No more days left of February.
Four more days until the Horse Fair.
Eleven days until Britney gets home
Thirteen days until Day Light Savings Time begins
Fifteen days until Dan heads to Wisconsin
Eighteen Days till the start of Spring break
Twenty days until the Spring (vernal) equinox
Days remaining until warm weather....number yet to be determined.
This snow has been lingering because it is in a shaded spot and had once been a drift several feet deep.
On my day off last Monday it ended up raining almost all day. It cleared off for a little while so I went out to see if taking Amiga for a ride was doable. She was soaking wet and filthy dirty. There was no way I was going to be able to get her cleaned up and dried off for a ride. And, with the ground so saturated and muddy, any hope of riding Amiga had been washed away.
I took several pictures of our water way while out checking the ground conditions.
I did go out to the barn after our Bible Study (about 9:30 pm) and spent almost 30 minutes brushing Amiga. She was caked with dry mud before I started, but looked good as new by the time I got done. I think she really appreciated getting cleaned up.
The water way, looking north and looking south.
Tuesday was a Longggg day of teacher meetings, so I rewarded myself with over two hours of horse time. I had done my quota of school work for the day. It had been in the low 30's all day, so the once muddy ground was fairly firm, although the round pen was still too muddy. (We need to get a load of sand in there once we can truck it in.) I worked Amiga on the parking area of the drive as usual and then took her for a ride. We started out in the side pasture, but it was too muddy there as well. So, we headed down the drive and up and across 150.... to Brian's house we went. He has one very pregnant cow who tried to scare us off by charging at us a few times. Amiga never flinched...I guess she is used to Sir Loin. The other cows were just very curious. I hoped we didn't get the one too worked up.
It was 27 degrees with some blowing snow Tuesday, but Amiga and I had a good time on our little adventure. Since it was getting dark and my feet were freezing, I headed her for home. I was riding in my muck boots because I had cleaned and re-applied waterproofing to my riding boots which are much warmer, but they still needed 1 more day of drying time. I was very happy with how well Amiga handled while I was on the ground and in the saddle.
Wednesday was not a great work/teaching day. Like the water slowly slugging from the culvert under the tracks into Becks field, seen in this photo, things, including myself, ran more like a rusty old gear, than a smooth, well greased machine. The internet was down for awhile, my school web site editing got all messed up, I changed the rules of the game for a protein synthesis simulation lab activity in an effort to keep everybody busy, but ended up making it a bit disjointed and confusing for some of the kids. I also did not handle, very well, a few discipline problems during class. I just wasn't at the top of my game. I was hoping things would get better when I got home....but it was not to be. Amiga was reluctant to load at both ends, and did not perform well under saddle during our lesson. I know a lot of it has to do with me and my poor cues to her, so I feel bad for her, however, she was not listening to me very well either.
Thursday I shopped at Farm and Fleet, Wal-Mart, and Tractor Supply...so got home from school 2 hours later than usual. I was going to give Amiga the day off, but because of the forecasted snow storm, I decided to ride while I could. I was going to keep it short, but was having fun, so went longer than planned.
Once done, I rushed over to Marj's to catch the tail end of Courtney's lesson with Zorro. 
He had bucked when they first put the saddle on, so they were taking it slow and easy with him. Marj led him around while Courtney sat in the saddle. Eventually she took over control of her precious yet ornery horse. He seemed well behaved when I was there. After the lesson I helped Courtney worm Zorro and then
Friday morning I woke to 3 inches of blowing snow. We did not get all that was predicted, but man did the wind blow all night. Luckily the drifting wasn't too bad. Brother came out into the snow to greet me as usual.
Amiga hesitated when she stepped out of her stall, as if to ask..."what in the world is up with this?" I had closed the door to the stall over night, so the snow was a surprise to her.
Sir Loin had been able to stay dry and snow free in the corn crib because it had been blowing out of the north this time.
Amiga and Sir Loin share some hay together after their feed.
The video below shows Sir Loin making a mess of it.
The chickens had a similar reaction as Amiga's when I first opened the coop.
Floppsie was very tentative about stepping out into the cold white stuff, and they all hesitated coming out of the coop.
U.S. 150 was rather icy...one car in the ditch on my way to school. I had a nice long ride on Amiga right after I got home. I worked on speed transitions trying not to use the reigns hardly at all. It took several times for her to get it, but then she was changing speeds on que and stopping and backing as asked. She is such a good little horse....really wants to please, even though (like most of us) she tries to do things her way.
Joe got the tractor out of the garage shed, hooked up the flat trailer, and loaded up the bales of hay from in front of the kitchen window. I wanted to get them out of there before the Day Lilies started sprouting.
Some school work and then a morning nap were on my agenda....but time got away from me and I was soon headed over to Marj's to work with Amiga. It was so nice to be able to borrow the indoor arena, especially with it spitting snow outside. Richard was working with his horse so I join in with Amiga. She had issues that I continue to work through and work on, but all and all, I was happy with our progress. After that I walked Zorro for almost an hour. He too had some issues. I can already tell he is putting on some muscle though. It is slow, but progress none the less. The rest of the day kind of slipped away like the morning did. I had the house to myself, (Joe went to a ball game and Dan to Courtney's) so I continued on a stack of papers I was grading. But the lack of sleep won out and I ended up going to bed REALLY early.
After the hay was gone, it did expose some Day Lily growth. I covered these with some dead leaves that did not get raked up last fall.
After 8 hours of sleep, I was up and ready to go at 4:30 am Sunday morning. When I did chores I decided to walk Amiga, since rain was in the forecast for the afternoon. And then I decided to just hop on and ride her a bit. She did great, so I quit after 15 min. and turned her out on the front pasture where there is plenty of grass. Nursery work, Church, and school filled my morning. A nap and school work filled my afternoon, along with lots more time wasting. It rained much of the afternoon, so I abandoned any hope of riding Amiga a second time.
I took this photo Friday morning. I think Amiga looks so cute and I love the snow covered pine in the background.
Amiga and I count down the days until spring.
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