Home

Farm Life

I woke up when my first alarm went off and crawled out of bed. I got showered and dressed before grabbing my vlogging camera. I started recording. "Good morning guys. It is currently 4 am and I usually don't start my work until 5 am. Today is going to be a little different then most days. Most days I have my therapy students, riding lessons, or helpers coming in, but today is Sunday so I give everyone this day off. I still have animals though so I still have to take care of them. Today I will be having my boyfriend help me around the farm and I will be vlogging everything to show you all my daily routine. Right now it is 4 am and Zach is still asleep. I am going to be nice and give him till 5, but this time I like to spend having some quiet time weather it's prayer, meditation, or reading I just like to have my mind started first in the first part of my day. So I'm going to cook some breakfast and have my quiet time. I placed the camera down and made a simple breakfast for Zach and I. I made him a plate and left it to warm in the oven. While I ate I did my daily devotions and a little bit of morning reading. When I was done, I cleaned up the kitchen before picking up my camera again. "Alright guys so I've finished my little quiet of the morning and now it is time to go wake up Zach so let's go do that!" I walked into the room carrying the camera and I saw Zach all wrapped up in the comforter. I put the camera on the night stand and let it record. I climbed across the bed and started kissing his face. "Good morning. Time to get up." He wrapped his arms around me and pulled me onto him. "What time is it?" he said groggily. "5 am. I let you sleep a bit longer then when I got up." I looked up at him and he stretched and looked down at me. I leaned up and kissed him. "Good morning. I made breakfast for you so it is time to get up and start the day!" "Okay. I'm up." I crawled out of bed and grabbed the vlogging camera heading back into the kitchen. "Okay so while he is getting ready I am going to go ahead and do a few things ahead of time. So the first animals I end up feeding are the dogs. They eat early in the morning and they work around the stables with me, so I like to feed them first. Because Bear and Tank are both muscle working dogs I like to feed them the raw diet." I whistled and the dogs came walking into the kitchen. Tank was my blue/gray Pitbull and Bear was my Malinois. "Okay so today they are getting a red meat mix. Now each day I like to mix it up for them to give them different types of food. Today they will be getting: lamb, carrots, apples, peas, pumpkin, brown rice, sunflower oil, and fish oil. So some people don't like feeding their pets raw food, but look at these boys." I turned the camera to show the dogs who were already drooling. "They don't mind it." I continued to cook and when I was done I put the food in the dog's bowls. "Alright boys dig in! While they are eating I am going to go ahead and start de-thawing the rats and mice. I think I'll do about 8 today and if they don't feel like eating a second one I will just refreeze them. So I don't think Blake knows about the reptile room yet so that will definitely be interesting to watch. I usually set them in a bowl of lukewarm water and once I finish with the horses and the reptiles start to wake up to the sun more then I will come back in and feed them. The only one who eats fruits and berries is Tucker so I'll make sure that's separate for him." Zach walked out of the room looking really sleepy. I pulled out his breakfast from the oven. He took the plate and kissed me. "So I already fed the dogs which I was telling the viewers about. While you are eating I'm going to tell you basically everything we have to do." I sat down at the kitchen table with him. "So I usually like to feed and let the wild horses out first and the mule with them. They usually don't mess with Matilda and they just let her graze with them. Then I start feeding the horses in their stall and by the time we get to the end of the list the first horse is usually done with her breakfast and I let them out into the fields. Then we've got stalls to clean out and the tack room to organize. After that we can exercise some of them if we really want to, but I also like to walk the fields and leave some hay out there for them. Then...we have the reptiles to feed." Zach looked up at me with mouth full. "You have reptiles?!" "Yep, but those will be the last things we feed cause they aren't awake yet. Don't worry if you don't want to feed them then you don't have to. I can feed them. So you ready?" The dogs came over licking their faces. "You boys finish? Good boys! I gave them both dentasticks." Zach finished eating and cleaned his plate up. "Alright so no sneakers you have to wear boots for your own feet protection." He put on his riding boots and I put on my working boots. We walked outside and the dogs followed us. "Alright so I am going to let you feed and get Matilda because she is a sweet girl. I will get the two wild boys because they aren't as nice yet." We walked to the smaller barn where there were three stalls. In the first stall was Matilda our mule. "So Matilda gets some fresh water and timothy hay and that's about all she eats in the summer. In the winter I will give her a bit more of a mixture just to keep the winter pounds on, but not during the summer." I showed Zach the piles of hay next to her stall and I walked to Prince and Spirit's stalls and gave them a mixture of feed and hay. "Now Prince and Spirit are our two wild horses that were rescued from a reserve and my plan is to get them onto another reserve here soon because I don't think wild horses should be tamed unless there is no other option. So the only person they come into contact with is me." Zach was petting Matilda's head as she was resting against him. "I think she likes me." He said smiling. "You made a new friend. Alright let's let them eat and go feed the other animals." We walked out of that barn and over to the larger barn. I turned the lights on. "Good morning my beautiful babies! So I start off by feeding Abby first since she is the closest one here and I make my way down the isle. They all get the same mixture of feed and hay if they don't end up eating it all then it will just stay in their feed pens for when they want it. So let's get started." Once we finished all 25 horses were fed. "Alright now we can start letting them out. Let's go back to the small stable and let them out first. Those three go in the front pasture behind the house. The females go in the back pasture behind the outdoor ring and the males go in the side pasture behind the indoor ring. So let's go get your friend Matilda and the two boys." We walked back to the small stable and the three animals had their heads out of their stalls. The two horses were kicking the door. "Hey! You continue to act up and you won't go out into the field until after every one else! Zach I'll show you how to get a horse on Matilda here." I showed him how to put the harness on and attach the lead rope and then undid it. "Alright get Matilda."