Okie and Skyler's Winter Home

Two months ago we moved Okie and Skyler to a "winter home."  Our horse set up is not very easy to manage in the winter months - we don't have pasture, so they cost a fortune to feed because they graze all day on very expensive hay!

Anyway, here are a couple of pics of their new digs.

 The boys have a lovely view of the river.

Clearly, Skyler is getting enough to eat. 

 Nana gets a good look at the yellow horse, making sure his coat looks good and checking for scrapes and scratches.

 This is a perfect example of how Okie and Skyler interact...they are in their own space, plenty of grass and room, not even that close, really...

 ...and NO!  Skyler pins his ears and gnaws at Okie - who probably thinks this is Skyler's way of showing him some affection.

 Absolutely gorgeous property.

 Each of them has a stall in the barn and run - they are penned up at night and only let out in the pasture during the day.  Skyler always goes in the right side and Okie only goes in the left side.  I wonder who made that decision?...Skyler...

 The owner has one horse left - a miniature pony stallion she calls Rusty.  He and Okie have become good friends.  He is in a separate pasture, but his stall in the barn is directly across from Okie's so they chat in the barn.

 I can't remember exactly how old little Rusty is - but he's old - near 30?  He looks great for his age!

 Someone went in the barn...is it snack time?  Must be, to get both Okie and Skyler's full attention!

As grumpy and independent as Skyler can be, he is always the first to greet me when I show up and I can call to him from the back yard and he almost always answers back.  As we're getting ready to leave, he perks up to listen to see if I'm going to say anything of interest...like, I'll be back with apples, Skyler!

Organize Yourself, Day 1

Incase you missed it, I picked up this week-by-week guide to organizing your life, and I'm going to be blogging my progress.

This week's goal:

1.  Write out a vision for your life.  Answer these questions to help you find inspiration.  If you could do anything...
Where would you live?
How would you earn an income?
What would your days look like?
What would you do for fun?
What would you do more of?
What would you do less of?

Oh man, I'm glad my handy-dandy organization book gave me the questions to get started, or I would be overwhelmed already and it's Day 1!

Where would I live?  I'm not especially in love with the town I live in, but I am in love with living close to my family and friends.  My parents are less than 10 minutes away, and since this is where I grew up, this is where even my long-distance friends tend to come back to.  I live between two larger cities, and I have really good friends who live in both, so its handy because I can see all of them easily.  However, we have a lot of crime in our little rural town.  A lot of gangs.  Our school system has gone to pot.  That is a huge concern for me.  I wouldn't mind moving closer to one of the larger towns, but still staying in the country. Would something with room for my ponies and kids to roam be asking too much?

How would I earn an income?  By being awesome.  I said this jokingly to a friend of mine, but I'm kind of serious.  I'm hoping that I will be passionate about my new career in insurance, and that I am really freaking awesome at it.  I would love to be the rock star of the life insurance company - but that kind of goes for whatever I do.  No one wants to work at a job they are bad at, right?  But I don't just want to be good - I want to be awesome.

What would my days look like?  Equal parts Super Mom and Career Woman, with a healthy dose of volunteerism thrown into the mix.  I like to be busy and have a lot of fun things on my calendar.  And yes, I consider meetings fun.  I like having a day with my kids where I am alone with one or both of them.  I tend to do better one-on-one.  I also wouldn't mind more consistent date nights with my hubby. He can be a pretty fun guy.  I like to have fun.  So I suppose the answer is wake up at a decent hour, 6:30ish, send the kids and hubby on their way, work my tail off at my job until mid afternoon, get some me-time in in the early evening, eat dinner with the hubby and kids, and then head to volleyball/volleyball practice/cattle sorting practice/Relay For Life meeting/dinner at Nana's/etc.

What would I do for fun?  I have mentioned before, I have too many hobbies.  I play volleyball, coach volleyball, ride my horses, volunteer for Relay, snowboard, wine taste, and drag my family to every community event I can squeeze in.  I'm getting Grace started early in this stuff too - we go to gymnastics once a week, I got her in to preschool a year early so she goes to that twice a week, she loves the horses and meeting up with friends for coffee.  Yes, my three year old daughter likes to meet her three year old friends for coffee.

Being awesome at volleyball.

Grace and I are both being awesome at riding horses.

Decorating cookies with Mrs. Claus last year at Christmas - we met up with our friends Jauna (left) and Emily (to the left of Jauna) - we do ALL the community events we can!

Grace and daddy at swim lessons - I was too preggo to make that happen, so sometimes when I want our family to do something, daddy has to step up!

Community Days festival - Grace and her BFF Ellie got matching rainbow facepaint!

What would I do more of?  I feel like I should say that I would do more work around the house...but that's just because our disorganization has me really on edge.  If my house was completely in order, I would really like to do more fun things with my husband.  He works so hard, he deserves to have a fun wife.

See?  We clean up nice.  We should do more of this.

What would I do less of?  I would do less dreaming and more doing.  I would also do less spending.  I can always do less spending.

I guess that's pretty much my vision.  I don't think I'm that different from anyone else - hopefully I'm determined enough to make these things a reality.

Can I say, "Oh My Gosh?"

So, May 10 2010 was my last entry, eh?  Pretty sure my life is completely different now.

First of all, there's this little guy:

His name is Logan Patrick, and he's pretty much the coolest little guy I know.

Logan arrived on September 24, 2011.  I actually spent every minute of 2011 pregnant up until that point - probably a good thing I didn't blog during that time.  Postings about my love of chocolate pudding and hatred toward the folks in Starbucks who always wanted to know when I was due, and then give me their two cents on my size, my caffeine intake, and my plans to continue working - that's what my blog would have consisted of this year.  Keep in mind, these Starbucks people are not friends - they are strangers!  Where do people get the nerve?!?  Moving on.

Another big change:  I recently left my job at the TV station to start a career that will hopefully be a little more family-friendly.  I am going to work for a company called Northwestern Mutual selling life insurance.  This last week I did a four week course that prepared me to take my state license exam.  Sounds pretty boring, right?  It really wasn't!  I thoroughly enjoyed learning the ins and outs of life insurance policies, health insurance policies, and the laws that go with them!  I didn't expect to enjoy the material very much.  I have life insurance, but I never understood it and I didn't really care.  Now, I am excited about it!

With all of these life changes going on, I have decided I need to get uber organized.  I stumbled upon a book that was recommended in some blog, somewhere.  Here it is:

As you can see, this is a week by week guide to getting organized.  One week at a time.  Sounds pretty good to me.

The first section is Organize Yourself.  One of my goals in the first week is to start a journal.  I'm not really a handwritten journal kind of girl...so I thought I would give the old blog a whirl.  Not only that, but this is a way I can easily document the changes I make throughout the year!  And maybe this blog will hold me accountable and make me stick with this little program.  Having two kids, an adoring husband, a home, and now working for myself an essentially being a business owner - that's going to call for a pretty high level of organization!

I'm going to officially start the program tomorrow.  I can see nothing holding me back from getting my life completely organized.