In memoriam: RIP my little friend, Raspy

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Ranch Revealed...

The winner is:

Say what? That's not right...

Oh please......

Wait!

Yup, that's it....

Welcome to THE BLACK SQUIRREL RANCH!

*No squirrels were harmed during this deliberation and we also have no plans to actually rope or ride black squirrels. They are just free to continue scampering across the lawn. Oh, and we aren't gonna rescue any either. There are still only four little "squirrels" in the house, guarded by one big white one:

Misty Morning Visitors

Found a little something in our driveway this morning...

Usually, we find deer in our front yard.

Cowgirl Kimi wrangled 'em into one of thepaddocks....where they promptly

went to meet Princess Buffalo: aka Gretel, the exploring Mini Horse. She's

run away into the woods 3 times, looking for the candy gingerbread house of the White Witch.

(Which is why her name went from Jellybean to Gretel...now we just need to find Hansel!)

 

Does anyone else see how tall Joe is, compared to me? (Joe's the black guy; I

don't know the name of the little albino horse, but he's nice).

The boys trying to get a gander at Gretel. She's cute:

how could they not be interested?

Downward Dog

It's kind of hard to believe this guy was born and raised 50 miles above Mexico, in Arizona.

I don't think he minds the cold weather in Wisconsin....

Sweet and Sour

In addition to an amazing surprise birthday party for me, Mr. H got me a Meyer lemon tree for my birthday. I've always wanted to grow citrus, but only lived in a suitable climate for it in Arizona. And then, everyone else had a surplus of lemons and kumquats, so I just let them give me bag after bag. Delicious!

There are certain types of fruits that can be grown indoors, so that is how we came to settle on a dwarf Meyer. We named him Meyer Lemsky, loosely attributed to the mob accountant Meyer Lansky. (I don't know why).

Wulf keeping an eye on Meyer before he got transplanted.

Lap Dog

Can I please sit on your lap while you type? Loki does it.....

The Big 3-6!

Thank you so much to my wonderful husband who single handedly organized a huge surprise birthday party for me on Saturday. It was perfect. My mom flew in from Tucson as part of the surprise! Seneca and my mom drew straws as to who got to come up from Tucson (someone's got to stay and man the fort).

Farmer Ron not only led his traditional birthday rendition to me--while Bill had me blindfolded with a stocking cap-- my mom's voice then chimed in and I had no idea what was going on....Then, a lot of other voices started singing and I was really confused!

Farmer Ron also grilled burgers and dogs on our snowy deck in 20-degree weather (priceless) in short sleeves. All of my friends who were "horse people" went out with me to play in the barn and see Jelly, the wonder horse. Friends from all walks of my life were there and it was amazing. Mr. H even had friends from long ago and the present write short little vignettes of their memories of me. Hysterical and quite touching at the same time!

And to all of my friends who have been lying to me for the past few weeks: I love you.

Do the rest of you see an inordinate amount of squirrel cards as well?

That was Seneca's doing: the theme was "nuts." Hee hee