June 11, 2008

Counselor, New Mexico
I woke up early in the morning and had breakfast with Pat and the two kids. Then we went out to clean up the corrals. I think I should name the story of this place . . . the Horse Poop Diaries. I love cleaning horse poop. Pat said she thinks it is a very zen thing to do. I agree.

Then we worked with Toby the mule, and with T riding him, we tried to get him to pay more attention to the reins. After that we worked with R and her horse, Sparky. Sparky is a mustang who was wild a few months ago. R got on him for the first time today. I think she was more nervous than Sparky! He took it really well!

While I was in the kitchen making dinner (! yes, you read that right), Pat was out with the horses. The kids came in saying there were two horses out in the yard. I didn't think it was right, so I thought we should put them back in the corral. R put them in a corral that they weren't in before, and the other horses started chasing them around. I thought maybe we should move them to the other corral, but when we went back out, they seemed to be getting along better. Then I saw Pat across the road, and asked her. She had let them out deliberately, and so I went back in the corral and turned them loose myself. It was cool.

Oh yeah, dinner. I thought it was done when Pat asked if the spaghetti sauce was hot yet. Oops. A cook, I'm not meant to be!

Earlier in the day after lunch the kids and I took a hike up to some old Indian ruins. It was awesome. It was difficult to keep up with them, but we finally reached the top. They wanted to go home another way. A mountain goat route, I think. I got stuck between not being able to get down, and not being able to get back up where we were. T had to climb up another way, and pull me up! Then he went back down with R, and I climbed up higher to find a safer way down. One of the dogs came with me part of the way, and finding the way wasn't too bad. I have to mention here how beautiful this place is. A picture is worth a thousand words, so I'll take a picture so you can see. That little knob in the right corner is where the Indian ruins are. The knob is actually a part of the old building.

It was a pretty cool first day! Oh yeah, it is absolutely beautiful around here.