TGIF! Headed to the farm today after work for the weekend and I will have no regrets, I tell you! We are getting back on track! Share your best ‘no regrets’ meme or GIF! Go get IT today and this weekend!
Tag: Giving
…So NOW…
Is there a podcast or something that you regularly listen to? Share!
I go through times where I mostly listen to music and then other times where I mostly listen to podcasts. I have been on a little podcast stint as of late. I feel the need to share the greatness of St. John the Divine Sermons and Lessons podcast! I find it truly helps me stay in the right frame of mind, reminds me of what is truly important, and keeps my eye on the prize or end goal. It makes me think and puts an extra zip in my step.
I like to listen to sermons etc. on podcast, online, or radio because I am often at the farm during services. I try to go to bible study during the week, but sometimes it just does not work out. Yesterday, while driving the hour to the farm after work to take care of a water leak and check up on everything/everyone, I was catching up on my SJD podcast.
Have a listen to what really spoke to me. Rocked my world. Floated my boat. Insert them all here, because that is what it did for me! It is a quick 35 min lesson by Meg Rice. I love to listen to her! “God moved…His power at work within you…God will meet us in the everyday things of life…see the burning bushes in our lives…God wants nothing more than to communicate with us…SUNRISES, SUNSETS, STARS, ANIMALS…whatever it takes….eyes to see when He is reaching out and talking…ask for your burning bush…don’t be so busy you miss it…HERE I AM…YES…our promised land is a state of the mind and the soul and the spirit…walk through our wilderness and reach the fullness of His intimacy and LOVE…FAITH.” Sitting in my car listening, it felt as if I was there, sitting in a chair, listening and laughing with everyone else. It felt straight from God, through her mouth, to my heart. That might be cheesy, but it just is what it is. It was also recorded on a special day for me!
LISTEN NOW!
My girl Darcy had so much at the farm yesterday evening. I walked down to the pond to sit with the horses and somehow she missed the memo that I was going . Once I was down there I looked around for her, and nowhere was she! I looked up towards the house and called to her. Bounding down she came. Once she saw me on the other side of the pond, she sprinted to the shore. To my surprise, she swam across the pond to me instead of running around. You do not know my dog, so I will explain my surprise. She is a full blooded outdoor bird dog, but a water dog she is not. Now, she can swim, do not get me wrong. It is just not her strong suit and she prefers to just wade in and then wade out never getting to swimming depths. Not often will you see her just swimming…as in I have NEVER seen her do it on her own accord, but swimming, swimming, swimming she came to me! It is a big deal. I just love her and love that the feeling is mutual. Man, this week with my animals has been great (Click here if you missed my telling of this weekends love fest)! My heart is full and my cup runneth over! I have even gotten hugs from the nephew and niece.
I have been a bad dog mom and have not given her much time lately on the blog here! Bad, bad. Here she is posing with a nearly destroyed toy…really though, she is hard to catch in a good photo!
What?!
I am not doing anything bad…
It is my toy!
Please forgive the messy background…
Have a look at a little snip-it of my hang out session…turn the volume all the way up! You know how I love my grazing noises!
Lead with love, dear readers!
Drives me CRAZY…
Do you know what drives me absolutely, up the wall crazy?!?!?! When I have a few lyrics of a song stuck in my head and I can not call the name of the song! I either need to listen to that song at that moment or I am trying to tell someone they need to listen to it at that moment. LIKE RIGHT NOW! It drives me bonkers until I can figure out what song. It is so bad that I usually can not do anything else. I google and google and think really hard. If I am lucky, I remember quickly. If I am not…well…it has taken me a couple of days to recall. To me, it is like having something stuck in your teeth when you do not have any floss on hand. Do you get it now?! CRAZY! It always appears right on the tip of my tongue, right within reach, and yet so so far away in the depths of my mind. It happened to me this very morning. It took me till now to name the song. Man. The relief when it comes to me is just as real as the frustration. Sigh.
What song was it, you ask? Oh, good! I was hoping you would!
OK, so I will get to that. Remember the other day when I posted the follow up to Truth, Speaking of truth? I shared with y’all the song by Sean McConnell, Praise The Lord. If you missed it then, or even if you didn’t, have a listen and or check out the lyrics. One of the lines states, “I find I know less as I come to know you more.” Is that not the truth? We get so consumed with our own knowledge and preconceived notions in our heads that we miss Him for who and what He truly is. It is a little like that whole forest for the trees bit. Working with horses is the exact same as our faith, relationship with God, and life. The more we learn, open, and improve our skills, the more we realize that there is sill so much to learn and to do to get better. We must continue to strive and never quit questing. AHA moment right there.
Anyway, that line got me thinking, you know, the way I do. Thinking about all the multitude things I do not know and how small we are compared to the greatness that is. I remembered that song by Ryan Bingham that was in the movie Crazy Heart. The lyrics are great, just my kind of song about writing a “book about what I don’t know,” should know better, where the wind is blowing. All the things. You know, the wind sure seems to blow from one place and come back around…
…that is a story for another day, I digress. Thanks to theshmcc on YouTube for the vid. Then that song got me thinking about our lives as books. Whole books. Not just a page (open that door for all the metaphors!!!). A culmination of all the things in our lives as a whole. THEN that is when IT happened…the terrible awful, my brain quit and I could not call the song that was on the tip of my tongue. It felt like another Ryan song, but then it could have been somebody or so and so else that is similar to Ryan in the whole of Texas Country. All morning it was like a bur in my saddle pad. I googled and thought and googled again.
All of a sudden someone hit fast forward and turned the volume up and I got a whole line of the song rushing to the front of my brain. It came to me! It was another Ryan song, ‘Snake Eyes’ (lyrics here)! I could talk about this song for a while, but what made me think of it was the line, “bind me down, I’m a book not a page.” Have a listen and enjoy this great video shared by Lost Highway Records on YouTube.
I will let that sit with you, dear readers.
I hope you enjoy. Share your thoughts!
Speaking of truth…
This guy (Yes, Sean McConnell again!) knows the truth! Thanks to Music Fog on YouTube for the vid. Our God is a God of LOVE! It is about the personal relationship between you and Him, not anyone else. He communicates with each of us in a unique way. As unique as each of us. For me, it is horses (animals in general), nature/outdoors, and music. That is what IT is all about! AHA moment. Have a listen.
How does He speak to you or where do you feel His presence?
Go lead with love!
Truth.
AHA moment every time I am with them.
Have an open mind to receive the gifts! ALLOW it to happen! They are abundant! To me, horses are one of the greatest gifts from God. They keep me present and I am able to see, hear, and learn what He is trying to show me.
I started following Emily’s blog, The Exquisite Equine, and I love what she has to say about self discovery through horsemanship and being open to the gifts that horses have to offer us. Especially her two most recent posts entitled Just Let It Be and Expanding Trust. Hop on over there have a read. I could not agree more with what she has to say. To top it off, she has trained with Anna of One Horse Life. Jealous!
A ride in the Hill Country…
Please enjoy this scroll through of my ride with friends and fellowship in the Hill Country along the Frio River! Not many words needed, I dare say! If you missed the reveal of my gifts, check out yesterday’s post.
I had a little bit of traffic on Friday, but it was OK, I had great music. Petunia thought she would help herself into the yard when I got there. The Sunrise on Saturday was just…just. Beautiful!
So excited to be in Friday traffic on the way to the farm!
This song…I listened to it about ten times on Friday.
Look who let herself into the yard. This is Petunia running away after being discovered.
Waiting for my friend to pick me up Saturday morning! Could not ask for a prettier day!
Loaded up and pulling out Saturday morning!
Look at the beautiful rig!
Ikey poo patiently waiting.
Ike’s buddy Ronan, the red roan. AKA RoRo.
Heavens. Look at all that stuff in there. We are girls…
We were so blessed to have no incidents while hauling and no traffic, either way!!! We only had great conversation and music! Oh, and plenty of great Texas views and beef jerky. Hey, we did not want to get hungry!
driving, driving
We had plenty of provisions.
I got my sun coverage
On the road again
Hey look what we found! A cross on the hill!
We met at a friend’s place in Bandera for a couple of days along with some other friends before heading to the Frio. They were all going on the ride. We had great times, story telling, rest, and sunrise/sunset times. Yes, that is me with my nails done. I had to hide the horse ruined nails, but who cares when your horses are that cute!
THAT is me with my morning coffee. I like to feed my horse in my pjs.
Too cute for words. Ikey poo and RoRo.
Beautiful sunset. Could not help but put the rig in there. Kinda hard not to with a 34 foot trailer.
We lost someone along the way!!! Ha! Just kidding…
Ike getting fancy in his stall! I then added more shavings. I like to really bed them down. I also documented his BMs. You horse people understand that.
Ikey settled into his stall. I think he liked pretending to be fancy with a stall full of shavings.
Look at that kissable face.
We horse people like when our horses poop. It means they are healthy, so we take photos and send them to our friends!
Now time for the good stuff…Riding snaps!
It sprinkled a little and it felt so good.
Hydrating…
Such beauty! God’s beauty!
Me before we headed home…Ha!
I hope you enjoyed! Have you gone on any fun trips lately?! Share!
Lead with love, dear readers!
When you need perspective
OK, so I am still processing my last week…and am still tired! Tomorrow, be prepared for a picture book of my week riding in the hill country! For now though, we must all wait. I can not begin to process that just yet. Yawn. I am still recovering!
Oh!!! I can show you the gifts I gave! Looky looky!!! Remember I told you about a few gifts I made for some friends that were going to be on the ride this past week? Now that the gifts have been given, I can show you! I gave each a photo transfer of their horse on a block of wood with character (have a look at this post to learn how!) and a piece I found created by Alex Ladner, also on a block of wood. I think they are just exact. I really tried to work with the character within the wood and let it shine and compliment the photo. I gave a few more photo transfers to some others, but these two are my favorite. Do you like them??? I hope so.
OK, back to perspective. The Friday before I left for my trip, I rediscovered an artist! I love when that happens. I started listening to Sean McConnell while in undergrad. He was getting some air time on a local Red Dirt station at the time. I loved his sound, but then somehow I did not keep up with him. Not sure why. Crazy how that happens. Anyway, while at work on Friday, I was listening so some shuffle mix that came up on YouTube. I was working away when I heard the song ‘Lie Baby Lie,’ but a different version than what used to be played in the flatland when I was in college. It intrigued me and I went to go look at who it was that was playing and singing. To my surprise, it was Sean! I immediately went to look up all of the material he has created since I stopped listening to him. I still dig his stuff and I am still listening to it this week! One song in particular really spoke to me that Friday. Have a listen, and when you need perspective, give it another listen. I have added it to my mental file of ‘when I need perspective.’ I hope you enjoy it. Thanks to the man himself, Sean McConnell, for posting this vid on YouTube. He also has several faith based songs. I have no doubt that I will be post on his songs again!
Have a blessed day, dear readers, and lead with love!
Tune back in tomorrow for the big recap!
Gettin’ crafty.
Does today feel like Friday to anyone else?! It sure feels like Friday to me, but alas, it is Thursday for all of you who have not figured that out yet. Happy Friday eve! Ike and I leave Saturday for my week long trail riding vaca! This is why it feels like Friday to me, I guess. I am so excited…and anxious, but it will be fun! It is getting real. Have to pack today so I can leave straight from work tomorrow to get to the farm and pack our stuff there.
Anyhoo, I got crafty yesterday and created some gifts to give my compadres who are going with me on the ride. If any of you are reading this, STOP. I mean it. OK, now back to business. I will not show what I actually made or bought in case they are not listening to me.
The crafty part that I created was a photo transfer to wood. I used The Saw Guy‘s method (there is even a video!). I have actually done this now three different times. There are a few different ways to do this apparently, but I have only used this one method with the recommended products. Mainly because I still have all said products and I like the way it works. In my research done previously, it appeared that there are a few different products that can be used to create the same or a different look. Here are some examples of her
finished work from the post.
I never seem to accomplish the level of antiquey look that she gets, but I am guessing she applied filters or edited the photos prior to printing. I have not watched the video or read the post in a while, so she might explain that there. I just really like the look of these! The next photo transfer I do will be of my dun duo and my Darcy dog on pecan wood from the farm. It will be big ;).
The second part of a couple of the gifts came from a local gift shop here in town. I do not know how I got lucky enough to find these! I have been racking my brain trying to figure out what to get to finish out my gifts. I kept coming up empty. Then I went into this shop figuring I would not find anything that I felt was good enough, and bam. There they were. There were only two, which is exactly the number I needed. They perfectly fit the bill. They practically spoke to me and told me to buy them for my friends. I just love when that happens. To me, the best part of gift giving is finding that little something that screams that person’s name and seeing the joy it brings the person when they get it. That feels like an AHAmoment. I love gift giving. I suppose it is one of my love languages. I take it very seriously. Anyway, I digress as usual…the pieces I bought were created by artist Alex Ladner. I hope the gift shop gets more of his work because I would like some pieces for myself. The pieces I got were no bigger than a 4×6 photo and have a block of wood as the canvas! Again, I am not going to show what I got or made until after I give the gifts, but here is a teaser of his other creations (his photos).
Does anyone know how to accomplish this look? Is it like a plaster? Clay? With glaze? I want to figure it out. I just love these! Alex, if you ever read this, I just love your work!
Tomorrow or Saturday morning will most likely be my last post until I return from my trip. Do not lose faith in me! I will return and with many photos!
I am excited to show you what I created and bought! Until then, walk in love, dear readers!