We made it into 2025. 2024 was such a cluster personally and I’m not overly optimistic about 2025, but I’m just disconnecting and trying to live in my little bubble. We’re here and doing our best, right?

Horse-wise, we’re doing OK. I really need to ramp up the separation training. Nay does decently in the round pen as long as he has some ace on board. Do I love using drugs? No, but for whatever reason, he doesn’t seem to blow through it and I can connect to his brain. We’ve been following the Warwick Schiller method and it’s been decent. Perfect? No, but he doesn’t meltdown and actively try and hurt himself like he has all other ways. This way he’s learning to break from needing his friend and that he can eat or look at other things. I use the bag to break his focus on where Cairo is and then that’s it.

Above video shows him the progression of pawing/ fence walking to grazing, grazing below something he doesn’t always do.

Even when he’s upset in the round pen. He rarely does more than fence walk and trot and call. No cantering/galloping. In his stall or tied, he kicked everything in sight (I have bent welded steel).

Cairo occasionally calls but isn’t that upset alone. Plus a flake of alfalfa usually shuts him up. LOL

On the Cairo front, he’s settling. I did a feed switch because he wasn’t thriving on the first feed. He’s gaining weight though it’s taking time. Lots of soaked cubes and more concentrate than I’d like. Hopefully I’ll be able to cut back eventually. I did sit on him once, but he really needs some good ground work. Plus, my saddle does NOT fit. Great. I’ll try everything else I have hanging around to see if I can find something that will work short term. We’re in a bitter cold snap, but I did talk to my trainer about bringing him over once it warms up. I should be able to do some free lunging too before I hop on if necessary. And a ground work day.

He’s definitely a sweet boy who has started to figure out the routine. He knows I’m the lady who feeds and who gives kisses (not a fan of that one). He LOVES any kind of chewy molasses treat (aunt angi’s are his favorite right now) and it turns out, he likes puff peppermints, but he now also will eat regular peppermints (he turned them down for the first month he was here) happily. But, he is a big fan of carrots and will murder you for carrots. He also loves his hay and his naps and naps daily in the hay. But, he’ll get up from his naps for carrots. He’s also not letting Nay push him out of the hay as much and has realized that the round bale is big enough for 2 horses (especially now that it’s in the feeder). I think he also realizes that Nay doesn’t actually do anything other than bite towards him.

Nay Nay has been super well behaved lately. Scary well behaved. To the point that my husband has been leading him in. He generally is decent, but goes through phases. Lately? He’s a gentleman. A toddler could lead him inside. Going out? Eh. It depends. The second it gets warm/soft? He has to roll. HAS TO. While I’m leading him. Every year. We walk, he goes down. If he starts pawing, I can stop him. So what does he do? He stops pawing and just collapses without warning. He’s got a bag of tricks that one. You think you’re a step ahead and he’ll just outsmart you. I will say, Cairo’s face the first time Nay Nay rolled on our walk to turnout was priceless…

Beyond that, not much else to report. We are dealing with some frigid temps. I like the cold but it’s COLD. And had some snow. Possibly some more snow this weekend. I might not complain about that. I’ll take snow over rain. It’s nice to actually have winter. Boys are bundled. I finally got my Jeffer’s refund that’s to PayPal. And got Cairo a bunch of blankets from other places so we’re all set.

In non-horse news, Dulcy is growing like a weed. She’s 7 months old now and mostly well behaved. Mostly. She’s still a terror and still terrified of the world. But we adore her. Most of the time. Marble is still with us, but we know our time is limited. Just letting her tell us how she’s doing. So we’ll have that to look forward to this year. But we just want to enjoy whatever time he have left. Hope everyone had a good holiday and a happy new year.