Embrochure and Endurance

Embrochure and Endurance

When you haven’t played clarinet for 20+ years, one of the things you quickly notice when you get back to playing is that the muscles of the cheeks and lips really get a workout. The embrochure (the way you hold your lips and mouth) really taxes muscles that...
Winter Feeding Has Begun

Winter Feeding Has Begun

Last week I blogged that we had most of the hay we need for the winter, and I anticipate getting the last load next week. Well, we had our first freeze of the season (no freeze watch, but hey the National Weather Service forgets about us all the time) and that means...
Back At The Music Stand

Back At The Music Stand

Oh how the mighty have fallen. For someone who used to be an 1+ soloist at middle school competitions and who was part of state honor band, now, I swear my clarinet playing sounds like a drunk goose. And I should know. I have geese, though they haven’t been...
Happiness is…hay!

Happiness is…hay!

This past summer in the Ozarks we had a really bad drought. While the rain has certainly picked up in the last month or so, the news reports in early October were all about farmers selling off cattle and worried that they wouldn’t be able to feed them. Not only...
Winter Feeding Has Begun

Colic!

I’ve never dealt with colic before. I’ve seen it on tv shows, heard about it, read about it in Equus, but I’d never really actually dealt with it in all of it’s down, rolling, scary realness. Last year my filly Firefly had a bit of gas colic....

We’re getting SmartPaks!

I finally did it! Checked the budget and decided to get my girl SmartPaks. You see, Fortune (my older mare) gave me a horrible scare that I’ll blog about tomorrow this week. And I realized, the way that she’d been eating probably wasn’t the best for...
When Your Equine Baby Gets Hurt

When Your Equine Baby Gets Hurt

I’ve been blessed when it comes to Fortune. Though I’ve had her since she was 3 months old, and she turned 19 last month, we’ve never had many major issues. An abscessed tooth when she was 2ish, some thrush when she was stalled, but for the most part...