More pictures

Pictures

Typical Banico

Another update

This semester has been crazy busy with school. I have had 12 hour clinical every Thursday and lots of tests and big care plans to write. Only have three more weeks to go which includes a test in nursing Tuesday and one last clinical this week, then dead week and then finals and then home for break. Doing well in my classes and I have been really enjoying clinicals. They are a long day but I feel like a real nurse and have been seeing so much. The only boring part is post conference where everyone looks like they are about to fall asleep.  

(Pictures are random pictures from about three years ago. Wild horse in a turn out and a trail ride the same day.)

Banico is doing good. Due to being busy with school I have only been getting out there once or twice a week. He is out in pasture part of the day so he is doing fine. I am really out of riding shape now. Did have a really good ride today. Did some jumping and Banico got really energetic about it. Think the jumps were about 2'6 but for what ever reason looked huge cantering up to them. I also ground drove him last weekend and he was great. Makes me want to start doing more of it.

I went with my roommate to her house for Thanksgiving. We had a good time. Mostly just relaxed and hung out but did go shopping for a bit. They have three cats and four dogs and it was nice to have animals around for the weekend. Our apartment doesn't allow pets so I miss my cats quite a bit. One of the cats slept with me for the first two nights for which my roommate has called him a trader. I did appreciate having a cat sleep with me for a bit. Thanksgiving dinner was very good. It was defiantly nice to get out of the apartment for a few days and have a nice home cooked meal.  

update

I have been really busy with nursing school. This semester includes one day of 12 hour clinical in the hospital and lots of other work. I have only really been getting out to see Banico once or twice a week but I have a really great barn that takes care of him and he is out in pasture at least half the day. Think he is quite content just hanging out in pasture and bossing all the other horses around. 

Sence he destroyed his last turn out (see link for the story ) I have been looking for a new winter blanket. My aunt Julie found this one on sale:

Many thanks to her.

And just a cute face with burrs in his forelock. He managed to completely fill his forelock with burr this week and would not let me get them out so he still has a bunch. They mowed the pasture so hopefully he wont be finding so many any more.

summer

I had a busy summer. This post is mostly random picture overload of what I did over the summer. 

 Spent a bunch of it tagging along with my boyfriend while he worked as a farrier. I learned how to pull shoes and some about finishing but never got good at that. I also learned a bunch about shoeing and trimming in general. I have been trimming Banico for awhile so I knew the basics but it was interesting to see all types of feet. 

Pulling back shoes on an old TB gelding

Attempting to finish 

Cutting clenches on a huge warmblood

Same on back feet

Boyfriend hot shoeing

Went sailing a few times and had a bunch of fun. I have been sort of learning how to skipper the boat and have enjoyed it. I almost dumped us over a few times but never did. No tsunami this time around. 

My boyfriend sold this pony/mini cart and the lady that bought it convinced me to help her train the mini to drive. The mini was very smart and basically picked it up in two sessions of about 2 hrs total. It was just the basics of ground driving and getting hooked. She never spooked at the cart and was basically ground driving by the end of two hours.

Isn't that the cutest little face ever?

Took Sophie to a hunter schooling show that the ETI group I use to show at put on. Sophie is an old hunter ring veteran that got sour on the show thing but she seemed to have a good time. She really is a pro at jumping and is really fun once you get her going properly. We went in 4 classes and got first in 2'9 hunters and  working hunter under saddle, forth in 2'6 hunters and fifth in hunter obedience (she is a great horse but obedience is just not her thing). We ended up getting day end high point for the 2'9 division. 

Short video of part of the 2'9 class

Also rode her quite a bit during the summer and had a bunch of fun jumping her. 

My boyfriend found a baby king snake in the hay stall at the ranch that was partiality paralyzed. She has a very obvious lump about a third of the way down her body and only has partial control over the last 2/3 of her body. She got named Ripley. My boyfriends chiropractor also works on animals but is terrified of snakes. But she still did some work on Ripley and even brought out laser therapy to work on her. Apparently she has become my snake as my boyfriend already has a ball python so he is trying to get me to bring Ripley out here to have as a pet. 

snake laser treatment 

a mostly recovered snake. Her front end is normal and really strong so she can get her self up on things but gets her back end tangled on thing sometimes. 

Also went on a few hikes over the summer. My boyfriend is a big outdoors person and likes to go backpacking in Yosemite so we were trying to get ready to do that. We ended up not being able to go for other reasons but still had some great hikes locally.  

Stubbornly sideways picture of Punch bowls 

Some caves we found on one hike

Back to school

     I had a really great summer break and wasn't on the computer much so this blog got really neglected. I am living in an apartment this semester instead of the dorms and really like my new roommates.

     Banico is doing good. I am really happy with how my barn manager took care of him over the summer. He was really good weight and seemed happy to see me or the carrots in my hand. Of course he had to get a big swollen leg from who knows what the second day I was back but my barn manger wrapped it for me for a few days and it got much better. I had a great ride yesterday which was the first one in about 4 months. He was really good and we only had a few little things I had to remind him about. I even took him over a few cross rails. He did manage to rub a good portion of his tail out which is disappointing but I know it will grow out.

jumping

I got some pics of jumping Sophie. She is an old hunter ring veteran and is very fun to jump. 

 Warm up.

The quote after this jump from my boyfriend was "what are you doing down there". I ended up landing sitting down and was laughing for awhile after it.

Made it over and called it a day.

Summer

     I had finals last week and am done with another semester of school. I am now back in CA for summer break. Banico is staying back in KY for summer but my barn manager is riding him and taking good care of him. Of course he scraped himself on something the day before I left but it was just hair so wasn't serious. 

     I had some good rides on both of my boyfriends horses since I got home. I got to jump Sophie up to 3 ft which was the largest I had ever jumped. I had only jumped Bancio before so it was good to try other horses out. I also had a good ride on Weldon and poped him over some small cross rails. 

Good horse and crazy weather.

     I had a great ride on Banico today. The last weekend he had been really energetic and spooky so we cut him back on his grain again. Today he was just about falling asleep in the cross ties and was great for me when I rode. He looked like he had rolled in the creek right before he was brought in because he was completely covered in mud. He also smelled like he had rolled in the creek. He is also about done shedding and looks great. I didn't ride him very long but poped him over a little verticle someone had set up. He was much improved from the spooky horse I had last weekend.

     This evening we had a big storm come through and had a tornado warning. We didn't have one touch down near us but there was the beginnings of one that came through close to us. There was also a bunch of lightning and thunder really close and rain off and on.


Just so this post isn't completely picture free here is what my horse did to the tail flap off of his blanket a few weeks ago:

The blanket was later found outside with all the straps riped neatly off.

ETA on Saturday: Crazy lightning and thunder storm last night. Lots of rain and amazing lighting show. It woke me up twice and had to stay up and watch for awhile. The storms in CA just dont compare to the storm last night. 

Spa day

     It was finally warm enough to give Banico a bath today. I got down there and he was kind of jumpy so I lunged him and then rode. He was a bit spooky when I lunged him but he settled down quickly and was listening well enough so I got on. He was prity good for me riding but spooked a few times at who know what. It was hot and humid today so he got really sweaty so I decided to just go ahead and give him a full bath. 

 Wet but clean horse:

     He was wiggly for the bath but he sure looks much better.  I also took his tail down and washed and brushed it out. 

Clean horse:

Off to roll of course.

Spring Break

     I went home for spring break last week and had a great time. I have been meaning to post about it earlier but between a busy school week and a bout of food poising I haven't had the chance.  

      The Friday I got back I was able to go down and ride my boyfriend's horse Weldon and visit with everyone. Pics from that ride:

Saturday I went on a trail ride with my boyfriend and I rode his other horse Sophie while he rode Weldon. It was a lot of fun. Weldon freaked out when another horse passed us and was giving his owner trouble but other than that it was a good ride.

Sophie:

Sunday we tried to go sailing but when we got to the harbor there was a Tsunami warning so we didn't go out. We did get to see it come into the harbor while we were there. It mostly looked like a very strong current coming in and it raised the water level in the harbor almost 3 feet.

I rode Weldon again on Friday and he was very forward. The rest of the pics are from this day.

Boyfriend and Sophie: