We are on the bottom end of foaling and couldn’t be happier with the foals we have on the ground.

                Monday was a really nice day. Except all of the kids were in school full time, and we (including the dogs) liked them at home part of the time. Anna is done with tennis, so she was home after school to help build fence, Mondays are fencing days.  We had the PHD (post hole digger) but it would only go in the ground about 6 inches before it hit caliche, so it was a hand dig, rock breaker kind of day. Instead of getting 5 posts in, we only got 3. Kade and Jaxsen’s baseball has not started yet, so they were also home, but for some reason Jaxsen was not out building fence. Kaine had baseball practice, so he came down after he got off of the bus, so him and I got there the same time. The three old mares are not happy about having the three mares in with them to go to King, but we have to put those pairs somewhere. Good thing we built an extra pen. The three older kids went home to feed their show animals, and Toni and I continued with the fence for another 30 minutes or so.

Tuesday was another beautiful day. Twist foaled and had a cute palomino filly. Kaine had a baseball game in Mattawa, so I went to that. They won 5 to 2. Toni, Anna and Kade worked on the two and three year olds, since Tuesday is horse day. They loaded Jitterbug, rode Jag, layed across Jojo, Stormy and Lightening.  All are doing really well. Stormy and Lightening won’t be 2 until this summer, so we are just getting them ready to go. After they got done working on the horses, Anna and Kade went to feed their steers and heifers. Ben was working late, so Kicker did all the cattle chores. When I got home we hooked up Butte to the gooseneck, and got the two bulls in that dad was hauling Wednesday.

Ben left for work early on Wednesday, so Anna did the morning chores on her own, normally her and Ben do them. Dad left bright and early with two bulls, one to Sprague and one to Rice, he has been to both places and made good time. Toni and Kicker went to LD and Gwen Green house to get some more continuous fence panels. Jeanie brought King down from Tims. Then Toni and Jeanie went to Jordan Pace’s  to get Jeanie’s horse and for Toni to check it out.  Jordan has broke about 16 horses from our breeding program, but none of ours. We plan to send him a few this fall. He had a horse we sold there while Toni was there to see his new place.  Toni, Anna and Kade dug some more holes on Wednesday to put the continuous fence up. It is really hard and rocky and the post hole digger was not working well, so we are using a lot of muscles.  Kaine and I got there in time to help with the last few holes. Toni put her grey Canadian mare in with the heavy pen. The kids purchased a mini mare and colt, John is bringing it out on Sunday. We already have the colt sold. John and the kids are looking at a new miniature horse stallion since Dreamer is getting fairly old.

Thursday morning dad and Steve headed to Toppenish area with one bull for Kody. Another bull was getting picked up, so Toni met with them, and with the small world philosophy the guy is good friends with Kicker’s cousin. Sports are getting into the way of Toni’s fence building plans, Kaine had a game right after school and then Jaxsen and Kade after that.  Because King is in the corral, we decided to tease his mares with Double to see if we needed to move any of them down with King, and they aren’t ready yet. Belle should be the first to come in heat, but we are teasing Belle and Reba just so we don’t miss anything. Kade and Anna worked on “their” horses and didn’t work on anyone else’s horse on Thursday.  So Jojo, Jag, Jitter, and Stormy got worked on. Toni was claiming Stormy but Kade says he stole her. She is a pretty typical Double foal so far and just takes everything in stride. We also sold some meat on Thursday. If anyone needs any, go to got-beef.net  We have a freezer full to sell.

                Friday Toni is still checking every morning. Nothing in the morning. The kids were running late, so she had to go give their steers hay, check, then run back home in time for court on webex. Dad went by the field and saw Red Robin had foaled, but decided we must have already seen it, so he said nothing. We unloaded the continuous fence and started putting it up. It is different that what we used before, but it looks great and has the connectors already welded in, so that is nice. It is 6 rail vs the 7 we used for the rest of the project, but who cares. It is allegedly lighter, but it feels just as heavy when you are moving it around. Marlo was out to help. Jax went to baseball, so he was the only one not there helping. We got all put the last panel put up with all of the extra help.  We moved Belle down with King. The kids took off for their chores and saw that Red Robin had foaled, so we ran down and saw it. Super cute filly, three white socks and a spot on her head. Got chores done and got ready for Sat.

                Saturday Ben had to work, so Kicker and I met Leslie and Stacy and we headed to Spokane with the campers for the junior show. We have 11 steers going and about that many kids when you count the 2 little ones that can’t show yet.  The three big kids worked on their steers. Toni and Jax fixed fence and started moving horses around. Kam came out to look at his two heifers and steer. He looked at the bull calves while he was out too. At 11:30 Chad showed up to trim Crossfire and Fly Guy. Fly Guy did great for his first trim. Then Brita, Norm, and Austin showed up to go see their foal, which was the foal out of Twist. Brita had already asked to buy it before it was born as it is a full sib to her filly she has now. The bull buyer got a flat tire, so once he got that fixed, he showed up about the time Kicker and I got back, so Toni and I loaded his 2 bulls.  Then we started getting ready for chores.

                Sunday everyone was still getting ready for Spokane. Both Butterfly and Dunny foaled and had colts. We are pretty short on colts this year. Our good friends Erina and Terry brought their  grandson Jr to see the horses and their mare Livvy out to get bred to Tank.  We drove around and checked everything out. Had a great time with Jr who is walking and talking. Dad let us use the trailblazer so we had room to spread out . After they left, we started moving horses around so that King has a bigger pen because he is getting 4 mares all at the same time. Tank has had Voodoo and Fancy in for a bit, so we turned them out, moved Gang, put moved panels so Tank could have Gang’s pen and the bottom corral pen, put King on the hillside, and moved 2 summer yearling heifers we don’t want to get bred down to eat the grass in the alley. One of these heifers is my belted galloway Oreo and the horses do not like her at all with her belted white belly. She is freaky to them.  We brought Twist and Red Robin to the house, one to King one to Tank.  We got Crystal and her filly in so that Crystal can go be bred to John’s stud PD (Judge Dat Cash). We also decided Tuffy needed her west nile and dewormer, so we chased her around a bit before she decided to go in. She is 27 and still acts like a range horse. Once she is in she is ok, but she is not overly friendly. Luckily she had some awesome foals, so she has earned her place on the ranch. Toni and I finished putting up the last post for the continuous fence, and by then John was there with the kids’ new mini stud. In our efforts to move a panel over to load Crystal we broke off a riser so had water spraying all over. Toni and John went down and shut off the irrigation water while I moved Crystal to the big corral, let Double out, and fixed gates. So we have made another project for ourselves for Monday.  Luckily Crystal’s filly, Cash, loaded right up without the panel, maybe because John with his 6’6 wingspan was there to grab her if she didn’t go in?  After all was moved and fed we called it a day.

We are on the bottom end of foaling and couldn’t be happier with the foals we have on the ground. We are also starting up with cattle shows, which seem to be back in full swing, so we are starting our extra busy season. If anyone wants to come out and look at foals or yearlings, we can schedule you in.