Updates, late April

As I'm typing this, Burd, our Quaker Parrot, is bathing himself in the gallon-sized dog water dish on the floor. Our two (now two, count them) dogs are watching in half interest as he nearly drowns himself with every gargly dunk. Normally Burd gets a shallow Tupperware dish with lukewarm-to-toasty water only a couple of inches deep for his private shower time, but he's braving a good five inch swimming pool at the moment of icy-cool fresh doggie water. Now he's scuttling across the floor, wet wings spread, shucking all need for flight (even though he is fully feathered) and ignoring entirely the two dogs watching his duck walk. Lemon is flying over, checking on him. Her long, yellow top knot has been nibbled and yanked down to a few short, sad gold feathers sticking straight off her head— Burd seems jealous of her headwear and has been removing her plumage whenever he feels the urge to be vindictive. Despite that and the occasional velociraptor-style argument, they have become good friends.

A lot of stuff has changed since my last post.

Perhaps not most importantly, but must noticeably is the addition of Scoot, an 11-week-old bicolor Australian Shepherd puppy who is currently sprawled on the floor next to me, chewing on his third favorite playtoy, a roll of purple duct tape. The reason I think he likes it so much is that it can't move very far for him to sink his teeth into, even on the cool, glossy tile— Scoot lost much of the function in his hind end due to an attack from his sire as a 4 week old puppy. His movement is sadly a bit limited. He was bred by a place called Texas Aussies, interestingly enough located in the vicinity of Chicago, Illinois. His name was originally Arrow, which seemed fortuitous considering he would end up at YMCA Camp Flaming Arrow, but now goes by Scoot, for obvious reference to his choice of locomotion. Our friend Ellen brought him down last Tuesday via American Airlines. Since that time, he has progressed from only a few moments of looking like a half-normal quadruped and standing on all fours to being able to drunkenly stumble after Dick and I. He will likely not recover full use of his back legs, but thanks to a fairly proactive breeder and now some tough love and a lot of swimming lessons with us down here in Texas, I think he is going to continue to improve to a point where he can get around on his own, albeit not gracefully. Richard was in the market for a "truck dog" to tag along with him to work sites, and looks as though he's got his mate. Hop is resigned to the idea and seems to benefit in the long run— currently Scoot is dozing on the tile floor whilst Hop enjoys one of Scoot's many chew bones while nestled in the fuzzy faux shearling of Scoot's new bed. Our goals now are to get him more mobile (check) and get some weight on him— plain Greek yogurt and Taste of the Wild kibble, with a smattering of Hop's Wolf King huge-honkin' dog food bites to spice things up.

Scoot collapses a bit and makes some people gasp and sigh and claim they want to cry, but he is good-natured, happy, bright, and an excellent sport about the whole "being crippled" thing. We do our best to exhaust him every day, and he sleeps well through the night cuddled up in our bed. No accidents in the house to report yet, but I think you can thank the breeder more than us for that. I'm really excited to have another lifetime dog, and I think he can certainly become as good a dog as Hop, if not the same athlete. Dick is absolutely in love with him; he hasn't had a puppy in ages and I suppose this is the first one that belongs entirely to him. We have gotten a few questions regarding our sanity in adopting an animal with obvious and possibly devastating special needs (the prognosis is cautiously optimistic, but not entirely rosy.) I can't say those doubts are unfounded, but I've also found the joy of owning a puppy is a hundred percent greater when you get to see him strengthen and grow in many ways outside of the norm. If you can think of things as predestined, (and I don't always, despite a lot of either good luck or karma) he was absolutely meant to be here.



My dad died a week ago last Friday. He would have been 85 and a half today (not that you get around to celebrating halfsies when you're past twelve, but still somewhat momentous.) He was dealing with long-term congestive heart failure and acute arthritis in his back, and looked to his family and a lot of prayer and close talks with his God as he grew closer to death. My mom definitely misses him; he was in all ways her best friend. I miss him, at least in the way I most remember him. He was ready to move on and if anyone was excited to find out the whole dealio with Heaven, it was my dad. Still sucks sometimes. But it is amazing who actually comes out of the proverbial woodwork to support you during these sorts of things; I am definitely surrounded by people who care, and those who seem awkward about saying anything are easy enough to forgive. If my dad left me with any legacies, they would be threefold— 1. The urge to make pictures that make people happy, 2. The understanding of what a good spouse can and should be, and 3. Realizing that there is no excuse to be unfriendly or act unloving. I cannot and have not always acted upon those three things, but they are intrinsic and they are all part of my Poppa.

The horses are all good. Had a blast with Ellen playing cowgirl and charging up hills and fording the river on horseback for the first time this year. Ellen, from Illinois-ish area where it seems overly cold and damp, is a friend I originally connected with probably at age 12 or 13 through the AOL online message board community of eons past— we were both horse crazy and fell into the same clique of pony-fueled girls who still keep in touch more than a dozen years later thanks to the miracle of Facebook. Though she and a handful of the other girls made a ridiculous and wonderful pilgrimage to our wedding in 2009, this past week was the first time I'd gotten to spend a true chunk of time with her, and it was effortless and fun and full of laughter and chatter, despite the heft and weight of the week she arrived. (Arrangements to fly Scoot down were in the process as my father passed away; we went ahead with things and she pitched in to help my mom and grandma as well as play in the dirt and river with us back at camp.) I do, however, blame her for making me go back and look at my LiveJournal rantings and immediately plant my face in my hands. Alas. ;) Love her much. I rarely get to the end of an extended visit and feel like I already miss that person, and that thought struck me pretty hard as I left the San Antonio Airport last Friday.

Feeling very discouraged about NATRC. It pains me not to get to go to any rides, really, and I hate to feel like I'm half-assing anything. I don't want to go to one ride, alone, and leave my work to someone else— and then not be able to attend anything else for God knows how long. I suppose it just needs to sit on the back burner and wait for.. when? 2012? Probably not. 2013? It's perhaps awkward in that I feel like the only person close to my age (not technically a child still, and no actual children of my own, so sometimes I feel like the only competitor making excuses about my schedule) but the experience and the people and the sore butt at the end of a 40 mile weekend absolutely got me pumped to ride competitively for the first time in a lifetime of horsemanship of one color or another. But the catch twenty-two is that I can't leave my job, which is primarily on the fair-weather weekends of Texas falls and springs, to go do competitive rides.. and I can't afford the rides without the security of a job and a place to keep and train my horses. That said, I wouldn't trade my job for anything either at the minute (except perhaps somewhere with a real house and a little acreage of our own) and look forward to hopefully a lifetime in this field. I just can't help but envy the schedule of a private camp and feel a little hopeless at the thought of no more CTRs for a very long while. I am purposefully skipping the Wimberly Wayfarer for a great friend's birthday and have no regrets about that; honestly, though, it partially has to due to the fact that I looked at my schedule and saw there was no point in pushing my finances and our vehicle when it would be a strain on my job, my friendships, Richard couldn't come, and I wouldn't exactly be aiming for any more rides in the fall. I think that is the conclusion of my emo rant, and I will feel better after our next dressage lesson (which of course I haven't prepared for in a week) and having something else to aim for.

In other hobbies.. We have been swimming every day for nearly a week now. Feels wonderful. I have the urge to try and do the lifeguard swim test (sans the rescues and things— just the 500 m swim) by the beginning of summer, and between dog swim time and just general joy of being outside in the spring swelter, I am getting enough exposure to maybe bring myself to that point. My legs are also tan. This is exciting.

I'm tan, I'm fitter. I'm still missing my Daddy, but even more in love with my sweet spouse every day. Our house is full to the brim with animals. The horses and the kids who come with them consume most of my time. The stress of this time of the year can push camp people to the point of being nutty, but at the same time, they can show absolute love and selflessness when you least expect it.

Pre Thanksgiving

November doesn't have an excellent track record with my family, taking into consideration the past two and the loss of all of the males on the Phelps side of the family, but I still enjoy Thanksgiving. We aren't really having much of one this year as my Grandma and mom don't feel the urge to celebrate, but there will be food and the five of us, plus the normal dog assembly, plus a 140-lb Great Dane, plus the parrot. Somehow by injecting droves of animals into my parents' modest suburban home, I think I'm hoping to keep things light and hopefully out of the reach of the Dane.

I'm looking forward to a new camera, sort of a by-product of my mother investing in a new Mac Book Pro. We aren't exactly drowning in money here currently, as every animal and every vehicle seems to have expressed their opinion on breaking somehow (transmission, ear infection, viruses, alternators, ACLs, etc.) and we insist on driving a lot and having pricey hobbies (okay, last one is my fault) but we are doing alright. Having a lot of fun thanks to friends and good weather and being outside a good deal. Last weekend, a couple of great friends hosted us in College Station for Richard's first Aggie game. I was happy to go to see them and let Richard get the A&M experience, but ended up having a great time watching all of the excitement that surrounds a game in Aggieland and then enjoying someone else's nice family and friends. Totally worth the drive.

R's been working a lot, fifteen or so hours today alone, but we are driving to San Antonio tonight as soon as he gets off work. It has been pretty super to have him to work with the youngsters on trimming, plus Pax can get her pancake toes trimmed more often and Indy is having to deal with rasping instead of nippers. He's been riding one of the 5 year old bucksins for me, too and dealing with some of his crap that I wasn't fond of. My Thursday lesson girls are in love with him and his horse "Whiskers" and made him run the barrels twice last week. And by run, I mean, cajole obese Whiskey into trotting farty circles around the barrels angrily. He wants to do a NATRC ride with me, but we don't have a horse conditioned early enough for next weekend. He's tagging along anyway to run P&R checks again and be a good camp manager for me and El Bandito.

All in all, life is good. My dozen lesson students seem to have finally balanced out (moreso that I've gotten a better handle on things and started laying a few more diligent ground rules about scheduling.) Now I can enjoy that part of my job a lot more than I was— my riding instructor, Ashley, pretty much hung the moon as far as I was concerned at age 10 and 11, and while the fun —but correct— legalities of the YMCA prevent me from having the same kind of open-door-policy on the barn and horses, getting girls in the saddle who might not otherwise have a chance is what I'm pretty sure I'm cut out to do. The main thing that bothers me is the lack of weekends.. Not because I mind working 6+ days a week, but because I have a deeply burning desire to pursue my own competitive riding for the first time in my entire life. It isn't as though I don't enjoy weekend retreats— on the flip side, I love having our loving and very fun summer staff here to help run the place, not the least of which is Tiff. I just think I've found a sport both my wacko horse and I click at, somewhat. And to add to that, I now have a burning desire to ride dressage, because clearly that's an affordable and practical solution to having too many other things on the plate.

Ah well. Did I say life was good? It is.

Thinking on Christmas.

This isn't a very personally exploitative blog, but it's Christmas, and at Christmas (according to my favorite seasonal film, Love Actually) you tell the truth, so..

I really, really enjoyed having Richard here this year. I could not have fathomed how weird it would be to not be visiting his family in Belfast. I miss them, and for that I love their son and brother all the more. Since getting married, I have become eighty times happier and we've been more full of family and love than ever before. I've also somehow become at least twice as scatterbrained, messy, and unorganized. I've also gained fifteen plus pounds since the summer. That's painful. I don't doubt I can change that, but it's scary how quickly you can fall into a poor routine of work, play, and eating. My elderly dad is seeing some serious health problems. Making twice the money just means twice the bills for us, though we can't complain.

No, no complaints. In our current state of affairs, I am so happy.

I like to write down my Christmas exchanges somewhere, because I always have a tough time remembering months later. (What does that say about our culture? Not sure, but it's not particularly good.) So with that, I'll conclude this sporadic update.

For Richard, I bought a Gerber folding knife (which I ended up keeping, and he kept the gorgeous but large Horseman's Emerson knife he ordered for me, haha,) a soft grey bath robe, a handful of Transformers and Star Wars accessories for the new truck, some deerskin gloves and a Carhartt beanie, and to top it off, I woke him up by dumping Hopalong on our bed dressed in a Yoda costume. Which was epically cute, despite not fitting and my mom's dog, Rembrandt, desperately wanting to eat off Yoda's useless, floppy arms. He also got a motorized Lego AT-AT model (the Star Wars walking thing? idunfreakinknow..) and seemingly lots of pajamas. We also sort of consider his recent Tony Lamas a Christmas gift in extension. They're awesome, and at least well on their way to being broken in.

I received a pair of roughout chinks from my parents, plus pajamas and slippers shaped like cowboy boots! So cute. Richard bought me a fabulous Emerson blade which we decided was better for him (but the thought was awesome; it's considered "The" horseman's tool) in the long run. Still awesome. He got me the Waldemar Cookbook which I've wanted for awhile, and a card to get Hopalong DNA tested so we can figure out what makes up our fabulous best-friend mutt! Plus a little Blackaloosa (a black appaloosa.. don't ask, it went well with the Barak-Arama vanilla-scented air freshener he added)

Richard's family sent a darling compact and makeup bag and lots of our favorite Burt's Bees products. (I thought British people didn't get Burt's Bees but I guess they are pretty global. Hah.) He got a box of his favorite chocolate bars from home as well and a comedy DVD you probably wouldn't on any shelf in an American Target. I got a journal as well, and we both received a pair of beautiful, tiny silver spoons from Eve. We're a bit tore up that the present we designed and expedited to them is apparently being delivered in four days.. Richard is calling up the company (photobox.co.uk) tomorrow and raising hell. I felt awful that we didn't have something under their tree.

We also got a little money and books from my grandma. (Picked out by us, yay-- The Man With an Iron Heart for him and The Omnivore's Dilemma for me) My aunt and uncle got us a small handheld digital video recorder, good for short little clips.. I get the feeling we'll be taking LOTS of shots of Pax doing cute things. And we inherited like eight pounds of Starbucks Christmas coffee beans or something ridiculous since my family isn't completely partial to flavored coffees. I love them. So that was lucky.

I am not sure what we're going to do with the money. If we split it, there'd be enough for him to get a decent flat screen and for me to maybe find a used Wintec like the one I want.. But we could also just pay off a lot of bills.. hmm. Decisions. ;) Oh and I definitely need to invest in a horse soccer ball..

It's nice to be sitting here, typing and listening to my husband very busily crashing through his trough of several thousand Lego parts. It's a different Christmas, but it's a good one.

Honeymoonbeams

Well, hello there. I'm in Georgia.

Rather, we are in Georgia. As of a week ago, I'm a married girl. Wifey material. Tied down and committed to one person to argue with forever. And after recouperating from intensive end-of-camp time, family travels and reunioning, we loaded down Sullivan the Dodge Caliber with camping gear and food and at least three or four cameras and drove for 28 hours to finally land here, a spot on the map we arbitrarily picked, Blairsville, Georgia, in the north of the state in the Chatahoochee National Forest. Speeding through Nacadoches, Texas to Shreveport, Louisiana and Jackson, Mississippi and eventually on up through Georgia. It's gorgeous. We're holed up in a snug motel on the square with a quasi-mountain view and easy access to our cooler full of leftover wedding beer. (Tonight is a Dos Equis and Tecate evening.) Tomorrow night or so we're going to camp and then it's on to the Carolinas or up the Appalachian Trail.

On the definite list to visit so far are:

• Washington, DC: museumry (Smithsonian!) and monumentally things and the like.
• Assateague Island, Virginia: wild horses and kayaking and camping on the beach. (Did you read Marguerite Henry books as a child? Then clearly you weren't a little horse girl. I so was.)
• Wherever in Kentucky our friend Tobbe lives.

The only real complaint we've had is a plethora of fast food on the drive from Texas, which we did relatively non-stop. Hopefully we'll fix that with more picnicking and less Chick Fil A.

Mmm, waffle fries. And mountains. Great combination.

Bring it on.

Camp kicks into high gear this afternoon, as the riding staff arrives for training tonight and everyone else should be ready on Wednesday for the full staff events to begin. Next Sunday will see herds of boys (and parents; gack!) and then I suppose we will be in full swing.

Richard arrives tomorrow. I always get a tiny bit nervous about his flights, but no overwhelming anxiety. It will feel a relief on all levels to just have him back again, with the shaky promise (come on now, US Immigration) that he'll never have to leave again. Kara came yesterday, which was exciting and I feel like any worries I had about being friends-with-an-internet-friend seem to be for naught. She is very cool. The horses are ready. Wedding plans are not, but I've left my mother with some creative projects for the effort and my dad with hotel and food concerns. Bandit's goofy eye is fixed and though he isn't quite where I'd like him, weight-wise, he is fifteen now and deserves some allowances.

City Year is a go. I spoke with John, who will be one of the senior staff / team leaders, so to speak, next year and that conversation gave me some renewed energies for the service year. Watching some of the PSAs on YouTube had me a little nervous that I was the wrong sort, or too old, or perhaps not a perfect fit for the organization, but it seems like I was well wrong in that thinking. I'm looking forward to the challenges of working with a wide assortment of people, and happy at the thought of meeting those kids.

I'm off to go pick up some staff at SA International, and then my mind is sadly going to be lost to June second when Richard gets here.. Hopefully with some British chocolate and the new Dave Matthews Band CD in tow. He has learned well the lesson on how to appease a girl.