Did You Miss Me?

Hi everybody! Is anyone out there still reading this? I can't believe it's been more than 2 months since I last posted. I imagine most of my faithful readers have give up on me by now!

But, despite it being a busy, busy summer, I'm still here, the farm's still here. Our finances still aren't much improved, but we're still struggling along, so I have hopes we'll get to a less anxiety-producing state eventually. If we can just hang in there for another year or two, I have hopes that thing will get better.

Anyway, I've been saving up lots of news and happenings to post about, but rather than trying to write one big long post with everything crammed in, I think I'll try to break them up into a bunch of smaller posts, divided by topic.

See you in the next post!

One Year

I just realized: This blog is one year old now!

Looking back, I can't believe all the stuff that has happened in just one short year. It was a very difficult time, perhaps the hardest year of my life so far, but we hung in there, and I learned so much. So now it's time to look back on some of my accomplishments:

• I learned how to write a blog. And though my readership numbers are not huge, the blog has had visitors from at least 49 states and 65 countries, on every continent except Antartica!
• I sold 11 horses, more than 30 sheep, dozens of fleeces, plus a few sheep pelts, skulls, and horns.
• I learned how to sell on Ebay, and made several thousand dollars selling some of my valuables to help us buy hay for the animals.
• I learned how to negotiate trades (sheep for horses, horses for sheep, horses for services, sheep for services) and how to negotiate sales (deposits, payment plans, shipping arrangements, what extras are or are not included in the sale price). I even negotiated an excellent situation with free board and professional training for my stallion, in exchange for free breedings to him.
• I gained a lot more experience working with young horses of widely varying personality types.
• I helped and/or watched the delivery of dozens of lambs.
• I learned a lot of new things about veterinary care of livestock and pets (wounds, sicknesses, birthing challenges, broken legs, poisonous snake bites, maggots, parasite control).
• I got my first 3 paying jobs designing websites for people.
• I got a year older (could be worse), got through another year of marriage (still going strong), got a year closer to having our credit cards paid off (whoo-hoo!), and got another year closer to having our sheep flock reach its "certified Scrapie free" status (not a huge deal, but nice).
• I made a lot of tough decisions, faced worry, heartbreak, fear, indecision, disappointment, and anger... and still retained some semblance of sanity and humor (most days!).

So, what's ahead for the year to come?

• I want to keep learning and improving the farm, of course.
• I want to keep working on getting our finances back under control after the financial disaster that the horse situation has caused.
• All the stress of the past year or two led me to eat for emotional reasons, and I gained a lot of weight, which has made me feel unhealthy and tired. I want to get slim and fit again. I have a plan to lose 1 lb. per week for the next year. I started in late June, and have lost 7 lbs so far without "dieting" or exercising more---just by making more conscious food choices. I don't expect that all the coming weeks of weight loss will be as easy as these past few, but that's okay, I'm tired of being tired and heavy. I'm ready to be "the real me" again.

Latest Batch of Good News

It's been a busy week. This time of year, July and August, are the hardest for the sheep because of the heat and the parasites, so it's always a time of worry for me. Plus our finances are getting very tight again, which is another source of worry.

But I've had several bits of good news lately, which I'm quite happy about:

1. On Sunday, the mare (Callista) that I sent to my trainer was sold. Hurray! So that's one fewer horse I have to worry about and a few thousand dollars coming in to help pay bills. Now I only have 2 more horses left on my sales list, and I have 3 different buyers interested in one of those.

2. Both of the clients I'm designing web sites for have needed work done right away, and both of them had added complications come up suddenly that created more work for me. But I have had more time available lately to actually WORK on the two sites, so I've been making rapid progress, which feels good.

3. My stallion has now made enough progress in his training that he is being ridden by a 14 year old girl. This speaks volumes about what a wonderful temperament he has!

He also just had his wolf teeth pulled, which will make him more comfortable wearing the bridle. And all of his mares have recently tested "in foal" except one, whom he will be rebreeding this week. Between a busy training schedule and a busy breeding schedule, he has had a lot going on in his life this summer, which is great for him. He loves both his jobs!

4. Although this time of year always brings challenges with the sheep's parasite loads and heat stress, in looking back over my worming records I discovered that one of the ram lambs I'm keeping (Umber) has shown extremely good parasite resistance, with near-perfect FAMACHA scores and ZERO worming.

Since he is also our largest lamb of the year and is a cross between my best fleece ewe and my best meat ram, the fact that he is so parasite resistant as well makes him incredibly valuable to my future breeding program. Especially since he is unrelated to Nicholai, who is my other extremely parasite-resistant ram.

Between these two, the new ram I'm getting this summer (who I know to be highly parasite resistant), and the possibility of another new-ram purchase next year that I have already lined up, I should be able to start making some excellent progress on my goal of breeding for parasite resistance without sacrificing meat conformation.

In another few generations, perhaps July and August won't be a time to worry about the sheep at all anymore!

Buyers (and Not-So-Much Buyers)

It's official: Callisto is sold. I just got the deposit for her this afternoon, and she will be going to her new home on Monday. Now I'll never be the one to ride her over those 4 1/2 foot jumps when she's old enough.

When I was a teenager, there was nothing in the world I wanted so much as a horse that could take me over the really big jumps! Now I guess I'll have to wait for Grace to grow up and see if she has the talent.

On the bright side, I think Callisto is going to a nice home that is very well suited for her. She's going to be less than 3 hours away from here, and her new owner has said that I'm invited to come and visit her any time I like. Isn't that sweet?

So, with the money from her, we'll be able to:

1. Pay our $800 propane bill so that the propane company will come fill our tank again before we run out of heat.

2. Pay our stallion Senter's annual $800 insurance bill so that if he gets sick or hurt we won't lose out on all the $14,000 we invested to buy him.

3. Buy 2 1/2 weeks' worth of hay.

That doesn't seem like much to get for such a magnificent horse, but at least it's something, and I'm grateful for it! I think Callisto is going to fit in perfectly at her new home.

On the other side of the selling process:

Most of you know that I have my beautiful tobiano Oldenburg/Spotted Draft cross filly Libby for sale. She's got it all: conformation, color, refinement, temperament, brains. She's absolutely spectacular.

Because I'm doing such a major herd reduction, I'm only asking $3,000 for her, which barely covers what it cost to feed her mother while she was pregnant with her.

A few months ago, I had a buyer asking about the filly. We exchanged emails for weeks as she asked about all the details about her. She decided that Libby was "the one." I arranged a very flexible payment plan, we discussed what shots she'd like Libby to have before she was shipped, even what color halter she'd prefer. We worked out every detail. The buyer said, "I'm putting the check in the mail today." AND DISAPPEARED OFF THE FACE OF THE EARTH FOREVER!

Time went on, and now I've been exchanging emails with another person who was interested in Libby. I've spent the past month answering email questions from her. She even called me on the phone (from Canada!) to ask a huge list of detailed questions. She started looking into finding a shipper and getting the documents needed to import the filly across the border.

Then, this afternoon, for the first time, she made me her official offer:

Would I take $600 for Libby?

$600????? For this flawless yearling filly with bloodlines that include Spectrum, Rainbow, Peron, and Lungau? You make me spend a MONTH answering your questions, knowing all along you're planning to offer me a paltry 20% of my asking price??? You'd pay more than that to ship the horse there, but the horse herself isn't worth as much? I don't think so!

What on earth are people thinking?

I mean, okay, fine. I'm doing a drastic herd reduction, and my ads all say that my asking prices are negotiable. "Negotiable" means I might be willing to take $500 off the price, if you pay immediately, pick the horse up promptly, and I don't already have 3 other people inquiring about the horse that day.

It does not mean that as a reward for the pleasure of answering countless questions spread out over the course of weeks, I'd be delighted to give away a flawless horse with Olympic medalist bloodlines for what isn't much more than slaughter prices!

I understand that horse buyers have budgets. If someone started right out asking me just how flexible my prices were, and did I have anything that might be in the "Under $1,000" price range, I would not have been insulted. I wouldn't have offered that person Libby, but I wouldn't have been insulted.

And if after asking many questions over the course of weeks, a buyer had come out and offered me at least 50%-75% of my asking price, I would not have been insulted either. Depending on how many inquiries I'd received on that horse, I would probably have at least considered the offer.

But this---Sheesh!

My emotions about it are kind of mixed between 50% insulted and 50% amused at how ridiculous the whole situation is.

On to the next buyer!

Selling Like Hotcakes

I think I'm making progress on the horse sales at last!

Selebrity, Callisto, and Torchsong are almost definitely sold---we're just ironing out the final details and waiting for payment. Maggie and Libby each have more than one person who seems seriously interested in them, so it seems like they will probably sell before too long. If all those go through, that's nearly $15,000 worth of sales, AND it's about $1,000 per month less in feed bills!

You have no idea how much of a relief that would be! We could pay our bills on time, buy all the hay we need for a while, repay some loans from family members, get our pickup truck fixed, fill the propane tank that heats the house, and maybe even think of making a few of the farm improvements we want to make, like reseeding the pastures and building sheep shelters. We could even build a chicken house and get that flock of chickens we've been wanting.

That does still leave Penny, Callista, and Andromeda to sell, but with all the other sale horses gone, that would take much of the pressure off. I could spend time working with Penny, and I could start Andromeda and Callista under saddle to increase their value. And heck, at that point I'd probably have a little extra cash so I could pay to advertise them, instead of having to count on the free ads.

It would be so wonderful if all the horse sales were complete before lambing season starts, so I could just be done with them and move on. Lambing season takes up a lot of my time and effort, but at least it's a happy, hopeful time. I'm looking forward to giving it my full attention.

Imbolc

I've been thinking about Imbolc, which is the ancient Celtic festival celebrating the fertility of the sheep flock and the very earliest signs of returning spring.

Wikipedia says:

In Irish, Imbolc (pronounced im'olk) from the Old Irish, meaning "in the belly" (imbolg), referring to the pregnancy of ewes, and is also a Celtic term for spring. Another name is Oimelc, meaning "ewe's milk".

How cool is it, for a shepherd, that there is a specific holiday in honor of sheep? It's celebrated on February 2nd---nearly 3 weeks ago now---but I've been so stressed and swamped this year, I sort of let the day slide by without much notice.

It wasn't until today that I remembered I had neglected to do my annual Imbolc ritual: The year's first Groping of the Ewes.

Each November, I put the rams and ewes into the breeding pens and hope they do their jobs properly. Then I wait, full of hope and faith, for the lambs to come. Imbolc---the festival of "ewe's milk"---is when the ewes' udders begin to fill up in preparation for lambing. It is the time of year when I can first get confirmation that my faith has been justified.

When the ewes are busy eating, and too distracted by food to pay me much mind, I walk along behind the row of them and feel between their legs to see if their udders are starting to develop: a sure sign that lambs are on the way in another couple of months!

It's such a simple thing, but after I've been so down and out all winter long, you have no idea how uplifting it is to get that small sign of hope and renewal for the farm: ewe after ewe, each with a small udder starting to form, each getting ready to give back to the farm, in the form of lambs, my year's payment for all the work, love, and money I've invested in the flock for the other 11 months of the year.

We're a partnership, the sheep and I. Going down the row of pregnant ewes, I am filled with gratitude for all they give back to the farm.

Imbolc can also be seen as a metaphor for the other aspects of my life right now. Just as Imbolc is a holiday celebrating the return of spring during a time that is still deep in winter, our farm is still deep in hard times, but with a glimmer of hope beginning to shine through.

On the one hand, we are still broke and worried about money, but on the other hand, I got 4 new inquiries about horses for sale today, and now have 4 "almost definite" sales plus a few other "possible" ones. If we can just get these horse sales completed, everything will be fine. We'll still be in debt, but without the horrendous hay bills, we'll be able to manage it.

What will that be like? We've been struggling so long, I can barely remember what it was like to be able to pay every bill as soon as it came in and still occasionally have something left over to put into savings or to spend on something fun.

After two days of not feeling well, my health seems to be looking up, too. Maybe it was the vitamins I took before bed the last two nights, but I feel almost better today. I'm going to take another batch of vitamins tonight and, after another good night's sleep, I hope to be back to normal by tomorrow.

Coming Down With Something

All yesterday I wasn't feeling well. I rested all day, took some vitamins, and got a good night's sleep. This morning I felt a lot better, so I thought I'd shaken it off. But this evening I started feeling ill again.

I'm not sure what I have, or where I might have caught it, since I haven't been anywhere to be exposed to any germs. I'm unreasonably tired, and a little woozy. The gland in the right side of my throat is sore, and it's going into my ear now as well. My skin is starting to feel that hypersensitive feeling you get right before you get a fever, but I'm not feverish.

Ugh! As if I don't have enough to do, without being sick too. I try to always be careful to rest and recover as soon as I start showing symptoms, because if I don't, I'm very prone to having every cold or flu turn into a 3-week session of bronchitis. Let's hope that doesn't happen!

We got a small load of hay yesterday. Prices have gone up again, to $7.50 per small square bale. Our supplier says it'll go up to $8 soon, and may go up to $10 before this year's first cutting comes in.

On the bright side, I got birthday cards from family today, with money inside. Every little bit helps, so I'm very grateful.

There have also been a few new horse inquiries. So I hope a few of those turn into sales soon.

A Few Rays of Hope

We are still dead broke, but there are a few hopeful signs on the horizon now.

I have two horse sales that are in the "almost definite" stage, plus another couple of potential deals still in the inquiry-and-negotiation stage. Anything that reduces the number of horses we have to feed and also brings in some much-needed cash is cause for celebration at this point.

Ken and I are so VERY tired of being desperate all the time!

But, with those rays of hope encouraging us that this whole horrible situation may be resolved eventually, we were actually able to start looking around the farm and begin making tentative plans for how we will readjust the farm to our new situation.

Surprisingly, the farm itself feels more amenable to the new course of action. The old antique barn, which is completely inadequate for the number of horses we have had---and not particularly useful for sheep, either---is quite beautifully suited for the greatly reduced number of horses we hope to have in a few weeks or months.

And the old run-down former country store that is on the property---it's spacious, and we kept wanting to find a way to convert it into a horse stable. But its layout and dimensions made it totally unsuitable for horses. However, now that we look at it a different way, it would be incredibly easy to convert it for sheep!

Not that the sheep need to be inside much, but it has plenty of room where they could go in during ice storms and such, and plenty of room for me to set up as many lambing pens as I'm ever likely to need.

In looking at these buildings differently, we also began to look at the adjoining pastures differently. Currently, the horses are in the front pasture, next to the store. While this is convenient for feeding them (we keep our hay supply in one part of the store), it's also unsightly, because whenever it rains, the pasture gets muddy from the horses' hooves tearing it up, and that's the first thing anybody sees when they come to our farm. Yuck!

But if we have only a couple of horses, we can switch them to the paddock near the barn, which attaches to the back pasture. Nobody sees that pasture, so if the horses muddy it up during the rain, it's not going to make the whole farm look bad.

The sheep, on the other hand, don't destroy the ground they stay on. So, someday when we have money again, we're going to disc up and reseed the front pasture, divide part of it up into additional sheep breeding paddocks (we'll need more breeding groups now that we have added polled sheep to the flock), and then the nice neat green sheep pasture will be the first thing people see when they come in the driveway.

In time, we'll add a permanent run-in shed to each breeding paddock, instead of the cheap-but-unsightly tarp shelters we now have. I think it will be very convenient and will look very nice.

I'm so tired of having our resources stretched so thin we can't do right by the farm, as far as maintenance and improvements. This could be such a beautiful place, it was just so incredibly far run down when we bought it, we started out with a huge handicap, and have been playing catch-up ever since.

Here's an interesting thought I had about using the store to shelter the sheep. It has WAY more space than the sheep will ever need. Which means I'll be able to store my fleeces for sale in there too, instead of having them take up huge amounts of space in the house.

That got me thinking what else I could use all that extra space for. If my wool is going to be down there, why not my spinning wheel and loom as well? It could become my fiber studio. And if it's going to be my fiber studio... there's not much of a step to go from that to having it be a store again, where I could sell stuff I produce. Plus I know a lot of other creative people who might like an outlet to sell their stuff too.

The place would need lots of renovation to fix it up, but it IS already set up as a store, with shelves everywhere, large counters with tons of storage behind them, and even a nook where the cash register would go.

And don't you think it might be a fun gimmick for the people to be able to come to the store and buy, I don't know, a handwoven blanket or something, and be able to see the sheep the blanket's wool came from, right there in another part of the same building?

The sheep wouldn't spend much time inside, so it wouldn't be too hard to keep the sheep part of the building clean and presentable.

I don't know, maybe it's a silly idea. But I know *I* would enjoy shopping at a store like that, so maybe other people would too.

What do you think?

Straw + Camel's Back = ???

Don't get me wrong: I'm really glad I traded the mares Char and Scylla for the new group of sheep. I think it was a true example of the best of bartering: two people offering the best of what they had in exchange for something they wanted or needed more.

And I know that Char and Scylla are going to have a great life in their new home. David has already sent me several batches of pictures, showing them happily exploring and eating hay in their new pasture. They are going to be well loved and taken care of, so I have no regrets about letting them go there.

But even though it was a good choice that needed to be made, all the same, parting with Char took something out of me. It left a hole. It changed the way I feel about our horse operation.

Even though I've cut down our herd from 15 horses to 9 in the past month---no mean feat in the current horse market---we're still floundering in our financial crisis. No matter what I do, it's never enough to keep up with the hay bills and vet bills and so on. So Ken and I have been discussing our farm's future.

We're both so tired of the stress and worry. And after parting with Char, I just don't have the heart to continue struggling to keep the whole horse enterprise together, so we've decided to sell all the horses except for Senter and the two Art Deco fillies.

That means Torchsong, Callista, and Callisto will go on the sales list now, as well as Maggie, Andromeda, Penny, and Libby. They are wonderful horses, and I love them all, but I just don't have the heart for it anymore. I never wanted the horse operation to overwhelm the rest of the farm. I wanted to have a more balanced mix of livestock. And I definitely want a more sustainable lifestyle.

I'm tired of being on the brink of crisis all the time. I'm tired of watching my husband killing himself worrying over money. I'm tired of watching every penny I make siphoned away to pay for hay and still not be enough.

If the horses are not giving us any joy, then what's the point of all the struggle? Time to get the farm back on track. Maybe once we've thinned the herd down to just the two Art Deco fillies (and Senter, when he comes back from training), we'll be able to recapture some of the enthusiasm, on a smaller scale.

Meanwhile, I have seven more horses to sell. I wish it were over already, so we could just get on with our lives!

Heartbreak Ahead

I've been crying all morning.

I just can't put it off and avoid thinking about it any longer. Today I have to gather up all the paperwork for Char and Scylla and write up a sales contract for the Trading-Horses-For-Sheep deal.

Char and Scylla's new owner, David, is already on the road, driving here from Wisconsin with a trailer full of sheep. He'll arrive sometime tomorrow, drop off the sheep, and the next morning he'll leave for home, taking Char and Scylla with him. After that, it's very likely I will never see my Char-char again.

This is a really good trade for both of us. David is getting a couple of gorgeous, high-quality horses, and I'm getting a group of gorgeous, high-quality sheep. The only trouble is, I LOVE those horses, and he LOVES those sheep, so even though we know it's a great trade, we're both going to be really sad about it at the same time that we're excited.

This whole time I've been working out the details of the trade, I've been able to concentrate on the facts: Adding the new sheep to my flock is an excellent business decision. Value-for-value, if I count the lambs that the bred ewes will have in a few months, I'm getting more in "sheep" currency than I could sell the mares for in cash right now. The sheep will eat less hay than the horses, so we'll save money there. And I know that David will give the mares a fantastic home where they can be very happy.

I know all those facts. I've been clinging to them for weeks. I've been able to go about my life, do the chores, spend time petting and talking to Char and Scylla, and I've been pretty much okay.

But today, every time I so much as look out the window and see one of them, I start crying. It's a beautiful day out, warm and sunny. It would be an ideal day to go out and spend one last day playing with Char before I have to say goodbye. But I can't bear it. I can't stand to spend time cementing that bond we have, only to have to break it forever tomorrow.

(Sheesh, now I'm crying again, just writing about it. Part of me feels stupid for getting this worked up about a horse---I'm a grown woman, for Pete's sake. I made an excellent business deal that will help our farm. So shut up and stop crying about it, already!)

It would make it easier, I think, if parting with Char and Scylla was the magic sacrifice that would instantly cure all of our endless worries about money. But that's not the case. On Friday morning, they'll leave here, and on Friday afternoon, we're still going to be wondering how to pay our electricity bill and how to stretch the last of Ken's paycheck until the next one arrives.

That's not NEW, of course, we've been in that situation for months now. It just makes it harder to think that parting with Char and Scylla makes no difference in our situation at all. It makes it feel like they were never here or that my sacrifice doesn't matter.

I know that's not really true. Parting with Char and Scylla will help our finances in several ways. It's just that those ways are more gradual: saving money through decreased hay usage (using 1 fewer bale per day at $7 a bale saves us more than $2500 in a year) and earning more money through increased sheep sales later this summer (the lambs those new sheep produce in the spring should sell for about $6500 by fall).

But those are not quick fixes that my heart can latch onto. The heart is all about the NOW. No matter what the mind knows, the heart is never content to trade sorrow today for some distant future reward, because today is all the heart knows.

The only way the heart can find solace is to turn to some greater love. For me it is this: Even more than I love my beautiful Char-char, I love my farm and I love my husband. Our financial situation has been very hard on both of them, and this sacrifice will help ease the burden.

And that is how I am able to do this with a willing (although sorrowful) heart.

Ice Storm

On Friday (Feb. 1), we had an ice storm. In our current, impoverished circumstances, that's one of the things I dread hearing outside, because we don't have proper shelter for all the horses.

The young horses in the back pasture have a run in bay to the barn that they can go into, to get out of the rain.

The mares in the front pasture used to have a big run-in shed---one of those large, curved tarp sheds on a metal framework. But the destructive power of a bunch of large horses, plus the ferocious winds we get on our hilltop ripped the thing to tatters in the course of a year.

This summer, when it became a hazard, we tore it down, planning to build a real wood run-in shed before winter. We paid our neighbor come with his backhoe and level out the spot where we were going to put it.

Then the drought hit, hay prices went up, and horse sales plummeted. The money we had planned to use to build the shelter had to go instead to just barely manage to feed the horses. So now, whenever it's cold and rainy, I run out and open the gate to release the mares into the big pasture, so they can go find shelter among the thick cedar trees.

If the weather is just cold, or just wet, the big horses aren't bothered by it. But on Friday it was pouring rain and about 34 degrees (F). They are big, hefty girls, so they were not chilled or shivering, but they certainly weren't very happy with the situation.

We fed them early and extra, so their bellies were full to help them produce body heat, then they ran around a bit to get warm, and then they went and stood under the cedar thicket.

My one comfort was that I had seen that the weather was supposed to be getting warmer and warmer, so I knew they wouldn't be cold for much longer. Now today, it's nearly 70 degrees!

I'm looking forward to getting our herd down to the 5 fillies we plan to keep, because then they can all easily share the run-in bay that is attached to our barn, and I won't have to worry about the weather so much. Maybe someday we'll be able to afford to put up that shelter in the front pasture too.

At the moment, I just have to concentrate on selling the last few horses we have for sale. We're feeling the financial pinch again. I really need to earn some extra money in the next couple of weeks to buy more hay, since Ken's paycheck is stretched to the limit already.

Time to start listing a few more things on EBay, and to finally get around to advertising my fleeces for sale, and anything else I can think of to keep us going until the last few horses sell.

If I can just keep us going until summer, our sheep sales should generate enough money to buy our winter's hay and get us through another year.

Of course, the other thing I dread about the wind and rain and ice storms that come through here is that the house's roof leaks in my upstairs office. The winds are so fierce, they've torn off a lot of the shingles (which, of course, were installed as cheaply as possible by the house's former owners).

We had someone come out and price how much it would cost to redo the roof with new, high-quality architectural shingles, and were given a quote of $27,000! That is so ridiculously beyond any price we can even remotely foresee being able to afford, we had to just laugh, because otherwise we might cry!

I know there are other options for fixing the roof that are less expensive, and we will have to look into them when we can. But at the moment, we're concentrating on trying to raise enough to just pay the electric bill and buy hay to feed the horses, so the roof will have to wait.

Thinking Sideways

When---as is often the case---the path to our goals is obstructed by some delay or complication, Donna and I encourage each other to find ways to "think sideways" around the obstruction.

I spent today "thinking sideways."

I was writing emails all day long. Mostly, it was answering people who were inquiring about horses. For example:

One person decided against a horse she had been interested in, so I suggested another that she liked even better.

A fellow Icelandic sheep breeder wanted to decrease his sheep flock and get a couple of horses. I want to reduce my horse herd and add to my sheep flock. We exchanged emails discussing the possibility of a trade.

A horse trainer/breeder wrote to ask about breeding her mare to Senter, but our facilities are not really ready to host outside mares yet. So I suggested the idea of trading breedings for training at her facility.

A young rider was interested in one of my horses as a show prospect, but her favorite was out of her price range. We discussed payment options to help her afford the one she wanted.

I feel like I accomplished a lot today, even though I barely had time to get out of my chair. I think the most fun I had was discussing trading a horse to the sheep breeder. It was really entertaining to make out a whole list of possible options, using "sheep" as my base form of currency.

"It would be this many sheep to buy the horse. Add 1/2 sheep per month for board, or 1 sheep per month for board plus training. If you want her bred to my stallion, that'll cost you another sheep."

I don't know why, but I just had a lot of fun making out a price list in sheep.

A Load Off My Mind (And Out of My Closet)

Back around the end of October, I decided that I would sell my large personal stash of spinning fibers that I'd collected over the years, since I needed the money and I never have time to do any spinning anyway.

A few people bought individual items from the stash, but recently a lovely woman who runs a shop at a Renaissance Faire bought the entire remaining stash for $500. Tonight I just finished packing up these two gigantic boxes, crammed full of just about every kind of spinning fiber there is. Tomorrow, we'll ship them off to Washington state, and in the summer, she'll sell them in her shop. I like to think of all my fibers and fleeces going to a Ren Faire---surely someone will have fun with them!

The money, of course, like all our other money, is already spent buying hay for the horses. But it arrived on a week when we didn't have any other money to buy hay for the horses, so the timing was perfect.

Now, I'm reveling in the enormous amount of empty space I now have in the closet and under the bed in the guest room where I've been keeping all this fiber. With that gone, I may be able to reorganize the room to hold my loom and spinning wheel, plus all the fleeces from my own sheep that are waiting to sell, which will then clear out a lot of free space in our library where the fleeces have been stored. Maybe in time, we'll be well organized all over the house!

Now I'm on to my next big project, which is designing a website for a fellow Icelandic breeder. That's work I enjoy, so it should be fun.

Little by Little

It was a dreary, sleety day today. Despite having his nice shelter to stand under, Senter was shivering when I went out to check on him, so I went back inside and got his "coat" (horse blanket) to put on him. He used to get all spooky about it when I tried to put it on him, but now I think he understands that it keeps him warm, because he didn't budge at all when I put it on him today.

We spent a quiet holiday here at home. Ken went to our neighbor's Xmas dinner party, which she always invites us to, but I wasn't feeling well, so I stayed home. I've just been so tired lately, it was good to spend a day mostly just resting.

Even though unwarranted exhaustion was my only symptom, I think that it really may have been some kind of sickness, like a mild flu or something, because although today I felt better, tonight Ken was experiencing exactly the same thing, and went to bed early.

I have a bunch of loose ends to tie up, business-wise, so I worked on some of those today. I did a manuscript critique for a former client whom I worked with before when I used to do freelance editing. I packaged up and sent one box of fleeces that someone bought, and started organizing a few others. I'll finish packing those tomorrow. The fleeces are selling very well, considering I haven't even advertised them yet.

The payment check for my mare Bonnie did arrive at last, and tomorrow I'll be able to deposit the next payment check for my mare Boudicca who is being paid off on a monthly basis. So, for the moment at least, we have money to buy hay and pay some bills. It's going to vanish fast, though, so I have to still keep working on selling more of the horses.

Surprisingly, I have gotten a few inquiries lately. I thought everyone would be too busy with Xmas to be horse shopping, but apparently a few people were still looking. Plus I have a few previous people who inquired that I haven't heard back from during the holidays, so I need to contact them again soon to see if they've made any kind of decision.

Little by little, I'm getting things done.

No Sale

Sad to say, the prospective buyer called this morning and decided not to buy Penny. She liked her and thought she was sweet and beautiful, but wanted something that was going to be a little taller.

It's a common trend, among people who are interested in Warmblood breeds of horses, to consider a horse that is going to be a mere 16 hands to be "short." I think it's the perfect size, myself, but the trend is for taller and taller horses.

I'm disappointed, of course, but you can't blame a person for liking what they like and wanting what they want. Horse shopping is like dating---it can take a lot of tries before you find the right one for you!

Anyway, I naturally started worrying about money again, since I didn't expect anyone else to be doing any horse shopping now, with the holidays almost upon us. But to my surprise, after a week of silence, I got inquiries from three brand new potential buyers today! That lifted my spirits quite a bit, to have more hope for maybe selling a few more horses soon.

A Swarm of Complications

I'm learning that sometimes it's not the really big problems that bring you down. Sometimes its the multitudes of insignificant complications and disappointments that swarm around you like biting insects that end up being the things that break through your composure and sap your fortitude.

The past couple of days, that swarm has been hard at work here.

My computer still isn't fixed, so I'm still using Ken's computer, while Ken is stuck doing his work sitting on the living room couch with his laptop.

Now our truck has broken down again too---the same problem it's had a dozen or more times before: it's fine one day, and then the next day you go to start it and nothing happens. Sometimes it cures itself the following day without our doing anything to it. Sometimes Ken fixes it by jiggling some of the fuses. Sometimes we tow it to the repair shop, only to have it start up fine for the mechanic. Sometimes the mechanic replaces something that seems to solve the problem, only to have the problem reappear the next day or the next month. Most recently, we replaced the ignition, which seemed to solve the whole problem, until yesterday, when the issue reappeared just as it always has.

So now, without any immediate funds to fix the truck (not that anything ever seems to fix it permanently), we can't continue our project of mucking out all the horse paddocks. So, when potential horse buyers come to look at horses, the place literally looks like crap. Plus, we have to move each day's supply of hay up the hill in several wheelbarrow loads instead of one truckload. And we no longer have the option of going to pick up a couple of days' worth of hay ourselves if our hay supplier can't deliver on time. In other words, many of our farm tasks are crippled.

Although we got the vet out here in plenty of time to do the Coggin's tests on the various sales horses, one of the vials of blood broke in transit to the lab, so now the vet has to come back out again on Friday and take the blood again. We don't have to pay for this second trip, but it still delays the paperwork for that particular horse. Lucky for us, it's one of the horses that isn't leaving until next month, or we'd be in trouble!

Ken got paid yesterday, including his Xmas bonus, which was a relief. I had been getting stir crazy here, since I had not even left the farm for the past month. So we decided to drive into Charlottesville and do a bit of minor shopping. We have no money for real Xmas shopping this year, but we thought we'd get a few things we needed at the pet supplies store and it would at least give me the chance to get out for a few hours.

Because we were mainly going to the pet supply store, we thought it would be fun to take our Pomeranian Leeloo with us. And it would have been fun, except that on the way there in the car, she got carsick all over me!

After driving to three stores and still not finding the item I was looking for, we gave up, picked up dinner at the Burger King drive through and headed home.

When we got back, we found that our electricity had been shut off. Ken knew it was overdue, but his paycheck had arrived and he knew we had money to pay it now. Unfortunately, he didn't think to call the electric company to pay it before we left for the afternoon. So when we got home, Ken phoned in our payment---plus a hefty fine---and we had to sit around by candlelight waiting for the guy to come reconnect the power. Kind of put a damper on my "big" afternoon on the town!

While we were waiting for the guy to come turn the power back on, we moved my big, room-divider sized candle stand downstairs next to the couch. Because it holds 39 candles inside individual glass cups, it produces quite a lot of light, so we could see while we waited.

But this morning, our Pomeranian Leeloo and one of our cats, Echo, got scuffling in the living room and upset a couple of our other cats, who crashed into the candle stand and knocked it over, breaking two of the glass cups and scattering shards all over the floor.

Another cat peed on Senter's horse blanket that was lying in the laundry room, waiting to be washed. This is only about ten feet from the cat door through which the cat could have gone, to pee outside, but apparently that would have been too much trouble.

Then, what was supposed to be good news today turned out to be another series of complications. The payment check arrived from the person who is buying our mare Bonnie. Only the person made the check out to our farm name instead of my name. Since our bank account is in Ken's name and mine, we can't deposit a check made out to the farm.

At first we thought we would just go to the bank and change our bank account to include the farm name too, so if this kind of thing happens again in the future, it won't be a problem. But it turns out we can't add the farm name to a personal account, so we would have to open a business account, and we can't open an account in the business's name unless we go to the county office to fill out a "doing business as" form.

So we went to the county office. They gave us a form, but said that we had to fill it out online. So we went back home to fill it out. I don't know what happened to the "doing business as" form since last time I filled it out, but what I remember as being a very simple, one page form that took only a couple minutes to fill out, today was this endless, convoluted array of contradictory web pages that asked for the same information over and over in slightly different ways until I had no idea whether I was even answering any of the questions correctly.

Finally, some of the definitions on the questionnaire were so vague and confusing that Ken called the "help" number for clarification. Of course, there was no one there. He left a message, but no one ever called us back.

By this time the day was pretty much over, so we just gave up on the whole stupid process, and I emailed Bonnie's buyer to ask her to send another check, this time made out correctly. So it'll probably be another week before we can get this much needed money.

Oh... and here's another irritating complication: What the heck happened to my blog header? For months it has been perfect, showing the full photo of my horses in the field, with the pale sky over their backs being the backdrop for the blog title. But suddenly a few days ago, with no editing from me, the whole header is a different size, the photo no longer fits, and the blog title is illegibly squished down onto the horses' backs.

I suppose I'll have to figure out how to fix it eventually, but sheesh, it took me long enough to get it right in the first place. What's the point if Blogger is just going to randomly rearrange stuff without my permission?

All these stupid problems are not so overwhelming individually, but when they all just keep piling up like this, it saps my drive and energy. I get so frustrated and tired. I'm just trying to do a simple, decent job. I'm not asking for the world. But some days it just seems like it's impossible for anything to go right.

It's Official!

Dr. Shane came to do Bonnie's vet check today, and it's official: she's definitely pregnant. That means her sale will go through, and we'll finally have some money to pay off most of our most urgent bills. Hurray!

Dr. Shane gave shots to the horses that are already sold, and did Coggin's tests for all our other sale horses too, so that will be already taken care of when the time comes to sell them.

The only downside to all that is just those few relatively simple shots and tests added up to a vet bill that was close to $700. Yikes! Yet another reason why raising horses is not profitable.

I did get $500 in the mail today from fleece and fiber sales, so that will pay for our next load of hay, which should (hopefully) last us until the check for Bonnie arrives.

Just a few more horse sales and we may almost manage to dig out of this financial hole.

Sold One!

The people who were thinking about buying Bonnie decided today that they would definitely buy her, as long as I get her vet checked to verify that she's pregnant. I've seen Bonnie's belly changing shape these past couple of months, so I have no doubt that's a test she can pass, no problem. So it looks like Bonnie will be going to live in Massachusetts pretty soon.


I also spent a very pleasant couple of hours this afternoon talking with a lovely woman from Charlottesville who has fallen in love with Icelandic sheep, and wanted to come visit the farm. She doesn't own a farm yet, so she wasn't actually sheep shopping, just coming to see the sheep in person and getting to ask lots of questions.

I had a lot of fun talking with her. It's strange to think that I was pretty much in her shoes only a few years ago, and now I have a farm and sheep and horses (and all the attendant bills and worries) and am the "expert" who can answer all her questions. I've learned so much in such a short time, it makes me proud of myself. And I really enjoyed encouraging someone who is just in the very beginning stages of thinking about starting a farm someday.

(I did tell her not to invest in horses though!)

I have at least two other people who sound like they're pretty seriously considering purchasing horses, plus a lot of others who have made initial inquiries. Gotta keep that momentum going, sell some more horses soon!

Turning Point

I was lying awake last night, as I often do, when all of a sudden I got the feeling that our farm's financial crisis has reached a turning point. I have no logical reason to think that yet, but the feeling came all the same.

I feel certain that some of the dozen or so people who have inquired about horses in the past few days will turn out to be the right future owners for some of the horses on my sales list. I feel certain that we will pay our bills, rebalance our farm plans into a more sustainable scale, and by spring perhaps be in a position to actually start enjoying owning the farm again, instead of just worrying all the time about how we're going to keep it.

Like I said, I have no logical reason to think this yet. And maybe I won't feel that way tomorrow. But it sure is a relief to feel that way today.

I got a few more new horse inquiries today. The people who made an offer on Bonnie are now considering my counter-offer. And I got to meet a couple of very nice local horse women who came out to meet the herd this afternoon. It was a busy day, but all in all, I feel pretty good.

For that, I'm very thankful.

Horse-Shopping Feeding Frenzy

So apparently I've discovered the secret to writing horse ads is to sound really, really desperate.

When I updated my ads recently, I didn't really change much of anything in the descriptions except to add an "Emergency Herd Reduction" statement at the top of each one.

I did this two days ago. Since then I have TEN different people interested in horses, including four who say they want to schedule a farm visit and one who has made an offer on Bonnie. Bonnie has become very popular. I have FIVE people interested in her.

This is so weird. I mean, I'm happy about it, of course, but where were all these people all spring, all summer, all fall, when they could have gotten a horse in time to do something with it while the weather was still good (and saved me from feeding them all for all these months)?

I've had more inquiries in the past two days than in the past 4 months combined.

Mystifying.

Still, it's good news, so I'm not going to complain. What I'm going to do is answer a lot of inquiry emails and phone calls and schedule a lot of farm visits. Which, with luck, will lead to selling a lot of horses and stopping some of the money that has been hemorrhaging out of this farm in the form of hay bills.

It will be nice to be able to pay all the people we owe money to. It will be nice to be able to sleep at night without having to lie awake wondering how to afford the next shipment of hay. It will be nice to have a shipment of hay last more than a week!

I just hope I am able to make the right judgments and find the RIGHT home for each of the sales horses. They're good girls, every last one of them, and they deserve good homes where they'll be loved and appreciated.