Fun in Photography

Yesterday was an adventure in photography.

About a month ago, I sent my Nikon D40 to a 'good' home.  I had found a family that had both a mom and children that had a photography 'itch' and wanted to learn with something a bit more challenging than a Smart Phone or a point and shoot.

The oldest girl had saved up her own money to purchase a small Canon pocket camera to take photos for 4H last year.  

We finally arranged a time that we could all get together and take a 'farm hike' and explore photography together.  I brought some of my older cameras and we headed out.  The youngest got my nearly indestructible Fujifilm point and shoot.

Everyone enjoyed the fresh air and sunshine.  Each of the kids saw and photographed the world differently. 

It was fun to watch them explore the world through the camera lens.

Of course I brought my little toys to help them figure out how to do macro shots of very small items.  They have invited me back for when they hunt morel mushrooms and to help them identify wild flowers in the forest.

The kids told me about the categories they could enter in 4H, so we talked about different kinds of shots they would like to do.
Mom casually mentioned that they could really use a good 4H leader in their group.  I raised my eyebrows.

I haven't been involved in 4H for over 20 years.  

Hmmm.

I always love visiting their farm - my hubby buys hay from them and sometimes I go with and enjoy the views from their incredible ridgetop farm.

Mom said that we'll have to do this again.  I agreed.  All of the kids caught the 'Shutter-Bug'.  

We talked about sunrises and sunsets on the farm also.  I can only imagine how spectacular some sunrises are.  
Their farm sits above the Mississippi and has valleys on each side of it.
On many mornings, they look down on mist covered valleys as the sun comes over the horizon. 

I know I will look forward to our next Photo-walk and adventure.

I can only say that spending hours with enthusiastic young people really made my heart sing with joy yesterday.

I'm looking forward to doing it again.

Siera ~ Naughty

Siera is doing well her hoof/frog issues seem to be clearing up.
I should have been exercising her more, but with mud or ice being the normal all around us, I haven't been able to.

However, I was able to get her out and ride her for a bit this past week.

She decided that she wanted to protest every step of the way and be back with her friends in her paddock. 
This is pretty much Siera's normal spring behavior.  She needs to be weaned from her friends/buddies each spring and learn that yes, she can walk away from them under saddle or on lead.

But sometimes she just needs to stand and think about it.

She is actually getting better at this and realizes that when she is going to toss her head and act like love sick animal, that she will get a time out at the 'naughty' tree.

I let her stand there for about 45 minutes while I did some yard work.  She pawed a few times and tossed her head only once or twice.
Then she settled down and stood quietly.

I loved her up and we took a short ride to the ridge.  The woods were too slippery and muddy or we would have gone on a nice narrow trail.

When Siera has too much open space and nice even ground, her mind wanders and she thinks more about misbehaving than worrying about her next step over a log or climbing through a ditch.

We worked a cornfield for a while until she realized that I was not going to just turn her in the direction of home.
We did a lot of circles and many 'stand stills'.

When she finally took a deep sigh and moved on with forward ears, I knew that we'd gotten through the first stage of separation.

Since she hasn't had to work most of the winter, I rode her out 1/2 mile and back to get the mail.

It is funny that different animals have different attitudes about leaving the farm.  Siera puts up a fuss and eventually quits when she is asked to work a difficult trail.

Lil' Richard was more than happy to leave the farm. 
Badger never minded.  
Fred brays and vocally carries on for about 1/4 mile, and then steps right out.  
Opal used to turn her head towards the farm and walk with one ear turned to home.  When we got past that magical mark in the trail, she'd stop and she'd be all attention to detail.
Sunshine will turn her head and may even bray once, but then she marches on.  She waits until you aren't paying attention and then will try to turn back home.


I would like to see Siera get over her separation issues, but I also realize that she may never be that kind of mule and I will have to deal with it each spring.
That is okay, she is a fun ride. 
Siera's best feature is that she doesn't spook.  

She is one of those equine that will lock up and stand still as a statue until she figures out the situation.  

I'll put up with her idiosyncrasies if she'll put up with mine.

Lil' Richard Part Two...

Yesterday, it was not my intent to take Lil' Richard out again, but it was still soooo muddy everywhere that I thought I'd just take him out for about an hour and ride him to get the mail.

The day before the temperature was nearly 70 here.  Yesterday, it was only 50 with a bit of a cold breeze.  I got Lil' Richard out and took him to the round pen. He rolled and then got up and bucked tossing his head.
This is his normal routine before I curry him and work a bit with him.

After a few minutes of a refresher course, I tried a different saddle on him.  It is super light weight. He really had to sniff it all over as Siera had been the last one wearing it.

It met his Majesty's approval and we saddled up and then worked on trying the bit out again.  I let him wear the bridle for a while and then swapped back to using a rope tied to his halter.

It was a good thing I'd used the saddle.  Lil' Richard enjoyed the fresh cool air and was a LOT more lively.  He pranced and bounced when we went outside.  He was not ready to listen quite yet. We had to stop and go back to the basics.

So we did a bit more of walk, trot, whoa, on a long line and then he stopped and sighed.
He got to spend a bit of time at the thinking tree in the yard too while I changed coats.

We proceeded to ride up and down the driveway and take the challenge of going through some muddy areas.  
Funny, he has no problem running through mud and puddles on his own, but with a rider ... the mud looks like pony swallowing muck!

He wanted so badly to just take off and run up the driveway, but I convinced him that he needed to turn around and listen to me.

I could see it in his arched neck that he was full of it. One of the mistakes people make about ponies is that they assume that all ponies are good for kids.  
This pony will never be a kid pony. 

His rider will always need to know what they are doing and have good balance.

We did ride to the ridge and get the mail, but on my terms, of course.  We rode past screeching children, a barking dog that ran under his belly and all sorts of noises.
He actually ignored them and had his eye on the ridge.

Funny, I think he believes he is going visiting each time we ride up there.  He is extremely willing to take on the long hill.  He never fusses either when we just stop and get the mail.

Since my driveway is so steep, I lead him back down.  I didn't want the saddle to slide up on his neck.  

Lil' Richard is just a fun little project for me and we won't be doing long hard rides.  He just isn't big enough for that.

Hubby came out and I asked him to take a photo of me and The Big Guy.

I have to admit, he is a fun little moped!

He probably would be fun to have on a cart, but I have no harness and no cart so we shall be content on getting the mail, and little fun yard rides.

Just look at this face?  Doesn't it say..."Look at me!  I may be small, but I have attitude and cunning! I'm a bit of a devil!"

Happy Trails.  And many adventures getting the mail.

A little story about a little Pony

Lil' Richard came to us years ago.

Here he is with our Grandson, Dennis.  This was 2009.  I think Dennis may have been 3 years old here. You can see that Lil' Richard is not a Big Horse, but more of a crop out mini.  He is somewhere between 33" and 34" at the withers.

He has always been very gentle to be around, but he was our 'teaser' pony for when we bred some mares to our donkey stud.  Most of the time he spends his summers grazing areas of the yard that are too rough to mow.  He can be happy tied to a tractor and clean up all around it.

This winter I started to mess with him.  I worked with him twice in December when we had mild weather. I then worked with him in January and rode him bareback inside the round pen and outside of it.

Then the temps dropped and the weather was pretty awful.  I let things slide and yesterday I decided I'd work with him after I'd ridden Siera. [Siera will get her own blog entry.]

I took the bridle that I'd introduced him to last time and put it on him.  He chewed and chewed and chewed the snaffle bit.  I put the saddle on him and he was very nonchalant about it.  That bit kept bothering him.
So I tossed a leg over him and sat in the saddle.  I made my noise for 'forward' and he took 5 or 6 steps, I gently took one rein and asked him to turn for me.
He stopped and dropped his head with his neck stiffened.

He then simply lay down.
I couldn't help but laugh as I stepped off to the side.  This is one of the reasons I find him so fun.  My inseam is 32" so it wasn't like coming off from a 15 hand horse!

I adjusted the saddle and took the bridle off.  I put his halter back on and used some twine to make the nose piece smaller.  The I jury rigged the large training rope and made reins [sort of] for the halter.

I would normally ride him bareback, but in January, I'd bruised my tailbone while riding my high backboned mule bareback, so I wanted a seat this time.  I will sort through and find a much lighter weight saddle to put on Lil' Richard, or more than likely just ride him bareback.

I stepped on again and he was fine.  He walked forward at every command and turned as I asked with the lead rope.  He and I were bored with the round pen. So we went out to the muddy driveway.

I think it is easier for him to get his feet muddy than me to have to walk in it!

So we rode up and down the bottom of the driveway for a bit.  I wanted to see how all of the distractions of the mares and mules whinnying at him would affect him.
I tried the blue bridle again and he refused to go anywhere while chomping.  

I eventually took it off and redid the makeshift halter/lead rope contraption.  
I guess my thinking is, if he responds so well and doesn't try to run off with this halter contraption, perhaps I'll keep him happy and let him ride that way.

He pretty much ignored the mares and molly mules who fussed and ran back and forth in their pasture.  He was working out what I was asking him to do.  I asked him to take me over water that was standing in big puddles.  He looked the situation over and seemed to just shrug and walked through it.

Here is our Big Shadow in the driveway.

After a few laps up and down the lower drive, I pointed him up the hill towards the ridgetop.
At first he hesitated about leaving the farm, but then I think I heard little gears click and whirl in his brain.  His ears went forward and he started to trot up the hill.

Of course this is his escape route if he gets loose or his tie out breaks.  He runs up the driveway and out the ridge to another farm.  The owner always finds him in the barn with her horses.  She opens a stall door and he goes in and gets some sweet feed and hay.  We generally get a call early in the morning to come and get him.

He hasn't escaped in a year, but I know that he knows that UP the driveway is on the way to Linda's farm.

Halfway up we stopped.  Lil' Richard is not in super pony shape, let's just say he is a bit chunky and soft.  He is not used to carrying my weight.  I waited and let him catch his breath.  He moved forward and pretty quickly we were at the mailboxes.

He checked the mail and decided it was mostly junk.

I let him have a breather at the top of the hill and let him find something to nibble on.

He'd done such a good job, that I led him while carrying my mail back down to the yard.  Here is a shot of the saddle I used.  It fits him well, but I'm going to try another much lighter one on him.

That is mainly for training right now.  I will probably mostly ride him bareback because I don't need assistance to get on him, nor do I need a stump or a bucket.

When we got home, I rode him up to the shed so I wouldn't have to walk in the mud.  I unsaddled him and then took the curry and led him to the south side of the house and let him graze on some green grass while I groomed him so more.

The Little Pony that could.
I am having way too much fun with him!

It is mud season.

As beautiful as spring can be, there is always Mud Season to count on.  When the frost comes out of the ground as the snow melts, everything gets.

Squishy.

Our gravel roads become some of the most interesting places to drive.  Ruts and yellowish mud are items to contend with.  If the car is washed in town and you drive 1 mile on the squishy road, your car will be covered in road mud by the time you get home.

Our dooryard has become the annual 'swamp'.  It usually clears up as the frost leaves and the driveway hardens again.  This year after construction, hubby said we'll redo this section of the driveway.
Right now I'm looking at all of the gravel and mud that has been plowed onto the grass and think of endless hours of raking.

Surprisingly enough, daffodils are beginning to peek out from the ground!  I haven't found the crocuses yet, but they should have been first.

Morris and I went down into the valley to see if the Skunk Cabbage flowers had poked up through the snow yet.

Morris got muddy, and I got muddy.  We stopped near a spring in the creek.

We found treasures that had been hidden by the snow.  An antler shed, an interesting rock, and hip bones from perhaps a raccoon.

The creek was fairly low for this time of the year.  But I expect the rains that we are going to get may help a bit with that.

The valley felt so warm, I left my jacket hanging in a downed tree that I would pass by on my way back up the valley.

PeeWee's Valley

  

The hillside trails were pretty treacherous.  Which basically means any way I chose to hike was treacherous.  The north facing hillsides were icy and slippery. Any other trail was just muddy and slippery.
I found that I could slide on my rear end quite well while holding my camera in hand.

My backside accumulated some mud.

We found no skunk cabbage yesterday.  But today is supposed to be 70 degrees and rainy.  I think that should bring up the flowers!

I do love winter, but when spring comes along there is the excitement of new growth and warm weather.

I expect at some point this month to get some more winter like weather, spring usually never comes this early to our part of the world.

Story Telling

Let's admit it, I am a kid at heart.  I like toys and telling stories with photography and toys.

One of my most favorite photos of toys is this one of Morris's toys riding in the Tonka Truck.  I took this in 2010.

I don't know where my silliness comes from, but it keeps occurring.

A year or so ago I started a photo/toy challenge with my Grand daughter Ariel.  We had fun thinking up photos with captions with different toys.  I started with a collection of My Little Ponies and eventually graduated to a collection of 'Wild Animals'.

Doe became my main subject.  Doe is always looking for a home.  Along the way she finds various friends to help her along.  

Stinky became Doe's guide in a way, helping her to stay out of dangerous areas.  He tells Doe that living in a parking lot is not a safe place.

New friends always appear on the scene.   There is a buck that Doe meets during Rut Season.  His name is Bo.  Is there romance involved? We can only guess.

Then a dinosaur gets into the act. Very strange that Doe would befriend a Velociraptor, but in the Toy World, anything goes.

My new neighbors enjoyed my idea and the children got involved, on a hike they brought some toys and we even made things up as we hiked.

Suddenly the story got a bit more fun.
I began to look for adventures for the toys.

My neighbor's son decided that we needed a Val Barbie. So into their collection of dolls they went and viola, the Val Barbie was created.

She comes complete with short dark hair, glasses, skunk hat, coveralls, and a lego camera and Tommy Gun.
Now how fun is that?
Of course I need to find a way to put 'Val Barbie' into the ongoing Doe Saga.

Another family got involved in the story telling and this past weekend, the kids helped me set the toys up for a few shots.

They made some suggestions, and the Doe Saga took a strange turn.

At an ice formation, the kids set up Dino, Doe, and Bo.

Suddenly Doe is asked to make a choice between her two suitors, or she thinks she does.

Doe being Doe, decides to run off and think things through.  This causes an emergency in the 'Toy World'.

Val Barbie calls an emergency meeting at the Dynamite Box.

The toys gather and launch a search party for Doe.

So I can be found with toys in my camera back nearly on every hike or walk I take.

And the search for Doe has begun.

I must admit, I am having great fun.

Baxter Hollow

Regretfully, I didn't have enough time to spend the day actually hiking back into Baxter Hollow.  I only had enough time to walk on the road leading into the Hollow itself along Otter Creek.

The road is closed off and there is a small parking lot to use.  I don't know if this place gets crowded or not during the warmer months.  I parked at Stones Pocket Road. Apparently there is another access on the north side.

There is a road closed sign that you will see first and off to your right is the small area for parking.

Once you walk around the gate you will follow the road for a mile before getting to the trail head.

You can view some interesting rock formations as you head towards Otter Creek.  At the bridge you get your first glimpse of Otter Creek.

And it is worth the short walk.

I wanted to get into Baxter Hollow, but because I didn't tell anyone where I was going and a lot of the trail conditions were pretty icy, I stayed on the closed road and took shots of the ice and the creek itself.

I will be coming back to explore this place more thoroughly.

I imagine in the spring it will be teeming with incredible wildflowers and I can't wait!

I've read reviews that the trail is faint and tough in may ways, but I spend time using deer trails as my own hiking trails in the land and woods that surround me, so it sounds just the sort of place I'd enjoy.

Besides, I like 'tough' and rough trails, they are so much for pleasing!