Everyone else just kind of “getting thru the days” right now? Weather is having such wide swings you need to check Temps before getting dressed! 16F last week, then up to 50Fs that day, back to the 20Fs that night. Wild changes! Horses are drinking well, added daily salt has to be helping them stay hydrated. Some are actually biting off additional chunks of their salt blocks in their stalls at night!
We have been getting in drives between snow and rainstorms. Mostly walking to the dirt road, then trotting a couple miles. They have been hanging onto their hair until last weekend, still not shedding like the old horse. We had enough for making a large pony from him Saturday! His star had been shedding for a couple weeks, so you got covered in white hair if you even got close. Usually the working horses start their shedding after being sweated a few times. But like everything else, nothing has been normal this year!
They are going along mostly well, still looking for excitement along the road though! “Was that a bag? Those are new car tracks in the mud! I HATE orange trash cans!!” It does keep husband on his toes!! Ha ha We walked a different road last night and they were even more “looky” there. Didn’t want to get very far from home with heavy rain predicted, so it was an all-walk day on pavement. They have about worn out their winter shoes, so new shoes with regular road studs will happen next week. Then it will probably snow because the daffodils are starting to open!!
Mud is bad. I have to move the tire feeders out to the arena tomorrow so horses can stand on sand that drains the rain water away. May help dry their hooves a bit more. Drainage ditch was pretty full with water racing downhill across the hayfields into the road ditch before water went into the tube under the road, on into our ditch… Lots of water last night and this morning. But it is all trying to leave fast, so no water up over the driveway. We could kayak in the woods, the lowest point on the farm, which is beside the buried part of our big drain tube. The woods collects water from barn roofs, paddock runoff, before water drains off into the drain tube.
Been trying to “bond” with my old leather sewing machine, but we are still in conflict! I can get about 10 nice stitches, then the lower side makes loops with the needle, not tight stitches. Thread wads up around the bobbin, needing to get cut loose, then re-thread bobbin threads in the shuttle. Some kind of tension issue I think. More fiddling with my knobs while trying to treadle to keep fabric moving. This is way more difficult than rubbing head and stomach at the same time!! Ha ha Machine worked OK when I brought it home after servicing, not sure why it went “off kilter” during previous sewing sessions. I have the manual, they sure expect a person to fix any issue using the book!! I am resisting returning to the service guy. Machine is cast iron, about 100 pounds, he is 60 miles away. He had it working well when I picked it up. I just have to figure the correct settings again.
If we get a couple clear days, I need to pull out stored items in the carriage shed and make a pile to haul to Martin’s Auction later this month. Not sure exactly what I have back in there that can go. May not be much but every little bit gone gives me extra room! If it is back there, we are not using it. And going to Martin’s will be fun just getting away! DD has said she can horse and pet sit for us, we will be gone FAST!!
Working on some crafts too, adds variety to my rainy days. Have killed 2 sewing machines and they have been really slow getting them back. That is holding up one project with no embroidery stitches on the machines I have left.
I have sewed two bird netting curtains for the barn aisles. The wretched finches have suddenly decided to start pecking off the barn roof insulation!! We have managed to drive most of them out but they slip back in when doors are open to bring horses in at night. Doors will need to stay open when we start keeping horses in days, night turnout. I am hoping these giant curtains can be closed during the days, keep birds out, not nesting In the barn rafters anymore. Husband has his doubts, but is willing to put up the cable and help hang them. I will run some ribbon thru the holes for visibility, it is very fine netting, hard to see. I caught one cat in the netting while sewing the edging to hang it. Claws were a bit long, but she didn’t have to jump on the pile and roll around!! She got wadded up pretty good, then howled to be set free while I was laughing!!
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Maybe I’m a COTH Matchmaker… But 
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