Ride & Tie in Washington

Don and Annie Betts are heavily involved in Ride and Tie. Until last year, Don was the President of the organization and Annie did the newsletter. He's enjoying his first year in many to not have the presidential duties.

This year he put on the Lost Mountain Ride and Tie.  It was a 30+ mile event where two people compete on one horse.  For more about Ride and Tie, click here. Dennis has a screen-printing business, along with is embroidery business, so he did the ride shirts for Don.  Rather than mail them up, we delivered them in person.  Much more fun that way!!

The shirts are Annie's design and I think they're adorable!

There were only three teams competing (not all that unusual for R&T) and they all finished in good time with sound horses.  Here are a few pics of the teams and their mounts.

This mare was incredible! She was a big girl and she used to compete in some kind of polo event.  And she was incredibly fast...witnessed in person when she saw a llama for the first time and did a 180; unfortunately, her rider didn't keep up.

Above and below are the medical team. The doc (above) is also a pilot and flew over from Seattle to ride. The doc below (an anesthesiologist) flew out commercial from Tennessee to compete.  He loves R&T...obviously!! (They were riding Cinder. She's an awesome mare that I got to ride on Sunday to help pull the ribbons from the ride. We went about 10 miles on some incredibly treacherous trail. It was sure fun!)

And these two were the third team.  I just love this horse, Pumpkin.  Of course, I'm a bit partial to chestnut ponies!!

Okay, enough with the pony stuff.  Next post is all about quilts and one of our reasons for going to WA!

Vacation

We left on September 9 for Washington and an almost two-week vacation.  Of course, we were supposed to leave early, but as usual, we got out late.  And the hard part for me? Look at how clean and neat and tidy the yurt is; it was so hard for me to leave.  Silly, yes, but true. (It didn't take all that long for me to get over it though).

We drove as far as Salem, OR, and spent the night. Friday morning we were up early and headed north again. We recently purchased a Tom-Tom and it was so helpful. Because I have a business and a resell license, I was able to go shopping at E.E. Schenk. They are a huge wholesale warehouse with lots of fabric, notions, patterns, supplies and tons of other really cute stuff.  An added benefit, Beth Durand rode her bike over to meet us.  I haven't seen her in two years and I almost didn't recognize her.  She has lost 85 lbs.!! She's been on WW and biking.  Her success has motivated me to start biking again.

Several hundred dollars poorer and with a slight overstuffed car, we continued on our way to Sequim and our friends' (Annie & Don Betts) cabin. We always stay in their cabin on Sequim Bay when we're up there. Eventually, we'll get our yurt up and won't have to mooch from them so often, but until we do, its the most lovely place to stay.  Our first time there I was so dismayed that it only had a tub and no shower.  Now I look forward to that--I'd forgotten how relaxing a bath can be!

This is the cabin...

And here are a couple pictures of the view.

Next up...pictures of the Lost Mountain Ride & Tie.  It was part of the reason for our trip.

The Trouble with Blogging...

is keeping up! Everyone's lives are busy, but mine was supposed to slow down.  After all, I'm retired now. Shouldn't I be able to sit on the couch eating bon-bons and watching Oprah? Shouldn't I have hours to exercise to counter-act the bon-bons? Shouldn't I be out riding and quilting every day?  The answer is "yes," in my dreams. In reality, however, it's a big, fat NO.  I seem to be busier now than I ever was...why? I have no clue. For the rest of you that are retired, are you having this issue as well??

There are three sites I check regularly: my e-mail; the APQS chat list, and Facebook.  Granted, I could dump FB  because I blog, but then everything would be so one-sided. I wouldn't know what was happening with my horsey friends and my many other friends whom I'm only in contact with because of FB.  Quitting FB just doesn't seem like an option.

So instead, I think I need to make time to blog in the same manner that I make time to exercise...although blogging is way more fun.  With any luck, this will work and there will be no more three week absences.  Wow...three weeks...did anyone notice I was gone?

Stay tuned for the "catch-up" blogs...

Donna Dorothy Miller (2/17/16-8/25/10)

Donna Dorothy Miller was my mother-in-law. She passed away in our hospital the day after we brought her back to Quincy.

Donna had fallen while we were on vacation in Washington. She went to the hospital and they had her on morphine, etc., and didn't have her up and moving around for four days.  When you're 94, four days is too long to lie in bed without moving much. This caused her to be unable to walk with her walker; so she went into our local convalescent home. After rehab, and because her condition had deteriorated so much, we knew she wouldn't be able to come back home with us.  Thus ensued our search for an assisted living residence for her.  Unfortunately, she had a severe stroke thirteen days after moving into Eagle Lake Village (its supposed to be assisted living, but it was more like a four-star hotel! Both the residents and the staff were incredibly nice--we're having them save us a room.)

Here are photos of Donna and Ed, her husband. She met him on a train right before WWII. How romantic is that? They were married and then Dennis came along eight years later.

Donna and Ed settled in Walnut Creek and bought their home for something like $12,000...can you imagine?? They lived there until Ed passed in 1998, then Donna moved to Quincy. She lived on her own, still driving, until she broke her hip at 92.  While we were both working, she would watch our dogs. Every day they got hot dogs, and chicken, and crackers; Donna made sure to have Chloe's favorite shows on TV during the day, too.

She had a lovely, long life, doing what she liked.  We'll still miss her...

Simplify...

The other day, Dennis and I were at a meeting where the gentleman we were meeting with was going to e-mail us some information.  Thus ensued the debate: whose e-mail should he send the info to? I, of course, thought mine; Dennis overruled and said his, because he doesn't get nearly as many messages as I do. I had to agree.

So, when I got home I took a long hard look at my e-mail messages...all 3,751 of them.  Really??  3,751??? That made me think...was I ever going to read all those messages?  So I spent almost an hour deleting them all.  I've made a promise to myself that I will not have more than one page of messages. In Google mail, which is the program I use, that means 50 total.  Currently, I have 17 unread and 45 total messages.  I unsubscribed from tons of lists and advertising offers.  It actually feels good...sort of like after you're done cleaning house and before you mess it up again.