Changing Brakes...

Well... I think I surprised a few people:)! Let me back up a little bit... When I was married, Kyle's philosophy was that if he helped in the house, I should help with the cars. (Originally it was the yard and the cars but one day I butchered a section of our yard with the weedeater and I was forever banned from yardwork - oh darn!) So, anyway as I was saying, I've done some work on cars - specifically I have helped change a serpentine belt, brakes, oil, and spark plugs. Well, last week at dinner with my Bible study class, a challenge sort-of kind-of got thrown down and you know me - I'm rarely one to back away from a challenge:)! So on Friday this week I showed up to help a friend from my Bible study class change the brakes on his truck. Truly I think he was shocked, but there I was, straight from work with a window of time to help and help I did:)! No, seriously, I really did help! I figured out how to get a bolt loose that we were struggling with! I got my hands dirty, or should I say greasy, and everything!! The best part is that I didn't get my nice white shirt dirty - nice planning on my part to wear a white

shirt to change brakes:)! Anyway - here are a couple of pics from helping Robert change his brakes - thanks Robert - it was fun!!
And... I won the challenge so now Robert has to give up a few moments of the Indy 500 to come to our class social today at the mall:)!!

Horsin' Around

Well... we spent Mother's Day weekend horsin' around - literally!! Megan rode in her first "real" show:)!! It was such an amazing weekend for her - she was gone from sun-up to sun-down Friday through Sunday, but she was surrounded by horses and others who love horses as much as she does so she had no complaints! By Sunday afternoon Wyatt had a different opinion - we weren't there as much as she was, but he was exhausted and told me all about it!
He threw himself down in the dirt and sawdust, narrowly missing a pile of horse poo and proceeded to shout, "But this whole day has been all about sister and I'm tired of it always being all about sister. When is it ever going to be about me?" Biting back a grin and listening to the quiet chuckles around me, I walked slowly over to where he was and gave him a big hug. Which didn't help anything at all because I wasn't taking him home just yet:)!

As far as the horse show, it was definitely baptism by fire! I knew nothing about horse shows and Megan knew only a little bit more. In spite of her inexperience competing, she managed to get several ribbons (a couple of 4ths, a couple of 5ths and a 6th). There were thirteen girls in her group - all of whom have been competing for years so Megan was proud of herself for hanging in there and for doing as well as she did. We learned that the "showing season" runs from May through early November and Megan decided she wants to go for a season of showing so we're going to go for it! You'll be hearing lots more about horse shows as there are eight that she will for sure compete in from the first weekend in June to the first weekend in November. She has upped the number of times that she'll be riding each week - she'll have two formal lessons with her coach and she'll work out with Jake (that's the horse she'll be riding at least for the first part of the season) three to four times a week in addition to her lessons.

Right now she's competing as a "Novice Hunter-Jumper". As I understand it, this is the 4th level up - the jumps range from eighteen inches to three feet. "Novice Hunter-Jumper" is the last level before the jumps get higher - from three to four feet. Depending on how the first part of the season goes, she may move up to "Jumpers" midseason. The move to the next level is huge and carries a lot more risk- the horses go much faster and much higher. This scares me to death, but what are you going to do when your baby girl has loved horses since she was literally a baby???

I'm attaching a few pictures for the moment and am working on a slide show. If I can say so myself, I'm pretty impressed with some of the pictures I got:)! Enjoy!!