2010-2019 Decade End Blog Challenge

 The end of 2019 does not just mark the end of a year but a decade.  So a year end review makes sense but then there is also the decade end challenge.  From May As Well Event you are supposed to use one photo per year and describe the significance of said photo.  Here goes!

2010

Willy was a sweet 20 year old Arabian gelding I leased for a time.  I had access to ride him each Saturday and enjoyed going out and having some fun time outside of my horseback riding lessons.  I grew a lot with him!

2011

I tried a new horse for a period of time in 2011, Missy.  She was a nice mare but we never really clicked and I didn't have access to an indoor area to ride so was often rained out.  I continued lessons with Laurie and her Arabian horses.

2012

My first ride on Dani (Daenerys).  This was when I was horse shopping and when I met Dani I knew she was the one.  I was so excited.  She was a great mare that was calm and sweet.  After all the checks, exams and contracts were done I moved her to a boarding facility where we could begin our life together.

 2013

Dani has a fun personality.  She is actually holding onto this sign with her teeth....no photoshop here.  I was entering a contest to win something from Julie Goodnight and this was the ticket!  Already Dani and I were bonding and I was learning she had a great sense of humor!

2014

I moved Dani to her third boarding facility that had lots of nice pasture out east in Peyton, CO.  We had lots of area to ride out there and met a great riding buddy who also was a Morgan.  

2015

In 2015 my hubby and I moved from CO to NC.  Dani followed two weeks later via a professional horse shipping company.  I finally had a pony in my backyard!  We then found Chance, a nice Arabian gelding only one year older than Dani.  They have become good friends as long as Chance does everything Dani tells him to!

 2016

This year was full of rides some lessons and getting used to the new property.  We had a lot of work cut out for us like painting the barn and getting fencing removed and repaired.  It's been a great property and only gets better for us as time goes on.

2017

More riding around the neighborhood.  Still not getting Steve on a horse as much as I would like so I often rode Chance to keep him up to speed.

2018

Not horse related I had a spinal surgery due to herniated disks.  I was off riding for over a year and needed help from friends while I recovered.  It was scary but my husband got me through it, and Bernie my snuggle-saurus.  Yes I'm 39 years old as I'm writing this and I still love my stuffed animals!

 

2019

This year has flown by.  I got on Dani after over a year off from riding.  Both of us a little fatter but we are still alive and kicking!  I didn't have the comeback I really wanted.  A really hot summer and other things got in the way.  Well....no more! 2020 will not keep me off my horse.  I will get back to riding regularly and get Chance ridden some too and maybe even get Steve up on his horse at some point.

It's been an interesting decade and as I face my 40th birthday in February I realize that life is short.  I'm only getting older.  I have a lot of projects I want to do but I need to take the time to say hell with it and kick my (and Dani's heels) up with glee and leave the worries behind.  

It's the new roaring 20's ya'll!!

The Mud Season

This time of year we don't have a lot of snow.  I don't mind that so much since snow causes a lot of issues in the south!  What we do get is rain.  Rain means mud at my barn.  The drainage is still an issue with the barn area and this year is the year I will finally tackle it.  I will take one step at a time. 

I'd had one person come out to assess the drainage and they were not hired obviously since they were thinking that we should drain one direction (aka into our leach field) while I was saying we needed it to drain the other direction....though it would mean more work of course.  For those not familiar with leach fields they are an underground system that the effluent from a septic tank (on-site wastewater system) drips.  The septic tank fills with all the waste water from the house.  Solids fall out of the water and have to be pumped out of the tank once every couple years.  The liquid then trickles under ground in a series of pipes (or other devices) to percolate over the dirt where good bacteria will break down the waste and thereby clean the water so when it enters the ground further down there are no bad bacteria.  Having extra water from your house or some other area drain into this leach field is a bad idea.  It needs to stay as dry as possible to only deal with the water from the house and of course rain etc.  I tried to explain it to the excavator guy but he didn't get it.

I worked in public health for 8 years and one of the things I did was inspect leach fields, so I know what I'm talking about and know that I don't want to make a really expensive system fail if I can prevent it!  So I'm working out the detail myself.  My first task will be an area where I normally like to hang the horses hay bags.  It's a muddy mess.  That will just need some scraping and sloping using our front loader and then the addition of good draining substrate.  That will hopefully be done in the next couple of months.  The next step will be at the end of the barn where the horses enter the aisleway.  It just sits muddy most of the year from November until May.  Again that will be scraping and moving in better substrate.  

Look at this old pic from before painting the barn! 
Shows the "pond" in the low area

Later I will try to make the aisle more even and dig a trench where the water naturally goes and pools and back-fill with good draining substrate as well.  The final step will be in between the barn and the storage shed, I'll need to construct a type of French drain to move the pond that forms there.  I literally have standing water there for weeks until it finally dries up. If I can get all of this done this year that will be great.  I will be happy with getting a couple parts of it done.

One section of our fencing has poly rope fence...something we want to move to for the rest of the electric fencing.  I was noticing a weird bump on one part of the rope and upon closer inspection I saw lichen.  Oh my goodness, you can't stop anything from growing in North Carolina it seems!  I wonder if that will degrade the fence in time if I should treat with vinegar or something?  How funny!