Are you freaking kidding me?!?!?

I just read an article about the "strife" caused over the vaccinate or don't vaccinate controversy. Seriously, are you kidding me? If you're worried about letting your kid play with an unvaccinated child because you're worried that your child might catch something, you're missing the whole point of vaccination. You vaccinate your child to protect them from the unvaccinated masses (OK, so there really aren't that many unvaccinated children out there). The children who are at risk are the unvaccinated children playing with other unvaccinated children; there are no stop-gaps in those play groups. And really, if you choose not to vaccinate your child, don't get all pissed off when your child gets sick. What did you expect? Honestly?

When did that happen?!?!?

This morning as I was dropping Ashee-butt off at school, it hit me...she's not a little kid anymore. When did that happen? Just yesterday, I swear, she was "mustin' bustin' " at the Rooftop Rodeo in her little pigtails. And then it hit me again...none of the kids are kids anymore. Digger's turning 17 next week (17!!!!); I'm not old enough to have a kid who's almost old enough to vote.

Logically, I know how it happened, but in my heart the Heathi are still my babies, not young adults who want to make their own decisions and have their own lives. Even the baby, Monster, isn't much of a baby. He's grown at least 4 inches over the summer, another couple of months and he'll be taller than I am (not that that's a feat by any stretch of the imagination!).

Wow. Kinda makes me sad on one hand that they're growing up and won't need Mom much anymore, but on the other hand, I'm awful proud of the people they're becoming. Maybe all of the shouting, threatening and ocassional spanking is paying off.

Yay! The kids are back in school!

It seems really early for school to be starting, but it did and I'm so happy. Maybe now I can get on some sort of schedule (I say that every school year), but really I'm just happy that I know where my kids are supposed to be while I'm working. I'd like to say I know where they're at - but they are teenagers, so they're supposed to be in school and I want to believe that my children would never, ever ditch, but I wasn't born yesterday. Though, if I caught them ditching, I'd kill 'em. They know that. Hope the threat is enough :)

Vote for Julie!

Heidi Nyland, Julie Goodnight's producer, is also an exceptional equine photographer and has had many of her photos published in major horse magazines. In fact, Heidi's the one who took the picture of me and Sundance (one of the livery horses) last summer that ended up in Trail Rider magazine. Heidi's also the one who chose me and Estes to be cast members on "Horse Master with Julie Goodnight".

One of Heidi's photos of Julie and Julie's horse, Dually, is in the running for the October cover of Perfect Horse magazine. Perfect Horse magazine chooses their covers by reader vote. So...I've included the link to the survey so that we can all vote for Julie. I figure it's the least I can do for Heidi since she turned me into a magazine model and TV star!

To vote (and it's unlimited voting) go to http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?e=001OKrttuHNuHfq8VM5xUhe53_QzlEijLOPiV-A7PWF3MVzN_bdSqpuLRIxT3ji9rigt6xkskaHZ3EoU0h7sj6VaJs2xl4QheeazTtMkIO0NOQI72Yg6s8540Wuun1CRNUVs5aW6BieQtkhKti_DLyxrdKI9j0HQi4a and choose option #2.

Vote lots!

My TV Debut

Just finished watching "my" episode of Horse Master (http://www.horsemaster.tv/) and it wasn't too horrible. The worst part, as I knew, was my interview. I was thinking too hard. It was kind of fun to watch it, but I couldn't take my eyes off of my beautiful Estes. She's such an amazing animal! The cool part was knowing what was going on in the background, behind the scenes so to speak. Julie said Estes is a smart horse, but I think the divot above her left eye from not getting out of the way of a tree branch proves otherwise! Seriously, she's an awfully smart horse and it really did only take one correction from Julie and one from me to "cure" her. I've had her out on the trail since and not had a single problem with her walking off, even when I missed my mount (bareback) and fell on my arse beside her.

If anyone gets a chance to watch it, let me know what you think. It'll replay on RFD-TV Thursday and Saturday nights and again in September. I believe that Julie will also put it on her YouTube channel after all five episodes have aired.

Every Day's An Adventure!

Last night, the kids all decided to spend the night at their friends' houses, so I treated myself to a sleep-over at RockCrawlinChef's.

We were just getting settled into bed, talking (looking to do more than talk shortly) when suddenly RCC's eyes got big and he strangled out, "What the..." and kinda squealed like a girl then cussed some more before finally telling me there was a bat flying around the room. Since I was looking at him, I didn't see it fly in the bedroom, but sure enough when I looked there was a bat zooming around the bedroom swooping low over us (okay, it may not have been that low, but it seemed like it at the time!).

It was painfully obvious by the fact that RCC had curled himself into the fetal position and covered himself with the sheet that I would have to be the hero, so I *bravely* pulled a shirt on and attempted to save him from the flying mouse. It's kinda hard to figure out how to get ahold of a flying animal when the apartment has 12 foot ceilings! I finally got a t-shirt and an extendable (is that a word?) duster to try to trap the damn beast. The problem was that he wouldn't stay trapped. Several times he let me drape the shirt over him while he clung to the wall several feet over my head, but when I tried to drag him down the wall the little bugger always managed to get away. I was just trying to trap him and drag him down low enough so that I could reach him to wrap him in the shirt and release him outside. He wouldn't cooperate. Little bastard. I was just trying to save his life.

RCC let me try my humane (and obviously hilarious) way several times before he had enough and took matters into his own hands. Did you know that Swiffers make deadly baseball bats? Neither did I until RCC nailed the little bastard right out of the air and bounced him off the wall. He didn't actually kill him with the swing, but stunned him enough that I could wrap him up in the t-shirt to get him out of the house. Once we were out on the deck, I tried to shake him out of the shirt but he wouldn't come out (either terrified or dead) and in the process dropped the shirt off the balcony. Oops.

We're not quite sure how he got into the apartment; we're absolutely sure he's no longer in the apartment, but not sure if he's dead or alive. Don't really care.

So much for me being the hero; RCC had to save himself from the bat with the Swiffer. Do you suppose they'll add "Bat Killer" to the ads for Swiffer? Not only can you clean your floors, but you can also rid your house of those pesky flying mice!

Wilson Family Luck

We got back from Logan, Utah yesterday. The trip was definitely an adventure! We left Thursday night for the forever drive through Wyoming (surprisingly, it wasn't as horrible as I had imagined) into Utah. Initially, we had planned to stop in Wyoming and find a hotel room, but since the drive was going so well, my darling "driving machine" RockCrawlinChef decided we'd push through to Logan. Seemed like a good idea at the time. Until we got to Logan at 1:30 in the morning only to find that EVERY hotel/motel was booked full due to the Cache County Fair.

No problem, just down the road a few miles is Brigham City, surely they'd have rooms. Ha! Apparently the fair had a bigger turn-out than usual. There wasn't a room for rent anywhere in Brigham City. Again, no problem. Just twenty miles down the road is Ogden. Certainly a city the size of Ogden would have even one room we could rent and puppy-pile in (there ended up being six of us on the trip).

Double Ha! When I went in to the Best Western only to find that there were no rooms (we'd literally hit 10 or so places - every one in Logan and Brigham City), I finally asked why there weren't any rooms. Seems that there was a mudslide that closed Highway 6, an Outdoor Trade Show in Salt Lake, and all of the county fairs. There literally wasn't an open room ANYWHERE. But there was an open dirt lot that we were welcome to park in if we wanted to sleep in the car. Turns out that was the best offer of the night. Not wanting to believe the guy, we drove around for another hour, even stopping at rent-by-the-hour hotels (where we saw some seriously suspicious activity) in a vain attempt at finding a place to lay our weary heads. No go. At 4:30 in the morning we were back at the Best Western, parked in their dirt parking lot trying to get some sleep. Luckily, we took the Excursion which has plenty of room for five adults and one pint-sized kid to toss and turn and try to find a comfortable position to sleep in.

After an hour and a half, we gave up and went for breakfast then headed to RockCrawlinChef's aunt's house, where we all crawled gratefully into bed and slept away the morning. The hotel thing could have been an absolute disaster, but was actually hilarious. We couldn't help but laugh at the whole thing. Even once we got sort of settled into "bed" in the Excursion we couldn't get to sleep because somebody (RCC) would start giggling and set us all off again. Honestly, it was the most fun I've had sleeping in a car!

It's almost time...

Wednesday, August 13th is when my episode of Horse Master will air for the first time! I'm a bit nervous about it, but there's nothing I can do now :) I already know from the clip Julie posted on YouTube that I hate my interview; not much else can go wrong...unless they don't edit out me practially falling to the ground laughing because I couldn't get my damn foot in the stirrup. Just a quick note to anyone who may ever appear on a horse tv show - don't wear brand new Wranglers and expect to be able to mount up easily...break them in first. A lot of Estes' dancing around while I was trying to mount actually covered up the fact that I couldn't get my foot high enough to reach the damn stirrup. After I'd worn the jeans the rest of the day and stretched them out I didn't have a problem, but good god, that first take was ugly.

It's also about time for me to meet RockCrawlinChef's family in Utah. We leave this afternoon with his mom  and sister for the seven-hour (seven day?) drive to Logan, Utah to meet his aunt and grandma. I'm a bit nervous about it, but I'm sure it'll be fine. After all, the one who needs to love me does and the rest is just icing on the cake! Wish me luck, though.

Equine Therapy is Good for the Soul(s)

For the past few weeks, I've been fretting about Estes' club foot. She's been awfully stiff and sore and not wanting to do a whole heap - she just wasn't feeling well. I assumed that she was stiff and sore because I've got her barefoot and I thought that she was just tender-footed, so I called the ferrier to come fix my baby. Well, the ferrier didn't call back, and didn't call back, so I had my dear friend Kai (who besides being my boss is also a certified Equine Sports Massage Therapist) come up to the lodge and work on Estes on Sunday.

What a huge difference! Estes had been gimping around, getting depressed, going off her feed and in general was just blah! After Kai spend some time massaging her, which Estes LOVED, and showing me some stretches, it was obvious that she already felt better. Her whole demeanor changed - and so does mine after a massage. Why didn't I think of this before?

I talked to my mom on Monday and she said that Estes was moving without any limp and that she thought maybe we'd been way off base in assuming that her club foot was causing all of her problems. Seriously, I thought my mom was nuts, but I went up for a ride yesterday anyway.

What a huge difference! My Estes, the one I fell in love with, the one who is a royal pain in the ass at times, is back!!! I believe Mom now - I don't think it was her foot at all, but the long trailer ride we had to get to Salida, which is when we first noticed her gimping around and it just gradually got worse. It was easy to assume that it was her club foot because that's her only physical problem and that's the side that tightened up and she was gimping on.

It was good for both of us to go out for a short ride on the mountain and not worry about how her foot and shoulder were feeling. She's a totally different horse, and all it took was a little massage and stretching.
Kai - you're a Rock Star!!! I can't thank you enough for giving me my horse back!

Yes, it hurts!

Some time in June I got a wild hair up my butt and decided I needed another tattoo. I swore after the 1st one I'd never get another; the first one was meaningful, and is continuing to serve its purpose, but I really had no desire for another one. Hmmm...that's what I thought. So I thought it over, and thought it over, and finally asked RockCrawlinChef to design one for me. I love his artwork and thought it would be amazing to have him be the one to design my next tattoo. I didn't give him any parameters, just asked him to design something that would suit me and he did. He drew an angel wrapped around a semi-automatic pistol - what more could a GunDiva ask for?



I fell in love with the design and made an appointment with Erick at Tribal Rites to have it done...I had hoped to do it for my birthday in July, but couldn't get an appointment until yesterday. RCC and I went together and held each other's hands while we got permanently marked :) It was painful at times, but nothing too horrible, and it was a lot easier to handle it with someone there to take my mind off of it. At times I had to giggle, because RCC sounded so much like a birthing coach reminding me to breathe.

I'm pretty sure it'll be my last tattoo, but that's what I said after the first one. Already, RCC's thinking about his next one. I think I'll let the memory of the pain fade first.