Gosh, it has been a very difficult past few years with my children but finally have them all straightened out and happy so now it is mommy's turn! Have a few personally goals - started to lose weight last year and then hit a platue so back at it again as this year is MY YEAR! With no truck it gives me the time I need to prepare for showing in 2010. We had two unexpected foals last year at the same time, we lost our grand old broodmare Different Season - one of the few remaing CH Kourageous Kalu daughters alive. She was 30 and had not had a foal in 6 years, well past her prime, and unfortunately, our then 2 year old colt with no testicle decended yet, managed to cover her - a feat we had been unable to do with $3,000 worth of vet work - go figure. Anyhow, we did raise her orphaned son Alexander in our dining room for 8 weeks until the weather got warmer - he was born February. The other foal was also from one of our "unbreedable" mares - again, alot of money spent on trying to get her to carry one to term and a midnight "date" with this supposed "not able to impregnat" colt resulted in a very lovely colt. He was gelded at 6 weeks to make sure we had no more surprises! I tell you, medical science has nothing on what a mare wants! Anyhow, we are not breeding for a few years - I want to make sure all our youngstock are caught up in training plus we have a few ponies that are in "school pony" training as well as I want to put a show record on our broodmare.

We are also doing some more renovations this year - finishing the fencing in my training pen as well as w are erecting a full size dressage ring within our big ring - this has me very excited! We are building two more stalls in the barn to bring us up to 12 which is more than enough in this cold weather! We are also building four shelters this summer, one in our stallion paddock, two in our existing winter paddock to allow us to do pony training for 4, plus finishing our pony paddock one so that our school ponies can winter outside which they seem to prefer. In our barn, we are starting to do my tack room and office - which is exciting as I have been saving what others have termed "junk" to put in my tack room/office - I will proudly boast two walls that will look like field stone as well as have my office area (it is located on top of our cistern (SP??) with tounge and groove pine and pine railings. I was given four steel doors that with a coat or two of paint, will look very fancy! Our school tack room is being finished to include our lounge/fittness area complete with our fake pony for practising mounting/dismounting and bridling - she/he will need a name!). Our inside barn walls are beind redone as soon as the weather stays warmer to include our "artist" wall, family history (all our school ponies are related), and our busy board with all the activities posted for the month. I also hope to get our shower area completly enclosed this year for pony training - helps alot when you are introducing a hose for the first time!

I am also hoping to get our huge jumper/hunter ring started - I want to have a few training areas as well as all the movable jumps we have been building over the fall and winter - lots of color and exciting things to show the ponies!

Well, I need to finish this off - the warmer weather means I can finally really get the stalls cleaned rather than just raked out.

Andrea