May 2022

 Another month in the books. Where does the time go? We had another busy month. We started the month with our yearly May 1st photo. This marks the half birthday for Sophia and coincides with the azalea bushes blooming. It is really just a good excuse to get a yearly photo of Sophia. Some day I will make a scrapbook page of these photos through the years. 

Sheep and Wool Festival was in person this year. I was thrilled. I met Robin, Susan and her girls there. Kallissa and I also met up shortly. It was so much fun despite being in POURING down rain. I got a lot of great yarn. Can't wait to make some of the patterns I picked out for this yarn.

We went to a new restaurant to celebrate my birthday day. It wasn't as good as Pasta Plus but was good. I would go back again. Bummed that Covid forced Pasta Plus out of business. That was my all time favorite restaurant. 

I was able to attend Angie's graduation. Tracey and Danielle were at Gianna's in Virginia and George came to Angie's. I can't believe the two girls had graduation the same exact day, same time! I was glad I could be there for her. 

Before Angie's graduation I dropped Sophia off at the barn so she could start prepping for the dressage rally. She was going to go down with another parent and I was going to meet them at the venue. Sophia was helping her friend in the wash stall. Her friend was cleaning her horses sheath and Sophia was keeping it occupied by feeding it treats. UNTIL he bit her finger. He chomped down hard and held it. It hurt like heck. Thankfully it was only the tip of the finger and he didn't crush any bones. 

That started the weekend off hard and it didn't get much better. It was hot that day, 95 degrees. Sophia and her friends worked hard to get the stalls set up. The barn was bringing a total of 21 horses. They sent Sophia and the older kids first so they could start getting the stalls ready. Sophia got a blister on the webbing by her thumb from shoveling the shavings in. Brisk was really hot and drank a lot. The sweat was dripping off him. This freaked Sophia out and she was very worried that he was sick. It wasn't a good day.

The next day she had the first turn out of the day. She had to be ready and have Brisk ready by 8:00. This was stressing her out. She made it in time, early even. She lost one point, her first HM point ever, for forgetting to clean his bit after she rode on Friday. Brisk did not like it when Sophia brought him back from his morning walk and his stall mates were gone. He was a bit of a jerk. This upset Sophia too. Her riding wasn't as good as it could have been. He spooked at birds during the qualifying ride and she missed the spot she was supposed to start her circle at. She lost two points on the test, which is a lot. She qualified, barely but qualified. Many of the kids who wanted to go to champs did not qualify so this was this score was very much welcomed.

Sophia did well during her musical. She scored second place. Brisk looked much better during that test. She rode to How to Train Your Dragon. 

We had a tornado warning one day when Steve and Sophia were at school. I was working. The wind really picked up. I went downstairs and brought the dogs in the downstairs bathroom with me. I ran and opened the windows (Steve told me too) and felt bad leaving the cats out. So I grabbed some treats and they followed me into the bathroom. Two cats, two dogs and me in a half bath. It was so windy, the dogs were anxious but thankfully the tornado never materialized.

Our pets are all good. The cats REALLY love Loki. They sleep next to him and rub up against him. It is so cute to see.