Well I don't see it splashed on a Hollywood tabby...

Shadow here thinks he is ready for show biz...

Today's post is going to be super short, as we are having our Missions Conference this weekend and I am helping out with the children's program so I have to be back early this morning. There is, of course, the fact that I arrived home rather late after last night's program and overslept (but we aren't going to mention that, 'kay? :o)  I will say that Mr. Former Big Lick Horse (photo left) is capable of lifting his legs up very high all by his lonesome, and I may eventually try to teach him the Spanish Walk. I just have to figure out the best way to do it without traumatizing him (you can read about his PTSD issues here if you're interested).

Is this picture wild or what? I remembered this shot when I was collecting photos for the video slide show, and was tickled pink to note that it actually was his right foot; and how awesome is that? I am, however, honor bound to restate that this picture really was a happy accident (but it doesn't detract from the coolness factor, now does it?) 
Well, that's all for this week and if you'd like to watch the video again, you can scroll down to last week's post ('cause it's not far) or click here. Horsey hugs and happy thoughts everybody! 

Rain Rain GO AWAY

...but over all, I don't think it's too shabby
This slide show video clip was done well before the video I posted a few weeks back (here's a link to the post in case you missed it: Cold and Colder). What was supposed to be a simple thing, turned into a ginormous (er, that's a technical term) ordeal to get it from the iMac at work to home, then uploaded to Vimeo. Being human, many repentable words were snarled at the computer by yours truly; but I finally got it - WooHoo!) I worked hard on getting the right photos to match with the words in the song, particularly at "big right foot". So let's see how many of you have eagle eyes and can see why that shot might be pretty darn cool, 'cause it's a tricky one. I can't remember who said it (was it you Ratty?) but the photo was one of those "happy accidents" I discovered after the film was developed. Enjoy!

Horses Are A Gift from Jen on Vimeo.  
Oh, and there's no prize for getting it right, but I promise to give you a nice big round of applause if you spot it!

Now I'm off to sit in class for a couple days to earn some CEUs for interpreting; hence the Friday post. I'm taking hubby's laptop with me, though (pretty sure I'd get the DT's if I had to go cold turkey for two days :o) Thanks for reading! 

Rina: Our Blood Bay Barometer

..And don't come back for days and days!

If you have been watching the weather (or experiencing it), you'll know that we have been hit with record rains here in the southeast; flooding is rampant.  The horses are miserable, and every bit as cranky as we are at the current state of sogginess. Thankfully, the house in the photo below is not ours...although we have standing water here too, it is not at flood stages (except for the Moo Crew's stalls, that is, which are now ankle deep in water). Since the horses are only in the stalls twice a day to eat, it's not a complete disaster (it sure would be miserable if they had to stay in there though).

  Happily, Rickey has found someone that owns a dump truck and may be able to help us get some dirt; of course we have to wait for it to dry up enough for him to get in there...otherwise he'd just get stuck (kind of like the farm truck did last week when we dropped more hay - took us an hour and a half to get it out...grrr :oP

The horses do like to play in the rain, especially when the temperature drops.  The cooler temperatures not only give them lots more energy, but the running and jumping around also helps them to stay warm.

The photo below turned out so well, I ended up listing it as a print in my Etsy shop.  I entitled it, "Pinging in the Rain" after one of my favorite old movies (plus it was a really bad pun, which just I love :o)

Of course after the pinging, comes the rolling...

Woo-Hoo! Today is Saturday, and Here comes the sun....HOT DAWG!!

A Note from the Girls:

Not only is there sunshine, but Mrs. Ladyperson [Jen] let us in the riding area where there is Winter Rye Grass coming up.

HOORAY!




So tell me, how's the weather at your house? Have you had oodles of rain or snow? Or did you manage to miss all the fun (sarcastically speaking, that is :o)

Let the nail biting begin!

Those two verses are one of the most foolproof weather gauges of all time, it's never wrong. I've used it for years and it has always held true; of course that was before we got our little four legged weather woman. While I am well aware that all horses tend to "take it up a notch" when there is a shift in the weather pattern, Rina seems to take it to a whole new level. She is, in essence, a panic attack looking for a place to happen on days it's going to storm.

The photo on the right shows her standing at full equine alert on one such day (she's 3 in this picture and still in her "gangly" phase :o) While she doesn't run around like a raving lunatic, she is definitely edgy and easily agitated. The full alert in the photo was her response to my saying her name softly; I only wanted her to look at the camera (Xanax anyone??)

You can see that the skies are clear in the background, although we did indeed have thunderstorms that day...she doesn't often miss.

To be honest, it took me awhile to catch on to the meaning behind the behavior. I spent lots of time wondering, what on earth is wrong with you today, Rina? As well as some personal eyeball rolling and thoughts like, you are such a total goose girl, sheesh!

The strangest day turned out to be the one in which Rina completely transcended edgy by plopping herself down on the ground in front of the water trough right at breakfast time; what on earth?!?

That was the day a tornado passed over our house, and talk about scary. God was very good to us; aside from a neighbor's metal arbor being squashed flat, there was absolutely no damage done here and yours truly developed a much deeper respect for Rina's forecasting capabilities.

This morning's breakfast report was pink skies and a pingy Rina. Hmmm...guess we're in for some stormy weather today, huh? :o)



If you are interested in exploring equine body language (I'm totally fascinated by it), please see my lens on Squidoo (it took me forever, but I think it turned out pretty well :o) http://www.squidoo.com/EpicFarmsBodyLanguagequidoo.com/EpicFarmsBodyLanguage Thanks so much for stopping by!

We Squidoo, Do You??

Oh my goodness, Epic Farms is in the running for a $3,000 charity donation from Squidoo! In case you've never heard of it, Squidoo is an online community that allows you to build lenses (web pages) on just about anything you can come up with. It's fun!

This month, they decided to hold a contest for a charity giveaway of $3,000. In order to be eligible, each charity had 7 days to create 10 lenses - talk about your crossed eyeballs, right? Well, we did it! Tremendous thanks goes to my two legged and four legged family members for allowing me to closet myself in my office where I holed up like a mad scientist creating lenses left and right (got 'em done, though :o) After submitting our lenses, we were officially qualified and in the running. The winner of this donation will be decided by popular vote this Monday and Tuesday (July 20th and 21st) and the officials at Squidoo will make their announcement on Wednesday.

Voting opens "bright and early" tomorrow morning, (although I started biting my nails yesterday in preparation) and if you'd like to vote for us here's the link: http://www.squidoo.com/charity-giveaway-voting You have to belong to Squidoo to vote, but signing up is a piece of cake. The competition is pretty stiff, but believe it or not there are only 8 competitors total. This means we have a pretty darn good shot at winning this donation!

Here are the lenses I created over the past week; just in case you'd like to see them:

http://www.squidoo.com/FOSH * http://www.squidoo.com/EasyPeanutButterFudge * http://www.squidoo.com/ShadowsLens
http://www.squidoo.com/RandyAlcorn * http://www.squidoo.com/EpicFarmsPhotoFun * http://www.squidoo.com/ChampsLens
http://www.squidoo.com/His * http://www.squidoo.com/Psst * http://www.squidoo.com/ilovefireproof
http://www.squidoo.com/LadysLens

Although we could definitely use the donation (with the storm damage and everything else we have going on around here :o) it is nice to know that however this ends up, the money will have gone to a worthy cause. You can't ask for better than that, now can you?