Summer is fading away....

It's hard to imagine, but summer is beginning to fade away.  It could be due to rainy weather the past few days, but now its  fairly dark when we wake up and the sun is setting around 8:12 [heavy sigh].  I won't miss the horrendous heat and humidity that kept us off the trails for almost a month; but I sure do miss the longer days.  Especially now that I drive farther to see G. 

We've been doing alot of riding the past month.  We were able to finally meet up with Cora and her new horse Skip; and have since met Patty and her horse Woody.   Woody is a SSH that came from the same farm as G in Shelbyville.....Evening Shade Farms.  He's a nice horse, and fun to ride along side.  They came out one weekend to the farm and we did the trails out back and then two weekends we met up with them at Salmon Brook where I showed them the trails.  I didn't realize how much I missed those trails until we got out on them. Lots of variety in terrain; multiple stream crossings where you can let your horse stand to cool down; some small hills; loping meadows and gaiting trails.  I've since taken G back on our own to ride, and it was fabulous!  He was fabulous!  I have a small video to share but its at home.  

We also finally got to ride the trails with the other Walking Horse and her owner at our barn last Sunday.  What a nice mare!  This horse has a smooth effortless running walk, and she's purdy to boot.  Hopefully we'll get to ride with them more this fall.  It really is nice to ride out with horses that are equal in stride length.  As much as I love riding with my QH friends, we do spend a lot of time waiting for them to catch up.

We're going camping in Massachusetts next month and meeting up with another gaited horse & owner, Jill & Sprite.  We met Jill in person at Equine Affaire years ago; and she came to a Liz Graves clinic held at one of the barns we were boarding at.  That was some six years ago maybe?  Although we only live about 4 hours away from one another, its taken this long for us to finally get to meet up to ride together.  I think this will be a blast!

G is loving life at the current barn.  Each visit I find a new scratch or cut that he acquires while playing with his buddy Irish.  I feel like a mom with a 5 year old boy.  I miss my scratch/scar free face; but I wouldn't trade this happy horse for it..... He's thriving here and our rides just keep getting better, as does our relationship. 

I recently finished a tribute layout for a woman as a gift to her husband who recently lost his horse to colic.  She had approached me about PhotoShopping a head shot of her husbands horse, as she wanted to change the background so she could frame it.  I asked her if I could do a layout instead, and that I wanted to do this as a gift to them.  We emailed back and forth and she shared additional pictures for me to chose from.  She shared some stories of Red & Two Wolves and that he liked using the colors of the medicine wheel in his artwork.   She allowed me complete freedom over the design.  Her husband had no clue it was coming.  This was the piece before I framed it.....

When I finished the layout and stepped back away from it I got chills like nothing I had experienced before.  The spirit of Red and his owner Two Wolves came alive somehow, and I felt like I had captured their relationship and how Two Wolves would view the spirit of his horse Red.  When it finally arrived in New Mexico and Val emailed me to convey their feelings, I felt a warmth fill my heart and I knew that I'd succeeded in my quest to make a memorable tribute to Red that they would cherish.   And I have horse friends who ask me how I could spend an entire day a month inside scrapping?  This is one of the reasons why.  I just love creating a story from a picture or two!