Photo by Stacey Wright, Courtesy of www.PeacefulGirl.com

This week’s Thankful Thursday is dedicated to a good friend and coworker of mine and a fellow blogger, Stacey.  Stacey caught the blogging bug from me last summer and has taken off running with it.  She’s not a horse person at all, but she has been such a source of support and encouragement for me in this venture.  In fact, she just called me to make sure I was productively blogging this evening!  Her ears must have been burning.  =)  She has become such a successful and active blogger and is always there for me to toss ideas at or get feedback from.  She has even been a big supporter of Pets Blogroll, dedicating part of one of her sites to her cat so she could join up and be involved!  Stacey is a diverse and unique individual and I encourage you to check out her great sites:  the dark and dangerous Fear Fragments - dedicated to the genre of horror in movies, music, etc; and my personal favorite, Peaceful Girl – where she showcases some of her amazing photography and her kitty’s antics.  Right now, she’s participating in a 30 day posting challenge on Peaceful Girl and I’m sure she’d appreciate some new visitors and commentors on her posts.  You can also check out some of her horror convention/dead doll photography at Flickr.  Anyway, I just wanted to say thanks to a great friend who has been a source of support both in blogging and in life over the past year.  Thanks, doll!

Happy Thursday to everyone and please visit these other sites that frequently participate in Thankful Thursday:

Akal Ranch, Enlightened Horsemanship Through Touch, The Pony Expression, and Tired Dog Ranch.

I bet you all thought I was going to let *another* week go by with no Thankful Thursday post, didn’t you?  Nope!  Wrong!  Here it is, a little late but better than never.  The weeks have slipped by a little too quickly and as I looked back to my last Thankful Thursday post (almost a month ago, gasp!) I realized that it was also about my intended topic for this week, the lovely Hazel (or Crazel, but more on that later).  When I wrote that post, about the little tan dog I found, I was purposely vague and didn’t include any photos.  The situation was a bit complicated at the time, but I feel confident now that she is truly Grady’s and my girl and want to share her with you all a bit more.  It’s still tricky here, as two out of two foster homes have bailed out on me at the last minute, and she’s right now residing illegally in my “over-the-legal-limit” apartment.  Which is what brings me to Thankful Thursday – the University of Doglando!  Grady has been going to Doglando for over a year now for daycare and he absolutely loves it.  This place is a doggie heaven -  located on the East side of Orlando, it encompasses 3.5 grassy, fenced acres where dogs of all shapes and sizes spend their days playing until they collapse.  I found this place by accident when Grady was driving me (and my partner at the time) nuts, with no playmate and wayy too much spare time on his paws.  Teena is the owner and she is brilliant with the dogs, able to manage huge groups of up to 40 dogs with no problem. 

Yes, I know she's skinny - she's actually gained weight since I got her!

Teena is very knowledgable and active in the rescue community and has really stepped up to the plate to help me out with Hazel.  She’s provided tons of free advice on problem solving, the legalities of the situation, training, and more.  She’s been an ear for me and a tremendous resource.  If all that weren’t enough, she’s been allowing me to bring Hazel in daily while I’m at work which has allowed me to keep her until I get her foster situation sorted out.  If it weren’t for Teena and the great staff at Doglando, Hazel would have had to go to rescue two weeks ago.   A special bonus:  she’s getting great socialization and training while she’s there!  Her “Crazel” days are becoming fewer and farther between.  So I want to say a huge thanks to everyone at Doglando.  You all are amazing people and I don’t know what I would do without you guys!

Of course I can’t leave out the Slobber Dog, and I am so thankful to have him in my life as well.  He has provided such stable energy for Hazel and she has been learning from him (mostly good behaviors, I’m happy to say!)  He’s also doing a great job of sharing all of his toys, his bed, and his mom with the little street urchin.  I am so thankful to have that adorable big lug and it makes me proud to see how far he’s come in his own rehabilitation over the past 5 years. 

I hope you all have a happy Thursday and please visit these other sites that frequently participate in Thankful Thursday:

Akal Ranch, Enlightened Horsemanship Through Touch, The Pony Expression, and Tired Dog Ranch.

People come into your life for a reason, a season or a lifetime.
When you figure out which one it is,
you will know what to do for each person. – Author unknown

This statement holds a lot of truth and the events of the past two weeks have certainly dumped me smack in the middle of deciding exactly which I’m presently dealing with:  a reason?  A season?  Or just maybe a lifetime?

I returned from my trip to Columbus refreshed and inspired, full of possibilities and hope.  The BlogPaws event I’d just attended had placed a huge focus on the plight of rescued and abandoned animals, and the week of the 12th was buzzing with news of the “Be The Change” challenge – a call to raise funds for Pets Without Parents, a non profit chosen at random during the conference.  I really do believe that things happen for a reason and that sometimes things are put into our paths at certain times for certain reasons, and this has never been more true for me than that April afternoon.   I’d returned home from Columbus late Sunday night and had left Slobber Dog with my friend Luke for one more night.  I left work on Monday, headed to Luke’s house to pick him up and along the way I noticed this dog sniffing around on the side of the road in a residential area.  In many circumstances I might have shaken my head at the irresponsibility of some pet owners, letting their dogs wander loose near a busy roadway.  But on this day, I was compelled to stop.  Was it the solidarity of the pet bloggers devoted to helping unwanted animals that I’d just experienced?  Was it the bones protruding from this dog’s spine and hips and the way she cowered at the traffic passing by?  It was probably some combination of the two that forced me to pull over on the side of the road and approach her.  It took a few minutes for me to gain her trust enough to get close but when I did, “Hazel” placed her head on my shoulder and stole my heart.  I promptly put her in my car and drove off with her, having no idea of how my decision would play out in the coming days.  To be honest, I still don’t.

From left: Photo courtesy of www.AmazonCares.org; Right: Photo courtesy of Tony Alter, flickr

Hazel has passed her vet exam – she just needs about 10 lbs (about 25% of her current body weight) to be in normal condition;  no heartworm or any other diseases.  She has accepted the other animals and they have accepted her.  She has proven to be a resilient and loving dog, and looks like she will make a full recovery from the likely abuse and neglect she suffered.  I have absolutely no doubt that this dog was in my path for a reason on that afternoon.  She has ignited a spark that I’ve been missing for a long time and I remember how helping rescue dogs has had such a profound impact on my life.   So why do I question her role in my life?

My current living situation dictates that I cannot keep her with me.  I am unable to have any more animals in my apartment, and her needs at this time are far greater than what I can provide for her.  My situation will be changing in August, but what to do until then?  I have been searching for options over the past few weeks and I want to do what’s best for Hazel.  She deserves a loving, stable home.  I have come up with a few options and I will remain hopeful that if this dog is meant to share my life, it will all work out.  Regardless of whether Hazel is here for a reason, a season, or a lifetime, she has shone a bright ray of sunlight into my life and I am so thankful that we crossed paths.

Each of these beautiful dogs is awaiting their forever home at Pet Rescue by Judy, photos courtesy of www.petrescuebyjudy.com

Please check out the Be The Change challenge and pass along the word to your friends.  It’s not too late to donate to the cause or to focus your own efforts in some way to help a rescue of your own choice.  April is Prevention of Animal Cruelty Month and Hazel has been a reminder to me that there are many animals out there that need help.

I hope you all have a wonderful, happy Earth Day Thursday and please visit these other sites that frequently participate in Thankful Thursday:

 Akal Ranch, Enlightened Horsemanship Through Touch, The Pony Expression, and Tired Dog Ranch.

Image courtesy of lulinhapato10, Photobucket

Once again, it’s time for Thankful Thursday! I hope this post inspires you to consider the things in your life that you are grateful for. If you have a blog, consider posting about it there and link back here. If you don’t have a blog, please feel welcome to comment here on what you are grateful for in your own life. If you don’t feel comfortable sharing, then just take a few moments to reflect on all that you have. If you’d like to tag other bloggers that participate, feel free to do that.

Happy Earth Day everyone!  This is the 40th anniversary of the Earth Day celebration, developed to inspire and encourage people to embrace sustainable living.  Here in Central Florida, we celebrate Earth Day with festivals and concerts to raise funds for environmental awareness.  For Earth Day this year, I’m going to spend some time working on my balcony garden.  Thanks to a great coworker, I now have a few more plants to add to my collection.  Grady and I will make a run to the local nursery, where we can enjoy being outdoors in this gorgeous weather and peruse the offerings.  Do you have an Earth Day tradition?  Do you celebrate the holiday?  Let me know what your tradition consists of!

I hope you all have a wonderful, happy Earth Day Thursday and please visit these other sites that frequently participate in Thankful Thursday:

Akal Ranch, Enlightened Horsemanship Through Touch, The Pony Expression, and Tired Dog Ranch.

When I was in the 5th grade (yes, I know I’m dating myself here…) my school created a slideshow of photos for an event they were having.  The music they chose to accompany the slides was a song that touched me deeply at the time and still occasionally pops back into my consciousness even now.  I can remember the melody and the words like it was yesterday, and there are times in my life that it feels particularly poignant.  This is one of them.  Enjoy….

Friends by Kenny Marks

Friends will go anywhere with you
Friends share the good and the bad
The times that I share with my Best Friends
Are the best times that I’ve ever had

Whenever it’s cold, dark and lonely
Whenever my heart breaks in two
And I’m needing somebody to hold me
The love of my best friends comes through
When I’m facing a mountain of worry
That some people don’t understand
A friend will stay there right beside me
Willing to give me a hand

Friends will go anywhere with you
Friends who really do care
The times that I’ve really needed a friend
My Best Friends have always been there

Whenever I’m down and discouraged
Yeah, the love of my friends never ends
My life’s so much better for having
A life of good loving, good friends
And wherever my life seems to take me
God, He knows how to answer my prayers
‘Cause when I’m needing somebody to talk to
A new friend somehow is there
Oh Yeah they’ll be there

Happy Thursday to all and please visit these other sites that frequently participate in Thankful Thursday:

Akal Ranch, Enlightened Horsemanship Through Touch, The Pony Expression, and Tired Dog Ranch.

Once again, it’s time for Thankful Thursday! I hope this post inspires you to consider the things in your life that you are grateful for. If you have a blog, consider posting about it there and link back here. If you don’t have a blog, please feel welcome to comment here on what you are grateful for in your own life. If you don’t feel comfortable sharing, then just take a few moments to reflect on all that you have. If you’d like to tag other bloggers that participate, feel free to do that.

First and foremost, this week I’d like to thank everyone involved in the successful launch of PetsBlogroll.com!  Jenn and Roberto from BlogSparks have done a phenomenal job of creating, designing, and hosting this new site and I really appreciate all of their guidance and help.  They are doing their best to develop a great network with lots of sponsors and prizes that is very user friendly.  So thank you guys!  And a great big THANK YOU! to all of you that have already joined the network and been such a source of support for me!  I can’t describe how great it feels to see something this personal meet with such positivity.  This network has been in the cards for almost a year now, and is a huge part of why I started From The Horse’s Back in the first place.  I really wanted to create a place for all of us to belong.  So thank you on many levels for helping me take one step closer to that vision.

On a more general level, I am so thankful for this beautiful weather we’re having right now.  I hope you all are enjoying a break from the nasties as well!  The past five days have been perfect for riding, dog park-ing, beach-ing, inline skating, and any other outdoor adventures you might enjoy, and believe me, I’m enjoying them all!

Happy Thursday to all and please visit these other sites that frequently participate in Thankful Thursday:

Akal Ranch, Enlightened Horsemanship Through Touch, The Pony Expression, and Tired Dog Ranch.

This Thursday, I want to say a special thanks to two awesome bloggers that have both nominated From The Horse’s Back for The Beautiful Blogger award.  This award is the very first that I’ve received since beginning this site last summer.  Upon seeing the other wonderful sites that were nominated as well as mine, I am doubly honored to be held in such fine company.  Thank you so much to Juliette over at Honeysuckle Faire and Jane at The Literary Horse for considering this site worthy of an award.  These sites are two of my all time favorites and ones that I regularly visit, waiting eagerly for a post.  If you haven’t checked out either of the sites before, please do so.  Juliette is a phenomenal artist (and all around wonderful chick) and her site always leaves you feeling warm and fuzzy.  Plus, now she has a new etsy shop where she’s offering some of her fantastic artwork for sale.  Jane has got to be one of the funniest human beings in the world and her blog brings me so much joy.  You just never know what you’re going to find when you head over there for a visit!  I especially recommend the Mr. Chips series of posts – but be warned, coffee spewing is a likely occurrence while reading!

Thanks again ladies, for such an honor and for being loyal readers even in the midst of my erratic posting! 

Happy Thursday to all and please visit these other sites that frequently participate in Thankful Thursday:

Akal Ranch, Enlightened Horsemanship Through Touch, The Pony Expression, and Tired Dog Ranch.

Just one drop can change everything…

Photo courtesy of maddogmarquis, Photobucket

Back in October ‘09 I did a series of Thankful Thursday posts titled “Nostalgia” (you can read them here, here, and here).  I guess I’m feeling a bit sentimental again, because this week I have been thinking a lot about someone who made a big impact on my life many years ago.  He was the man that I credit with developing that competitive fire in me and showing me the fun and social side of horse shows. 

I don’t even remember how my family came to be involved with “Vern,” but I remember our first business meeting with him back in 1990 at a little restaurant in Ohio.  He agreed to bring his burgeoning training operation to the brand new horse farm that my parents were building in southwestern PA.  In a sense we started off together, although Vern had been an assistant trainer for several years and was involved with some very high profile people in the Appaloosa world.  Vern was really the one that steered my family, and me especially, into the national and world arenas of competition.  He was the one that found Tyler for me, the white wonder horse that made me fall in love with riding.  He was the one that brought Icy and Seeker to our show string – two equally dynamic, well known, and talented horses that my sister and I were very fortunate to have the opportunity to show.  I could even thank him for Tiny – because he was the one that chose Super (her dam) to be my very first game horse.  Vern introduced my family to so many people and because of him we got extremely involved in the horse show world.  We became active members of the Appaloosa Pleasure Horse Association, regional Appaloosa clubs, and 4H.  One of my favorite memories was when he and my parents brainstormed and created this incredibly huge Appaloosa show for the now-defunct Pennsylvania Appaloosa Association.  They had jackpot barrels and pleasure classes with money added, sponsors, you name it.  Back in the early 90’s it was quite a feat for a regional club to have such a successful show.  I truly believe that Vern was the catalyst that took us from casual horse lovers to serious and actively involved competitors, and he got the whole family involved in some fashion.  He even spearheaded an effort to have challenged riders classes added to show lists at all the shows so that disabled riders like my youngest sister could be involved too.

We spent five very exciting and productive years with Vern before he moved on to other things.  I wish I could say that I’ve kept in touch with him over the years, but as so often happens we have drifted away to separate lives.  I recently met up with an old friend of his at the Quarter Horse show in Tampa and he told me that Vern is healthy and happy and has a beautiful farm in the Pittsburgh area where he continues to coach youth riders and maintains a successful breeding operation.   I hope to reestablish contact with Vern, if for no other reason than to thank him for being such a great trainer, coach, and friend to me and all of my family during our formative years in the Appaloosa business.

Happy Thursday to all and please visit these other sites that frequently participate in Thankful Thursday:

Akal Ranch, Enlightened Horsemanship Through Touch, The Pony Expression, and Tired Dog Ranch.

This week something made me recall a poem that I’d first read many years ago that touched me deeply.  To this day, its words still resonate in me when I read it and I’d like to share it with you. 

Photo courtesy of Sparkygirl911, photobucket

Fern Hill

Now as I was young and easy under the apple boughs
About the lilting house and happy as the grass was green,
     The night above the dingle starry,
          Time let me hail and climb
     Golden in the heydays of his eyes,
And honoured among wagons I was prince of the apple towns
And once below a time I lordly had the trees and leaves
          Trail with daisies and barley
     Down the rivers of the windfall light. 

And as I was green and carefree, famous among the barns
About the happy yard and singing as the farm was home,
     In the sun that is young once only,
          Time let me play and be
     Golden in the mercy of his means,
And green and golden I was huntsman and herdsman, the calves
Sang to my horn, the foxes on the hills barked clear and cold,
          And the sabbath rang slowly
     In the pebbles of the holy streams. 

All the sun long it was running, it was lovely, the hay
Fields high as the house, the tunes from the chimneys, it was air
     And playing, lovely and watery
          And fire green as grass.
     And nightly under the simple stars
As I rode to sleep the owls were bearing the farm away,
All the moon long I heard, blessed among stables, the nightjars
     Flying with the ricks, and the horses
          Flashing into the dark. 

And then to awake, and the farm, like a wanderer white
With the dew, come back, the cock on his shoulder: it was all
     Shining, it was Adam and maiden,
          The sky gathered again
     And the sun grew round that very day.
So it must have been after the birth of the simple light
In the first, spinning place, the spellbound horses walking warm
     Out of the whinnying green stable
          On to the fields of praise. 

And honoured among foxes and pheasants by the gay house
Under the new made clouds and happy as the heart was long,
     In the sun born over and over,
          I ran my heedless ways,
     My wishes raced through the house high hay
And nothing I cared, at my sky blue trades, that time allows
In all his tuneful turning so few and such morning songs
     Before the children green and golden
          Follow him out of grace, 

Nothing I cared, in the lamb white days, that time would take me
Up to the swallow thronged loft by the shadow of my hand,
     In the moon that is always rising,
          Nor that riding to sleep
     I should hear him fly with the high fields
And wake to the farm forever fled from the childless land.
Oh as I was young and easy in the mercy of his means,
          Time held me green and dying
     Though I sang in my chains like the sea 

- Dylan Thomas 

Happy Thursday to all and please visit these other sites that frequently participate in Thankful Thursday: 

Akal Ranch, Enlightened Horsemanship Through Touch, The Pony Expression, and Tired Dog Ranch.

 On Monday, I talked about my fun trip to the Florida Gold Coast Quarter Horse show.  What I didn’t mention is that the fun continued on long after I left the Florida State Fairgrounds.   One of my very first blogger friends, Juliette from Honeysuckle Faire, often spends her winter break in central Florida and we decided to meet up this year.  After I left the show, I drove down to St. Petersburg to meet Juliette and her family.  Now, those of you that know me on a personal level know that I’m fairly reserved and often quiet.  However, any nervousness I may have had about meeting Juliette was quickly relieved.  We had a great time chatting about horses and blogs, among other things.  Julie is a genuine and charming person and her family is great too!  I even got to meet her adorable cat Noodlebug, who won me over with the most precious face ever.  If you haven’t checked out Honeysuckle Faire yet, you should go over and take a look around.  Juliette is an incredible artist and her site features some of her work, as well as the story of her two boys Pie and Sovey. 

Michelle, Noodle, and Juliette

I am so thankful that I had the opportunity to meet Juliette, Brian, Maizie, Lake, and Noodlebug.  I had a great time and hope that we can get together next time in PA for Juliette’s dream of a blogger buddies riding weekend.  Ok, now who’s coming to Florida next? 

 Happy Thursday to all and please visit these other sites that frequently participate in Thankful Thursday:

Akal Ranch, Enlightened Horsemanship Through Touch, and Tired Dog Ranch.