I think the earth is drunk

It appears that the earth is one of those drivers who swerves between lanes and can't pick a constant speed. 2008 is going to get an extra second added to the end of it. So, don't shout "Happy New Year!" too early. (I'm not sure you'll want set your clock back, though)

A really good quote

“I don't want to drive up to the pearly gates in a shiny sports car, wearing beautifully, tailored clothes, my hair expertly coiffed, and with long, perfectly manicured fingernails. I want to drive up in a station wagon that has mud on the wheels from taking kids to scout camp. I want to be there with grass stains on my shoes from mowing Sister Schenk's lawn. I want to be there with a smudge of peanut butter on my shirt from making sandwiches for a sick neighbor's children. I want to be there with a little dirt under my fingernails from helping to weed someone's garden. I want to be there with children's sticky kisses on my cheeks and the tears of a friend on my shoulder. I want the Lord to know I was really here and that I really lived.”

MarjoriePay Hinckley

Hoarfrost

Owen, Kim and Holly's Holiday Festivities

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

My Sister's Business Cards

My sister, Amber, is the one who wrote the symphony that we went to in Portland almost a year ago. She was looking for some new business cards and asked me to design them for her and I was so proud of myself I thought I would advertise for her on our blog and show off my work. Her requirements for the cards were something abstract and artistic, like an ink pattern type design, with a professional-looking font. It was difficult for my left-brained photographic detail-oriented self to do something like this, but I think they turned out nicely! She's still deciding which one she likes best of these ones.

Let it Snow

We finally had a real snowstorm here this week!  I should have gotten out earlier today to take pictures before anything melted, but as it was close to zero degrees when I went out to feed the horses this morning I elected to go back in the house to have hot chocolate instead of an outdoor photo shoot when I was done barn chores.  Here's some of this evenings snow shots.

Welcome Home

When I got up this morning there was thick fog over everything - a rare occurrence for us. The frost was also heavy enough that it looked like ice on everything.

Thankful for Funny Horse Faces

Cecil also goes by "Hot Lips"


















Cole has been known for his "go go gadget lips" too.

What a weekend!

This weekend was a fun, yet busy, weekend for us. Kim had a few riding lessons on Saturday that went pretty well. She also had a group of people come see her ride a horse named Cole. This group of people are friends of her's that she has known for several years. When Cole was pretty young, Kim did the initial training for him, and these friends were there to see that. They also knew Cole at this time, and most of them thought he was just a crazy horse. So, recently, they've been hearing how well Cole is doing and that Kim is using him for lessons - nobody could believe it. So, Kim rode Cole on Saturday for them to see how far he has come. All of them were very impressed. It was fun for Kim to have an audience.

We also had some friends visit us from Denver. Will and I knew each other on our missions in the Philippines. Then, while we were living in Vancouver, WA, Will and Kelley moved in across the street from us. Now, they live in Denver. So, it has been fun finding each other every time we move. They brought their three little kids up, who absolutely loved the farm. Here are the two oldest "driving" the tractor.

From Will & Kelley

And here they are getting pony rides on Cole.

From Will & Kelley

From Will & Kelley

Eight Things

I'm relatively certain that on other blogs I was selected to complete a survey of information about myself. I can't be sure as there could be other "Kim L's" who may have been the intended recipients of the tagging, but I thought the info might be educational for those regularly frequenting Country Livin'.

8 TV shows I like:
A difficult distinction as I am more movie than TV watcher.

1 - LOST
2 - Simpsons
3 - Biggest Loser
4 - Bones
5 - Ellen Degeneres
... and I guess that's all folks!

8 things that happened yesterday:

1 - did barn chores
2 - worked 4 horses
3 - taught 3 riding lessons
4 - doctored horse wounds
5 - narrowly missed getting kicked while performing above task
6 - fed the dogs and cats
7 - fed the full-time missionaries
8 - read all of your blogs

8 places I like to eat:
Also a difficult designation since we're too cheap to eat out very often, so this list includes places where I've ever enjoyed eating.

1 - Enzio's (local Italian eatery in old town Fort Collins)
2 - Subway
3 - Owen's parents house
4 - home
5 - our backyard under the tree
6 - Suehiro's (Japanese place also in Old Town)
7 - The Charthouse in Steamboat Springs
8 - Bethnie and Goldlin's (our friends in Fort Collins, make the BEST Navajo tacos you've ever imagined)

8 Things I look forward to:

1 - Owen coming home
2 - the wind stops blowing
3 - horse shows this summer
4 - the bread to be done in the bread machine
5 - Cecil finishes growing (his butt is 2" taller than his shoulders right now)
6 - Quickbooks coming out even for once (maybe this should be on the wish list)
7 - new fencing in the south pasture
8 - a new roof


8 Things on the Wish List:

1 - a border collie puppy
2 - a 3 horse slant load gooseneck horse trailer with living quarters for the long horse show weekends
3 - paddock boots that don't have enough heel to hurt my back
4 - a master bedroom suite
5 - a pair of jeans that fit right off the rack
6 - women's shirts that are wide enough in the shoulder so I don't rip the seams with my lats, but are fitted enough in the middle to not look like maternity shirts. Good luck with that one.
7 - better powers of visualization
8 - being done recuperating from the fall last spring

8 Odd things about me:

1 - I don't like chocolate
2 - I spend at least 3 hours at church on Sundays by choice
3 - I crave salt
4 - I'm allergic to everything. Jewelry, spices, most laundry detergents and soaps, perfumes...
5 - a half dose of generic pain meds last me twice as long as normal (so from a 4 hour ibuprofin, I take a half dose and it lasts 8 hours)
6 - I don't own nylons or stockings
7 - watching TV at home is not "right" without a dog snoring at my feet
8 - I read the Book of Mormon in 2 months every year. I start 11/1, read 10 pages every day, and finish Christmas Eve. This year is my 11th reading. I began this when the Relief Society ladies at church in Alpine Heights ward in WA in 1997 challenged the high school senior girls to try this and I've continued it every year since.

I hope you all feel enlightened by this glimpse into Kim's inner workings!

The Emperor's New Coat

Mollywobbles is always cold in the winter because her breed of dog has almost no hair. It's hard to be a naked dog when the wind is blowing 25 mph and the house is so chilly. Never one to watch an animal suffer, my mom roses to the occasion and found her a jacket on clearance. Molly loves it, we call it her housecoat. So for all those (myself included) who mocked owners that dressed up their dogs - I guess sometimes it's a necessary evil.

Gourmet Owen

Owen makes the best pizza using his own dough from scratch. Last night he was tossing it in the air, true Italian Pizzeria style, but this was the only pictures I got of the construction. It ended up being cheese, mushroom, and pepperoni pizza. I fully intended to take pictures of the finished pizza, but we were hungry and forgot and ate it instead.

Happy Halloween

So we're a little late, but Happy Halloween! This was our pumpkin. I designed the face and Owen carved it while I toasted pumpkin seeds to eat (my main reason for carving pumpkins).

Owen of course wanted a shot of the pumpkin having its nose picked.

Closet Cross-Stitcher No Longer

I guess with this post I'm no longer a "closet cross-stitcher"! I finished this last night. It was done solely during movies and TV watching, and was started in 2003. The first horse head (the one on the right) took longer, a couple years because this was the first real cross-stitch I ever started and I had to learn how to do it. By the time I got to the second horse head (the one on the left) I had become significantly faster and that one was done in the last year on the cold days I couldn't be out working. I'm going to have it framed and hang it somewhere in the house.

Now Presenting....

Thank you to those who participated in the early voting for a new haircut. The results are in and the new style had its inauguration this morning. (If only presidential campaigns were so brief.) Here is the end product. It was a bit of a gamble, I googled "hair wellington, co", called the only person whose number showed up, made an appointment, and went this morning. The hairdresser was amazed that I could go to someone I knew nothing about to have something so drastic done, but it turned out fine. The cut hair is in a bag and ready to send to Locks of Love. www.locksoflove.org

Attention All Voters

I've decided to donate my hair to Locks of Love again, but before I do I've got to decide what hairstyle I want on my head after I donate my hair. There are programs online that put celebrity hair on your picture, but they charge about $20 for the service so I decided to give it a go in photoshop myself. Here's what I came up with - any preferences?

Ann Hathaway hair makes me look like my Dad

I don't know who this is, but the hair makes me look like Carrie Ball

Gwenyth Paltrow hair makes me look like my sister Amber

Ann Hathaway hair that makes me look like me.

The New Yorker Article

A friend of mine posted a link to this article:

http://www.newyorker.com/talk/comment/2008/10/13/081013taco_talk_editors?yrail

It's another view on the election that I found an interesting read. It was nice to peruse something that was well written and made sense, rather than some of the political nonsense available in our local papers. It is a bit one-sided, however it made some good points.

The Color Purple

This is Cole after his riding lesson with Kelsey. She loves him and you can tell!

My whole reason for taking these pictures was to capture the color purple. Cole's owner loves purple, and so happens to buy everything for the horse in purple. Kelsey also loves purple, and so wears her coordinating fleece to her lessons so she and Cole look stylish. I swear this was exactly how I was at 14!

Contagious TMD?

This is Thai last fall wearing the dental speculum. The horse is sedated and the speculum is put on them to hold their mouth open while the vet floats the teeth. Horse teeth are continuously erupting, and so must be filed regularly to maintain even grind and smooth edges.
This is Dr. Landis floating Thai's teeth. The speculum props the horse's mouth open so the vet doesn't get bit while inside the mouth with a long float (a horse's arcade of teeth go all the way to the back of their cheeks). "Float" is the British word for "file".


I had a new insight this week into how well horses reflect their rider's issues. While I'm teaching riding lessons it is obvious to see which rider is tense through her shoulders, because that rider's horse won't stretch out into a longer stride, which requires the horse to move ITS shoulders. Similarly, if the horse is sore in its lower back, after I'm done riding it MY lower back hurts. It's all body mechanics, horse and rider feed off each other and mirror each other's tension.

I had an interesting experience this week with the vet. I have TMD (Temporomandibular Joint Disorder) which gives me difficulty with my jaw. I have trouble chewing and am very sore in the morning because I clench my teeth in my sleep. I have a splint I wear when I sleep that helps considerably. Well, the vet was out at our barn this week to vaccinate horses and do dentals. Cecil has been quidding (chewing up some hay and then spitting it out so you have wads of partially chewed hay in the stall) so I had the vet do a dental on him. Horses, especially young ones like Cecil, need to have their teeth floated, or filed, regularly to make sure they can chew their food effectively. In the process of Cecil's dental we discovered that HE has TMD as well. For a horse it's a bit more complicated because you can't just tell them to sleep with a splint and take an ibuprofen when it hurts. But how's that for a horse mimicking its rider's issues?