Passing of a great horseman....

An old friend died Wednesday morning. Dick Osborn. He spent his life riding and training horses and running a boarding stable. He gave lessons to young and old. In his youth he rode cutting horses.

This picture is of Holly, Dewey (his dog) and Dick, around 1995-96, taking a break at Bear Lake in the Indian Heaven wilderness, here in Washington State. I really enjoyed that day riding with Dick, his ready smile and his pipe, his faithful dog, and beautiful Holly.

My first memory of Dick is when I was about seven years old. My Dad was a farrier back then, and he had taken me out to the job with him that day. Dad was to put shoes on Dicks cutting gelding, Hoppy. I still remember Hoppy tied to the hitching rail in front of the red barn. Hoppy was a little blood bay, all of 14 hands.

I remember Dick telling me that day to "Stay away from that mule, he kicks" There was a big white mule tied to a rail by the old old big white wooden barn. This barn has long been torn down to make room for the boarding stables that were Dicks lively hood.

I also remember going inside the red barn and seeing Dicks photos and awards on the wall, by the door to the tack room. A young child dreams of the things in those photos.

In later years my sister and I would venture back out to Whipple Creek Riding stables. My sister and her husband at the time, worked the boarding stable for Dick. Her ex is still there. I kept a horse there for around 8 months, cleaned 23 stalls a day to earn my board, with baby Meghan in a backpack on my back. That horse is Easy, our 26 year old mare. I also bought Mickey there, she is the daughter of Dicks stud, Hollywoods Dynamo. Son as he is called, is the son of Hollywood Gold Bar, a famous cutting stallion. Son is 32 years old now. Holly, the mare in the above photo is one of Sons foals.

I always loved Dicks quiet ways, he was quite the hand with a horse, and always quiet and kind.
I wish I could share all the wonderful pictures in my head that I have of him and his horses. Son has a very strong Palomino gene, I know of only 3-4 foals, out of at least 30, that were not Palomino.

My Mom bred her mare to a buckskin stallion Dick owned and later sold, only to get him back, to starved to save. Moms mare had Dusty when I was 8 years old, the first foal I had seen born, in our pasture. My Moms Creamello gelding is out of Dusty and Son.

I think its amazing to think about how long that I knew Dick, 37 years! He will be missed.

Rest in peace dear friend, ride the trails and that winning cutting horse again. You are now with your Hoppy and your Dewey.

 All my love.

Meet Cecil....

This is one of my oldest friends, Patti, and her new little boy, Cecil. She is my friend I have posted about before that had Cecil at 44! She sure looks good and Cecil is very healthy and a beautiful baby!

 He is such a cutie!

 This is a little blurry, but I love how he looks at his Mama, he is Mamas boy!!

And me with Cecil, I really enjoyed visiting with them, and meeting little Cecil for the first time!

Troubles....is it just me? I just dont get it.

I have a problem, at least I think its a problem.
We live on the same property as my husbands oldest brother. I have asked him twice to not feed my horses. Again today I seen him walk out and dump corn husks over the fence. He has never had horses or even been around them until he came to live here. My girls are fat and happy, and I do give them corn stalks when we grow them on the place. I do not feed them store bought corn husks, because of all the chemicals and mold. Another time, this Summer,  I found where he had tossed out in the field a bucket of old rotten apples. And a couple days ago I found a pile of moldy corn husks.  Come on already! I have explained to him that I cant afford that vet bill! when they colic over spoiled food??? They didnt eat them, I threw them back over the fence.
So I have asked him twice, how do I impress upon him that I dont want him feeding them garbage? I have told him that they are not cows and cant eat like a cow. I just dont understand. I want to know what they are getting and when, I am really picky about that.
I need ideas, or I am going to go postal on him! I was so upset and shaking when I seen him do that today.  Hubby he just shakes his head. I am going to have to ask him to say something too.

Do I really have to put signs up that say "Dont feed the horses" on property they have been on for 20 years!!!!

The many ears of Max....

Oh Max, he has many ear "styles"!!

The one ear back, on forward pose....

 The Taco Bell Chihuahua, flying ears look....   "Yo quiero Taco Bell??"

 The folded ear soft look....

 And the double inside out ear look....

He is so funny, and he has quit the ears!!!! LOL LOL And check out those front legs! LOL He really is 50/50 Chihuahua/Dauchshund!!!

I hate rabbits!!.....

Which means, usually, you dont like the smoke from the campfire in your face! In this case its one great big campfire!! There are several forest fires East of us, and the Columbia Gorge is doing its thing and acting like a funnel! Bringing all the smoke down river and into the Portland area. I borrowed this picture from a local news website. This fire is on the skirts of Mt. Hood.

You can smell the smoke in the air.

And it makes your eyes sticky.

 This is what the sun looked like this afternoon. It gives everything an eerie orange glow.

And more smoke!

Hubby smoked us some briskets for my Dads 65th birthday! Wow did they turn out gooooood!!!!
I didnt take any picture this afternoon of the party! Silly me!

Eye candy, Oh my....

I surprised my Mom with a trip to Lindas Dahlias Wednesday. I told her I would pick her up, wear walking shoes, but I wouldnt tell her where we were going! LOL

 I picked us up a Chai tea at Starbucks before I picked her up.

 Dahlias are my favorite flower. They are so magnificent, and tons of colors and shapes. It was a good day to take pictures, it was just a little rainy, so there were drops of water on the flowers.

 The varigated, stripped ones are my favorite.

 These are little Pom pons, about the size of a golf ball.

 Purple or lavender are my favorite colors.

 Mom liked all the blush/ melon ones.

 They are so striking, it was so much fun to see what they have this year, a lot of different ones.

 They are all named too, but there is no way that I would remember all of them!!

 Some of the colors just glow, like this pink one with yellow in the middle.

 Some are just so fun and happy!

 This is one of my favorites! Creamy yellow to lavender tips!!

 Another one that glows!

 There are smooth petals, curled, split and everything in between! And all of the shapes of the flowers have names.

 I do remember this one, its called Jokers Wild! the white spots on the flowers are random, you can have one like this or one that is half red and half white or with just a few petals that are white, its so cool! Mom and I both ordered this bulb.

 This one is one of my favorites too!! Or are all of them!! LOL

 This one isnt real clear, but the anemone ones were some of Moms favorites!!

 These are called Collette, or colleret, after the ring around the center I think. These I love too! LOL

 So many colors!

 This one is so cool!

I have a lot more to share!! LOL I will post a few more another time. If you want to look through the online catalog here is Lindas Dahlias website.  We had a lot of fun! Thanks for going Mom! The owners, Linda and her husband Bob, are old neighbors of ours too! So it was fun visiting!

Huckleberries and Fish....

Hubby and I went up on the Mtn. again. We went up to meet my Mom and Dad, they are up camping and fishing and picking huckleberries. We went back up to Goose Lake, this time my Dad has a boat. We finally found them, way out on the lake. I zoomed in for this first one.

Here is better perspective as to how far out they were! Its so absolutely quiet up there that I yelled their name and they heard us.

There were 6-8 boats and bellyboats out on the lake.

So they putted over to where we were. No gas motors allowed on this lake, they have a little electric motor that Hubby gave Dad, and he got going again. Works great for that little boat. Needless to say they were bright enough colored to see across the lake! LOL LOL

Hubby and Dad went back out fishing and Mom and I went and picked berries. This is one of the berry "fields".

 Here is my Mom through the trees LOL LOL. if she didnt have orange on, she would be really hard to see!! Thats why Washington has a hunter orange law during hunting season.

These cute tiny white flowers were covering the ground under the bushes.

Huckleberries!!!!!!

 There were a lot of berries, but not super thick. Between the two of us we picked about a half gallon in two hours. Mom gave me what she picked!! Thanks Mom!                    This is a Lupine, hard to see with the background. There are still an abundance of wildflowers up there.

 And Hubby!!!! They caught fisshheeess!! Hubby caught 5, and Dad caught 4, 5 is the limit. Hubby got one really nice Brown trout about 15-16" long!! Most were about 10-12". There were mostly Browns, and a few Cutthroat.

 The beautiful bowl of Huckleberries!!! I will let them dry and then measure 3 cups for a pie and freeze them.

If you have never had Huckleberries, I highly recommend them!!! They are so much more flavorful than Blueberries! They are so worth going up and spending hours picking, in my book!!! Hubby, he likes to eat them, but he hates picking them!!! LOL They have a red/purple juice and stain your fingers purple when you pick them. mmmm mmmmm I love Huckleberries!!!

Apples and Zucchini....

Apples and zucchini, oh my!!! Well I am going to admit it is Summer now!!! We had our first 90 degree day for the year yesterday!!! We reached 96!!! I have a lot of apples right now and the zucchini is coming on, taking up counter space! soon in buckets!! LOL (Dang I missed "National sneak a zucchini onto you neighbors porch day") LOL LOL Hubby and I picked 6 grocery bags of apples off of the tree in the front yard. I think they may be Gravenstines, but I dont remember for sure. Tart like a Granny Smith, but much softer and clearer skin. I put the apple pealer, corer, slicer to good use. Whomever invented this little machine is a Saint!!! LOL LOL

I processed a lot of apples! Still have two bags!!!

Hubby and I canned apple pie filling! Cant wait to see how it turned out. We had one jar break, so only got six quarts. It takes two quarts to make a 9" pie the recipe says.



Hubby had to buy a new water bath canner, as the one we have is older than the hills! LOL

 OH the plethora of zucchini!! LOL I love it in everything, scrambles eggs, zucchini bread, just sliced with blue cheese dressing and sunflower seeds on it is my favorite, at the moment!

I prefer to pick them the size of the smaller one at the bottom, but they have a way of getting away from you! And hiding when you pick! LOL The small size is a perfect single serving, salad size.

Made two Zucchini bread loaves, but that took a meager 2 cups of shredded squash! I really wish Zucchini would can well, I tried it, but its most suitable pureed as a soup base, its so soft.

And I am waiting for the Apple Butter to reduce down! Its almost ready and then I will can it up!

Maybe I will make more when I see how much this batch does. It took 4lbs of apples.
Until next time!!!