Life is still good down a dirt road.  I was super blessed to find a new horse only 3 weeks after my wonderful mare, Stylin died.  I know that sounds quick, but everything just fell into place.  Linc, who is a 17 year old Kiger Mustang, belonged to  friend of mine for 10 years.  The timing was right and she reached out to me to see if I would be interested in him.  She knew my riding style, knew that Linc was a sensitive soul as was my mare, and thought that we would make a great pair.  I knew from the moment she brought him over, that he was for me.  I had seen her start him over as a 6 year old and watched him blossom over the years.  I never had a nervous moment about riding him and love his goofy nature.  He and I have developed a good partnership and I we get out on the trails whenever we are able.  In the meanwhile I ride him around home and also take him on walks with me.

Resurrection

We've been in our new home for a year and a half and we ADORE small town life.  I won't try to catch up a full year on my first blog post in a long while but will just highlight a few big changes in our life.

As you can see, I've changed the name of my blog to "Down a Dirt Road"  -  just couldn't make the old name fit the new place.

• My 83 year old mom moved in with us and I am now her full time caregiver
• My beloved horse, Stylin, died from a catastrophic colic July 1st of this  year
• My wonderful mother-in-law passed away this month
• We have an awesome new church family and community
• Our new location is quiet and the neighbors we've met are friendly
• I am improving my art skill by doing a daily drawing and sharing on IG and FB

I hope to begin posting again on a regular basis and get back to reading my favorite blogs.

Hello - Good Bye !

Dirt road to our new home

My husband and I have been looking at property for the last year.  We wanted to move out of the city and closer to his job without being too far from family and friends.

We found a lovely place on 3 acres in Lawtey, Florida which is only a 30 minute drive from where we are now and it will cut Bobby's commute in half.  We are so excited!  We made the deal today and hopefully can close this month.

We will be living down a dirt road off of the main Hwy 301.  There are planted pine forests around us owned by Gilman Paper so we don't expect any new homes sites will be made available anytime soon.

Back yard view - partially wooded

We will miss our beautiful live oak trees that we have now but are really looking forward to small town life in Lawtey.  Plenty of room for us, our horses, dogs and cats.  We will fence the property and have a front porch built on before we move in.

Now we can concentrate on selling our current place and take our time moving out.   I truly believe that God was at work in our lives to help us find this perfect place for our needs and budget.

Easter Weekend 2015

My sister Robbin and me

Had a really fun weekend visiting, hanging out and eating with "fambly".  Seems all of our gathering involve lots of food!

Went to Van Zant park on Saturday with Mom's side of the family for a picnic and easter egg hunt followed by checking out some property for sale in Melrose/Keystone Heights area.

My cousin Deborah and my mom

Sunday was an early bird church service to celebrate our risen Lord,  a trip to Newberry to visit Bobby's family and then to see Jenny and Joel and his family at Crystal Lake in Keystone.

Total of 300 miles on Bobby's truck this weekend!  Busy but so worth it!

This is my hubby Bobby

Just What I Needed

This is my happy place.  In the woods, on a good horse, with a good friend.  

My friend Cathy took the day off from work and asked me to go riding.  Hell yeah!!

When I went out back to get my horse Stylin this morning, her daughter Maybe volunteered to go instead.  She came right up to the gate and practically stuck her head in the halter.  She has never done that before, so I took her up on it and saddled her up.

Picked up Cathy and her mule Vanna and away we went to a local trail head.  We rode and visited for about 3-1/2 hours.   What a perfect way to spend Good Friday -  communing in God's natural cathedral.

17h mule -  14h horse

Starting Again

I've been inspired to start blogging again if for no other reason, for myself.  As I logged on, I saw that many of my previous posts had broken picture links.   Looks like I have a lot of work ahead of me to repair as much as I can.  Seems that Facebook didn't want to share anymore.  :(

 Sisters -  Shelly, KD, Robbin

The Lord has blessed me so much this past year.  I've been able to earn enough to feed my horses and help my husband with the normal bills.  I've really been learning to let go of worry and allow God to work in my life.  I still get anxious from time to time when I lose a regular cleaning customer, but something always pops up.  I enjoy spending time with the family and am grateful for the time I get to share with Mom who's health is failing.  I get a little more time to spend in my yard and with my animals.  Still getting some riding in here and there.   I've learned to live with less and that was one of my main goals of leaving the corporate world.  

Maybe and Stylin

I spilled some coffee on my laptop a couple of weeks ago and was surprised when it quit working the next day.  ( I really didn't think that the small splash would hurt it.  Duh!)  Luckily for me, the purchase of a ten dollar USB keyboard allows me to keep using it, which is a good thing because of my budget.  Thanks to the computer guy at church for suggesting the fix!

Since I didn't have a job today:  I'm able to work on this rusty, old blog.  I'm getting dinner started early.  I got to visit with my farrier.  I'll be able to go video my friend's mule for sale.  I'll be able to take my dog for a nice, long walk.   I'll just live in the moment and not worry about tomorrow -  Matt 6:24

Tribute to Great Horse

I miss Dixie.. a lot.  We made the decision to help her into the next life on June 24th and I still look for her in our back yard every day.  I won't share the details of her illness, but I am at peace with my decision and treasure the time I got to spend with her on her last day on this earth.

This post is a celebration of the horse that shared so much with me, my family and friends for 15 years of her 27 year life.   Rest in peace Dixie.  1987 - 2014

carrying my friend Cathy

Dixie and me

Teaching a young JT to ride

Carrying my friend Karen

Carrying my sister Shelly

My friend Traci enjoys riding Dixie

Dixie and me

With Cory

With Mustang

Pulling cart with Nana and Jenny

With JT again... a little older

With Stylin, Ringer and me

Dixie and I pony Ringer

Dixie carrying my husband Bobby

Karen having a blast on Dixie

Cathy again on Dixie

Ms. Dixie

With my friend Lisa from New Mexico

Dixie and Stylin at the Blessing of the Animals

Dixie and the girls with Nana

Dixie wears a flower

Bobby riding Dixie

Close to Home

With my new, much, much lower budget, I will have to pick and choose my camping opportunities and have opted to ride close to home most of the time.

My daughter Jenny, my good friends Cathy and Shelly and I went on a ride two weekends ago that was a lot of fun.  We parked at the Jacksonville Equestrian Center, but instead of riding the trails there (they were having an ACTHA event) we crossed SR 228 and rode around on the old Cecil Field Naval Base.  It's now called Cecil Commerce Center and boasts a runway that the Space Shuttles could land on as a backup.  Since there weren't any signs that said "no horses", we took a tour of the perimeter of the golf course, down thru the main street, and ended up at a lake and picnic area.  That was after cruising by the Golf Course Club House where they were having a "Redneck Golf Tournament".  We asked if we could buy a beer, and a couple of good ole boys handed us some cold ones out of their coolers.  :-)

Shelly with a concoction that Cathy made for us with the golf course behind

Cruising down one of the main drags

Enough is Enough

I took my sweet, old, mare Dixie out for a short ride on Saturday and I believe that she told me it was time for her to retire.

She didn't stumble, she didn't refuse, but she felt tired.  I get it old girl,  you are ready to retire and you have earned it.

Dixie brought me back into horse ownership in 1998 and has been such a great teacher, confidence builder, guest horse and babysitter.  She has been semi retired for the last couple of years, but other than taking the occasional child on a backyard tour - I'm officially letting her live out the rest of her years as a lady of leisure.  At 27 years young this year, we're hoping to have her around for a good long while yet.

Thank you, my sweet, sweet girl!  

Clinics - You're Never Too Old to Learn

Life has been busy since I've semi retired.  I'm staying busy doing chores, running errands and cleaning houses.  I did however, take the time to improve my horsemanship education.

In February, I attended the Metta Baxter Driving Clinic held at the University of Florida's Horse Teaching Unit.  It was so much fun!  It was two days of hands on learning; we learned about harnesses and carts, how to harness and put to a cart and actually got to drive as well.  My friend Cathy came home and put her big horse Busta to a cart and he didn't have a problem with it at all.

We drove each other before they let us touch the horses.  :-)  We also got to see the horses that are part of UF's horse program - really nice horses.

Then on the first weekend in April, my friends and I went to a Ron McLoughlin clinic at Silver Sands Bridle Club in Port Orange/New Smyrna Florida.  Ron teaches classical riding techniques based on what he learned from Monte Foreman many years ago.  He runs the Classical Stock Seat School of Arizona and we are fortunate to have him come to Florida 3 to 4 times a year.

It was an intense 3 day weekend of riding, studying and more riding.  I loved the group riding and the special one on one attention that he gave each student and horse.  I came home with some awesome exercises to practice so that I can ask correctly for what I want from my horse.  Stylin was awesome and all of us had a great time and came home feeling that we could become better riders.

I had such a wonderful time learning with my great friends and my wonderful horse.  Life is good and I am blessed!

Retirement So Far - Life is Good

So far I've been very busy during these first couple of weeks as a "retired" person.  I've put in a couple of applications at veterinarian offices nearby.  I'm hoping to be able to work close to home and am open to whatever God may surprise me with.  I need to find a little something to feed all of our critters and pay taxes going forward.  So glad that my husband is supportive.

Alex, Ellen, Me, Cathy, Traci & Karen

I got to go camping at one of my favorite places, McCulley Farms, with my buddy Cathy for New Years.  It rained and got pretty darned cold, but we still had a relaxing and fun time.  Our other friends, Mike and Traci Woodard were there as well and we met a new lady that Traci met on line.  Ellen May is taking a ride about with her cute little Arab mare for a couple of months.

Traci, Karen, Alex, Me and Cathy

This past week was spent starting on my list of chores that I want to accomplish while I'm currently not working.  Unfortunately, I discovered a pretty big leak and mold in our large back storage room.  I've spent days cleaning that room up; threw away 5 extra large bags of junk and wet papers, pictures, etc and also was able to bag up 5 bags of good items for donation.  Took in lots of books to my favorite bookshop and got $48 in credit.  The next step is to get some roofing repair estimates and some sheet rock repair estimates.  OUCH!  Not the way I was hoping to spend my savings.

Life is certainly less stressful already.  I have enjoyed spending more time with the horses, working in their horse pen and just set up their new round bale slow feeder net.  I hope it will save us some money on hay as our girls waste a lot.  The net is supposed to cut out the waste completely.  I'm hoping it will be a good solution for us.  I just have to make sure that the older mare, Dixie, gets enough to eat.  She is not used to using a slow feeder net.

The girls try out the new hay net

I also fixed up an easy peasy nesting box out of a plastic bin thanks to another blogger's suggestion, and now my two little free range chickens are laying their eggs where I can find them now.  YAY!

The rain was threatening today, so instead of loading up for a ride, I went for a walk with Cathy and her mini mule Luna.  Her little mule pulls already pulls a cart, but we thought it would be a good idea for Cathy to get her used to more traffic and we certainly could use the exercise ourselves.  :-)

A little video of our walkabout