Giddyup, Cowgirl!...

I hate that I haven't blogged in so long. I hate that my sister, mother to four children (and one on the way!) is far better at keeping up with hers than I am with mine. I hate that I make promises to "catch up" on the blogging... but don't seem to ever deliver on the promise.

Excuses excuses excuses - including the fact that our computer has been "putzing out" on us for several months' time (requiring lots of backing up to an external hard-drive, which in turn then leaves me without my photos readily available) - they just don't really cut it.

So now while Tee Jay and Casey are napping (and my churning belly lets me know that Finlay most definitely is NOT), instead of waiting to get two-year-birthday and Easter and Christmas and other photos off the other hard-drive and uploaded to this newly working PC, I'll just share with you our little outing from today.

CANTER YOUR HORSES!

Casey and I share really nice rides to-and-from her daycare five days a week, and along those trips we get to see two sheep (in the same enclosure) and many, many horses (among a handful of farms). Lately, she's becoming more and more insistent, with her finger pointed in the air like a scolding parent mind you: "I want to go in there." This request/demand is always made when we pass one particular farm, and it's followed by, "Mommy, talk to Daddy. I want to go in there with the horses."

So I did talk to Tee Jay to find out if he thought there was a place we could go nearby that has horses just-for-the-seeing, since it's not like I'm ready (or have the money) to get my two-year-old into riding lessons (though I'd venture to say my first time on a horse was probably earlier than Casey's age now, having been raised by a Mom who took a "trail ride" with my grandfather nearly every Sunday when we lived in West Virginia). While he and I started looking online for possibilities, I stumbled across the website for the exact farm that inspired Casey to want to "go in there" and realized they were having an Open House TODAY!

We ventured out to Majoda Stables and spent a good two+ hours there, mostly spending our time snacking on hot dogs and hamburgers and walking to-and-from the barn and the bench near the riding ring. We learned very early in our day that Casey did NOT want to be anywhere near the horses themselves (not even the goats or the adorable soft bunny rabbit named Cheezit), but she LOVED watching the horses and the children riding them... from a safe distance. (That is, she loved watching them once she got over her fear that one of the many horses behind a fenced enclosure might come eat her hot dog out of her hand. A five-year-old'ish girl next to her explained all about how horses are vegetarians...)




Casey took a special liking to one horse named Cinnamon while I spent most of my time petting a horse named Jack inside the barn. The whole ride home, our sleepy girl asked us to sing songs about horses, sheep, Cinnamon and Jack. As afraid as she was at times there on the farm, I think she'll be begging us to go back soon!