Exploring

 

On the way up

 

 

WE love to explore new places. We´ve only lived in this area since the beginning of this year and we´re finding new favorite places all the time. Yesterday on our way home from the grocery store we decided to follow a road that we have been curious about for a while. It was a marvelous drive high up on a ridge of the mountain. On the side of the road it was a steep drop down to a water reservoir. The view was spectacular. On the top there were pastures and a village. They had their own airstrip. Some people had an airplane in their back yard. The place was magic and it´s in our neighborhood! It would be awesome to find a trail that leads over there. I think it would be possible to ride there but it has to be on a trail. You can´t ride on the road at all it´s very narrow and steep, on top of it some people were driving very fast.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Hiking along The American River at North Folk

North Folk

 

 

 

We had such a great day yesterday! A family day with a lazy morning at home, lunch at one of our favorite spots and a long hike along The American River afterwards. There are so many beautiful places around here that if you spent all your freetime for the rest of your life visiting them you would of only seen a tiny little part of it before you die. I love the nature in this part of CA and horses are allowed on almost all trails...hundreds of hundreds of miles :D

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Enjoying nature and wildlife again!

My faithful friend Neikka always enjoys an adventure,
 especially if it includes swimming in the pond or the creek.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Before it become too hot this morning we went for a long walk. In fact the longest walk I´ve had since Hayley was born. It felt good to be out and almost back to how things are supposed to be J

 

 

 

I love taking walks in the wilderness and the Baby Björn sure gives us a lot of freedom.

 

 

 

What does humans, bears, dears, dogs and horses have in common? They love blackberries!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Strange as it might seem the blackberries we pick are always gone before we reach the house...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We stopped on several places to pick berries; they are so sweet right now. We accidently scared a big deer away from a good spot, sorry. Earlier this morning at least one bear had his breakfast close to our pond. The smell was strong and it was strong all the way down to the creek. I know we have plenty of bears but they are closer this time of the year. I love the beauty that surrounds us here in the mountains. It´s a great blessing to be this close to nature.

Trigger is always eager to go out and explore new trails.

 

 

 

                                                   Hayley one month old (tomorrow).

For the love of horses

Hayley got this beautiful horse with the mail today.
He came all the way from Sweden. Thank You Helén <3

 

 

He found a perfect place in Hayley´s window where he can
 watch his horse friends on the outside :D
Hayley is by the way already 4 weeks old today.
Yesterday she had a doctors appointment
and we found out that she gained more
than 2 pounds since she was born.
She´s a big girl now!


 

 

 

My husband and I didn´t meet at a bar or a club, we met through our love for horses. Our first conversation was about how to manage riding the Pacific Crest Trail.

http://www.fs.usda.gov/pct/

What kind of preparation would someone who wanted to do that need? What kind of horses would be suitable? How many horses would each rider need? What about food and equipment? We haven´t actually done that ride yet but we will, when our children are a little older.

It´s absolutely wonderful to share the same passions with the one you love. I couldn´t imagine anything more perfect!

I´ve been looking for an Icelandic Horse for a long time and Philip has been going with me looking at horses for the last year AND enjoyed it! When I finally found THE HORSE he was in another state. I found him when I was about  to give birth to our Baby Girl and we made arrangements to pick him up shortly after that. Unfortunately I had to get an emergency  C- Section. After that my loving husband didn´t want me to do the 15hour drive (one way) to get my horse. He offered to go by himself. Of course I was a little disappointed, I really wanted to go and pick up my horse myself but I did see(feel..)  the logic in him going..

Last week he went to Oregon to get my horse. My young Icelandic gelding trailered nicely and they were on their way, for about ten minutes …before the truck collapsed (the same truck that we got back from our mechanic last week). The former owner of the horse was kind enough to come and transfer the horse back to her ranch and help my husband to a hotel room. The truck is now at a mechanic in Oregon. My husband had to take a rental car home. Our trailer and my horse is also still in Oregon. There must be some higher meaning with all this, probably something really good is about to come out of it. I´m very curious to see what that might be!

I´m so grateful that my husband loves horses as much as I do or more otherwise I can imagine that this trip could of cause some hard feelings. Instead he is willing to do the trip again when the truck is ready. I just love him with all my heart!

When he was gone I finished reading the book I was reading “Have saddle, Will travel – Low impact trail riding and horse camping” by Don West. It was an interesting book. I enjoyed the stories from the author’s adventures, the pictures and the poems. I agree with many of his thoughts, it is very important to not leave any tracks when you´re enjoying our beautiful nature. A major part of the book was about what to bring and what to leave at home when you´re out in the wilderness. Maybe I would have left some of the things he brings on his trips at home. I wouldn´t bring all the painkillers he brings and maybe not even a tent. On the other hand I would bring a GPS, my IPhone, solar charger for batteries and maybe a GoPro on my helmet. It was worth reading and like the author said himself equipment gets more efficient and progress all the time and we should take advantage of changes to the better.

Like if he could read my mind, I needed some new reading material; my husband brought a bunch of my favorite horse magazines and three new books with him when he came home from Oregon.  

 

 

 

...only five more weeks

I don´t know if I should laugh or cry. It´s a perfect evening not too hot. Like made for an evening ride. I open the windows to let some cool air in. Trigger immediately starts begging me to come out, loud and clear. It´s kind of hard to explain that we still can´t go for a ride. That the doctor told me to wait another five weeks (had a C-section three weeks ago) and then starts slowly by only walking my horse. I wonder if the doctor ever had a four year old horse that haven´t been ridden for three months? Maybe not. Even though Trigger is a reliable, “safe” horse most of the time, a really good partner I kind of doubt that he is eager to go for a slow walk. He would…probably…if I ask him but I doubt that is what he has in mind right now.

Anyway, I went out to his pasture and spend some time playing with the three horses that lives there. The result is that I had three horses that desperately wanted to go to their playground= read The National Forest (the nearest trails). I wanna go for a ride!

I just went inside and Trigger keeps calling me back. It´s very annoying that I can´t take him out BUT if there is anything positive in this – It feels good to have a willing partner that wants to spend time with me.

You are what You eat and Wrangle´s good luck

One of the things that I love about California is the access to locally grown organic fruits and vegetables.

There is no secret about it -  You are what You it. Eating healthy food takes some basic knowledge about nutrition, determination and organization skills. First you have to know what makes your body feel good and what gives you energy. We are all different and I don´t believe that we are all meant to eat exactly the same things but there are some no brainers…like most fast foods are not that good for you, neither are sugar, fat, pastries etc.

When shopping for groceries it definitely helps to have a plan of what you want to eat for dinner and a written list before you go to the store. Sounds simple enough? Then it´s the most difficult part…sticking to the list you made J Why would you want to do that? I know why I do it. I want to have a lot of energy and spend my days doing the stuff I enjoy doing. If I only (or mainly) have healthy choices at home that is much easier.

The food we buy at home is mostly organic, when it is at all possible we prefer to buy organic food. Or even better growing the food ourselves, or eating what´s already out there provided by nature itself.

Next year I´m going to spend more time in our garden. I would like to grow most of our fruit and vegetables myself. This year it wasn´t realistic to do so, being very pregnant during spring.

While being on the road it can be difficult to eat healthy, the choices are not many. It might be easier if you bring some healthy snacks to eat in the car, then you´re not starving and it´s easier to not stop at the first drive through. It´s worth spending some time looking for the good stuff. I´m not saying good stuff like in expensive food. Good stuff like in healthier choices.

When Hayley takes her morning nap I prepare healthy snacks that I have in the fridge. During the day if I get hungry between meals (that kind of happens when you´re breastfeeding) then I have a tasty snack already prepared. I usually prepare a couple of different snacks each day. Nothing complicated but it´s so nice to already have them when you´re running out of energy.

Energizing Banana/Nut bread with cinnamon.

Yesterday I woke up at 6.15 by the sound of our German Shepherd chasing a horse. I walked to the window to see what´s going on when I heard the horse go down with a scream. I couldn´t see which horse it was from the window. I did see that all four legs looked like they were in strange angles. I thought I was gonna have to shoot a horse (it would take too long time for a vet to get out here if a horse was seriously injured.) The front legs what caught under a gate and the back legs were caught under the fence. On my way out I heard the horse trying to get up several times without success.

 When I got out it was Philip´s horse. My heart almost stopped. It looked nasty. My guess is that Stella (our dog) and Wrangle was playing. Wrangle is the only horse that actually enjoys her company. The others are kind of tired of her. Wrangle must have made a sliding stop before he got to the gate and somehow slipped. He was definitely stuck and couldn´t get up. He was scared. I put the dogs away in the garage and talked to Wrangle while I investigated the injuries and the situation. Even though he is a small horse I couldn´t possibly lift him up from his strange position. I didn´t know if he had any broken legs. All four of them were in strange positions. The blood on his back leg came from very superficial wounds luckily. I worked on the gate and manage to lift the gate of it hooks. I had to walk around to the pasture next to his to try to get his back legs free, by then he was completely calm just lying there. I didn´t know if that was a good or a bad thing.. after working on the fence, cutting it open and lifting his back legs he was finally free (it felt like a really long time had gone by but it was probably just a few minues) but he didn´t move. I guess he was in shock. I walked back around to get to him and I encourage him to stand up. He did. After a few seconds he walked away, straight to the hay barn! He didn´t limp and got away with some superficial cuts on his back legs. Lucky boy!

Northcutt Ranch

A true beauty inside and out.

Penny, one of our rescues,  having fun today.
 About 30 years young.

Philip and Wrangle also had a lot of fun today.
This morning they went out running and later this afternoon they went for a ride
...it was only 100 degrees something..

Philip and Wrangle just came from the creek. Wrangle prefers to jump over water rather than walking through it and Philip wanted him to walk through the creek...ending up being very wet himself. His boots were full of water when he came home. I bet Wrangle just tried to help him cool down a little bit. It was very hot today. When they came back I watched them working on opening and closing gates. They worked like pro´s together. It´s a pleasure to see how their partnership develops all the time.

Hayley and I spent most of the day inside. We did go out for a walk in the Baby Björn around the ranch, after it cooled down a little bit. Hayley was wearing this cute onepiece that she got from her aunt Lynette.