Working Saturday

There was a layer of fog as Loki and I went outside for some morning relief. I saw something out in the fields and went to investigate.

Somehow, Kitty managed to ditch her blanket. I picked it up and dropped it in the barn for examination.

Carrie had the pole barn guys spread gravel dust out in all the dry lots during the week. It survived it's first test with all the rain we had. The dry lots are not a giant mess of mud. It looks nicer and helps with drainage.

The downside is we now have to scoop poop wherever this is gravel dust. That adds ground to cover.

Shane's done a good job of helping out. He hasn't complained too much since I assigned him as my helper following the cat pee incident (Carrie sprayed a bunch of air freshener and now the laundry room smells like peppermint piss). He doesn't do an A+ job and it makes everything take longer, but he's learning to be useful. He's not doing a bad job either.

I have Shane scoop poop for the most part. It's a crappy job, but someone has to do it!

Kitty and Annie are getting along famously. I have limited experience with horses, but I know enough to laugh at their lack of personal space. I've started to think of them as a "two-headed monster."

When Shane and I were done with horse chores, I had him suit up for TKD. That he protested. There was no wrestling tournament, though, and I wanted him to do something around other kids. His protests were ignored.

In typical Shane fashion, he told me he had a ton of fun when class was over. We had the same talk about "choosing our attitudes" I feel like we always do when he throws a fit about doing something and ends up not wanting to stop.

Maybe this time it will stick (but I'm not holding my breath).

It felt like spring, so I wanted to do a dump run when we got home. Carrie and I team lifted old stall doors while I assigned Shane tasks that fit his stature.

He provided some imagination.

Shane helping stresses Carrie out sometimes. She'd rather do things herself, so they're done to her standard and in her time. I'm a stickler for making Shane participate. I figure it's work and time for me now, but I hope it will grow him and help him to be more useful later. Mistakes will happen, but I'll deal with them and blog about anything funny enough to repeat!

We spent over half an hour cleaning out the barn and the garage of broken pallets, doors, cardboard, and trash.

It normally costs $7 to dump our trash, but we had to pay $17 today because we went over 600 lbs! That's a lot of trash! We dropped off the cardboard at the recycling center before hopping on the scales, so all 630 lbs of trash was true trash.

It was the afternoon by the time we got home. There was some cleaning and some rest before Shane and I went out for evening horse chores. It was a productive day.