Horse Lesson 101: How (not) to catch a horse....

Well, I would like to announce that we are now the proud owners of Honey...

A very beautiful, Tennessee Walking horse.   Cam is in the orange sweat shirt..riding Honey.

We actually bought Honey a while back, but waited until now to bring her home.  She started out on a farm with about 8 acres of pasture....we have about between 60-70.  In our pasture Honey tends to go to the very FAR side of the property where there is a smaller section that is separated by woods from the rest of the pasture.  I'm not sure why she "hangs out" over there, but I'm not feeding her there.  So I have to walk to the other side of the property, and try and catch her.

Well....she didn't want me to.  She is bigger than me, and moves much faster than me...needless to say I didn't catch her for quite some time.  I actually gave up and left, then came back. 

So I though that mabye you would let me tell you how NOT to catch a horse...since I can't exactly tell you how TO catch a horse...

Kelly's Guide to (Not) Catching a Horse:

1.  You don't just walk up without some sort of food or treat in your hand.  You must have something that makes them want to come to you.

2. If you have a treat, you don't hold the treat in one hand and the lead rope in the other, you also don't hang the lead line around your neck/shoulders where the horse can see it.

3. When giving said treat you don't try to grab the halter with the hand that is holding the lead rope.

If you do these things you WILL be following a horse up and down a hill that my son has always called "The Mountain" for no less than an hour, and your butt and thighs (although they need the workout) will hurt for at least a day or two...

What I learned

What I did figure out though is this:  When I spot her, I drop the lead rope at my feet and hold out the treat and walk up.  Then I give her the treat and grab the halter.  Then I walk her to the lead rope and pick it up and bring her home....where I feed her the grain/oats (whatever it's called)...  :)

This morning before work, I walked over, got her, brought her home and fed her before leaving to take Cam to school....We even got there early for a change :)

Y'all have a good day now.  If any of you horse people want to lend some advice to us beginners please feel free to do so!

School...

It seems like all I do these days is complain about school.  From the moment Cam gets home he is calling me...the teacher this, the teacher that, blah blah blah blah.


I truly feel like his education is not where it should be.  I'm not saying that he is dumb, I"m saying that I don't feel like the school is teaching the kids.  I feel like they are only concerned with MAP testing.  That's it. It really does seem like they only teach for the MAP test, which is the standardized test that we use here in SC.  I'm tired of feeling like he's not learning anything.  I'm tired of hearing how his class is always in trouble.  I'm sick and tired of hearing the complaints...not to mention that he is barely skirting by....this is odd for him.  He's usually a pretty good student and it just amazes me that he can go from being a fairly decent student to failing.  He brings nothing home, he does no homework and now here I am fussing about school again.

Not to mention, it gets old hearing your child come home everyday from school complaining that again he's been in trouble, not individually, but as a group the class is in trouble.  I dont' think it is fair that they are punished as a whole when all of them are not misbehaving.  Yesterday his complaint was that they were not able to go outside because of the rain, so they went into the gym.  In the gym, they were playing tag and the same teacher that he complains about everyday was the one over the prime time.  She got on the loud speaker and said "Y'all are fool, just fools" and took the rest of the prime time.  Now I'm going to assume that they were being too loud...I understand that....but really??? No warning, nothing...just call them fools and set them down?

I'm sick of it.  I really wish I were in a position that I could home school him.  At least then I would know what he is/is not doing and I would know what is going on.  I found out that the prison system is modeled after the school, honestly I don't think that says much for the school.  I mean, these kids have not broken the law...they are not criminals.  Am I the only one that sees a problem with this???? Really???