change in plans

My plans for a nice day off on Friday included sleeping in, a lesson at 1:00, out the barn to work my girl, chores, and then an easy night. Er, scratch that!! (Ha! Like I could have a slow and relaxing day! Don’t you know better by now?)

We’ve got two sets of cross ties in the barn, on in front and one in back. We always use the front set first since the back set is right in front of Alpha’s stall. And well, Alpha knows he’s stallion 😉 But whenever the team gets ready to go, both sets must be used. So, Macy was in front, and Allie was in back. Alpha was actually doing quite well with things, until I went and walked by. I was about to work Snow, so had to sneak by them both to get ouside. No big deal. My mom unclipped Allie on one side, pushed her towards her own stall, and we walked behind her. And let the screaming begin!!

Neither Allie nor Carla took last month – they were both in a transitional heat cycle – so we’ve just been waiting and waiting for them to come back into heat. Well, once “free” to wander by stallions, Allie has decided she’s in heat! We all cheered, Jim said “okay, come on Carla…” and without missing a beat she squats down. So, we’ve got one loud and messy barn, but we’ve got two mares ready to be bred!

Fortunately, I’m off work all day tomorrow, Jim is off at lunch, and I could move my lesson to 10:00 so we can haul both girls to the stallion owner’s place in the afternoon. Fingers crossed for two bred mares!! 😀

allie goes down the road

So after successfully pulling the tire, but not losing her urge to go go go, we decided it would be best to hitch Allie with one of Jim’s tried and true mares to the training sled. The more experienced mare would keep her in line, and she certainly wasn’t going to be dancing for long with the weight of the training sled. She was pretty fidgety, but happy enough to go forward and play along. Eventually she did settle in and walk along with Macy very well. Jim took them down the driveway, and then my mom and I hopped on the sled and we went up and down the road a few passes before taking a turn and going through a field and along the woods for a bit. Allie did great!!! There were changes in terrain, rabbits jumping in front of her, scary farm equipment, and dark shadows, and she just walked on – calm as could be! Big day for her!! And she looked very cute in her drafty duds 🙂