Some Sad News and Some Exciting News!

I have been rather unfaithful with keeping up my blog. I am so sorry about that. In the past several months I have had many changes in my life. Unfortunately, I doubt I can keep this blog up anymore.... I'm so sorry for that. Hopefully I can find time to post maybe once a year?

Anyways, I wanted to let everyone know about something exciting.... Ready to hear the big news? I finally own Winston! After years of wanting my own horse, i finally have my perfect horse! In November, I bought a saddle and bridle, and two days later my parents bought Winston for me as an early Christmas present! I am so happy to finally own him! Sadly, I can't take lessons anymore due to boarding fees, but my teacher has agreed that I can work for her in exchange for lessons, so I will be working at the barn whenever I have the chance ;).

That's all I have time for now!

Hannah & Winston

One of My Favorite Behind the Scenes Shots

So I really like the movie The Widow's Might, but even more so, I like this behind-the-scene shot. Enjoy ;)

An Update on My Life

Yesterday I managed to go out to the barn for a lesson with Winston. My teacher had decided to try a different bit on him, hoping to gain more control and attention from him. And it worked! He did really good yesterday, even though he spent most of the lesson trying to adjust to the bit ;). But he did great, and he did his best to please me. When I went to get him from the pasture, I actually got him to come partway to me. When he was in cross-ties, he kept trying to turn his head around to keep both eyes on me - which was a bit frustrating for him. When I put him back out to pasture, he stayed right beside me, when normally he runs off and goes and rolls around. But yesterday he stayed beside me till I left, then he followed me with a look of "No! Don't leave me here without you!". It was so cute of him.

Well, I'm still a bit behind in school, but I'm working on getting done ;). Catch up can be so hard at times.

Sadly, this year, after the summer, I will have to stop babysitting the kids I have now babysat for over a year. Since I enrolled in CollegePlus!, I will have to dedicate my time to studying. I'm sad to have to say goodbye to the kids, but I'm also excited (and freaked out) about college.

I hope all is going well with my dear readers.

God Bless,

Hannah

A Somewhat Disjointed Post...

It has once again been too long since I posted. I apologize.

As I sit here at the computer, finally having a few spare minutes in which to type up a blog post, I can't think of what to say.... I can't even remember what we have been doing since my latest blog post... all I know is that I'm falling asleep after spending all day doing 5 days worth of Chemistry. Ah, the bliss of being behind in school :).

Since I can't really think straight right now, I suppose I will just type what comes to mind ;).

Lately I've been spending more time on the Kingdom of Arrethtrae forum (www.kingdomofarrethtrae.team-talk.net). If you have read the Kingdom Series or Knights of Arrethtrae Series, I suggest you check out the forum. It is quite fun!

Sadly, I haven't gotten to ride Winston or even go out to the barn in the last three weeks. Life has simply been crazy....

Let's see.... We also were without power for six days due to tornados and storms on April 27th.... And those storms caused much destruction which we helped to clean up some...

Mostly it's just been crazy (well, when is it not crazy?).

Well, seeing as you have persevered through my boring post this far, I may as well post some random pictures, which will hopefully be less boring ;).

I suggest you keep an eye on your children ;).

This picture really isn't funny....

The picture says it all.

Isn't the bunny cute?

I was playing around in a picture editing program and decided to color in and edit a 'line art' I had found. Here is my end result ;).

What a Busy Few Months!

Like always, I have been too long in posting. :). I tend to not post too often... Anyways, let's get on with the post ;).

In January we had a surprise party for my older siblings (it was great!), then celebrated two more birthdays that month (Dad's and Daniel's). We happened to have several snow days, and on one of those days, we had eight inches! It lasted the majority of that week! We went to a monster truck show and it was pretty cool. For Daniel's we went to Chuck-E-Cheese's. We hadn't been there since his.... 5th? 6th? birthday.... anyways, it had been several years. We were slightly concerned about going, considering that the last time we went we came home very sick. This time, we armed ourselves with several large bottles of hand sanitizer :). And we all stayed well!

I have been continuing to work with Winston, and now I also have another horse that I can ride whenever I want. Her name is Breeze. I also am going to be teaching my Mom how to ride! This morning Zachary took Lauren and I to the barn. Lauren rode Breeze and I rode Winston. When I was riding Winston bareback (one of us had to ride bareback since Winston and Breeze use the same saddle), he was perfect and calm (I even trotted him, which I hadn't done bareback before). After Lauren was done riding Breeze, I got on her a bit. She is a great horse, small compared to Winston, and has a great walk and trot. Her only problem is her stopping and cantering. She doesn't like to stop when asked too, and her canter is fast and reckless. So I guess I now have two horses with 'issues' to solve. After riding Breeze a bit, I put the saddle on Winston. As soon as I mounted up, he started acting up. I could tell he was a ticking time bomb. I made him stay at a walk and trot, and when his trot got a bit too fast, I had him stop and back up, which he did. But as soon as I rewarded him with a bit of slack in the reigns, he took off from a stand still into a huge, fast canter. Trust me, he has a fast canter. When he canters, no one can stop him unless he wants to stop. So he cantered around the arena eight or nine times before finally listening to me and stopping. And he wasn't even breathing hard after that! That horse is fast and has lots of endurance, that's for sure! I'm wondering if he has a bit of Thoroughbred in him. I already know he most likely has some Quarter Horse, and if he has both Thoroughbred and Quarter Horse, that would explain his speed and his endurance (speed from Quarter Horse, endurance from Thoroughbred). I got him to calm down a bit and made him walk around a while before I got off. Sometimes, he can be the brattiest, most head-strong horse around! But I still love him.

Oh! I forgot to mention that we FINALLY got and iMac! Yeah! And my parents got iPhones, and let me tell you, it is slightly... weird... to see my own Mom walking around staring at a iPhone screen! And texting her? Even weirder. My Mom never texted with her old phone... so now it's taking some getting used to ;).

Over the past two weeks I was a bit sick. But I'm well now!

Yesterday I went to the barn for a riding lesson. Winston was way out in the far corner of the pasture, so I got to slog through all the mud and rain puddles to go get him. And then he was all muddy. And shedding... so it took me a while to get him cleaned up enough to saddle him. Our lesson went pretty well though.

Last night I went to a class to learn Adult CPR. That was quite interesting, considering it was from 6-10pm and the only ones in the class were me, a boy that lives across the street from me, and another boy. Quite fun... depending on what your definition of 'fun' is.

Last night we also had some friends over to spend the night at our house... that was interesting, considering that Daniel slept in my room, so at 7:30 this morning he woke me up... by petting my head...

Today it's warm outside and really pretty. But sadly, it doesn't look like I will get to go to the barn to ride...

Well, I suppose that is all for now! I hope all of my readers are enjoying the life God has blessed them with (and I hope this post wasn't too boring!).

Until next time,

Hannah Joy :)

Our snow fort! I love how the fence color turned out in contrast to all the snow.

Our tree fort buried in snow.

Winston and I

I was riding my bike one day and stopped to take some pictures... thought this would be an interesting shot...

Happy New Year!

Well, the year 2010 is now over and we are already several hours into 2011. Has anyone noticed today's date? 1/1/11? Cool, isn't it!

Well, i spent New Years Eve night doing Christmas Town at the Creation Museum, and after that, a bunch of us played volley ball all night! So the first thing I did this year was play volley ball.

We are staying in the Deck Lane/Bunkhouse with several other people. Try figuring out logistics of showers when you have a total of around nine or ten people for one shower!

We are having lots of fun though. Yesterday we hung out with some of our friends that we hadn't seen in a while.

Tonight is the last Christmas Town event of this season, but the first of the year 2011.

I suppose I'd better finish my Pop-Tart and then see what we will be doing until we have to get in costume this afternoon.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!!!!!!!

Southern Happenings

Yes, it has once again been too long since I have updated. I apologize for that. It's been quite crazy around our house lately... with my birthday in September, then Reformation Day in October, and traveling to the Creation Museum in Petersburg, Kentucky, Thanksgiving weekend, and once... wait... twice again traveling to the Creation Museum.



I guess I should start where I last left off in my blogging. I guess the last thing I really said was that Beauty was getting adopted. Well, sadly, that adoption fell through. BUT the week of Thanksgiving, all three mustangs (Ace, Beauty, and Ruby) were taken to a mustang adoption and were all adopted! Their pens look strangely empty now.........

For my birthday back in September, we went ice skating and a few of my friends and their families got to come too. That was great fun! We even proved that there are three girls (me included!) that can skate faster than the guys (yeah!). After ice skating we went out to eat and then Zachary and Lauren took me to the mall to do some fun shopping (and we had a blast!). For my birthday I got a really big framed horse painting that has a Bible verse on it (and now belongs on the wall over my bed), I got a really neat little box (I call it my treasure chest :D), a really nice leather coat (it's quite warm!), three western shirts, a new western belt (it's got braided horse hair for decoration on it!), a Lil' Kinz panda (which I named Charlie Oreo), 18 Kids and Counting DVDs, money, an awesome horse lamp (I'll have to post a picture sometime if i remember to), an awesome hat that says "Equine Spirit", a necklace from my best friend (we have matching ones now - mine says "Friend" and her's says "Best"), money, and lots of other stuff too.

Next was Reformation Day. This year my best friend and I once again re-inacted Margaret (me) and Agnes (my friend) Wilson. Margaret was an eighteen year old scottish martyr and Agnes was her thriteen year old sister who was also convicted, but ransomed.

Lets see..... what comes after that? Ah, yes, the Creation Museum. The first weekend in November my family traveled up to Petersburg, KY, to volunteer at the Creation Museum. That whole weekend my Dad and Zachary worked on building props for "Christmas Town" while Lauren, Mumma, and I worked on fringing costumes (lots of fun..... sitting on the couch, watching movies while your fingers start hurting from pulling the fabric apart....). Actually, I got "Daniel Duty" most of the time - spending time occupying Danny by taking him to the petting zoo and through the museum. That Sunday we decided to go to a church service held at the Creation Museum. Daddy only gave us about five minutes warning (amist packing and cleaning up the bunkhouse to leave later that day), so we ended up going in our blue jeans, t-shirts and sweatshirts, and tennis shoes. Let me tell you, going to church for the first time in the fifteen years of your life wearing blue jeans is pretty awkward......

Thanksgiving weekend was spent in Mississippi at our grandparents' house. On Thanksgiving day, my older brother took me hunting. It was quite fun, even though we didn't bring back any deer meat.... Oh well, maybe next time, eh?

Last weekend we traveled back up to Kentucky for the Christmas Town dress rehearsal/benefit dinner. Friday night was pretty cold, considering we were standing out there in three layers of clothing plus our costumes. Saturday morning I woke up in a winter wonderland of two inches(ish) of snow on the ground. I took Daniel outside to play in it for a bit while everyone else finished up packing. He decided to throw a snowball in my face, then rub the snow in... so he got tackled :). I'll tell you... it's pretty weird to find yourself waking up in Kentucky with two inches of snow on the ground (with it still snowing!) but fall asleep at home with the weather feeling rather warm at somewhere around 60 degrees....

This weekend we travel to Kentucky once again to participate in Christmas Town. In fact, we leave tomorrow.... It's kinda weird that when I was little I considered three hours in the car to be a "long trip", but now, six hours in the car isn't too bad.

Have I really gotten this far in my post and not mentioned anything about Winston?! Well, he is comming along quite nicely. When I first began riding him, he would become confused and freak out a bit. Yesterday, when I went out and spent some time with him, he stayed quite calm. He has finally gotten out of his confusion and freaking, and now has quite an attitude about him. He has gotten into the habit of playing 'chase' whenever I get him out of the pasture, but amazingly enough, yesterday he walked up to me and didn't run off. He also tends to get worked up in our lessons - getting himself into the mindset of "let me run, or let me stand still". He seems to stay much calmer outside of the lesson setting (not sure why, it could be that my methods of doing some stuff with him is different than the methods my teacher uses). Yesterday when I rode him I saddled him up and rode for a little while with the saddle on him, letting him get some of his energy out. Then I did something brave. Well brave considering he is a 15.2ish hand high (a 'hand' is four inches) horse and quite big, and tends to be hyper when being ridden. I rode him bareback. Amazingly enough, he seemed quite calm being ridden bareback. In fact, he seemed calmer being ridden bareback than he is being under a saddle. After riding him (by that time I was slightly cold - after all, it was only 30-something degrees outside!), I had to give him some feed and Mumma and I had to feed the four cats (Peanut, Gidget, Gizmo, and Morris) and lock them in the tack room, feed Lucky the dog and tie him up, then lock up the barn before heading home. All in all, it was a very fun day at the barn.

Well, I had best wrap up this blog ramble before it gets too terribly long.

Adios my dear readers, and I hope that I shall see you soon.

Hannah :)