dad recently sold his gelding and so we are down to only two horses that were home and able to go out to the desert. We had to borrow a little pokey pony of my dad's friend that goes with us. In the goodness of my heart I rode the little midget so that Bronsynn could be on B.J. who she is most comfortable on. Not my most favorite ride. The things I do for that child.

This is us when we arrived at 'The Kitchen' for the best hotdogs in the world. I don't touch hotdogs anymore but I won't pass one up when I am the mountain. I brought sauerkraut and my dad put a can of chili on the fire and we had some damn fine dogs. Yum. This is the kitchen table with our game:

This is me and my doggie. I am not above physically forcing my dog to pose with me. He loves it on the inside:

Bronsynn atop the horse I trained...lucky for her:

The view from where we sat...prettier in person:

The ride back to the trailer was a thousand years. I didn't expect to feel any different when riding a horse while pregnant. I never get sore - not even when I got back on a horse after being away at college for two years. I was most apalled to find out that not only was I sore, I was sore in places that you don't realize exist. My stomach hurt, my back throbbed and I couldn't cross my legs for days. W.T.H. One of many things to cause me distress about this sitch-iation.

Also, the drive home took a thousand years. An extremely slow moving train decided to stop on the tracks for ohhhhh about 40 minutes. There is no other road to get home. yay. On the plus side I put my camera to use.....

...and had a photo shoot with myself. Your welcome for my artistic abilities.

I also included Bronsynn:

And my pops. He takes a really good pic:

Finally back on the road I turned around after some time and found this:

Oh a close up you say?? Why, of course!!

She'll be getting tagged on Facebook :)

One More Ride

I think it was the weekend before Thanksgiving that I headed out to the desert with my sister and dad for one last ride before the winter really kicked in.

It was FREEZING cold. The wind was blowing super hard and made it, in a word, miserable. The wind was so hard that it was freaking out the horses and they were skiddish. Amanda was bucked clean off and landed hard and that was only about fifty feet from the trailer! Not a good start.

However, we still managed to have some fun. I bundled up and had my beanie, sweatshirt hood and coat hood on and I was all cacooned in and happy as can be. We stopped for lunch a little lower down than normal to avoid the wind but it still sucked. I don't eat pork but I do have a hotdog up there because nothing tastes as good as it does when you're out on the mountain. Add some homegrown red onion and relish and it's nearly the best damn thing on the planet.

After my sister and I made such a cutsie pose, Matt wanted in on the action, too:

And Ope (on the right) always comes up with the greatest culinary ideas for desert dining and now his kick is those frozen applie pie things from the gas station. He heats them up in tin foil and has 'Hot Apple Pie'. It was tasty.

We made it back in one piece, albeit a frozen piece, and Amanda couldn't even sit on the hour long drive home. She had to kneel on the back floor and lean forward on the console. She messed her butt up pretty bad. Poor girl. We can't all be pro like Maghann ;)

Horsin' Around

Last weekend I headed up Yellowfork with my dad. We towed Bronsynn along with us too.

Our good family friend, Ope, was up there with one of his friends. My dad and his group ride all summer as long as much as they can but they really hit hard a month or so before the hunt to get their horses ready for the 12+ hours of riding a day up in the Uintahs.

Ope and I took pictures of each other taking a picture of the other. Get it???

My dad on Smoke:

For some reason I could never get a good picture of Ope's donkey. But it was a baby and super cute. It just followed us around and chased after the dogs, showing them who the boss is/was:

It is incredibly beautiful up there in the fall...I love all the bright oranges, pinks, reds and lime greens:

We met a couple herds of cows...I got to this one before my dog went and chased them off:

Bronsynn is becoming a better rider all the time. She is more comfortable on the horse now and spent most of the ride loping up ahead of us and then doubling back:

And Bacardi, as always, traveled probably three times as much ground as the horses do. He HAS to be in front and he runs everywhere and then comes back to the group and heads off again. Can you tell how much fun he had?:

One dirty and exhausted little puppy: