Workout

Gave both the horse and the bulls a workout tonight. Last chance for a couple of weeks as we´re headed over the pond to visit good friends in California Thurstay.

Brady was pretty good and he showed he knows his stuff now. Maybe a bit sluggish at the start, but that was expected as he hasn´t been worked much the last coouple of weeks. He did some good things though and was soft and responsive in the two rein, starting to hold the bit some too. Now he can go back to filling his belly and bully the other horses in the pasture and eyball the cows over the fence for two weeks.

Cowboy piaffe!

Spin




Possition, possition....

Cut

Work that right turn!



Turn



All done

Good job, pard!

Third Cutting!!

Boyd Rice and his phenomenal Third Cutting just marked a 230 in the Summer Spectacular 5/6 classic Challenge open final! Man, what a horse, one of the best I´ve seen. Lets see if the other contestants pick up his thrown glove and accept the challange!

Our Day

We slept in and took things slow and easy this morning. Took a trip to town, fixing some things for our upcoming trip to California. Got home fairly late and took our usual rounds in the pastures.
The girls

Polly

Annelie & Super Man

Scratch, scratch

Gang strolling the prairie



Annelies babies

We finished of the day with a family ride, Annelie, Ida & I. Took a trip around Sättra and me and Ida took a few laps in the arena as a finale. Great night! Cool breeze blowing and the air was alot crisper than it´s been for a while now. Really welcome for both us and the animals.

Brady

Our good side!

Yihaaa!

Some pics

This is what it looked like in the pastures today.

Not exactly springtime green anymore!

Super Man & Polly

Polly



Call me when somethin´s happening...

pretty rowdy bunch!

Rain! Finally some Rain!!

Oh, wait....it just stopped....nevermind...

Lying here on the couch after some fence fixing and general lookover of the mares and fillies. The sky looked promising and it actually started to rain....for about two minutes!

Have some people coming down to look at Molly shortly. Hopefully they like our little filly and she ends up in a good place! Gonna move the bulls up to the arena tonight, work them alittle, and spray them some. The buggs are not being very nice to them and they are suffering.

A Family affair

Pretty amazing mare, Stylish And Foxie. She earned $300.000 with Bill Riddle in the saddle and was reserve champ in the 1997 Super Stakes. Her dam, Foxie Merada was shown by Bills brother Terry to $95.000 in earnings and Super Stakes Champion herself.

Stylish And Foxie has produced full sisters Peptos Stylish Miss $260.000(Open finalist in the Summer Spectacular on Sunday, 7th after 2nd go w. 437) and Miss Stylish Pepto $213.000(missed 2nd go by 1 point, Tuesday) and Eyez On Me $106.000(by Peptoboonsmal-Stylish And Foxie) missed Sundays finals with a score of 428,5 (434.5 needed). Miss Stylish Pepto and Eyez On Me are both trained by Bill Riddle.

So we´ll keep an x-tra eye out for Peptos Stylish Miss on Sunday!

Wednesday

Pushed the bulls around some last night. It´s to hot to do anything at a faster pace than at a walk and we just fooled around some with the basics. It was close to the 90:s even at 8 o´clock at night. Brady was in the two rein and he´s starting to explore the bit more now. He´s constantly rolling the cricket when we´re walking or standing still, and that´s a good sign. It only takes a raised hand on slack reins for him to give to the bit and the neckrein is there aswell. Bothered by the plentiful giant Horseflies we´ve got this summer,( I swear them things will take your leg off!!) we didn´t stay with it long, but it was good to work him a little.

We´ve also been helping our friend put her yearling colt in harness. I´ve been driving him for a couple of day´s with helpers. Yesterday I drove him with the help sitting next to me and he did really good. She should be able to drive him by herself pretty soon!

Hot!

23 horses advanced to the finals on Sunday along with an additional 2 from the wild card round Saturday. Last nights leaders, Peptos Stylish Miss and Playing At The Mall had subpar runs but still placed in the top ten after the two go´s.

Third Cutting
Saw Boyd Rice and Third Cuttings run and boy, were they in control! Clean cuts and totally dominating the cows, alway´s accurate with strong, spectacular moves when needed. They were awsome to watch, but hey, they all are at this level!

This is the 23 finalists (+2)



On the homefront not much is happening. To hot to do anything worthwhile. 91°F in the shade and with our moisture it feels like 115! The pastures could really use some rain, it´s starting to look like an African savannah here. The regrowth is non-existent and we really cant take much more of this. Had the mares and foals spend the day inside to get some relief from the sun, flies, mosquitos and other varmints that pester them. It was much appreciated!

Summer Spectacular 1st Round Classic/challenge

The results of the first round in the Classic/Challenge. took a score of 213 to advance. 116 horses (out of 191)heads to the next round starting today.

The first 21:



Most of the favorites advance and "The Duel" is still very much alive between Dont Look Twice, 220 and Third Cutting, 219. Great mare, Peptos Stylish Miss share the lead with Playin At The Mall scoring 222. Peptos Stylish Miss full sister, Miss Stylish Pepto just missed the 2nd round by a point scoring 212 for Bill Riddle.

A weekend at grammy´s

Spent the weekend up at grandma´s. Great weather, socializing with Annelies relatives, looking at a couple of ranches up there too. Finished the weekend with a swim in one of the many mountain lakes up there with Annelies kid brother Ronny, Nathalie and Grandma. Ronny´s girlfriend Nathalie is pregnant and ofcourse he had to check and see if she floats like the cork she currently looks like!






Ida is swimming like a fish and you can hardly get her out of the water.

We´re pretty lucky

This morning I was sitting, coffe in hand, looking out our kitchen window at the mares, foals and fillies sleeping or quietly grazing in the morning sunlight. I got to thinking how very fortunate we are to be able to live this type of life. Sure, there are hardships, tough times and a lot of hard work to keep things rolling. But there alway´s is, no matter where or how you live, that´s just life.


Atleast we are able to live and breathe surrounded by beautiful country, great friends and our wonderful horses. That´s worth a whole lot!! We got the bay & beach a quarter of a mile away, nature reserve bordering our summer pastures and, this time of year, a pretty decent climate.
Shrek (Me) & Ida at the beach the other day.

Add to that the joy of working with the horses, young and old, and following their progress. Watching your kids grow and make strides on their way to maturing and becoming indipendent persons.
Good morning sunshine!

Annelie baked us a real summer cake yesterday (Strawberrys, meringue, whipped cream)


Life is Sweet!!!

Summer Spectacular

Fasten your seatbelts! This years Summer Spectacular is shaping up to be something special!

Starting Monday with the Classic/Challange, there´s a horde of great performers:

Nurse Connie, Boon To Suen, Itawtathenapuddycat etc. What most of us are looking forward to though, is the match between Phil Rapps Don´t Look Twice and Boyd Rice and his great Third Cutting!! They went head to head on a number of occassions last year so it will be interesting to say the least.
Third Cutting
Don´t Look Twice

The Derby open doesn´t kick off until July 22, but there´s some serious contenders in that one too:
Sup.Stakes Champ Reys Desire, Abeline Spectacular champ Reyminate, Iced Out, Starstruck Ichi, Futurity champ Rockin W, Tag Rices $600.000 horse Chiquita Cat to name a few. Tommy Marvins has his good horse CP Jesse Cat and Futurity finalist Peak Easy. Gonna be a good show that´s for sure!

Starstruck Ichi

Reyminate

Feet trimming

Annelie and I just got done trimming the fillies feet. Hands full of bandaids, aching back and horses pretty tired of their master! I´m way to tall, old and out of shape to be doing this. The fillies have to hold their legs abit high when I work their feet so it´s hard on them also. Annelie finished up when I had had enough. She´s a rock, thank´s precious!

Ashado Boko

Our little filly Ashado Boko placed 5th last night at Solvalla Racetrack. In a race for three yearolds only, she got a trip third on the inside after a very frisky start! They reached the halfway mark fairly quick also and we thought they would tank on the home stretch. The leader and 1st inside did and pulled Ashado with them for a minute in the last turn. Fortunately her driver found an opening, and as they headed for home she finished the last quarter really strong to end up 5th and earn an even $1.000!

Go Avenir, Go!

Our Sunday started off really slow and easy. A beautiful day, albeit seriously hot! Had an owner come out and check up on his horses, a trotter mare and her colt. Really good people and we spent some time with them having coffe and socializing in the shade. At lunch time we packed our beach bags and headed down to picknic by the water. To hot in the sun so we eventually crawled in to the shade down there too. Fortunately for both man and beast, there was a nice breeze blowing yesterday.

Spent much of the afternoon down on the beech as it was too hot to work the horses. Me and Annelie helped our neighbour move his Houdini-prone Highlands down to another pasture by the pier later when it was a bit cooler. Hopefully they´ll stay put! After that we took our bulls up to the arena and worked Avenir and Brady some. Avenir really loves working the cows. Not the most patient horse in the world, Annelies 23 year old bronc, but he tries.
Avenir & Annelie





Me and Brady worked some on our boxing. He´s doing ok, but he knows when it´s practice or the real deal. He excells out in the open, herding or chasing down critters, but takes time off at times in the practice pen. No big deal, you just gotta remind him a time or two...
Ida & Brady