Potpourri

No, not the smelly kind - as in, a mixed up bunch of stuff. So, I'm at work today after having stayed home and taking a sick day yesterday. First sick day in, I can't even remember how long. Felt deliciously luxurious getting to stay home and sleep in for as long as I wanted to. The bummer was...I didn't feel well and that's about all I felt like doing. Funny how years and years later I still harbor guilty feelings about being "lazy" if I'm in bed during the daytime. I can still hear my mom's tiny voice in my head...isn't there something - anything better you could be doing besides laying in bed??? Will it ever go away and let me just learn how to relax?? Probably not. Anyway, I'm still not feeling very well, but I figured I may as well be at work collecting my pay instead of wasting my precious vacation time lazing around at home. Sick days are not a luxury I have, and I have no co-workers so I always feel guilty for taking a day off unscheduled. I hate that...feeling guilty is such a waste of emotion!

The horseshoer was out last evening and trimmed the girls and Shad, and we finally got shoes put on Ladde and Harley. Now I want to go riding!!! I want to go riding with just my hubby for a couple of times to see how Harley is going to be out and about with not much vision. I think if we stick to some wide, safer trails, he will probably be just fine. No super steeps and no drop-offs for us. We'll stick to the kiddy trails for a while and go from there.

Our horseback riding club has its' first scheduled camp-out coming up over Memorial Day weekend at Mt. Adams in Washington state. It's a beautiful location and has become one of our most favorite camping and riding locations. We're thinking that we may not be able to go because our truck is in serious need of new tires. I priced comprable tires to the ones we have now and they're almost $1300...ouch!! Amazing how expensive everything has gotten. We don't want to risk having a flat along the road somewhere with the horsetrailer in tow, so we'll see how things pan out, but it's not looking good. We were so looking forward to this camp-out too. Hopefully our lack of money won't prevent us from doing a lot of riding and camping this season. We may just have to stick close to home, but then we'll miss out on socializing with our friends and that's a big part of the enjoyment. Such a drag!! I wish this economy would make a turn towards improving and put lots of people back on track. Somehow, I just don't see that happening anytime real soon. I guess we'll just have to get used to staying much closer to home, at least for a little while.

Our weather is slowly becoming more spring-like. Most of the mud in our pastures has dried out and we're experiencing drier weather and more sunshine. The temps are still pretty cool, but I'm just happy the rain is decreasing. Hopefully before long, we can start planting our vegetable garden. We're staying pretty small this year, planting tomatoes, some salad greens and cucumbers and hopefully adding to our berry patch. We recently bought two more apple trees to add to the fruit orchard. We have peaches, cherries, pears and apples. Yum!! I don't want to go overboard, but fresh fruit in the summer is always a treat!

Hope all is well with everybody...blessings from cingspots!