Monday, November 10, 2008

Going Up

Oh the Joy! I got home the other day and this is what I found in my back yard. It does not take much to bring me some joy. Just some old rusty pipe and some tilled up dirt. The Arena is almost all framed up. We entrusted the help of our good friend Freddy. I fed him some lunch. The man ate 5 hot dogs and some mac and cheese. I am doomed when my boys get older. I also brought some lunch out to the crazy bunch. They were having a blast. I think I might just get these kids some brown boxes and some dirt for Christmas. They all really had too much fun. Cowpokette worked up quite a thirst. She was working very hard. She is such a ham. I could just squeeze those cheeks. But enough babies, back to work. We only had the machine until 4 o'clock. It had to be back before dark. So, our arena is now in a horseshoe shape. Which is alright. The end that is not finished is the end that will have the roping boxes. I would love some advice on the roping boxes. I know they are supposed to be 16ft deep and 10 feet wide. And the left box is supposed to be 40 feet off the right fence. But we are having some talk about the holding pens and how they should work. I guess it would help if any of us were ropers. Mr. Cowboy has only been in a box a handful of times, and me, yeah never. We have looked up a bunch of arenas, but we still are not 100% sure on what we are going to do. I guess it will all work out, somehow. While we were all hard at work the Cowpokes were hard a play. They Cowpokes went and got their Rodeo play set and brought it into the arena. They are so cute. And look at those Donkeys. They are trying hard to look like they don't care what those Cowpokes are doing. It did not take long for the donkeys to sucker the Cowpokes into scratching their necks. These donkeys were wild about a month ago. Now look at those tame things. They will let the boys climb all over them. I wonder if those donkeys will still be my Cowpoke's friends when they start tracking them on Peanut. They sure are sweet. I am so excited about our arena. Mr. Cowboy had big plans on riding a bunch of horses. I can't wait. I told him I could be his assistant trainer and tack them all up for him.

13 comments:

Rambling Woods said...

I don't know anything about horses or an arena..but your adorable children were having a great time..

KD said...

What a nice straight line of poles and I love the pic of the boys petting the donkeys with their little bare feet in the dirt. I think kids need a fair amount of dirt to grow up right. :)

Beth said...

AWESOME! That is going to be a GREAT arena!!!!

Aimée said...

I too couldsquish your little girls cheeks right off of her, she's so cute!

Danielle Michelle said...

Great! That would put a smile on my face too! We had a donkey we used to heel. We'd put her inteh box and tell her to go and off she'd head down the arena! Then we'd yell TURN and she'd turn and we'd heel her! She rocked! We have a new one now we're trying to train. Way fun!

My dog's a coon hound/boxer cross! But he looks all hound except for the coloring. He's awesome...just dirty!

TjandMark/AKA PearlandHawkeye said...

I love donkeys. Hee Haw! Your kids are pretty cute too.

Amanda said...

Hooray for the arena! Is there one near you you could go measure to know where to put the boxes? Just a thought!

Grey Horse Matters said...

Glad your getting an arena. I know nothing about boxes and such, but I'm sure you'll figure it out. Looks like the kids are having a great time.

BrownEyed Cowgirl said...

I'm headed too your house for the winter. Surely you wouldn't mind if I squeezed the big Blue horse in the trailer for you, would ya?
I can just imagine how excited you are to watch your arena go up. And absolutely kids need dirt to play in. Nothing feels quite as good as soft dirt between the toes.;)Megan used to love to play in mud puddles, so I would just strip her down and let her play. Had a friend ask me why on earth I would ever let my kid get that dirty? My only response(that didn't sound mean) was that she wasn't made of sugar-I could scrub and scrub and she would never melted away.

I bet Miss KDWhorses has the answer on the roping boxes for you or TrainWreck probably knows. I've never built an arena with roping boxes, so I guess I have never actually paid attention to the actual dimensions-I just know when they put the boxes too close to the fence-people complain about it-LOL.

Laughing Orca Ranch said...

Woot! Woot! There it is!

Awesome early start on the arena. How exciting!

And I agree about the dirt. I had a neighbor whose little girls were always wearing expensive clothes in pristine condition. She never allowed her girls to get dirty or even play in a clean sand box.
Those girls looked miserable and were always sick with some kind of bug.

Dirt makes kids healthier. They build up a resistance to germs. :)

Your darling little Cowpokette's cheeks are just begging to be squeezed, smooshed and smooched! Too cute!!!!

The donkeys are adorable, too. I sure wish I could have one of my own. My neighbors would probably freak when it started braying, though. They just tolerate my sheep, goats and roosters barely. lol!

~Lisa

ps, Thanks for the sweet stuff you said on Callie's blog :)

Train Wreck said...

YEAH!!! Girl you and I are too alike! I have pitures of our fence going up, our arena getting it's first 3 loads of cinder sand! The little bobcat diggin the holes! Congratulations! Nice straight line o pipe! Keep us posted!

We are in the process of putting tops on our horse pens!! Too bad we aren't neighbors!

Karen said...

I'm excited for you about that arena. I WISH we lived closer.

The Wades said...

I think donkeys are beautiful!!! Your kids are so cute with them.