Back to Hood River!

This past weekend we made a spur-of-the-moment trip to HR with the horses. We had a wonderful trip, but we did have a few things go wrong...

The first mishap was our trailer tires blowing out on I-84. We still don't know if I picked up something on the road or if the tires were defective or ... ?? Anyway, to make a long story short, we hung out at a rest stop in Bridal Veil, OR, until an after-hours service crew could come out and put on new tires. It was pretty stressful to wait with two horses, one baby, and a dog. Luckily all four behaved themselves and waited patiently with us. Two hours and four hundred dollars later we were on our way....

Once we got to Hood River Nanny Tanny took over the care of Lilah. I don't think I changed one diaper from Friday to Sunday. What a record! I even got to sleep in both mornings! Thank you TANIA!!

Nanny Tanny also got Lilah her own chair for sitting outside with the rest of us. She loves it! Check out the video of her playing with it at the very end of this blog.




Loading up the horses....


The view from the horses' pasture


Our faithful steeds "Sweet P" and "Kate"









We hit beautiful trails both days. Kate (a young green horse) did her very first water crossing. I am not going to tell you how we got her over the water crossing the first time, but there was a tree branch involved. The rest of the water crossings she jumped with room to spare. There is plenty of great country up there I still want to explore so hopefully we'll do another weekend trip before the Summer is out.







Scenes from the trail....


Are we forgetting something? Or somebody? At the very top of Lost Lake Butte. I think the horses look tired....


Snow on the trail. And it was late July!


Lookout Kate! It's a VERY SCARY water crossing!






:)

The old ladies kicked my butt!

So the latest PEOPLE magazine has a brief article on "how the stars lost their baby weight" (in just six weeks!) They did so by all exercising two to three hours each day with a personal trainer. Yikes. Not what I have planned for myself, but the article did inspire me to make a goal of exercising every day this week. On Monday I lifted weights. On Tuesday I skipped exercising and had lunch at Taco Bell. Today, I got back on the bandwagon and tried an aqua aerobic swim class.



The course description called it "Aqua Fusion" and said that it was basically an instructor's choice class. The description did not say the instructor was a hydro-nazi with a Stepford-Wife smile.



I have watched this swim class in action and from a distance it looks very innocent. There are a lot of , ahem -- senior citizens doing seemingly-gentle moves underwater so I thought it must be a fairly low-impact workout.



WRONG!



It was an hour-long aerobic and weight-resistance class. The first half-hour I was rolling my eyes at the instructor's move descriptions ("And now the Cowgirl, to the left -- Cowgirl, cowgirl, cowgirl! And the Russian Soldier! To the right, right, right!") The second half hour I was shooting mental darts at her perky face.

All in all though, it was a great class. I can tell I'm going to be sore tomorrow. And I'll be back next week.....

What the .... ??

So, tonight I was picking up groceries at the local grocery store. As I was getting my groceries together and paying, I noticed a lady on the other side of checkstand who had her dog in the childseat of the grocery cart.

Okay, so I'm a dog person. Much more than a cat person. And my dog goes everywhere with me that he is allowed to go -- to the parks, to friends and parental houses -- he used to go to work with me every day! But he does not go to the grocery store. Isn't that unsanitary? And this dog was not a small dog, not like the AFB puppy was.





The dog was bigger, like a big lap dog.

I thought long and hard about asking the lady if anyone had said anything to her about having a dog in a grocery store, but then I thought I better not start a fight. Plus, I had Lilah with me who is probably equally as drooly and not as well house-broken.

And that's another point. The dog was in the same place I put my child in. It's designed for kids not dogs.

Sigh.... My little sister had just blogged about this as well. She thinks dogs are showing up everywhere. I'm beginning to wonder if it's true....

And meanwhile I'm going to email the store and complain.

-H

7/18/08

This summer Nick and I have been going, going, going. We are having a blast getting in all the things we didn't do last summer on account of a pregnancy.

This past weekend we traveled to Seattle to attend my college roommate's wedding. (The girl who said she would never get married and would always roll her eyes at Nick and I) Here are some pics!


Cute baby alert!











Lilah with my other college roomie!

Just had to share....

Here's Lilah seven years from now!



Just kidding. I actually kind of hope she doesn't want to jump horses. (It's dangerous!)



But here is a shot of one of my students in a mini-horse show I put on over the weekend. She is abroad my school horse "Aspen", who is worth his weight in gold.







When Aspen came into my program a year ago, he was skin-and-bones from being left in a field for a few years . Two of my staff went to see him, and were all excited about this great horse. I trusted my staff's opinions, so I argued the price with his owner sight-unseen. When I finally did lay eyes on him, I was horrified and furious with my staff. (It was one of the rare moments were I actually had to walk away, and the staff avoided me for the rest of the day) I was certain we would fatten him up and he would turn into a pro-bronc horse (a situation that has happened to me before) Why else would anyone leave a horse like him in a field to rot?






But thankfully I was wrong, as my staff loved to joke about now. Aspen really is a phenonmenal horse. He does everything perfectly. I think maybe it's because he is so appreciative to have a good home!

God bless Aspen!

Hood Rat, Hood Rat, Hootchie Mama!

This past weekend was a quick trip to HR, where we attended Nick's high school reunion that I knew nothing about until 72 hrs before. The extended family also happened to be in HR, and here Katlyn and Lilah are playing together:





Lilah says, "I will dominate you....."


Nanny Tanny and I picked up cherries for Nana H, and the farm had a petting zoo. Here Lilah is checking out a sheep with four horns on his head. Is that natural?


Lilah on her way to contacting hepatitis by standing barefoot by the pig pen


And after this shot was taken another mother passing by told me that fox-glove is poisonious. I deserve a mother-of-the-year award...


Nick and I heading out to his reunion. Thank god none of my ex-boyfriends showed up....


And how the day ended....


:)

Welcome to the 'Couv!

Getting better....

She's getting better at this walking thing!

Now tilt your head to the left...

The Sequence Challenge

Six games of Sequence, several glasses of wine ... and I still can't beat my parents.... Damn.

4th of July -- by Simon-the-dog

Well, we all remember all last year's 4th of July turned out. I do -- I still get scared when I hear loud noises or see big trucks. Heather says I still have post-tramautic stress disorder!



Here's the infamous shot of me after 4th of July 2007:








This year, my family took me to the Roundhouse, where fireworks are illegal. We brought Grandpa Paco and Nana along for the ride. The family enjoyed reading, relaxing, swimming, and biking.



As for the 4th of July, it was so quiet you almost didn't know it was the fourth. (I still managed to hear some far away fireworks, but I only hid for a little while)



Here are some shots from the weekend:











































There are still fireworks going off at home now, but I have found a safe hiding place under Lilah's crib. So what if I accidently wake her up when I'm diving for cover?



- Simon

Lilah's First Steps

July 2nd, 2008. Lilah 9 1/2 mons old....

Lilah took her first steps today from Nanny Tanny to Mommy. The first three she did without thinking about it, and she looked pretty balanced. Then, she continued to take solo steps throughout the day. Each time she went solo, she got more and more excited. The idea is definately sinking in that she can move around on her two feet!