hqueen's collection of Far From the Usual stuff.

[lazyday]

CONGRATS!!!!!!! Have you set the date yet? beautiful ring

 

[hqueen13]

Noooooo, not yet, lazyday! We have barely talked about it, really. Just tossing ideas into the ether right now, which is fun. The thought of actually planning is scary though! I do know I want to get married outside, likely late spring. Fairly laid back wedding, not stuffy/formal. Beyond that, the possibilities are endless!!

 

[snapshot]

First I have to say "absolutely excellent photos"!!!!!!!! I love them!!!! And secondly, congratulations on your upcoming marriage!!!!!!!!!

 

[Denim Deb]

Congrats. Are you looking this year or next year? If I had to do it again, I'd go w/October instead of March, a small wedding and outside.

 

[Dawn419]

Congrats on your engagement!!!

Love the prints you got for your wall, too!

 

[hqueen13]

Thanks Snappy, Dawn & Deb!!
The pics turned out really good, though it was pretty funny trying to get Storm to hold still long enough to get the camera to focus and get the shot, LOL!

Deb, I'm more of a spring person than a fall person. There is no crazy way I could plan it in 6 months to do it this fall. September also tends to be a dicey month for weather here in MD, and Oct can be crazy temp wise. I think June will end up being it only because that'll be just over a year from now, too many things going on in this year to make it happen. Course I also have to figure out how to deal with the allergies that I deal with in spring, too. I am going to watch things very carefully this year and see how long it really takes me to get through it. I am also working with diet and homeopathics and a couple other things to try to manage it. I've been doing ok so far with just homeopathics but the trees haven't started to really come out yet. Ask me again in a week and see how miserable I am

Had a great first day of our Tao of Equus clinic. I love these workshops, they are so much fun. If it weren't so freaking expensive I'd become an instructor I think. Ehh, who knows what will happen in the future. Too bad I didn't win that lotto

 

[TTs Chicks]

Very nice pics! Your ring is cool - CONGRATS ! ! !

 

[CheerioLounge]

Congratulations!!

 

[hqueen13]

Thanks for all the other well wishes.
I've been a bit of a stranger 'round here for the last week or so. Things have just been super busy. And I've been spending a lot of time browsing pintrest for wedding ideas. I am not the girl that has had my wedding planned out to the n'th degree since I was 9. I know the gist of the feel that I want, now the challenge is making it happen creatively on a shoe string budget. Wheeeeee Of course, with all of that is coming the family politics, which is very frustrating, but it is what it is. Due to the decisions I made 10 years ago when the other half and I got together, the family has not always approved, and so now it will be really interesting to see how things go over the next year or so before we actually have the time to get married. I certainly hope that 'time heals all wounds' and that the family will be able to be together and be happy.

In other news I had a lovely little bolt on Storm last weekend when I was riding. I took him out on the trail, which I have done VERY few times since I have owned him (when you have control issues on a 1 ton horse you don't exactly head out into the wide world without knowing for sure that you can trust the horse under you). I was with two other friends, and we took a little section of trail that loops off the main trail (shortly after we got into the woods, too, so we weren't even that far from home), and the trail follows the edge of a ridge, and some deer popped up about 15 feet in front of Julius, and that caused him to shy backwards into Storm, and then he shied, spun and took off. Oh, and I should add that I don't actually ride the canter yet due to aforementioned control issues. He's not balanced, and I don't have much experience with the canter, so I can't support him in it, and so we just don't yet. We are getting close, but we don't. But now he is. Thank goodness for the canter lessons I got on the instructor's horses my last visit down to FL to see her! All I wanted to do was stop him, and managed to do so about 50 yards back down the trail. This is also after we completely mowed over some small trees and who knows what else. We turned around to face where we came from and found Julius and Winston walking towards us with an expression of "dude, what is your malfunction" on their faces. I decided that we should walk towards them, and that was a big mistake. He did not like that idea, flipped me the bird, shifted around and then spun, this time taking off into the trees instead of down the trail. Now he is racing through the trees, weaving a bit, and leaping small logs (I assume, I didn't see what it was we went popping over). At this point I've lost both stirrups, and have gotten jostled from side to side, and am getting concerned about staying on. I can't stop him because every time I try to pull back I have to lean forward to duck the branches that are coming at me, which means I also can't see where we are going at the same time. Knowing that I couldn't duck and attempt to stop him at the same time and that I was beginning to slide around, I found myself basically laying forward on his neck after he popped over whatever it was, and at that point I realized that I was stable there, and could pretty easily kick my leg right over his back. My brain said choose where to get down, or risk getting pitched into a tree or sliding off sideways. I picked choose where to get down, and swung my leg over, and then slid down his shoulder, my feet hitting the ground first, and falling forward onto my knees (landing on a half rotten log, which is better than an un-rotten log), and then onto my hands to catch myself. I saw his feet spin away from me and felt that he must have been surprised that I wasn't up top anymore, and then he spun and continued his panicked bolt. I got up and was surprisingly ok, and found Julius and Winston on the trail again, and the girls were pleased to find me (mostly) unhurt. I walked as they headed back up with me and as I cleared the woods and looked up the hill I saw the streak of white flash by at the top of the hill by the fronts of the pastures. I gabbed my cell which was thankfully still in my sweatshirt pocket and called the other half to tell him what happened, lest he see Storm streaking by the windows without me.

We headed around the pasture again, and made it back to the top of the hill, and the other half already had Storm untacked, and he was looking cool as a cucumber. Someone else had snagged him by the time he got out the door, and since he wasn't sure how I was feeling, he went ahead and stripped the tack off of him. P had been in the end of the barn by the door when Storm flashed by, and she said her first through was, "wait, she doesn't usually ride like that?!" We all got a laugh out of that. I was feeling ok, other than the pain in my right knee from dropping onto the semi-soft log, and a rope burn on my ring finger (of course, thankfully I was not wearing my ring!). N offered me her riding gloves, and told me where to find them, so I headed back in the barn and rinsed my hands off to cool the fire, put on her gloves and put the saddle right back on to head down to the arena to ride. He wasn't getting off that easy! We had a lovely ride of about 30 minutes, and I was about done at that point. The girls headed out again with Julius and Winston as I was retacking him, but there was no way I'd feel comfortable heading out onto the trail again. The likelihood of seeing more deer was pretty high, so I decided that the arena would be just fine. I was quite satisfied, and had finished up and was putting my things away when they returned again. They had a nice ride, despite Storm's bolt.

After I came up to the house and got a bite to eat, we started doing some work outside and managed to get the brand new deer electric fence up. YAY! The electric charger works and everything! I am very pleased with it, so now we'll just have to wait and see if it actually keeps the deer out. I am a little concerned because the plants are mighty close to the fence in a few spots, so I hope that the zap is enough to keep them away if they try to reach for it. I'll take pictures tomorrow.

So this weekend I worked in the yard some more and sprayed the ever constant weed problem. I have been using vinegar and a little soap in the sprayer instead of the evil roundup stuff. It is a bit of an experiment and I have read mixed reviews online with the formula. We were getting some things that were dying, and so I added salt to the mix this week, so we'll see if that boosts the killing power any. I did like it a little better because I felt like if I did spray the wrong thing I could easily wash it off without harm, and even if I did get some on something I wanted alive, it probably wouldn't completely kill it unless I really doused it. The only bad thing is that I went through about 3 gallons of vinegar in the process, and barely finished half of the front yard. Next trip to BJ's we're going to have to buy vinegar by the dozen bottles.

I used up what I had of the vinegar and got out all the sour milk we had in the fridge and mixed it with water and poured it all over the plants that I DO want to grow. Well see if that helps any. Frankly, with as little rain as we've had the shear fact that I watered the plants might help. I noticed the hostas around the front don't look as thick as I feel like they should be. We desperately need rain in order to knock down some of this pollen. Of course at this point that is a catch 22 because the rain will cause things to grow out more, which will increase the pollen.

I did ok today with my allergies. This morning the wind was not blowing, and I was just fine. Then the breeze kicked up and there went that. I was sneezing and completely stuffed up for the rest of the afternoon. Of course I had the windows open in the house, too. And to boot I've been eating poorly the last several days, so that isn't helping the issue any at all. The remedies that I am working with are helping, I am sure of it, but when the pollen gets really high it takes every trick in the book and then some. We finished with the clinic today and I wrapped everything up and came in the house and took extra pills, and added a few things and ran the diffuser with several essential oils in it, and was pushing the lemon water to try to get things back under control. I decided to go ahead and soak in the tub even though it was early, and by the time I was done it was a little better. I hope that it settles back down and that it isn't windy tomorrow. There is rain in the forecast, but N doesn't seem to think it will be that bad. Me, I'm praying for it to wash some of this crap away! Plus we need the grass watered BAD. We aren't going to be able to keep the horses on the grass for long if we don't get rain soon!

I have a few more things that I REALLY need to get done, like switching out the winter dishes for the regular dishes again (I think the snowflake plates can be put away!), and getting the kitchen cleaned up, and then I'm going to have dinner and watch Mr. Popper's Penguins. Since the other half is away this weekend its just me, and I have to keep myself occupied somehow! Of course, I discovered that I grabbed the wrong unlabled bag from the freezer, and had been defrosting chicken bones all day instead of sheppards pie. And that means that just about the only thing to eat in the house is leftover pizza from today's clinic lunch. This will make the third time in two days I've had pizza, which is NOT good for my allergies (processed dairy makes them worse) but at this point there isn't much of an option. Must remind the other half to label bags of frozen things!

So now I am off to reheat my pizza and watch my movie!

 

[Denim Deb]

Glad you didn't get hurt. Hope your allergies get under control soon.