Making progress

We've finally gotten to the point where both Willow and Alex will pick up their front feet with no problem. The issue now is keeping them up. Alex is better about it, he stands and doesn't hop around but he does like to try and pull his foot away while Ken is working. He's still iffy about relaxing and letting Ken hold his hind feet, but he did well enough the other day that we got them trimmed. Now he has four lovely trimmed feet!

Willow is another story. Like her son, she picks up her feet like a pro. She just doesn't like to keep them up and will dance and hop around until she's up against a wall. Then she demands a treat and and sniffs Ken - back and forth - until Ken puts her foot down. The good news though is that both fronts are trimmed and balanced and can now grow out properly and the toe crack is healing nicely. We're still working on getting her to pick up her hind feet, but we're getting closer.

We haven't been working much with Never because he's been really anxious about his feet, and tense and anxious in general. I think part of the reason is because he wants to get out and play after being in all night, so maybe I'll start doing some work with him in the evening. I can't wait for the snow and ice to melt so I can get him working in the round pen and work off some of his energy. He still thinks a little like a stallion, no mating urges but he still flirts, but I'm hoping that will fade with time and focused work.

We've hit a lovely heat wave, 30's and 40's with a little rain. I figure most of the snow will be gone by the end of the week. YAY!

I haven't updated my photo business site yet, but the farm site is up and running! Check out the Duchess Hill Farm website here. There are no pics yet and I'm not sure about the color scheme (the green is a little bright for my tastes) but there are lots of links on the links page and the most of the individual horse pages have links to their pedigrees. It should only take a day to get pics up and arranged. Hopefully I can kick myself in the butt and do it this weekend.

Another bitter cold day

After enjoying an almost warm week (highs in the 20's), we're back to single digits and less. It's currently bright, sunny, and 2 degrees with a wind chill of -12. Needless to day, Sparky stayed in with Gem for company. I hope to find a turnout sheet/lightweight blanket for her so she can go outside without getting too chilled and thus lose more weight. I wish I could afford a chiropractor for her, to align her hips, but all I can really do at this point is to keep her comfortable until Spring.

I've been doing some training this week, mostly with standing quietly and picking up feet. Alex was so good that Ken was actually able to trim his front hooves! We're still working on the hind feet, but he's getting better. He's a bit of a 'cookie monster' at the moment, but I'm going to cut back as he does better.

Ken was able to trim Willow's front hooves today. Her near front hoof has a long toe crack that fortunately is starting to grow out. She stood pretty well while Ken trimmed and rasped it, but she got antsy with the far front hoof and barely let him finish trimming.

Never is going to take more work. He picks up his near front hoof pretty well, but he won't relax and let Ken hold it for trimming. He's worse with his far front, he keeps pulling it out of Ken's hands. As for his hinds, right now we're just getting him used to being touched on his hips, legs and hooves. He's very sensitive and nervous about anyone doing anything back there, but with time I think he'll get better. I'm really hoping to get some more ground work done with him this Spring so I can take him in some halter/in hand classes this summer. I'm also hoping to introduce him to a saddle before Autumn.

Since it's so cold out, and there's nothing on TV this evening, I think I'm going to update my website for (shameless plug) Duchess Hill Photography, work on a blog to go with it (I know, yet another photo blog...), and maybe I'll finally get at least the home page for the farm site up and running. I should also get some more stuff on my Cafe Press site (another shameless plug!), but I'm going to need to find some more pics suitable for cards and such. Snow shots would be nice, but it's so freaking cold out and I don't have a back up camera if something goes wrong. I've also been thinking about possible quotes, phrases and logos for more marketable t-shirts and such, but I've been having the darnedest case of 'writers block'. If anyone has ideas or suggestions... *S*