My husband can be a bit trying at times. People really close to me, know exactly how kindly I am phrasing that. But I have been sitting here watching him out my window, as he works with Dixie in the round pen. He has a way with animals. At least with dogs & horses. I don't approve of all of his 'methods', but he is pretty good.
He's been standing in the middle, and has her running the perimeter. He will point and say 'turn' and she stops and heads in the opposite direction. He'll sit on the milk can in the middle of the ring and say 'stop, Dixie' and she does. 'Come Dixie' and she walks to him. 'Kiss' and her nose is in his face. It amazes me how well he has trained her. How well he works with her, and she's almost as dedicated to him as Gus is! In reality, I think the part he likes best is pointing his finger at her and having her respond. We learned 2 things about each other early on. I know not to slap him in the face (only happened once) and he knows not to point his finger at me for any reason!
Anyway, here is Dixie when we first got her. (March '09) She was 19 months old at the time. We had already bought her Mama, Susie, a year prior. When our friend decided he also wanted to sell Susie's 'kid', we jumped on it! I promptly registered her as Sweet Sue's Little Dixie, ( as Susie's registered name is Jack's Sweet Sue and Susie's mama had Dixie in her name, so I liked the combo). Dixie had been running free with J's other horses most of her life, and no one had ever worked with her much at all. There was much to be done, as she was a wild, crazy little sh**!
This is Dixie last fall, getting trained on pulling the buggy. She took to it right away, pretty much like everything else Chuck has tried to teach her. She will pretty much do anything for him. Totally unlike Susie, who was 17 when we got her and extremely set in her ways!! I was worried about how they'd get along when we reunited them. Wondered if they'd remember each other. It was amazing! If horses could hug, they'd have been hugging for days! Sadly, they are now inseparable, which can be a BIG problem at times! But that's another story.
Chuck is working with Dixie to get her ready to go on a Cattle Round-up in Wyoming. He was at the ranch last year with our BIL for a hunting trip and became good friends with the owner of the ranch. He's been invited back to participate in their Spring Cattle Round-up for branding season. It will be a dream come true for this old cowboy. I sure wish he could have done it while I could still ride. How I would love to go with him and spend a couple weeks at the ranch, riding Susie on all the trails on that beautiful ranch of theirs! Anyway, he's been working with her everyday, to get her 'exercised up' and in shape, as well as training her on 'herding'. That means that they have been herding Susie around the pasture and she doesn't like that one little bit!! Susie is usually the one that is herding Dixie around! It's hysterical and I must get a video to share!
So, I will return from Alaska on May 23rd and he will load up the horses and head out on May 26th. Uggg.....the thought of returning home after that long flight and having to jump right into getting his laundry done and getting him packed and ready in 2 days blows my mind right now, but once he's gone, I can kick back for 2 weeks and prepare for my surgery. He'll return on June 8th or 9th and I go under the knife on June 11th. It all sounded good when we planned it, but now that it's getting close, it seems like we could have/should have done something different, but it'll all work out.
