OH! I Think I Broke My.....................

WOF Saga of Snowy River was a blue ribbon winner the first time he was in the show ring. He is now a yearling and still looking good. We can't set him up like S T did but he is looking pretty good anyway.

The first picture is a Venture's Black Fury baby born on our farm last year. His name is Duh Polish Fury in honor of our family name. (Lipginski) We are poking fun at ourselves.

I often write about things that pokes fun at myself. Someone once told me that their life wasn't as much fun or as interesting as mine. If you don't believe that your life is interesting and fun, open your eyes. Funny things happen every day all around you. All you have to do is look around and quit taking yourself so seriously.

Someone once said, "Life is too important to be taken seriously." I believe that Oscar Wilde was the one who said that. We can get so caught up in our self importance and worry so much about what everyone else thinks of us we can't see the humours side of life. It is liberating to let go and laugh at one's self.

This winter has been a bear with the snow and ice we have had. I am almost 69 years old and after breaking my arm this past year, I have tried to be careful not to repeat the experience. So I have stepped very carefully. I had been very successful until one Sunday just before Christmas. One of my weanlings had a bad cough and a very runny nose. There was really nasty stuff coming from his nose and I knew he needed the vet.

The vet came out and checked Little Fury and found he had pneumonia. He gave him some shots with the instructions that I was to continue to give him shots for the next week. He then ask if I still had penicillin. I started into the barn to look in the refrigerator and didn't watch my step and down I went. It hurt a little but I wasn't willing to admit that anything was injured except my ego.

I instantly thought back to a winter when Bill and I first got married. My brother Bob was about 12 years old. The ice froze thick on the lake on the farm that year. It finally got thick enough to trust it to ice skate on. We were skating around on the lake and having a barrel of fun. We weren't good skaters but we were having fun anyway. My sister and brother-in-law were there with their children and we were all laughing at ourselves and each other and having a great time in general.

Bob lost his balance and fell on the ice. He got up and said "Oh, I think I broke my........yo yo." He reached back in his pocket and pulled his yo yo out and tested it out. He threw it down and pulled it up several times and finally concluded his yo yo had survived the fall.

So now when some one falls we ask, "Did you break your yo yo." Or announce "Oh I think I broke my yo yo." Or "Oh, I hope I didn't break my yo yo." We have had a lot of fun with Bob over his yo yo as you might surmise.

We all had a lot of fun together as we joined each other for family Christmases, Thanksgivings and Sunday dinner. Then one day things changed and it all got very serious.

Our mother got sick. She had been teaching school several years by then. She was a kind wonderful woman whose children loved her dearly. The ones in the class room and at home. The doctor discovered a grapefruit size growth on one of her ovaries. The surgery went well and she recovered pretty quickly. She was still only 60 years old. Her recovery seemed to be on track when my Uncle died suddenly. He and my dad had been life long partners in their farming operation. My uncle had never married. I grew up with him being very close and a very near and dear presence in our lives.. We had barely gotten over the shock of his passing when it was apparent that our Mom wasn't doing very well.

What we feared was that this would be the last Christmas we would have with her and it was.

She was in the hospital again and the doctors told us the bad news. Her cancer had returned and had spread over her body very quickly. We knew it was just a matter of time when we would lose her too. That happened less than eight months after we buried my uncle. So we were once again grieving someone near and dear to us. It seemed our family never really recovered from our loss. She was the pin that kept the family together.

My daddy was a wonderful man but it was our mother who kept things working smoothly. It was our mother that kept the pot from boiling over. My family is made up of strong personalities. I bet your is too.

We all have different personalities. Sometimes things can get tense in a family with many members and so many personalities.

So what can we do? Well I tell you what we do. We can forgive each other whether it is a family member or a friend or an aquaintence that has wronged us. Some people seem to feel a need to go out of the way to make life unpleasant for others. I can't imagine what in their lives have made them so miserable as to want to hurt others.

So we forgive. And Jesus said we should forgive seventy times seven if necessary. I cringe when I hear some one say they will never forgive someone for what they did. Or that they hate someone.

Forgiveness is such an important part of the Christian life. It is a serious matter to me that Jesus said we should forgive each other even as He has forgiven us. I did more to cause him to suffer on the cross that anyone has caused me to suffer. How can I then go to Jesus and ask him to forgive me when I won't forgive others whom I think have wronged me?

You know God has forgiven you too. Today I ask you, is there someone you also need to forgive? A grudge is a terribly heavy burden to carry.

May God bless and keep you in his tender loving care.

Regards

Mary

Flair for Fury

OK I am frustrated. I uploaded a picture of Flair and I don't know where it went. It was a beautiful picture of her in the show ring with S T on board in an under saddle class this past show season.

This is about Flair and me and our trail ride. We finally caught a good day to ride this past week.
Leigh was here and she wanted to ride Velvet. Velvet is her favorite horse right now. She canters across the field with Leigh "in the irons" as they say at the shows. I had never been on Flair for Fury but I was told that she was my kind of horse.

As if there was an explanation needed, Bob went on to tell me how easy to ride she is and just how laid back and sweet. I got on her and rode her in the round pen while everyone else was getting their horses ready to ride. She wasn't real fond of riding in there because we had pulled shoes for the winter and there were a lot of rocks that had not been smoothed down enough.

I started to get a feel for her and found that she is very laid back. To the point of being a little lazy. Yes she is my kind of horse. Unlike J R that has a stubborn streak, Flair is a willing filly. I did have to urge her on some in the round pen but out in the open she was really easy to ride.

We rode up through the fields and down in the woods. I sometimes get uneasy in the woods because J R will get a little eager to go down the hills and he is not careful to pick his way along the trail. If you don't watch him he will scrub legs against trees. He pretty much has to be ridden all the time. He is a gentle soul and will not do anything really stupid but he likes to test the rider once in awhile.

I remember when I was trying to get comfortable riding again after some spills, we were riding in the woods. I like to follow instead of lead and Bob had ridden across a creek. I followed and when we turned to cross the creek again, J R started doing little crow hops. It scared me. I wasn't expecting him to do it. So he had one over on me. He did it several times to me after that and I was totally frustrated. I was too scared to do what I needed to do to show him I was the herd leader in our little herd of two.

One day we were riding in the bottoms along the river and he decided he would do his little crow hops. He made me think he was going to rear up. I knew in my head he was too lazy but my heart was not convinced. And so it went with my riding. Some days I was ok and others I was almost terrified.

Then came May 28, 2010. I was not on a horse. I was leading one of my weanlings and I fell and broke my arm. It took me several months to heal and all the time the surgeon who operated on me was telling me to stay off of the horses. I was ok with that. I finally got to get back on in October. I started riding J R again and I found that I wasn't afraid anymore. If J R wanted to run down the hill, I was able to hold him back. I made him understand what walk meant. If he wanted to crow hop, I made his feet move. If he wanted to eat, I wouldn't let him put his head down while I was on him. He started being more obedient. I in turn got more at ease on him.

One day I decided to ride a mare, Rocky Top Rebel. Rebel is bred and she is not a happy pregnant mare. But it was early on when I rode her. I don't ride her now. She is not due until May but she is a very unhappy pregnant mare.

So the last time I rode a horse was last week and I rode Flair for Fury. Flair is two years old. She has had ten months of training. S T rode her in all the shows last season and she hardly knew what it meant if she was in a class and didn't go to the winner's circle. She won the prestigious Breeder's Cup for two year olds. Breeder's Cup for a two year old is both under saddle and under halter in the same class. The horse displays her or (his) talent with a rider. The saddle is then pulled off and she is shown in hand. It takes a good horse to win. Some horses do well under saddle and then come up short in conformation. So Flair is a good two year old without a doubt.

Not every two year old, even in the Rocky Mountain breed is right for a rider like I am. But Flair is a good horse for me. She proved it to me last week.

She didn't feel like she was going to take off and run with me to stay up with the other horses. I like my horse to walk. If she did feel like she was going to go a little faster than I wanted her to go I pulled her up a little and she immediately dropped back down to a walk. The woods was a beautiful experience. There is a lot of down hill trails and Flair so carefully picked her way down the trails. She didn't always walk on the exact same path the other horses walked on. The trails were muddy because of the rain we have had. She would often walk to the side of where the other horses had walked. She was avoiding the mud and the slippery slopes.

So on the first ride on Flair for Fury (she is out of Rebel's Rocks Ann and by Venture's Black Fury) I have come to trust her because I can see she is trustworthy. Isn't that the way our walk with Jesus is.

I learned to trust Jesus when I opened my heart to him and told him I needed him because I couldn't do this thing called life by myself. First of all, I needed him to save me. I couldn't do enough good to save myself. After all he had already paid the price for my salvation. He died on the cross for me and you. His precious blood paid our sin debt. He now leads us on our life's path.

Sometimes we do walk off the path and try to go it on our own. But he comes looking for us like in the parable of the lost sheep. There were 99 sheep safely in the fold. But one was lost. The shepherd went to look for that one. Like sheep we go astray. We don't have to try to find our way back, we just need to call out to Jesus to help us.

Like Flair who chose the safest path for us Friday, Jesus will lead us on the safest path. He may take us places we wouldn't choose ourselves but he is showing us the best way home. When we are in his care we can't be any where that we are safer.

When Mike was in Iraq, my customers in the post office would ask me how I slept at night. First, I couldn't take care of Mike in Iraq That would be ridiculous if I tried. But there was one who was with him at all times. He was in God's hands. And all that is the safest place anyone can be. So that is how I could lay down and not lay awake all night worrying. I prayed of course. I would have rather he was back in the states but I could not do anything about that. But I knew with God's care he was in good hands.

I am praying you are safely in the Good Shepherd's fold tonight. I pray you are walking the path beside Jesus and following his will for your life. If you have wondered off the path, ask him to lead you back to safety. It is his good pleasure to walk with each of us.

May God bless and keep you in his loving care and may your new year be abundantly provided for by the one who died for us all, Jesus Christ.

Regards,

Mary

"And Jesus said unto them 'What man of you having an hundred sheep; if he lose one of them doth not leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness and go after that which is lost, until he finds it.'"

Luke 15: 4

The Grass is Greener

This picture has little to do with my blog subject but it is so darn cute of my son, Steve and his granddaughter Alyssa. Alyssa is 14 months old and has had 3 open heart surgeries. Not so many years ago Alyssa may not have made it to 14 months old. But thanks to modern medicine her heart has been repaired and she is gaining weight and looking really good. But I also thank God for her health for he guided the hands of the surgeons. She hears better than they said she would and that is by the grace of our loving Father.

I like this picture a lot. Alyssa is flirting with the camera and Steve's face and eyes tell their own story.

I have heard it said all my life that the grass is greener on the other side of the fence. If you have live stock you will know exactly where that phrase comes from. There has never been a farmer that hasn't encountered his livestock out of the pasture where they belong.

Michael you are going to love this blog. It is for you and Merry Christmas. Hope all is well in your part of the country.

I have my horses behind electric fence. The fence I have is safe for horses and it keeps them in pretty well. But we have large herds of deer and the fences get pulled down by deer jumping them and branches falling off of trees and landing on the fence. It is safe however and cheaper and easier than putting up woven wire fence. So that is what we have. We had a lot of woven wire fence at one time. We, of course, had to check it and cut trees off of it too. Unless the fence was just really down most of the cows stayed put and could be depended on to stay in their pasture. But usually there was one rogue cow. Sometimes it would be the bull because of his testosterone.

My dad often told of a bull they had that regularly went visiting. He would cross the river to get with another herd of cows. Dad told me about taking his shot gun and putting bird load in it and sending the bull back across the river. The bull seemed to have a pretty long memory of that unpleasant experience because he never crossed the river again.

We had a bull that did the same thing except it was across the fence into the neighbors pasture with his cows. The fence was never very good between this neighbor and us. They were absentee owners with other farms and they used their farm neighboring to us to run replacement heifers for their dairy. They didn't worry much about fence because the neighbors would fix it most of the time.

So Bill borrowed a page from Dad's book and took the shot gun and we went over to the neighbor's field and sent the bull home. It worked beautifully and he also had a long memory and didn't want to repeat the experience.

To built our herd and to have extra calves to sell, Bill and I bought baby calves from a cousin that had a dairy farm. He bred his heifers to beef bulls and he sold us the resulting calves. He also sold us his Holstein bull calves which we bottle fed and sold as steers when they got some weight on them. We happened to get a Holstein heifer from him once that we raised and turned out with our beef bull. She produced a big nice calf. She was a really good mother. It came time to wean the calves and hers was extra nice because of all the milk she produced. But in raising her calf, she really lost the weight. She was putting everything into her milk and it didn't leave much for her.

She wasn't a problem until we weaned her calf. Then she started finding her way out of the field we had her in. Suddenly the grass was greener on the other side of the fence. Often I would look out the kitchen window and she would be in the garden or in the yard. That really got on my nerves. We would put her back into the pasture and fix fence. A couple of days later it would be the same thing with another part of the fence. She was not only getting out of the pasture, she was tearing down fence to do it.

So drawing on past experience, I loaded the shot gun one fall afternoon and walked out to where she was grazing. I put the gun against my shoulder and pulled the trigger. The gun gave a load report and to my utter amazement, the cow dropped like a lead balloon. She was dead. I looked at her and I looked at the shot gun. I could not believe what had just happened. I was totally beside myself.

Now Bill was down on the river pumping a gasoline barge and we were getting ready to go to the field to pick corn. The children had just gotten home from school. The boys were getting a snack and changing their clothes and here I stood looking down at a cow I had just shot.

I did the only thing I knew to do other than cry. I called my Daddy. He said he would be right down to the farm to help me. The boys got the tractor and put the lift on it. Dad got there and we picked her up and took her to the barn. We skinned her out and hung her to chill. Yes, I know how to skin a cow. (Move over Sarah. You aren't the only one with a skinning knife) My Daddy bless his heart helped me do all that and told Bill he could see no reason that cow should have died from the shot since none of the bird shot hit anywhere that should have killed her. He maintained she had a heart attach.

Dad went home and took Mary Beth with him. Mike, Steve and I went to the field to pick corn. We came in about dark and Bill had been home for a little while. He had been out for hours so he went to bed and went to sleep totally exhausted. Debbie told us what happened when her Daddy got home.

The conversation went something like this.. Bill ask where Momma and the boys were. She replied that they were in the field picking corn. Next he wanted to know where Mary Beth was. Debbie told him she went home with Granddaddy. He asked why Granddaddy was here. She told him that Granddaddy came to help skin the cow. Well that was a surprise to him of course. So naturally he wanted to know what cow. Debbie in all her honesty and 7 year old voice told him that it was the one Momma shot. That was news to him. That was the first he had heard of a cow being shot and skinned.

To my surprise when Bill got up the next morning he said nothing about the cow that was shot and skinned and chilling in the barn. Two weeks went by and nothing was said about the cow. I wasn't talking about cows and neither was he. About that time we were at my Dad's house and I asked Dad if it was about time to cut the beef up and put it into the freezer. Bill innocently ask what beef I was talking about like he had never heard anything about it.

It was an incident that has followed me through life. Bill and I had several good laughs over it and my daughter, Mary Beth will tell the story every time she gets a chance, right Michael.

She does embellish and leaves out some important facts but her story always gets a lot of laughs. And she even tells her patients at the hospital about it to entertain them while she is working with them.

So as the grass that was greener on the over side of the fence led to that cow ending up in our freezer well before the usefulness of her life was over so bad choices can lead to heart ache and heart break for us.

I was recently in Stanton Ky to be at church when a dear friend was baptized. Her husband had also rededicated his life to Christ. It was a glorious day for their family and friends. But while there rejoicing over the turn around in their lives I heard about 4 young people that had lost their lives due to overdoses of drug they were using illegally. Somehow the grass looked greener on the other side of the fence to them.

Although not all lives will end like those, can't we all relate to the grass looking greener over the fence. A class mate has a bigger house, drives a nicer car has children that are successful and outwardly looking like they are living a life we may have dreamed of. But what is their heart ache. What has broken their hearts.

A friend lives in a big beautiful house, has travelled the world and has friends in high places. But they haven't been able to have children. That is a heart break for them but to look over the fence it looks like they have it all.

Sheep, cows and horses do not lay down in green pastures unless they have everything they need. A cow especially will not lay down and chew her cud if she is not full and content. So if we follow Christ and rely on God to give us all we need, we do not have to envy the grass on the other side of the fence. In Christ, we have it all.

Wishing you and yours a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. May God bless and keep you in his loving and tender care.

Regards

Mary

The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want, he maketh me to lie down in green pastures. He leadeth me beside the still waters

Psalms 23: 1-2

I must have been deep in thought. Bob snapped my picture when I didn't expect him to do it. Is that a horse magazine I was readig. Is there any other kind?


We had guests last week. Wendy is from Oregon and her son and daughter-in-law live in Indiana. They were really delightful people and by the time they left, I felt like I had known them all my life.

They had come to see the horses. That is itself makes for a good visit. It was cold then as it is tonight. We invited them in the warm house for coffee and some hot soup. There is nothing like sharing a meal with friends to make a day complete. I had made blueberry muffins and had coffee ready as well as a good pot of bean soup.



Of course the talk was mostly of horses and the horses we had just visited in the barn. It is a really good time when people come and admire one's horses. I was pleased to share pedigrees and accomplishments with them. Wendy was very knowledgeable on the breed and shared her stories of riding. It was a wonderful day.



But when it is all said and done we go back to the barn to feed the horses. The last two days have been terrible winter days. I look out the windows and see the rain falling and it is ice. I remember in January and early February of 2009 that the ice broke power lines and tree limbs and we were without electricity for nine days. So one just has to wonder if that will happen again.



Since then the power company has been here trimming trees back away from the power lines. So hopefully it is taken care of and we will be ok.



It is catch up time. There is a ton of paper work to do. Horses to register. Pictures to take. Papers to fill out and checks to write. It is time consumming but must be done. Soon it will be time once again to pull out all of the cancelled checks and receipts to file taxes. But for right now Christmas is just around the corner and pushing at the door.



Everyone ask the question, "Are you ready for Christmas." This year my daughter and granddaughter decided rather than spend money on each other and buy things none of us need, we would pitch in and buy gifts for soldiers that are overseas and away from home and family for Christmas. I think that was a good idea. I have so much that I really don't know where to put anything else. I have nicknack's that are stored away in boxes in the closet. I don't know what else I could possibly want or need.



But I have been Christmas shopping just the same. At church, we have a Christmas store. The members of the church take a shopping bag home. It has the age range of a boy or girl. We are to spend up to $25 for a child that age. The gifts are then placed in a large area and families can come and shop for their child. It is so much easier than trying to buy a gift for Sam or Sue age 12 or 8 etc. The parent gets to pick three gifts for their child. It was really a great idea that some one had to do it that way.



Our Bible study class has some men who come from prison for Bible study. One of them didn't get to put his children's names on an angle tree soon enough and ask for a little help for his youngsters. The class turned out generously for the family. I am very proud of what our class did for those children.



Our class is a kind generous group of men and women. Recently, we lost a member of our class. One of the members sent out emails to let us all know of his death. Soon Gloria had everyone organized to bring food for the family at the funeral home. Right after that, a member lost his mother. Once again Gloria went to work sending out emails and getting food brought for the family.



We get so wrapped up in what to buy for each other and decorating the house and preparing for a big meal that we can easily forget why we celebrate Christmas. Society has tried its best to take Christ out of Christmas. People get offended by someone saying "Merry Christmas" They have tried to get us to use "Happy Holidays". I am offended that anyone would try to take away my right to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ, my Lord and Savior.



One of the best celebrations I had this year for Christmas was to go to church with dear friends and see one of their own baptized and profess Jesus Christ as her Lord and Savior. Do you know how much rejoicing there is in Heaven when one of the lost is saved. More than we can imagine. We certainly rejoiced over her new birth and her husband's re-dedication of his life to Jesus.






As I write this the dogs are all over the house sleeping. I think my house has surely gone to the dogs. I have been allowing Mike and Natalie's dogs to come in to my house until one of them gets home from work. It is so bitter cold outside and they are more used to staying inside. So Erica is asleep on the couch. I lost that battle and I now just put an old quilt on the couch to save it from dog hair. Tex is at the foot of the bed sleeping on a rug and Cassie is sleeping out in the sun room. It is one of those nights out that Steve will allow his dog to come into the house.






God has blessed me with a nice home. The furnace is running and seems to never cut off but it keeps the house warm and we are comfortable. I sometimes just take it all for granted. Warm place to live in the winter. Cool house in the summer. Warm clothes to dress in to go to the barn. Warm socks and shoes. We have a little heater in the feed room and when we go in the feed room is nice. We can go in to warm up a little from the cold barn. I get into my truck to drive to the barn. It is warm. God has blessed me so abundantly.






If I did not have any of those things in life, I would still be blessed because Jesus died on the cross to cover my sins. If I could do enough good works to get to heaven on my own, Jesus would not have had to die the terrible death he died. But I can not do enough good or be good enough. I am blessed because I have been saved by grace through the precious blood of Jesus Christ my Lord.





St Paul was content where ever he was because he had the assurance of his salvation. So I will be content with whatever God chooses to bless me with. Where ever I am.






God bless and keep you in his loving care. May you pause to reflect on what Christmas is really about.







Regards







Mary







By grace are you saved through faith, not of yourselves, lest any man should boast.







Romans

Thanksgiving

God bless our dirty dishes

they have a tale to tell

While other folks are going hungry

we're eating mighty well

with home and health and happiness

we shouldn't want to fuss

for by this stack of evidence

God is very good to us

From Dear Abby

Many years ago but still as true today as it was then.

Have a happy Thanksgiving

May the Lord bless and keep you in his loving care.



Regards

Mary


Oh give thanks unto the Lord of lords for his mercy endures forever

Psalms 136: 1

Follow the Light

The sun had already cast long shadows and darkness was beginning to take over the land when we realized one of the fillies was not with the herd. Bob drove around the field on the tractor and found she was on the hill side outside of the fence. She had found the fence down and had stuck her head through because the grass IS greener on the other side of the fence.

I grabbed the lead rope and we got into the truck to get as close to her as possible by road. We saw her up the hill and just outside of the fence. I insisted that I could get her and got out of the truck to climb up the steep hillside to where she was standing. I had just enough light that I could see the deer trail leading up through the thick brush and steep hill side.

It was tough going. I half crawled up the hill grabbing onto small trees to both pull myself up and keep from falling backward. Thorn's from wild roses grabbed at my clothing and caught my bare skin a couple of times. But I was able to slowly make my way up the hill to where Masissah was standing. She didn't wait for me to catch her. She bolted back through the fence and gaited to the rest of the herd where she walked over to the bale of hay. I found her there innocently eating hay like she had been there all the time.

I instructed Bob to unplug the fence and I walked a stretch of it putting wire back on the insulators to hopefully keep them in the field and out of danger. It was now completely dark. I was across the field from the house. I did not have to make my way back down the same hill. I climbed through the fence and walked toward home.

The night was quiet and peaceful. The only sounds I could hear was the sound of my feet as I walked across the field toward the comfort of home. Despite the darkness that surrounded me, I could see enough in front of me that I knew where to step to keep my footing. I had already noticed the lights at the house shinning through the darkness. It seemed they were there to guide me home.

Then I started thinking about the true light of the world, Jesus Christ, and how he lights our path as we head toward our home in heaven. Behind me was darkness and the hill I had just climbed. It was steep and had I not been careful I could have fallen and landed at the bottom. I had some light then but what if I had turned around and decided to take a chance on going back down that hill away from the light.

Isn't that what we do when we take our own path and decide we know best. Instead of following the light, we take the path where danger lurks at every turn. We take one step after another until we are on that hillside in the dark and not being able to see we fall. But even then Jesus Christ is there to save us. Even then we can cry out to him and tell him we need him. We need his light.

In this life we are walking in darkness if we try to live as if there is no God. Without Christ the world in a scary place. In our ignorance we say to ourselves, I can do it myself. I don't need Christ to save me. I am too smart to fall for that fairy tale.

Have you ever tried to put something together and not read the instructions. We usually laugh and say that when all else fails we will read the instructions. And usually we do find that we have to get the instructions and read them.

I have decided I want mail delivery out on our route. I get some mail addressed to my home address instead of my P O Box and sometimes it is a letter I would have like to receive or needed to have. So I bought a mail box. I thought I was surely smart enough to put the mail box together. Yes, some assemble was required. I put some of it together and found some things about it that I couldn't decide how it needed to be done. So yep, I got out the instructions.

We do that every day when we don't read God's instruction book, the Bible.

May your paths always be lite by God's perfect light and may you always be guided by the light that leads you home to Jesus.

And may God bless and keep you in his loving care.

Regards,

Mary

Look deep into my heart, God, and find out everything I am thinking. don't let me follow evil ways, but lead me in the way that time has proven true.

Psalms 139: 23-24

For the waywardness of the simple will kill them, and the complacency of fools will destroy them; but whoever listens to me will live in safety and be at ease, without fear of harm.

Proverbs 1: 32-33

And Then There Is Rascal

First picture is WOF Ann's Mt Treasure. She is a yearling filly and is getting ready to compete in trial obstacles at the KMSHA show. Second is WOF Dock's Velvet. Velvet is 3 years old and a daughter of Choco Dock. She is a beautiful bay mare. Third picture is Vanessa Crowe showing Dixie Belle. She is a beautiful Chocolate Palomino that is 2 years old and is just put under saddle last summer.

Rascal is the newest member of our family. He is not a horse for a change.

Now I don't mean to offend people who own and love cats but I really don't like cats for pets. They are too ___________. You know cats so you fill in the blank. It is not that we have never had cats for pets.

We had two house cats at one time. My daughter had gotten a kitten (thanks to her children) for a pet. They named their new kitten Bob. It seemed like a suitable name until Bob got older. Bob was part minx. As most of you may know Minx is a breed that has no tail. They are also shorter in the front than in the back legs. Bob was a beautiful cat. and Bob had kittens. So now we know Bob was not exactly the best name for her but Bob she was and Bob she stayed.

When Bob had kittens my grandchildren really thought we should have one of them. They were really cute as young animals always are. So I finally agreed to have A kitten. Not kittens but a kitten. My mistake was that I let Bill and one of the grandchildren go to pick out the kitten. They came home with two kittens. Some of the grandchildren liked the female cat that was calico color. She was long haired. Some of them liked the short haired white cat that looked like his mother. And he was a very beautiful kitten.

So Bill compromised and brought both cats home. So now we were a two cat household. We owned the usual cat stuff. The liter box, the liter, the little scoop etc. The cats eventually grew up as cats do. They had some lessons along the way. For instance, they wanted to sleep with us. They kept getting put off the beds in a very firm way until they learned their lessons. But they never learned not to get up on the furniture.

I had a nice feather duster that I really liked. One day I came home and the duster was turned into piles of feathers all over the floor. I guess they thought it was a bird and decided to tear it to pieces.

These two cats were good mousers. One morning as I was getting ready for work I heard a mouse in the heat vent. Before long the male cat had caught the mouse and he was very proud. I was getting my clothes on when I heard some growling in the dining room. I walked out of the bathroom and the female cat was growling like a dog at the male cat. She took his catch over and let him know it was hers. He backed off.

They had not been out of the house for their whole lives and I decided that they needed to go out. I was tired of the liter box and the male cat always managed to get in the box but he hung his back end over the box and missed it. So I was left cleaning up his mess.

My husband and daughter tried to put them out one day and they hung on the back door. It was so funny. Both cats hanging on the back door. So they came back in and weren't put out for awhile. One day they were sitting in kitchen window. I opened the window and pushed both cats out before they knew what had happened to them. They tried to get back in but couldn't jump high enough to reach the window. So they stayed out during the day but came in at night.

One morning I noticed fleas in the house. I sprayed the house and we gave the cats a bath. After that the male cat became known as flea bag. The female had already become known as hair ball because of being long haired she had the problem of hair balls. This was Bill's names for the two cats.

When we went on vacation one time Bill took them to the vet for boarding. They asked what their names were and of course he told them Fleas Bag and Hair Ball. They had a good laugh over that at the vet's office and promptly gave them more normal names but around our house they were always Flea Bag and Hair Ball.

Flea Bag liked our dog Hannah but Hair Ball hated dogs. Flea Bag would curl up beside her and they would sleep together. Hannah never minded him being there. Hair Ball would wait for Hannah to walk by a chair and she would jump on her and attach her. Hannah was very confused. She didn't ever know (kbb whjm mjj Erica is helping me write) why she was attack. And there was no reason she was mistreated in such a way since she never bothered the cats.

One day Flea Bag disappeared. We could only guess what happened to him but we thought he maybe got too friendly with Coyotes. We had Hair Ball a bit longer but one day she disappeared as well. So we no longer had cats and I did not want another cat.

And then just recently Lucy and I had a girl's day out and we went to Stanton to the Van Bert Farm. It just happened a little kitten had appeared from nowhere on that particular day. It had a broken foot. It was really a rather ugly kitten. He had been shaved around his neck and his hair was shorter there than anywhere else on his body. He had fleas and was under weight even for a young kitten. He looked like he should still be with his mother. But there he was in Van Bert's barn.

Vera came out of the office and announced that cat had to be taken care of because she was fearful the dogs would kill him. By then he was climbing up Lucy's pant legs and she was already hooked. But as she explained, she already had a couple of cats and she couldn't take another one home. So guess who got talked into taking the cat home. You guessed it. Grandma. But then I do have the coffee cup Lucy gave me that says "The most sweetest Grandma Ever!" So I guess I am pretty easy.

We got home with him and she gave him a bath to get rid of the fleas. We wormed him and put him in the milk room at the barn. Vera had given us cat food so we promptly fed him and tucked him in for the night.

He is such a sweet little thing that he worms his way into your heart. Mine included. So now I am once again a cat owner. I do not say "cat person". But I do like Rascal, as I named him. It really does suit him.

Well now you know how it is. When children and grandchildren are involved you can own dogs and cats you really thought you didn't want and they become part of your life and then you don't know what you did without them. (That is also how I got Erica) That is another story for another day.

There is a lesson to be learned from animals. Any animal if we look for it. I can always relate our relationship to Jesus from animals I own or have owned. The little kitten is not perfect. He was a rather ugly little thing when I first saw him. He had a broken foot and walked funny. He was wormy and had fleas. We took care of the worms and fleas and he is getting prettier. He has grown so fast with good food and TLC.

Jesus took us in at the point in our lives when we were ugly in our sins. He cleaned us up and forgave us unconditionally. Our sins though scarlet are wiped out by his precious blood. He has saved us once and for all by us just asking for his forgiving grace. We can't earn it. We don't deserve it. It is a free gift that cost him a terrible price. The price was death on a cross. Shedding his blood. He was pure and innocent but shed his blood for you and me. We are clean but until we die and see him face to face in heaven we will still sin. We will still have that broken foot, so to speak.

Do you know my Jesus? Have you told him you need him more than life itself? Have you committed your life to him. Have you accepted that free precious gift he died to give you?

May God bless and keep you in his loving care.

Regards,

Mary

"For I know the plans I have for you", declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."

Jeremiah 29:11