Oh Daddy!

All momma's know that getting you kiddos into a routine is essential and at times, close to impossible. Just when you get them focused something (or someone) comes along and messes it all up.

Or in their words "helping".

Hubby is a huge help, I wont even pretend for the sake of my blog that he is anything but a great daddy! He gets up with him when he knows I am exhausted or having trouble sleeping. He plays with him all the time, gives baths, even changes his fair share of non-poopy diapers....he is great with Little Man. Which is why I didnt think having him feed Little Man his dinner/supper a few nights ago would be a big deal.

Apparently he needed more instuction then "1 tbsp of cereal mixed with formula and 1 container of baby food, he will eat it all". Then I left to go pick up Stinkerbell. Came home, everything is gone, everyone is happy and life is good.

Fast forward to the following day....I followed the same steps I had instructed hubby with however this time....Little Man refused. He refused everything. He spit it out all over his high chair and me (he is getting good at aiming for my glasses). I couldnt figure out what was wrong....he was hungry as he wanted to eat, he would just spit out all his cereal. Was it to hot? No, temp was good....was it to thick?....Nope...same as always. Did it taste funny?...it always tastes funny but not worse then normal. As I am sitting there begging my 5 month old to tell me what was wrong by using his indoor voice and nice words, in comes hubby. He takes one look at the disaster that is me attempting to feed Little Man and he says "you dont mix them together?"

Hmmm, well....lets try that and VOILA...we have a happy, hungry Little Man.

It isnt a big deal by any means. Anyone who knows me knows that I am a "winging it" kinda girl. Whatever works is what we go with so mixing his food and cereal is good with me. However it was not included in the instructions I left with daddio therefore it was not on the top of my list of things to try. Leave them alone for a few minutes of guy bonding time and it results in a 25 minute ordeal that resulted in my tasting the baby cereal.

I can promise you that after tasting it I wouldnt eat that junk either without mixing it with something else! YUCK!!!!!

Adventures in Breaking Colts: Lesson #1 Halters

We have 2 beautiful little filly colts who are just about a year old. We got them a few months ago. Actually, we were basically given them because for some reason people dont like to ride mares. I love mares, and my husband doesnt have a problem with them either so we gladly added them to our herd.

Socks is the bay and Coco is the black.

Before I start with the fun of halter breaking them, let me first say that this part is typically already done. When they are much younger. And much smaller. However that is not the case with these 2 as the previous owners didnt get them started and we got them in the middle of winter when the ground is hard and it hurts them alot more when the hit it (which they do...apparently often). So now we have two 500 lbs 9 month old fillys who have never been touched by a human, no idea what a halter is or why the scary human thinks he needs to put that thing on their heads.

Yep...what would possibly go wrong.

Well thankfully, not much. At first.

Socks was lucky volunteer #1 (because she thought she found and escape route...not so much), into the make shift ally hubby set up. She shook like a leaf, tried to dig out, climb out, back out (she was blocked from that happening) eventually, after talking to her and touching her, she stood there and relaxed. I took a little more time for him to slide the halter over her head, but he did it and she was fine. Well, maybe not fine in her book, but she was quiet and relaxed and not showing signs me being to traumatized. 40 minutes! A very good girl!

Then came the other one. Coco is a little bit bigger, faster and apparently has more "spirit".



In horse language that translates into "fear of dying at the hands of the mean guy in the hat".



When I left to go get the girl child from school, he had both of them in the alley and it looked like it was going to go the same way that it did with Socks. Slow but steady.

Umm, not so much. As I found out when I got back an 2 hours later and hubby was now in a larger pen, with a rope around the neck of a very sweaty, party bloody and extermely panicked filly.

Hubby was pretty sweaty and tired looking also.





"uhhhh...what happened?"





"This one has a little more fire then the other one" was his winded response.





All he was trying to do now was get her to trust him enough to look at him....which is what needed to happen to get the rope off.

Here is the trick with horses...they cant win. Ever. If they win once, they will try again and again. You have to get back on when you fall off. You have to go back through the gate when they wanted to jump it. You have to tied them up again when they break loose to go eat grain with they buddies. This is a safety issue by means of respect for the rider, as well as a manners issue. At least in our barn thats how it goes.

So he couldnt stop until he would be ending on a good note, which at that point was simply getting her to make eye contact with him so he could get the rope off her.

The blood came into play when she flipped out (literally) and landed on her back, smacking her face into a fence. Just a little blood from a couple of scrapes, nothing to worry about.

Here is part I love the most is watching hubby. Here we have a cowboy. All cowboys are tough...well, they all appear to be tough but I suspect that below the dirt, grease, cow crap and anything else they happen to be covered in, they are big teddy bears, but still....they are tough. Watching him stand there with the patience of a saint, talking quietly and petting her gently to help soothe the terrified filly was almost as sweet as watching him hold his son for the first time.



I wonder where those patience are with our two-legged filly at times????



Anyhoo...1 down, 1 to go....stayed tuned because tomorrow. Hubby has all night to rest and get ready for round #2. I have a feeling Coco is doing the same thing.