A not so great gift

Since the little bear turns 12 this week, I have been planning to take him to the zoo with friends and then his b'day party at his fave restaurant with family and friends. That is all a good birthday plan...also his ceremonial b'day pancakes, of course!
However, he has decided to test my resolve this week. I was on my way home from a long day at work Saturday and DH calls to say "Duncan cut his foot, bring home some bandage stuff". I stop at the little local store and pay dearly for some gauze and tape. I pop in the door at the house and into the bathroom where they are sequestered and lo and behold Duncan has a moon shaped lacerating that is almost 4cm. So I say Well we can cover it up with this, but we are going to the ER.
So we spent three or four hours at the ER, luckily had a very nice doc, a nurse that was okay with my neurosis about nosocomial infection and cleansing of the wound and Duncan was as good as could be expected.
I resisted the urge to laugh at the doctor when he said take the bandage off and let it get air after two days. While I agree with the method, I don't see Duncan leaving those sutures alone or keeping it clean so I will have to make a covering that gets some air while protecting sutures from his little hands and from dirt.
So...let's hope he is well enough to go to the zoo and party for his birthday!

Sorry no gorey injury picture!

Three heads are better than one?

Okay so my arms weren't long enough to get a good picture...but the fact that Duncan was giggling when I took this makes me smile. I think this might have been Easter Sunday.

Heck of a morning.

I got up this morning determined that Duncan's fever, my overtired self, my farrier search and more that I will have a good day. I leave thirty minutes early to take a friend to work and my car stalls. I have to go back to the house (3 miles took 20 minutes) get my gas guzzling truck and head back out, while fever-riddled boy cried.
I am still determined this will be a good day. I will it to be so...then I find I might have to take my new foster horse before the horse I am babysitting leaves and thus have FIVE where four works better.

It is STILL gonna be a better day?

A great man

Well, it has been ages since I last posted. With Duncan off from school for the summer I have been busy with the business, him, the horses and life. I have still made a point to be Thankful on Thrusday, but haven't managed to post about it here. I am sorry I have been missing.

I am more sorry today that I am posting for this reason.

Saturday morning I was informed that Friday July 9th, my farrier (horseshoer) passed away. To many, this would seem like an unlikely reason to be overly sad, but he was a fantastic man. His name was Wayland Arney and he was also my friend.
I will share my memories of him here:
Wayland was so respectful of clients that most are shocked when I tell them he smoked, because he didn't in front of them. He loved my son, not in spite of his disability, but as if there was none. He told me a mere 10 days before he died "Life is short, do what you want". He smiled often, and the smile lines around his eyes, said it wasn't a new thing. He couldn't say enough good things about his daughters and family. He was loyal to those he loved, to the point of being willing to fight for them. He helped me to get a truck and trailer and in a way, made it so that now that he is gone I can find a new farrier even if I have to haul to them. He was loyal to a fault, even when my horse was a difficult case, there was drama or whatever, he came when he was needed. I believe that there are just people with whom we click, and because of who Wayland was, he was that person to alot of people. He didn't talk constantly and wasn't verbose, but when he spoke he was truthful and what he said mattered, well unless it was a joke and he was harrassing you!
I will find someone to shoe my horse, I hope they will do a good job, but my horse will never be as good without him and I will never forget him. Like all the too short relationships in our lives, he changed me forever. In his case for the good!

Goodbye Wayland...you were truly awesome!

Thankful Thursday

As usual, it is late when I am posting my TT post. I was out living my Thursday so that i could be thankful. Today was the last day of school for my little bear. So I went today and managed to shop most of the day without buying a thing. How weird is that? I had a very low key day and that is the thing for which I am grateful. Low key will not be an option this summer. Duncan never stops going. He keeps me on the balls of my feet at all times. I am trying to remember how hard we worked to teach him to take those first steps when he runs across the field, trying to remember the speech therapists we cycled through to find one who believed we could teach him to speak, when he won't stop talking and remember where we came from to appreciate the where we are now. I am Thankful I never listened to the cynics, no matter what their title and I am Thankful there is school some of the year so I can rest up for the summer.

Thankful Thursday

Woo I was almost done with the day before I realized it was Thursday.

It has been a tumultuous week filled with dying vehicles, human drama, computer cord death and miscellanious annoyances, as well as some hope-inducing moments and fresh doses of laughter.
A few nights ago as I complained about having no decent internet at home. I caught myself saying-
"I never regret living where the stars are bright"....but I would like stars AND internet! So...the STARS...I am thankful for them. My farm happens to have this section of open sky that is like my personal window to heaven. It is the time of year I lay on the sunporch and look at the sky, lay by the fire and look at the sky....so...Thank God for stars and Thank God I live someplace I can see those stars. Let tonight be a starry one so that I may be thankful more!

By the way...I think the cottage may have just gotten it's motto. "May we never regret living where the stars are bright". I have been toying with Bright Star Farm anyway....hmmm?

once in awhile

I become the creative person I feel I was actually meant to be. I always wanted to draw when I was a kid, become a writer and be passionate. Between teachers who taped my hands to pencils so I would hold them 'right'. Adults who told me to put my tongue back in my mouth when I drew or colored, people who said mickey mouse isn't purple and college professors who said "be concise" my inner artist died a little. She atrophied from lack of use, she became jaded from life experience.

Once in a great while....the perfect mixture of weather, barometric pressure, moon alignment and my emotional balance I find a moment where I remember my inner-artist...she writes a poem, she draws a little....yesterday she was here....I hope she'll visit more often.