When the wind blows

Ok, I moved to the midwest to get away from hurricanes! Not really but it was one of the benefits, or so I thought....
This weekend I had about seventeen days worth of stuff I wanted to get done and well you know not much of it happened. I knew Ike was going to pay us a visit but I had no idea how much damage it would do, I mean criminy it traveled through like 6 states before it got here. I got up early yesterday and told my hubby I was riding Harley first thing before the wind started and more rain got dumped on my already mushy riding area. I have a show this coming weekend and am trying hard to stay riding all week. I saddled Harley and we schooled on the log lope overs and worked on the rope gate again. Yes, I did the rope throwing again and he still is a giant freak about it being on the ground. Corey suggested I drop it on the ground and then school him around it and then make him sidepass to it and get off there and walk back to the barn. His feeling was that soon it would be a reward to sidepass to it and I would get off then, that would be his reward and he would come to know the coil as the end of routine. So I did that and we shall see if it helps or not.
As predicted the wind picked up around noon and when I tried to get the boys to come in to the barn they ran from me. I wasn't happy that they were out in the storms and high winds although my pasture is pretty clear of trees and we are surrounded by mostly farm crops. We lost power at 1 in the afternoon and it did not come back on until 8pm, that really sucked. When I went out to feed the horses my yard looked like a war zone, there were tree limbs everywhere and sticks and leaves well you get the picture. I went down to the pasture to feed and immediately noticed Harley's left eye was swollen shut and weeping. Damn.....knew I should have left them in the barn after riding. I went digging in the old medicine kit and found the eye ointment and then had to put Harley in the head lock to get it in the eye. I worried all night of course and was relieved to find it almost back to normal this a.m.. That is all I need with a show coming up, a damaged eye.

Today was a cleanup extravaganza, my youngest and I picked up sticks and debris for over three hours this morning. I now have a burn pile the size of a school bus out there. I must share a very funny thing that also happened while picking up debris.
I had the mower out with my little steel cart attached and was throwing sticks in it by the pasture fence. The horses of course were curious to see what I was up to and came over to investigate. The weather is cool out 64 today and Harley was feeling frisky I could tell. I threw a rather large limb into the cart and it made a loud bang, I looked up to see Harley with a small branch with leaves sticking out of his mouth and he was spinning in place beautifully!! He must have done 6 spins to the left all the while holding that stick, talk about funny wish I had my camera.
Maybe I am schooling him to much on spins??? Crazy little horse......