Welcome to my weekly smile. The first photo here is Murphy from a couple months ago. The barn manager where he lives took this photo and sent it to me when I was visiting my daughter for the weekend. How can you not smile at him. 😀 I like how the photo almost looks like a painting which could be because of the photo being transferred from one media or phone to another. I am so very grateful for Murphy in my life. This week I’m smiling and enjoying all the animals in my life, and decided to start with Murph!
Duchess is so sweet! Dinah is relaxing, I’m giggling!
The sister’s are doing great and have the run of the house. As you can see, Dinah is sleeping in a bit, haha! Silly kitties! And here they are with my son. I call him the cat whisperer as they both love him a lot!
The lighting isn’t the best in this photo because it was so bright outside. I still like it though, as the kitties with my son are just adorable. This just makes me SMILE! 😀 They love being around us, especially my son!
One more photo of Dinah, she’s so pretty!Our sweet BZ girl!
Sharing my photo’s of our furry family is so much fun. BZ is doing really good. She is completely healed and going strong. She loves to play with her doggy bed as you can see in the photo. She bites at it and pushes it around. She’s so silly. I hope my smiling post is making you smile too! Haha, I have one more sweet photo that my daughter shared with me and I think it will be a perfect ending to this post.
But before I wrap up this post I wanted to thank everyone here in this blogging community. I want to thank all of you who have given me support in sad and hard times and have been here encouraging me even if its been in liking my blog post. I see everyone, even if there are no comments. I thank you for encouraging the good and fun posts too. I am a positive person and do not like to dwell in sadness but life can sure throw us curveballs. I know this is all just part of life, and I’ve learned over the years it’s okay to feel happy and sad at the same time. I think you know what I mean, and that’s why its good to start each day thinking about what makes you smile?
My daughter’s kitties, Mousse on the left and Molly on the right!
Isn’t this the best photo! My daughter’s kitties make me SMILE! Keep smiling, laughing, and enjoy each and every day. I also want to thank my sweet family for all of their support as well. I want to thank Trent for creating and hosting the Weekly Smile. Life is to short to not enjoy every day! 😀
Welcome to my weekend coffee share. Can I get you something refreshing? Ice tea or ice coffee maybe? Or a strawberry lemonade? It is HOT! We are almost 100F today, it’s summertime. It has taken months for it to be this hot so I am not complaining. I also can’t complain because we have very low humidity at 29%, so thankful as I know there are plenty of people living in high humidity with the high temps. I’ve been super busy and I have to say that I’ve been away for so long I have gotten out of the habit of writing! Darn it all, as I love to share but when you don’t keep up then I feel a bit overwhelmed wondering where I should start as I tend to want to share everything! I feel like I could write a novel! HAHA!
Usually once I start typing and the thoughts start flowing then I can get into a groove and my story unfolds of what’s been happening in my life. I’ll start with a project my eldest sister wanted to make for a family member I won’t name because it’s a surprise for an event or celebration. I am 99% sure this family member doesn’t read my blog posts so I’m going to share here with minimal information. My 2 sister’s and I are making a quilt. My eldest sister had me buy on a website a cross-stitch pattern on material. The design is stamped onto the material and it will wash off so I had to be careful not to get it wet as I stitched. Here is a photo of one of the squares.
You can see light blue lines on the material. Those lines are for the quilter once the quilt is sewn together.
My sister’s were on the phone with me as we scrolled through all the choices and we really liked this cross-stitch pattern with these two colors of blue. I think it turned out great and is beautiful. I stitched 12 squares and it took me 6 months! That is one reason I had to almost stop blogging. I work full time, so I could stitch a little bit before work (but need to take care of Murphy too) and when I got home from work for maybe an hour. Then I had the weekends, but oh my gosh, the time is ticking and I wanted to complete all 12 squares. I could have sent them to my sister’s to finish, but it is my only contribution to the quilt. I realize it is the focal point of the quilt, but it was important to me to complete. It is complete and off to my eldest for her to piece it together with sashing! I’m so EXCITED to see it pieced together!!
My other sister who is my horsey sister and lives in Idaho has a long arm sewing machine. She will be doing the quilting once the quilt is sewn together by my eldest sister who lives in Colorado. This quilt will end up being the traveling quilt by the time it is done! Once completed I know they will send me photos and I can share those and I’ll share more info of the recipient. She will be so surprised and I know will love this quilt made by her Aunties!
Visiting my Mom and Dad!Riverside National Cemetery, Memorial Day
Since I am a bit behind in blogging, I’m going to head back to the end of May as we went to Riverside national Cemetery to visit my parents. I was in awe with all the flags which makes sense now. They passed in 2003 so its been 21 years and so the area where they are buried is now full of those who have passed these last 21 years. We do not always visit there on Memorial day, and so you don’t always see all the flags. Anyways, I shared with my family members and sometimes I can’t believe how many years have gone by. I think of them often, in different ways and you never know what memories pop up from time to time. I am so happy we were able to make this visit, it was a beautiful day! ❤
Star Wars Land at Disneyland!My daughter and I visiting Star Wars!Yummy salmon dinner!Lobster open faced roll! DeliciousTaking a photo of us with my kids behind us on a ride!My hubby and me!
We are back in June and my family and I finally made it to Disneyland and Star Wars! We are huge Star Wars fans, so much so I named my middle son Harrison after Harrison Ford! We are only 35 minutes from Disneyland and I thought we should wait for the crowds to die down before visiting the new Star Wars Land. Well, we ended up waiting 5 years! Haha, not intentionally of course. Mostly just getting busy and trying to get everyone’s schedule together so we could meet up and spend the day there. It was a nice day, not too hot. We went the first week of June! We ended up eating dinner at a nice restaurant at Downtown Disney which is in walking distance just outside the park. After dinner we went back into the park to experience more rides! Fun time for all!
How are you doing? Do you need a refill? I have been making a lot of video’s of Murphy because I created a YouTube channel. I am getting a little obsessed with sharing all things Murphy! Haha, it’s very fun, he is so fun. I so enjoy my time with him and I know he enjoys our time together. ❤ I’ll share a link to one of my most watched video’s which has over 2K views. I now have 18 subscribers and 8.4K views as of today. Its crazy there’s people that watch little old me and my sweet horse when there are thousands on YouTube.
I started the channel in March because I was planning on taking video’s of riding Murphy and entering into some online horse shows. The way you enter is uploading your YouTube video, so I created the channel. It’s morphed into just a place to share all things Murphy as I’m just not that interested in showing at this time. Even if it’s as simple as making a video and entering an online show, I’m just busy enough to not be interested. 😀
Enjoying Murphy in the arena! He is my muse and friend. He loves people and attention!
Speaking of Murphy, a funny story! His stall backs up to an elementary school. He can walk to the back and put his head over the fence and greet anyone who walks up to the fence behind him. School is out now for the summer, but when school is in session he greets all who park in the back of the school. There was a water leak from a sprinkler from the school and the barn manager called the school about it and the next day the security guard was out and about and talked to the barn manager after the repair. He asked her, what’s that big horse’s name over there? He pointed to Murphy and she told him his name. He said he greets us every morning, he is so friendly. He’s so tall you can’t miss him! He wants to meet EVERYONE!
I think he is getting use to posing for me and my photos! ❤
Well, this is long enough and I think I’ve caught you up on the happenings around here. I am riding Murphy and he and I are doing great together. I’ve ended with a few photo’s of him that I took recently. I hope you all are having a wonderful weekend. I know some are heading into winter as we get on here with summer. Thank you for stopping by and I want to thank Natalie for hosting the #weekendcoffeeshare link up. Have a wonderful week ahead! 😀
My beautiful rose bloom. I love the hint of pink and wish you could smell it, so rosy!
Welcome to my weekend coffee share, can I get you a cup of coffee or tea? I thought I would create both a coffee share and use as the square challenge for my blogging friend Becky B’s Square challenge this month too. In order to participate I need to make all my photos in “square” format and then share the theme which is Moving Forward. This could mean Reconstruct, Renew and/or are Burgeoning which is a great Spring theme. As I share coffee and my square theme I think the rose above could be burgeoning with color! I will share more photos that are burgeoning with color and beauty.
My beautiful Iris blooms!The renewal each year of these beautiful blooms!
I couldn’t resist sharing my garden blooms which always make me smile and make me appreciate what Springtime brings to us as we enter into warmth, sunshine and the beauty of nature that comes this time of year. I can also relate this theme of Moving Forward to my personal life as I had to move forward with my horse Murphy. We were not in a good place back in February where he was so unhappy where he was living that I had to move forward and find him a better place to live. We moved to a beautiful boarding facility just a mile away from where he was at and he is so HAPPY! Here are a few photos of Murphy as our partnership has been renewed!
Murphy is so happy grazing and at his new home!
We have been here at the new barn for 2 months now, and he is flourishing and he and I have a wonderful bond together. I am able to turn him out to run around in the arena which is so important to his mental health. (At the other barn, it was not allowed to turn out in the arena which was hurting his mental health. He was so unhappy as there was no place to really run and stretch his legs!) I’ll share a video here of Murphy lose in the arena. Even though he can run he is often lazy too, which is a good thing. I want a calm, relaxed horse that has the room to run if he so chooses. 😀
Can I get you a refill? I wanted to share my moving forward as I have been talking for years about moving closer to family. We are working harder than ever to make this dream come to fruition hopefully this year. We are wanting to move closer to my daughter who is 3.5 hours north of us here in California. I will have to keep you updated on this process as we are in the beginning stages and months away. I am hoping for a smooth transition as I think moving can be very stressful. We will work hard to keep stress at a minimum. That is very renewing, and a little hard to imagine at this point, so staying positive as we head down this path!
I’ll end with this image of my burgeoning basil and lavender blooms! My camera focused on the basil in the background making the lavender a bit blurry but I thought it was a fun artsy kind of photo. I have this “live focus” on my camera and I think works great on my bigger blooms, haha, tried it on this shot and it’s fun to see how it turns out. I also want to wish all the Mom’s out there a wonderful Happy Mother’s Day!
I thank you for sharing coffee with me today and I hope you enjoyed my renew theme for Becky B’s square challenge. I have to get going here, off to the stables to take care of Murphy and so want to get this finished up and linked up for everyone. Thank you Natalie for the #weekendcoffeeshare link up. I appreciate you all stopping by!
I can’t believe April is almost over as the months rush by this year. Welcome to my coffee share! Can I get you a cup of coffee or tea? The blooms are really making their mark here where I live, although I am still waiting for my Iris’s to bloom. Last weekend was birthday weekend for my hubby and my daughter. His birthday was the 13th and hers the 14th. We drove up to Arroyo Grande, CA where my daughter lives to celebrate. We had great food and fun together.
Above, my daughter and hubby in Morro Bay, and Dave and I with the mural behind us (and the sun glare.) 😀 Behind them is the rock which Morro Bay is known for and is a State Historic Landmark. According to the internet “it was formed 23 million years ago from the plugs of long-extinct volcanoes.” It was an important navigational aid for hundreds of years to mariners as it stands 576 feet tall. The town is quaint and fun to walk around and shop. We ate a yummy lunch in Morro bay and I forgot to take photos of my food. I had Shrimp Louie salad with shrimp and crab, DELICIOUS! And we ate with the view of the bay. Here are a few more photos.
Beautiful bay!The Morro Bay Rock!
My daughter LOVES ALL bookstores and so we stopped in town and visited this bookstore in the photos above. I found a book called Thoroughbred Spirit, and it has wonderful photos and chapters about The Blood Horse, The Sport of Kings and a Vision of Beauty to name a few. It’s been so FUN to read all about the Thoroughbred ~ I can’t wait to finish the book. Its a great book to have on a coffee table. ❤
We treated each other to dinners too! I did remember to take a few photos of the dinner we had for my daughter’s birthday. She is very much a foodie, trying so many great restaurants and expense is not worried about and so she will bring us to the best food restaurants in town. I am more of a foodie than my husband and my favorite channel is the Food Network which I end up having on often just to have something to relax to while I work on my crafts. Its on in the background.
Celebrating! ❤Me and hubby! ❤Delicious!Best pizza ever!
Happy Birthday to these beautiful people! I feel so blessed. ❤ The weekend was so wonderful even though it rained the two days we were visiting. Thankfully, it only rained in the mornings as you can see at Morro Bay it was nice and sunny in the afternoon. We ate at a nice restaurant in Arroyo Grande and the plate on the left above was an appetizer toast with tons of yummy stuff on the top! Too many things to remember it all, it was so yummy. And we ordered two pizza’s we shared. The one my daughter is about to take a piece was a caramelized onion, mushroom with the best cheese, walnuts and honey! It was so unusual an umami bomb! The other was a pepperoni pizza which was so good but a bit spicy for me. Lucky, my husband preferred the spicy pepperoni!
Meet Molly! ❤
I can’t remember if I’ve shared but will share again if I didn’t, that my daughter lost one of her kitties in February. She was an all black kitty named Evie, and she probably had a congenital defect that caused fluid in her lungs. She wasn’t that old but it was so bad that she has crossed the rainbow bridge. My daughter has another kitty named Mousse. You can see Mousse in the photo on the left staring up at the kitten. Mousse is just over a year old and she decided she wanted to get her a friend as Mousse was adopted to be Evie’s friend. Above is my daughter’s new adopted kitty she named Molly! She is about 6 months old, a little shy but super sweet! She wouldn’t sit still long enough for a decent photo. She’s so adorable, I just had to share. ❤ We are all animal LOVER’S and have many furry family members! ❤
Can I get you a refill? I have so much to share, my goodness, April is a busy month for us here. I think I’ve covered most of the happenings around here. I so enjoy sharing, and I hope you all have enjoyed the coffee and our virtual time together. What’s been going on in your neck of the woods?
Murphy was well cared for while we were away!This was when I returned, he is so happy! ❤
I’ve missed the weekend coffee share link up as I took too long to get this together this weekend. And with the time difference, it’s closed. It’s all good as I am still going to share, there just won’t be any link to others. I am going to have to write and share on Saturday’s!
Welcome April, and welcome to my weekend coffee share. Can I get you a cup of coffee or tea? I am looking forward to some warmer weather this next week. It has been unusually cold here in southern California as we haven’t seen 80F(27C) in a few months. I am grateful for the coolness but am looking forward to some nice warm weather as we head into Spring! I am welcoming Spring with all that it brings!
How has your week been for you? I am enjoying my new barn that I moved Murphy to last month. I can’t believe how fast these weeks fly by and we are having so much fun together. The other thing on my mind this weekend is friendships and how friends can change. I’ve been reading how as we get older our values and what is important most to us can change and that it is normal for friendships to drift apart. It is difficult to be friends with someone who doesn’t see you and in conversations can misconstrue what we say, as they feel hurt and betrayed and when you discover this as they share I feel shocked. All I can do is move on and hope and pray for them and hope they can find peace and happiness. Life is complicated and so are relationships whether they be friendships or family relations.
I know I am not alone with the struggles of friendships whether it be with loved ones or friends. I just have to say that its been a tough couple of years and I am tired and can only take care of myself. I find that blogging is therapeutic as I enjoy sharing my thoughts here and sometimes these thoughts when shared helps me appreciate life and all that life can give us. I want to stay strong and as positive as I can and pray that any angst I may have caused to anyone in my life will some day resolve itself. I know I am being very vague, intentionally so, as there is absolutely nothing that can be done with the family estranged or the friends that are hurt. Life goes on and I’ll pray for them like I always do. ❤
The stormy day looking at the mountains!The next day, mountain views!
I thought I would share some photos of the storm that recently came through. The clouds are so pretty and this year has been full of weather events. We have joked over the years that Southern California is just hot and sunny. We would make such a huge deal when clouds would arrive and we would relish every rain shower! The last two years have been the opposite of that where we have seen tons of storms and much cooler winter. The photos I’ve shared look so much prettier in person and the local mountains when covered in snow are dramatic and beautiful!
I found some blooms! They are not here in my yard but in my town. These daisies are just so beautiful and the roses are from the barn. I will take more photos of the roses as they have a long row of roses and they are all starting to bloom! I just LOVE all flowers and the blooms are so beautiful and make me smile! 😀 What makes you smile? I have a ton of things that make me smile, flowers are definitely at the top of my list!!
Can I get you more coffee or tea? I’ll end with these photos of the most handsome guy and he helps keep me going every single day! Haha, I know he will survive just fine if I did not go to the barn every day. I so enjoy being with Murphy as much as he enjoys being with me! As I arrive he always nickers to me to say Hi! I always turn him out so he can enjoy another area to explore, and I ride him about every other day or so. I am reading a wonderful book called “Horse Brain, Human Brain – The Neuroscience of horsemanship” by Janet L. Jones PhD and I have learned so much about horses. Did you know that their sense of smell rivals dogs? Who knew! They can smell things far better than any human and it is far better for you to let them explore their environment when they reach with their nose to sniff something, than to reprimand or pull them back and not let them explore and enjoy their surroundings. There is so much more I can share, but this is getting long enough! Just know that our bond together is AMAZING! I LOVE YOU MURPHY! ❤ ❤ ❤
Thank you for sharing coffee with me today and I hope you have a wonderful week ahead. I have to thank Natalie for our weekend coffee share link which is here ~ and please visit others if you can. I am thankful to be here and am thankful for my life, my family and my furry family too!
I can’t believe it is the end of March! Can I get you a cup of coffee or tea? I have had a busy March as my sister was here visiting from Idaho. One of her son’s lives here near me so it is nice when she comes to visit him, she also spends time with me and Murphy. This is my riding sister (she is one of four sister’s and one brother) and her and I have ridden together all our lives. Since I have recently moved Murphy to a new stables, it was great that she happened to visit this month so she could see his new digs. She also could see the change in Murphy and how happy he is now. We are all happy campers! 😀
My Sister And Murphy!
My sister and I have so much fun together. Where I now keep Murphy, the arena is amazing and really big. Since I am mostly doing arena riding with him, it is nice I happen to find a place not only with a nice big paddock for Murphy, but I huge arena for him to run free in and for us to ride. A win, win!! I am so happy at the new stables and I know Murphy is happy too! I have lot’s of photos to share since I haven’t posted much this month.
Murphy in the wash stall. They have hot water too!Me and Murphy after a rinse!Murphy after a nice warm wash! He is so handsome, but then I’m prejudice!
It’s been nice weather this March, not too hot nor too cold. Just PERFECT! As I speak however, there’s a big storm here for the whole weekend. SO MUCH RAIN! and more rain coming! Lucky, we dry out fast but it has been a wet year for us here in Southern, CA. I can’t complain except that I won’t be riding until next week some time when things dry out. My sister timed her trip perfectly. It was dry and sunny most days, and much warmer than Idaho. She went home to a little bit of snow on the ground and we headed into stormy weather. I wonder if we will have those super blooms that happen here with wild California Poppy’s? It is so crazy, as they bloom all over the hills and mountains after a lot of rain. It’s a sight to see and I’ll get some photos if it happens this year!
My sister riding Murphy at the new stables!
My first upload of my youtube channel I created. I hope this link will work. I am still learning all the techy stuff and my son helps me when I get stuck. How FUN! Let’s see if this works!
Murphy after a nice run!Me and my selfies! Haha!
I haven’t made a selfie in a long while! Haha, it’s hard with Murphy being so big. I almost got his whole head in the shot! 😀 I didn’t take too much time trying to get a better photo and am just sharing what I got yesterday. It was such a gorgeous day! And now it’s cold and rainy. My how the weather can change!
Can I get you a refill? How has this last month gone for you, anything fun happening? I am so grateful and thankful for the healing of our sweet dog BZ. If you missed my earlier blog posts, our sweet dog was attacked by 2 lose dogs that entered our secured yard. We think they dug under the fence. She is all healed up and doing GREAT! She has so much energy and is such a joy in our lives. Here are a couple of photos I took earlier today! ❤
Her pretty coat is slowly growing back in and she is another happy camper! ❤ It makes me happy that all the animals, our furry family are doing well and are happy. I have had dogs, cats and horses all my life and can’t imagine life without them. I have many up in heaven now, but they are worth every penny and every hour we are able to spend with them. Do you have any animals in your life? I know they can bring much comfort, joy and tons of smiles!
Murphy needed this room to run and stretch his legs! He is so happy!
I’ll end with this video of Murphy lose in the arena when I first moved in at the new barn. Since it looks like my YouTube link worked, I will share more in the future! Thank you to Beaton, a fellow blogger who shared this great way to share videos. I’ve seen many others share from YouTube, I just was too lazy to create a YouTube account. I am glad I finally did. I may enter Murphy and I in a virtual horse show soon. I have a friend at the new barn who is doing this and so she is encouraging me to video and enter the horse show. These virtual horse shows were created during Covid, and are still very popular today. It is a great way to enter with people entering from all over the world, without traveling a foot outside your property! I needed a YouTube channel in order to go forward and enter these virtual horse shows! Haha, another win, win! Since I can share them here too.
Happy Easter Weekend, and Thank You Natalie for hosting the #weekendcoffeeshare. I’ll add the link here and please visit others if you have time.
I can’t believe it is October 1st! I was stressing myself out for this last weekend as I worried about moving my horse Murphy to a new stables. I can worry needlessly as all my worries were for nothing as the move went really smoothly. The first thing I moved was my tack room with the help of my hubby and his nice big truck!
I have too much stuff with all my hanging bridles, halters and miscellaneous things. There is so much to go through and lots I want to try and sell or I’ll donate. I will work on everything little by little. Some of the collection of stuff was donated to me from my riding sister (I am one of 6 kids and only one sister is a horse back rider like me.) She has moved to Idaho. I have shared her riding Murphy as she’s come often to visit (if you follow my blog). Now, a lot of my horse things like extra bridles for instance will not fit Murphy as his head is bigger than the average size horse. It is nice to have extra tack in case you need it but if it will never fit him, I am thinking it will be time to sell. This is a work in progress!!
My hubby was invaluable as he helped me prepare for Murphy’s move. After we moved the tack room stuff, the next day was preparing his stall. The stable owners provide the mats where my husband is sweeping. I bought mats some years back that is in Murphy’s stall at the old stables. With my husbands truck and C-clamps to help pull and move the mat’s we moved 7 mats from one stables to this new place. The 7 mats will help pack down the new dirt the owner put in the stalls to raise them up and with the mats it will help keep the stall drier when they urinate and easier to clean. All the mats I moved are covered in shavings. The entire stall is not matted. There is a section in the middle that is just dirt with shavings on top if Murphy prefers to lay down there. I also do not have enough mats to cover the entire thing. I would have to go buy more which I am not planning to do. I think it looks great and Murphy should be happy with how it is set up.
Murphy’s first day!Murphy looking around. Where am I Mom?
Move day for Murphy! I stressed and stressed over this day!! I’m so crazy, but I stressed myself out of stress – haha – seriously, I got so tired of thinking he was going to be horrible walking 4 houses down the trail and down a very long driveway with dogs barking in one of the yards, I exhausted myself and had to tell myself I know what I am doing, after all I’ve been riding for 53 years! I’ve got this I told myself. Once the stress and nerves went away, I knew we both would be fine. He is just super tall and he did jump up a little as he got closer to the new stables, but nothing I couldn’t handle.
I knew I couldn’t get Murphy over to the new stables unless he was following another horse. My best friend who already moved her horse to the new place rode to me so Murphy could follow her back to the new place. It worked perfect. Once we arrived at the new barn, he was standing as tall as a giraffe! looking everywhere like where the heck are we? You are a good boy I told him, and I decided it best to get off. We didn’t know what to do once at the new place and with his stance and he’s so huge I decided let’s just put him in his stall.
The photos above are from his first day. He was a little nervous but settled a bit and started to eat. He also called out with a loud whinny as he misses his buddies at the old barn. He called most of the afternoon now and again. I went back in the evening and he was fine and I didn’t hear him call out. He seemed fine and made it through the night without incidence. ❤
Sniffing around the ground in the round pen.He’s looking at a horse in a paddock!He is lucky he can see over the tall round pen fencing!
I am so thankful that the round pen at the new place is really big. It’s almost twice as big as at the old barn. The only thing I was worried about is the really high fencing. Many trainers/ranches purposely put up high fencing in the round pen so that the horses can’t see out so there are no distractions when you are working your horse in the pen. The problem is, they can feel more nervous because they can’t see any herd mates and can really freak out if you leave the pen and they are in there alone. It was no problem letting Murphy be in there by himself as he could easily put his head over the fence and see me and all the other horses! He was very calm and never ran around crazy. He is so leveled headed, he amazes me and I couldn’t be more proud!
He loves his grain after our ride!Eating his hay! YUM!
Day two with Murphy went wonderful. After the round pen I decided to tack him up and introduce the arena to him. I decided to hand walk him all around the arena to sniff and see everything. I didn’t bring my phone with me so I don’t have any photos of the arena. I will get more photos soon for future posts.
He was such a good boy. Along one side of the arena are trees, much like the last place we were at and you can’t see through the trees very well, so there’s always a chance they can spook if they hear rustling of the leaves or something they can’t see. There are a handful of goats that live next door beyond the trees which we could see through a small opening and he was fine looking at them and watching them. It was so wonderful to walk all around, the riding and bonding we did just filled my soul. He is so much fun!
I thought this was enough for the second day at the new barn. We went to the cross-ties and I groomed him and we went back to his stall. He was such a sweetheart and I didn’t have a problem with anything we did together. He entered is stall like he’s lived there forever and I prepared his lunch/grain which he was looking for and he was a happy camper! Those are the photos above! Him eating his grain out of his bucket and then eating his hay lunch. 😀
My best friends horse, Roscoe!Roscoe heading to his feeder for his lunch!
My girlfriends horse Roscoe has boarded at this stables a couple years ago and for about a year. He was moved back a few days before I arrived with Murphy. Roscoe is who I followed on the trail and I am so thankful my best friend could help me out by being the lead horse. I haven’t been off the property on the trail with Murphy for many, many months. I pulled back from the trail riding so that I could concentrate on training in the arena so Murphy and I could bond and I could teach him more things to be a better, safer riding companion. We are getting there!
Thank you for coming along with me on the start of my new adventures with these two boys and the new stables! Today was the first day in a long while that I felt so happy and at peace. I think reconnecting with my best friend has helped heal my heart. After losing my sweet Chloe in May, my heart has been sad. I’ve also been having some family issues that still linger, praying for my family every day. But I need to keep going forward and try and enjoy each and every day!
Murphy with a mouthful of hay says thank you for visiting today!
I am smiling at my beautiful rose blooms. We had some recent summer rains and the plants just love the fresh water. They smell so wonderful! My honeysuckle has been blooming too and I just love the smell as I pick a small flower and enjoy the perfuming smell. I am smiling as I finally got some needed planting done this last weekend.
My hubby’s cousin had sent a living basket in memory of my hubby’s Mom and there were 5 different plants in this basket that were really getting root bound and I’ve been meaning to repot them. Finally, today I was able to get 2 big pots and I split up the plants and I know 4 of them should do great but one was not doing good and I almost didn’t replant it but I thought I would give it a try. We will see if it takes off growing in the new pots. These new pots are large and I figured they can grow for quite awhile before I may need to separate them again. Here is a photo! 😀
My new potted plants in pretty green pots!
I really didn’t want 5 separate pots and I really like the size of these green pots. They were so reasonable and they are plastic made from recycled plastic found in our oceans. I think that is so cool! As you can see in the green pots 4 different plants and the 5th plant is so tiny as it was being squished in the tiny basket you can’t see it in the photo. I will see if it starts to grow and if not it’s okay. The plant in the center on the chair is my arrowhead plant my husband bought for me 34 years ago when our second child was born. I was suffering from post-partem blues and to cheer me up he bought me a living bouquet much like the one that was recently gifted to us by my husbands cousin.
Where I live my outdoor/indoor house plants 😀 thrive under the porch with no direct sun and have grown very large over the years. All of my plants are over 30 years old and now there are new additions which I will have to put in my will for my kids to take care of I’m thinking! Haha, I just love these plants. ❤ ❤ ❤
My sweet kitties, Duchess on the left and Dinah!
My sweet kitties bring me huge smiles. I haven’t shared a photo of them in awhile. They are laying there waiting for their dinner. I thought I would try and take a photo and it turned out pretty good. Silly kitties! They are actually sister’s but look nothing alike. They may have different father’s as I heard that can happen too. As I think about what makes me smile, I will end with my sweet Murphy!
This is Labor Day Weekend, my sweet Murphy!
Thank you for stopping by my smile post for this week. I think it is good to think about things to be grateful for big and small and the things that make us smile! Have a great week!
Welcome to my weekend coffee share, can I get you a cup of coffee or tea? I can’t even believe this weekend and how we had to change our plans because of Hurricane Hilary! This weekend is our 39th wedding anniversary and we had made plans to visit my daughter who lives about 3.5 hours north of us here in California. We drove up there last Thursday evening not even realizing there was a hurricane brewing very far south of us in the pacific ocean. We enjoyed dinner Thursday evening and had a wonderful day on Friday. One of the things I wanted to do visiting my daughter is to check out a local horse boarding facility. I had found one that looked promising online and the owner finally called me back while we were up there on Friday.
It was a wonderful place, reasonably priced and the owner was my age and my kind of horse woman. Her husband was the handyman improving the property which was a wonderful boarding facility. They own 10 acres and I was very impressed especially with the riding arena. She says there are a lot of ladies who board and ride the trails there and she hopes I will join them someday if we make a move north. This is something I wanted to find to make sure Murphy would have a great place to live too.
Honestly, I think I talk about moving closer to my daughter more than my husband does. I think he would be perfectly happy to stay where we are and just keep doing our day to day things, without planning a thing. We have done a ton of living (day to day) which I am so grateful for but not a whole lot of planning for the future. So as we are aging, I think it is important to think about where we want to retire and/or where is the best place to live as we age. It’s tough, because my family is spread apart and family is one of the most important things to me so I want us to be closer if possible. My daughter has said if we do not want to relocate close by, she totally understands. We still have a lot of homework to do… We will figure it all out eventually!
My hubby and I at breakfast!Yummy breakfast at Del Monte Café!Left to right me, Flora, Dave and Linea!
We had such a fun weekend even though it was cut a day short because of the crazy weather. We had great food on both Friday and Saturday. Saturday was our anniversary and we went to downtown SLO (San Luis Obispo) and ate breakfast in this cute Café. It was opened in 1939 and I’m sure has had many owners over the years. It is really cute inside and the food was delicious! I had stuffed French toast, yummy! Flora, my daughter’s girlfriend treated us to breakfast, thank you Flora! ❤ and my daughter treated us for a delicious dinner that evening. Thank you Linea! ❤
My daughter lives alone, well not all alone, she has 2 cats. They are so cute and keep her company and busy. She still has one guinea pig too. I always love helping her as much as we can when we come and visit. This is one reason why I wish we lived closer, so that I could pop over anytime to help say hang pictures or clean the backyard. Since we were coming she made a list of things she could use help with. We only accomplished a few things on her list but we were able to help her declutter her backyard from many leaves and dead branches we pruned. We helped with a few indoor items as well. We also visited and had yummy meals together. And we watched movies each night. A FUN WEEKEND!! 😀
This was our anniversary dinner at a local restaurant that wasn’t fancy but had great seafood! Haha, we asked my hubby, do you want fancy? or not too fancy? He chose not too fancy, my kinda guy! I didn’t bring any fancy clothes so the hometown feel and great food was my kind of dinner with my daughter and hubby. My heart was as full as my stomach!! 😀 ❤
AND A Hurricane! I would take a photo of the rain, but I know you can’t really make out rain in a photo. The Hurricane has turned into a tropical storm and is upon us as I write this. We are all fine and we have good drainage around our house and the barn where Murphy is has good drainage as well. We haven’t been hit with wind yet but the news says it is coming. The eye of the storm should be going right over us eventually which could mean why we haven’t gotten much wind. I am okay with that. It has been raining all day long and it will continue through the night and into tomorrow. I am so happy I am off today (Sunday) but I am suppose to work tomorrow but not until 2pm. I know the roads will be bad tomorrow, so I hope and pray my commute to work won’t be treacherous.
I’ll end with a couple of photos of my sweet boy from this last week. I have so much fun with him, he sure keeps me busy and actually is helping me keep in shape too. The riding workouts are aerobic for both of us as we walk, trot and canter around the arena. I also get a arm workout grooming him and I walk a lot around the barn with and without Murphy. 😀 I love it!!
Thank you for sharing a cup of coffee with me today as I shared my wonderful weekend with friends and family. The central coast where my daughter lives is absolutely beautiful and the weather is to die for in my opinion. The high’s barely reach 80F(27C) in the summer months and lows in the 50’sF(10C). Its even cooler throughout the year. She lives about 2 miles from the pacific ocean. It would be a great place to retire, maybe someday. 😀
I have had this Snoopy for 50+ years. I’ve always LOVED Snoopy and the Peanuts gang! He’s still here with me and Snoopy makes me smile, as do my memories of a wonderful childhood! ❤
Welcome to my weekend Coffee share! Can I get you a cup of coffee or tea? I say iced coffee or ice tea is in order as it is hot. The heat is here in Southern CA as we hit the 90’s(32C) most days. We will be hitting a 100 as the high this next week but thankfully it cools down in the evenings into the high 60’s(15C). That means it takes awhile to reach 100(38C), usually late afternoon which gives me a chance to take care of my horse Murphy in the morning hours. I only have the mornings during the week since I am at work in the afternoons. I work swing shift 2pm to 10:30pm. Its a great shift for me and my endeavors!
As I write this I am thinking about my garden and thought I would share my teeny tiny itsy bitsy veggie container garden. I have two tomato plants growing and this year have finally gotten some ripe tomatoes. Last year my plants did not produce a single tomato. I am having better luck this year. I have basil and some lavender growing in the container too. Smells so good and tastes good too! YUMMY!
My teeny tiny container with tomato and basil!The last of my rose blooms from a few weeks ago!
I know I could put together a pretty big garden as I have the room. I am thinking raised beds would be good but I have limited time to tend to said garden and there would be an investment to the garden since I would have to get the raised beds built. I didn’t want to invest into anything too big in case we decided to move closer to my daughter up north. This is still something we may do in the future, we just have not nailed down exactly when we may make this move. We have put this on the back burner for now and will visit this topic next year. So I don’t want to spend a lot of time and money on a huge garden area at this time and am happy with my teeny tiny garden. If we push back our move, maybe I’ll consider making a bigger garden. 😀
How are you doing? do you need a refill or refresher? We ate all the homemade brownies I made last weekend. They go fast around here and were so delicious. I have been struggling a little bit with getting in ride time on Murphy. He is now 5 years old and is still maturing so I am not being too demanding on his work outs. Now of course, it is really hot and so I am keeping things easy not only for him but for myself as well. I do not need to get overheated, so I keep our rides short. It can be very busy at the barn and difficult to get the arena where I ride. I often have to ride near noon when it is pretty warm. The barn is a small barn, and we all have to share the facility.
Getting ready to ride Murphy! He’s so much FUN!!He is so inquisitive, such a personality!
Murphy is such a blast to ride! I feel like a kid again riding him in the arena. I can remember my days when I rode with the horse trainers when I was growing up. I am taking my time with him as we both have fun getting some exercise and I am always working on little things to make our connection together better each ride. He is a fast learner, and I try and work on different things a little at a time so he is not confused. I also change things up so we both don’t get bored. 😀 Riding a horse is very aerobic when you work at the walk, trot and canter. So much FUN!!
Murphy looking so handsome eating his grain! I Love him so much! ❤
He is by far the largest horse I have ever owned. I will have to measure him again, he is huge! Last measurement he was 17.2hh ( hh = hands high. There are 4 inches in each hand. In the middle ages this is how horses were measured and we use this measurement to this day). I think he may be approaching 18hh or he may be 17.3hh I will remeasure soon. My farrier who trims his hoofs said he thought he has grown when he came out a week ago. I see Murphy every day so it is hard for me to notice. My farrier sees him every 6 weeks. I call Murphy my gentle giant and he has a giant gentle personality too and LOVES people. He is so curious about everything, and I love how interactive he is with anyone who spends time with him or visits with him. He sure makes me SMILE! 😀
I want to thank you for joining me today. I also want to thank Natalie for hosting the #weekendcoffeeshare. There are many folks who join in and I have added a link here. I hope you are having a good weekend! I have been keeping busy but also trying to enjoy each day. I know we all have challenges we face and maybe its a relationship challenge or a health challenge. Maybe the challenge is the crazy weather we all have been experiencing. I am thankful for being here with you and I hope maybe my posts bring a smile or two your way. I know smiling brings on endorphins which can be healing and make you feel good. Today I smile for me and you! 😀
My girlfriend in Kentucky sent me this beautiful flower photo! I just LOVE IT!
Welcome to my weekend coffee share, how are you all doing? Can I get you a cup of coffee or tea? I can make it hot or cold or I have some cranrasberry juice if you prefer. I can’t believe we are in July! My goodness, the weeks just fly by don’t they? I am enjoying the summer weather as it has been pretty warm and as the weeks go by my sadness about losing one of my horses has gotten better as I move forward. The only sadness I sometimes feel is when I want to take photos. I LOVE taking photos as you can see, I try and share as many as I can throughout my blogging. As I go through photos, I see my sweet girl Miss Chloe and it just hits me in the face, oh my, this is the last photos I’ll ever take of her 😦 DEEP BREATH, it’s okay, I say to myself. She is up there running free with my other horses that have passed throughout the years. Other than the photos, my heart is filled more each day with the love of my horse Murphy. He is SO MUCH FUN! ❤
He is so handsome and is looking at me as I call his name! He is enjoying grazing, his favorite activity!Every day we are together we enjoy some grazing time! ❤
I have been loving on this big guy and we have been having a lot of fun together. We definitely have a mutual respect for each other. I use to have it in my head that I would not let him eat the grass at all because he is so big I knew if I let him graze then he could take over and pull me all around wanting to eat. However, I realized that with every relationship we have with others there is give and take and so I decided I will let him graze but I introduced cues that he understands. When we need to be done grazing and walk to his stall or walk to the hitching post where I groom him and tack him up if I am riding, I give him this cue and say we are done. (The cue is clucking to him and saying “we are done” with a slight tug on the lead line. He is very responsive and understands well!) This mutual respect with cues and understanding has improved our connection to one another so greatly that I think we are both so happy in each others company. It is fulfilling to be able to let him do things he likes and in turn he goes with me for things I like to do with him. I feel truly blessed to have Murphy in my life. He is so smart, sensitive and handsome! ❤
My new snaffle bit I bought for Murphy!My silly selfies, both our heads don’t fit in the photo! 😀
I have been looking for a bit which Murphy will like for riding. I have many different types of bits and bought one about 6 months ago which he doesn’t like very much. I do have one that I have had for years that is okay and will make a nice trail bit if I ever get back out on the trails. Last month I attended the Monty Robert’s horse clinic called “The Movement”. I attended last year too, but I did not purchase the Monty Roberts bit. This year the clinic was fantastic and I will have to share in another post, but it dawned on me why don’t I buy Monty’s bit which he created. After all, he is a horse whisperer and understands Equus better than anyone I know. I can tell with this black sweet iron bit, laced with copper it is something Murphy loves in his mouth. The sweet iron and copper induces his saliva glands and they enjoy the taste in their mouth which in turn makes for a better connection when we ride. He isn’t tossing his head, or bracing up against the bit. We have had such enjoyable rides! I wish I had bought this bit a year ago. Better late than never, I like to say! ❤
As I think about all the horsey stuff I have been up to lately, I need to take a turn and love on my family a bit too. I can definitely go on and on about horses, and sometimes I can find myself losing myself with all things horsey! I have to tell myself, Diana, you need to spend time with family and don’t lose touch with them. Well, I am not that bad of course…. as I have said many times throughout my writings my horses are my therapy and what keeps me sane. (I also needed a segue to talk about my family.) 😀
My sweet grandson! He was excited to see me! I was excited to see my son and my granddaughter!My son with one of his kitties. This is Dublin!Me and my selfies! This one is a little blurry, but the best faces.
I was able to visit my family in Arizona a couple of weeks ago. It was a healing visit in many ways and without going into detail, things are on the mend with my sweet family that I love with all my heart. My grandkids are such cutie patuties and I have missed them all and am hoping that the future looks bright. This year has had the lowest of lows with one thing after another happening in my life for different reasons. I feel like this last month things are looking up and even though I’ve had some sadness I am beginning to really feel better and feel like myself again and I have found my smile! 😀
Can I get you a refill? I have been thinking a lot about this year and I believe my faith and being an extremely positive thinking person has helped me through the darkest days this year and I have to stay strong and look forward and cherish the past (I’ll never forget my sweet horses that have passed on) and enjoy each day I am here on this earth. ❤
My new hair cut!
I’ll end with a big change that I did last month and that is my hair cut. I needed a change and it has taken me years to finally cut off my long hair. It is still long enough to put it in a pony tail, but it is too short for a braid which I enjoyed. I now have shorter hair around my face but it is freeing to leave it down and have it look nice. I intend on keeping it shoulder length as I think it suits me well. I REALLY needed a change this year in which I could look in the mirror and see something different and new. It has revived me in more ways than I imagined it would. There is something refreshing about making changes like hairstyle! I can smile in the mirror and feel good about myself and my life, I hope you all can do the same!
I thank you for visiting with me today. I want to thank Natalie for hosting the #weekendcoffeeshare. She does such a great job and I always like to join in when I can. I hope you all are having a wonderful weekend and have a great week ahead.
Mylife-and-Horsestories 