April Showers Bring. . . Wait a Minute!

We've been getting a lot of this lately:

Which means riding has been a bit halted. I ride whenever I can, whenever the weather is decent enough. I'm not a big fan of riding in rain. . . not because I dislike being soaked (Well, I do, but. . . ) but because Daisy has always been funky about cars driving past on wet roads. Plus it decreases my visability as I ride, makes the road slippery, affects my ability to hear cars coming up behind us. . . etc. So I generally don't ride if it's raining at a good clip.

Today Daisy went out on the lawn for a half hour, for the first time this year. She enjoyed it.

I was taking photos, until I was ambushed. Miss Genevieve:

Besides some cropping on the one below, these are SOTC. :) I love my new camera!

These last two required a bit of zoom, and so I edited them on picnik.com. Not the greatest colors. I was headed into the house when I realized the other barn cat was visiting with Daisy as she grazed as well, albeit much closer. Daisy and Gronemeyer:

Gronemeyer has been known to plop down in the midst of herds of deer (. . . are groups of deer herds?), only to stand up after awhile and surprise them, making them scatter.

I went riding on Wednesday and has a great time. You know those moments where, despite the fact that you've heard it a million and one times, something suddenly "clicks" and you GET it? I was riding and thinking about this photo I saw that Smartpak posted of a Rolex dressage rider. Someone commented on how very closely the rider's legs were literally wrapped around the horse. Having seen the photo, it was all of a sudden much easier to understand and do, and voila, Daisy framed up really quick! :) I love it. 

My silly horse. So many times I ride and feel bad and think she's tired. . . but the last week she's been so FULL of it coming home. We always gallop the same straight stretch on the road, about a quarter mile, and she was hauling this week. And proceeded to gallop her way up hills following as well. And I thought she didn't have the energy. . . 

I'm so gullible.

Sunday Stills Challenge: the Color Purple

Alright, soo...I'm pretty lame-ooooooo, I know...I've had a very busy week, and rather than post nothing for Sunday Stills, I've edited one of my pictures from my archives...sooo...I'm a cheater...I used the archives, sorry Ed! :P

This is my cat, Genevieve, taken last year...edited on picnik.com. I generally am not a fan of the tool I used on this pic (can't remember what it's called), but for this picture, it turned out alright...and hey, I actually took it kind of following the rule of thirds! :)

See more shades of purple at Sunday Stills!

Macro Monday: The King

I've neglected to feature one of my barn cats (actually, both...if Genevieve holds still long enough, she can be next) lately, so here is Groenemeyer (aka, to me, "The King")...named after Herbert Groenemeyer, the German singer, in honor of my Uncle Volker, who died January 18, 2007... --------------------------------------------------
Yes, I realize the last pic isn't actually macro. :) See more Macros here!

Genevieve and Gronemeyer

Gronemeyer -> <-Genevieve

I'm going to write about Gronemeyer and Genevieve because I didn't really ever cover how we got them sooo long ago and because I have nothing else to post about...

We originally had one barn cat, Gronemeyer #1, but we didn't know what we were doing, so he disappeared one day and didn't come back.

We moved on to these two. We found out about them from a free kittens ad in the paper. I called the people and they said their kittens had disappeared and they'd call us when they got back (lol...). Well they called while I was in school the next day, and my mom was in town, so my mom went and picked them up. We didn't have a cage with us, so the people made us a "cage" out of an old litter box plastic container. The cats were SO small. We let them loose, and they both ran right away under the floor of the tack room and didn't come out. I was afraid they'd die there and ew...but thank goodness Mr. Gronemeyer is such a sucker for food. :) I put wet food outside on the floor of the tack room, and he came out (of course) and went to eat and I stuck him in a cage. But Genevieve doesn't fall for just anything (like food). She came out, though, because she was lonely, and I caught her. For the first week, she shook really hard when you picked her up. She was SO tiny! Gronemeyer was always pretty good about being picked up. I personally think Genevieve was the runt of her litter, because she was smaller and frailer then Gronemeyer for the longest time. What cute cats, though. We had to keep them locked up for 2 months to keep them safe. If the barn door was open so Daisy could come in, they were in a cage. If the barn door was closed, Daisy had to be either in or out and they ran free. They played in Daisy's pile of hay when she was eating, and cleaned up Daisy's extra bits of grain, too.

The day we let them out was very exciting. The world was already snow covered when they stepped out for the first time.

We had them fixed last February (I think...) when they were still pretty small. We had them spayed and neutered at Habitat for Cats, which does it for just $35 for stray or outdoor cats (barn cats). They were kinda funny in the car ride home---still all drugged up ;-). Now they are happy cats...Gronemeyer still gives us a scare now and then, leaving and/or getting into cat fights...but he's always ok. They've both gotten stuck in trees...I recall a day where I walked down the driveway calling and meowing (the neighbors already think I'm weird, so it couldn't really get worse ;-)) trying to find them, and lo and behold, they were "stuck" in trees, side by side.

Genevieve is the motherly figure to the cute but slightly dumb brother. She'll be waiting on the saddle rack in the barn when it's time to come in, and when I carry him in (he doesn't go in himself..he's always roaming) I hold him up to her and she always licks him twice on the forehead. They sleep together at night and to keep warm, too. And they are both quite the pros at killing nasty creatures-snakes seem to have "disappeared" and moles and chipmunks don't last long here. :D

Those are my two little babies, now almost a year and a half old...idk if this post was really necessary but it was still fun. :)

Have a good week, everyone! I'm still meaning to post a vid. of Daisy sidpassing over poles, but it just hasn't happened so far...

Bloggin' Out,

A Tribute to Genevieve and Groenemeyer

One year ago, I think around the sixth of October, my mom came back from Germany and we went and got two new cats for the barn; a second try, after the first kitten died (got hunted or something). We tried REALLY hard with these new cats. We kept them inside the barn for I think 2 or 3 months-they never set a foot outside. That was hard work, locking them up so Daisy could come in, etc...then we let them out for the first time. Since then,(many animals including but not limited to chipmunks, moles, birds, frogs, etc, have been killed) every single night they have meandered back home to get their canned food and get locked up in the barn. Genevieve will normally be there first and then after about 20 minutes of on-and-off calling, Groenemeyer comes, too. They're the sweetest cats on the face of the Earth. The first two days that we had them, they hid underneath the tack room floor and wouldn't come out...well, Groenemeyer would come out for canned food, the little pig, but Genny was still afraid of us. She used to shake when you'd pick her up. Not anymore! She purrs just as much as her brother. They're both just a little over a year now, and I thank God for them everyday. They're so wonderful. Anyway, this is so cheesy, here are some pictures....recent and old...

In case you're interested, some old cat-posts:

The Barn Kittens
Kittens and Chickens

Here are a couple from my mom's blog, too:

Curiosity Kills the Cat?
A Horse, a Girl & Her Cats
Cats Play

There are more on my blog but I don't feel like finding them and you probably won't look anyway :-P lol.

Catch Up

Sorry it took so long to post! I can't believe how busy I am already with school! (And Daisy, and Bible study, and the restaurant, etc)...this is just a cute pic of Abby and Genevieve...they lay on the porch together. :)

Daisy scared me by getting bot eggs on her. A bot fly lays the eggs, and they itch the horse so they bite them off, and then the eggs get inside the horse and hatch, and the larva (I think) eats at the inside of the horse, eventually dies, and then is discarded through the horse...lol...anyway, very bad.

See? All over her leg! I picked them off, though, but it was hard!

Dead bird the cats killed :-(...it's so pretty, even if it's dead...I hope you don't think I'm disgusting...it looks like it's stuffed...

My baby-Genny!! She's the most loyal cat I've ever known...she's m'girl.

Slightly blurry, funny picture.

Obviously I hadn't groomed her yet...haha.

A lot of fog last Saturday morning (Not the Saturday yesterday, but last week)...kept me from going riding with my friend Lydia :-(...I'll tell you all about that tomorrow!!!

This was taken from the house...you could barely see the coop.

SHE LOOKED UP FOR THE CAMERA!!!! A MIRACLE!!!

Grazing by the coop.

The barn at night.

My silly boy climbed a tree one afternoon...

^I LOVE this picture, it's so funny! ^ He's so cute, too.

Genny on the canvas covering our woodpile...she sleeps there a lot.

In the garage...cool pic, huh? That's a sled behind her :-P.

What's so interesting about this picture?! Daisy is eating grass in the laneway along the driveway. Normally she won't eat there--clover isn't good enough for her. She normally waits at the gate. I spent a sweaty afternoon this summer mowing that stretch by hand--ow...back and forth and back and forth...I'm glad she ate there now. Picture taken from above--on my parent's patio.

And, last but not least, our fat indoor cat, Freckles. She decided to cuddle up with the paper clips. Silly girl!

Isn't she funny looking? She's very sweet and loving though. She's fun.

Today was in the 90's, and now it's raining and windy...I took this photo this evening in black and white mode...I love taking pictures of trees against the sky. I don't know why, but I do.

I'll try to post pictures of Lydia and her QH, Stewy, tomorrow!!! :)

I won't be able to post as often now that I have school, sorry! :-(

10:00 PM

Silly Video

This video explains itself... :)
Sorry for my shaky hand, I was (slowly) walking down the steps as I filmed...

There Once Was-

-A Box.

There once was a little boy cat who made it his home for the day. He enjoyed it, as it was right by the door of a house. He slept in it, and was the doorman.

There once was a sister of the little boy cat. She followed her brother's role and played door-women while he went off to eat. She enjoyed it, as it was right by the door of a house.

There once was a sister of the little boy cat who played doorman and she stuck her head out while on-duty to see what was around...luckily, there were no intruders.

There once was a little boy cat who had a sister, and the two of them united and became an inseparable, clever duo, always on the lookout for intruders to the home.

Luckily, there were none.



(Uncle Gregor, this one was for you.)