getting bucked, and trying a lope

last month, riding Shiloh

Today when I went to Claudia's house, I rode Shiloh, her beautiful flea-bitten gray fifteen year old Quarter Horse gelding. His feet hurt him, so she put his special boots on.

We tried a lope (it's a little slower than a canter).
Guess what? Shiloh bucked! He protested with me, bumping his hindquarters up. Claudia got him going at a lope, and then he bumped his hindquarters up because his feet hurt. It scared me HALF TO DEATH! I thought I'd fall off. I didn't. I just lost a stirrup, but then I stopped him and got my foot back in the stirrup.

And then we tried a lope again. He did it again! I used to think I was ready to gallop. Now, I DON'T! Papaw (my mom's grand father) took me to Claudia's house and stayed.

I don't think loping is so cool. It's a lot faster than trotting. It probably would be fun, IF Shiloh didn't do that. It's SCARY!!!!

But over all I had a good time. We practiced going around cones at a trot, and then going around barrels. It was fun.

Going to the zoo with Papaw

We went to the zoo with Papaw (my mom's grandfather) a couple of days ago. It was fun. Oliver and I rode in his car, and Ethan and Trevor rode in my Mom and Dad's car. When we got to the zoo, we met my Mom and Dad and Ethan and Trevor.

Then we went and got a wagon so we could put our stuff in it and so Oliver could ride in it. He's so cute, because he kept pointing at things, "is that the monkeys? Is that a bird? Where are the fish?"

First we went to see the monkeys. There was a little baby monkey. He reminded me of Trevor, because he'd just go up to his mom and jump up on her back. He even stood up to the biggest monkey!

We ate, then saw the owls and the snakes and went in the desert section, and the arctic section. I love the desert section the most (because I love seeing the snakes, and the roadrunner bird that runs around in its cage).

Me and Oliver rode back with Papaw again, stopping with my Mom and Dad and Ethan and Trevor at Braums to get burgers and fries.

Then we drove home, arriving home at about ten minutes after my Mom and Dad and Ethan and Trevor.

I was pretty tired. Papaw came to our house that night to play hearts with my Mom and Dad, and to play rummy with me.

I got my hair cut!!!

I got my hair cut! It looks nice now, and it's really short. The reason I got it cut is because I was hot, and because I wanted to see how it looked. My mom said I looked older. She really likes it, and so do I. It looks so.........neat. But it feels weird to put my hand on my neck and feel that nothing is there.

I got my hair cut by Julie, my mom's sister. She did a good job!

Ethan is nine #2

I'll tell you about our visit to me grandma and grandpa. It was nice.
My grandma (I call her "Noni") made Angel Food Cake and two kinds of cup cakes. Ethan decorated the cupcakes. Yum. It was pretty good food. We sang happy birthday to Ethan and let him blow out his candle.
Noni bought bubble wands and stuff and so we blew bubbles for a while after we ate.
It was pretty fun!

Ethan is nine!

See, I told you I'd post again. Anyone know that Ethan turned nine yesterday on August twenty third? He had fifty dollars, (I think, something like that) and spent it on a star wars space ship with guns and Darth Vader and a Clone and General Greevis (how do you spell his name?) with light sabers.

My momma and papaw took some pictures of the cake and toys.

We went to my papaw's house (my mom's grandparent, and the one who had married Mimi) and ate roast for dinner and cake and cantaloupe for dessert. We're going to go to my grand parents' (my mom's mom and dad) house tonight for dinner and dessert. Mmmm.

This is a special treat for my mom, 'cause she doesn't have to cook dinner or make any dessert! Ethan loves it, too.

(so do I, cause Papaw's a great cook, and so is Noni (my grandma). Yum!

Here are some pictures and Ethan's video of his toys that he bought with his money.

Hope you like them!

We've also been reading a book called a Horse and his Boy, over at papaw's house. Ethan does puzzles while we read it out loud.

I'll write again tomorrow!

hot, hot, hot

I'm sorry I haven't posted, guys. It's been busy around here, especially school and vacation. But now I'm posting. Did any of you come to my mom's quarter yard sale? I sold lemonade there for 10 cents, soda for fifty cents, and even ice cold water and fruit punch for twenty five cents, and got twenty three dollars out of it. It's pretty awesome.

How many people saw that this is the hottest summer on record?

{deep sigh} I'm tired of it being hot. It was fun in South Padre, with the beach and everything. And to top it off, we got hit by part of a hurricane! I really liked seeing the wind blowing and the trees.

Oh, and did you know that Texas is one of the most popular horse countries? It is known for a lot of fantastic breeds.

I know, I know, I talk about horses a lot. But I can't really help it. It just LOVE them!

We're getting off the subject. Way off the subject.

At the yard sale, my mom and dad sold almost all of their things. A LOT. It was pretty hot out there, but I sat a table with an umbrella that went with it. I'm thinking on spending my twenty three dollars on a board game that I like. But I might get a few breyer horses that I like. That'd be nice. That would be nice.

See you! I'll post soon, I promise! And that's a PROMISE!

horseback riding at Claudia's house

Today I went horseback riding at Claudia's. It was fun! I helped comb out Shiloh's mane. I mounted, and rode out into Claudia's small riding pen. "Remember what I taught you?" She asked. I had remembered.

I walked around on Shiloh, who behaved well. Then Claudia let me trot, and man, is that bouncy! It was kind of scary, and I didn't enjoy doing that as much as I think I would cantering. My goal was to trot Shiloh around close to the rail without letting him trail off, and boy, that was hard! I kept trotting him, but he would trail off from the rail and go straight to Claudia and stop. He was lazy, but fun to ride. I almost got him to go near the rail, but didn't quite. I dismounted correctly, as Claudia had shown me. I led Shiloh around to the place where we untacked him. Claudia showed me how to take the bridle off, and how to untack the horse. I carried the saddle, (which was pretty heavy) and took it to Claudia's tack room (tack is the things you put on a horse to ride: saddle, saddle blanket, bridle, etc.) I examined all the saddles and bridles closely, and then went into Claudia's house to look around for a few minutes. My mom bought a book from her that she had written herself about horses. I'm glad I'm friends with her (and her horses, too!) Her house is lovely, with the view of her horses' field from the window. Oh, I forgot, since I've been so busy talking about Claudia and the horses, I forgot to mention that my mom came with me, and my brothers all got to stay with Noni. Well, have a very nice day, you all!

My mom is going to post the pictures of this for me tonight. :-)

horseback riding at Claudia's house

Happy birthday to MY mom!

Happy birthday, Mommy. Today was my mom's (the greatest lady ever)birthday. She's thirty years old! She LOVED her party on Saturday, and came home in a great mood. Now that it's her birthday, she get's to decide everything. She decided what was for dinner (tacos) and we went to Natural Falls, which is a hiking trail that she and all of us like. We played at the park, (including a game of freeze tag-she won.) Then after we ate dinner my dad went to the store for her and is putting the boys to bed. Ahhhhh, now I can relax in peace and quiet, and my mom and dad can have their time together. Tomorrow we're going to go to my friend Claudia's house to see and her horses-she's a very good friend of mine and my mom's. Well, gotta go! Isabelle ;0)

Horse festival

Wow! that horse festival was awesome! You should have seen it! Especially Freddy the fantastic Fresian, now that's a horse of beauty! Tom Turvey was excellent, and his well trained horse was too. He played all kinds of tricks with the horse. Plus I got to see real rodeo queens. But, ouch! One of the men started talking to the people about horses, and when he got on the horse (bareback) The horse bolted and he fell off hard on his back. He was okay, but another rodeo queen did that, too, only her horse didn't bolt, she just fell. Then there was a parade of breeds, a lot of horse breeds were led into the arena and led around a circle so we could see them. Plus my dad bought me a calendar and book in the gift shop.

Looking for furniture. Guess what we found!

We went to go buy some new furniture in Spring Dale. Guess what we found! We went into a store, there were tons of things in it. We didn't find any furniture, but we did find..............a HORSE RANCH SET! It was like new, with all the pieces still in the boxes. It was 15 dollars. Ethan and I LOVE it! We set it up when we got home. It looked really COOL! I also got a whole bag of horses, plus other big toy horses. I really like the things I got. I didn't have my money right then, so my mom and dad paid for it and I'll pay them back. They're very great parents and I love them SO much! They're smart to find cheap things at Thrift Stores and other places like that. Have a nice day! Izzabellie

Saint Patrick's Day! Fun! Fun! FUN!

It was pretty fun on Saint Patrick's Day. My mom painted Sham Rocks on our faces, and we started a lap book about Saint Patrick's Day, and a ton of more stuff. The next day we ate green eggs, drank green milk, and my mom painted the Sham Rocks again on our faces. It was cool! Our mom is the best!

Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr...................cold!

I just went outside. I had two shirts, a jacket, a huge coat, two pants, gloves, a hood, and shoes. It is FREEZING out there! I think that in some places it is a foot deep! I slipped and fell when I started running and then came inside for some hot cocoa Yum! My dad put sacks on my feet so that my shoes wouldn't get wet or snowy so we could wear them again if we go back out. It was fun out there, and I did like it, though. Ethan came and joined me. He didn't know how deep the snow was, and stepped right in one of the deepest spots! Later, (hopefully) we'll all go out there and play some, but my mom doesn't like to be cold, so she'll probably stay out a little and then come back in the house to warm up. Ahhhhhhhh. I kinda wish I could cast a spell on all the land, making it nice and pretty with the sun ALWAYS shining and the birds singing and the animals singing songs. Then it would never snow! HA! HA! HA! Well, maybe I AM kind of picky. I do like snow, it's just that spring is much better. But hopefully it will stop and spring will come again as it always does. No rush, no hurry. Alright, well I think I'm going to go back outside to let Ethan know where I was. Thanks, and have a warm day!

And along came the snow......................!

It's MARCH! It's SNOWING! I WANT NICE!!! Nice, nice, nice, nice, nice, nice! It's fun when it's starting to get into winter and it snows and we go sledding and get to throw snow balls, but when it comes to march and it snows, I want it out of here. But you know, we are kind of asking for it. I mean, we live in Arkansas. Arkansas gets cold in winter. The thing I can't understand is that it was really nice a few days ago, but now it's freezing outside. No fair! I thought it'd keep being nice. But NO it didn't. This certainly is a surprise. Well, at least we are all safe inside, and have a nice, warm house that we are very thankful to live in. I hope you stay warm! Have a cold but good day!

going to "The Coop."

Today we went to the "Chicken Coop." It's a thrift store in Gentry. Oh how I want to go back. I usually get bored and stuff and tired in thrift stores, but this one was amazing. They sold western saddles and tack (bridles and saddles and things) and they sold saddle blankets too. I wanted SO badly to be able to sit on one of those saddles, I wanted to know what it would feel like. I found a big horse picture for $20.00. My mom and dad said that they'd buy it for me, because they are redoing my room and it matches. Isn't that sweet of them? They're the best parents in the world. So anyway, we took the picture home after we paid for it and paid for the things that my mom wanted to buy too. I LOVE it! We're going to hang it up in my room above my dresser.

Sabino: paint horse coloring

The picture above is a Sabino Paint horse coloring. This coloring is very pretty. It is one of the main paint horse colorings.

Tobiano: paint color

The picture above is a Tobiano Paint horse. The Paint horse can be in lot's of colors. The main ones are Tobiano, Overo, and Sabino. The picture above shows the coloring of Tobiano. It's a beautiful color.

Going to see the movie, Alice in Wonderland

Me and my mom and dad and the nature man went to go see the movie Alice in Wonderland at the theater. It was a great movie. I liked it a lot. At first I didn't think I'd like it, because once my dad had shown me the old movie and I hadn't been interested in it. It wasn't very good, but this new one is a lot better! Near the end of the movie I got a terrible head ache. We watched the movie in 3-d, (with a special kind of glasses on), and my glasses kept slipping off my head, so the picture looked very weird. That might have been giving me a head ache. That ache continued until we got home, then I rested on the couch and slept for a few minutes until I felt good again. Now I feel good as new!

History: Harriot Tub Men

Today we were reading some history. My mom pulled out the book, Harriot Tubman, from the book case. I LOVE reading American history. I've heard of Harriot before, but I don't think I've ever actually known the true story of her life. I thought I'd post of how much I loved learning about History, (and everything else for that matter!) Its fun to learn to read, (to me.) I want to learn everything I can so I can be smart and be able to be a scientist someday and study animals or maybe astronomy. I'm not sure what I want to be yet, but I am sure that I want to be smart, and be a woman of God. I want to study the Bible and read about lots of the people that God loved. I tell myself, when I grow up, I'll marry a man of God and have as many children as possible, and teach them of God's ways too. My Papaw knows a lot about the Bible, so I can ask him about it if I don't understand a word or know what's happening. I know that when I read things, most importantly the Bible, I'll write them down so my kids can read them and so I'll remember them when I'm grown up. I'll go to college and study about being an artist. Don't worry, when I grow up I'll use my talents to Glorify God, even if I'm an artist, I'll paint pictures of God and the angels singing, glorifying the God of mighty. I will grow up, to be like Harriot, to love God and help as many people as I can. I know there's no slavery now, but people are still being punished for things they didn't do, so I want to help them. I hope you like this post, Izzy.

love with family and friends

I love my Noni and Poppy and aunts and uncles and cousins and family. My Noni always buys neat stuff for me and everyone else. She visits a lot and reads us bed time stories at night. She also checks us out books from the library to read. She always watches us when my mom or dad needs to go somewhere. She is very funny and creative and makes me laugh. I love her. Poppy taught me how to play chess, he helps me with a lot of stuff that I don't know how to do. He was the one who gave me a cool camera for my birthday. He loves to take me out to lunch. I love him. Aunt Julie is very kind and sweet. She takes me out on special times. She was the one who painted a mermaid picture for me to put in my room. She loves to draw with me and teach things about drawing and painting. I love her. Adam is very amusing and creative. He can juggle and make costumes and loves to see us. I love him. Aunt Amy is very creative and sweet. She loves to draw fairies and cool stuff with me. She also let's me hold and play with her cute little baby named Ransom. I love her. Vu is HILARIOUS!! He cracks me up all the time. He can draw pretty cool cartoons and people. Have you ever seen him shake me? It's SO funny. I love him.
Owen is cute. He is Julie's son. He loves to play and talk with Trevor, and he is quite amusing to watch. I love him. Scarlet is very cute. She is Julie's daughter. She is quite cute and can stretch her legs out far. I love to see her. She loves it when my mom paints her nails. I love her.
My mom is so beautiful and kind and sweet and creative and loving. She loves to be around me and everyone else. She cleans all the time, so I've been trying to help her with everything, including the boys. She is my mom, and I love her. She loves to be outside, and go for walks and swim and run. She makes me lunch every day and helps me with school. She helps me clean my room even though she doesn't have to. She also buys things for me for Christmas and on my birthday. I want to do so much to help her. I cleaned the playroom while she talked to the boys and calmed them down. I really love her. My dad is very funny, amusing, and loving. He is the one who works everyday to earn money for us to pay for our house and everything else. I kind of feel sad when I watch him go out the door to work at five thirty in the morning. He works almost all day for about 10 hours and only gets a lunch break. He usually comes home at about four thirty, around dinner time. He loves me and the rest of the family. He likes to play games with us and take us hiking and rafting. He is the one who bought me some of my really cool toys. I love him. Papaw is very sweet and lives in Washington, Sequim. he visits us usually every April or May. He loves to help us plant flowers and helps us make our garden. He sends us letters with pretty pictures on them. He bought me a horse calendar that I really like. He also is the pastor of a church. He is planning on moving here, so I'll get to spend a lot of time with him. Mimi was very kind and sweet and loved me. She died a few weeks ago because of cancer. She was the one who sewed me a lot of my dresses. She loved me and everyone else. She made very good meals like bread, cookies, and cinnamon rolls. Yum!
Alisa, who I just met, owns two horses. One is a beautiful black Arabian horse named Chance. One is a half fresian named Max. Alisa has been writing to me about her horses and about what your supposed to do when you own a horse. I love Alisa. I also just met Claudia, she owns three horses. A bay named, Rio. A gray horse named Shilo, and a beautiful paint named Jonny Reb. She is a very nice lady and has also been writing to me about horses. I love Claudia. I have also met a sweet lady named Linda. Linda is a beautiful, kind lady that has two horses. They are both very pretty chestnut colors. One is named Page, and one is named Mindy. I also love Tracy, and her family. She sees my mom a lot. She comes everyday and talks to my mom and gives her coffee and really yummy things. She has two very cute little kids: Jack (the baby) and Kate (the toddler.) They're both very cute. I also like John, (Tracy's husband.) Though I've never seen him that much. He was at a dance with Kate called, "The daddy daughter dance." It's where you dance a lot and have fun. My dad and I were there, too. We took Liana (October's daughter.) October is also a very helpful and sweet, smart person. She can speak French, Spanish, English, and a little German. She is very very good at puzzles and is very funny. She has a daughter named Liana, a boy about the age of Ethan named Diego, and a toddler about Trevor's age named Chacho. She loves spending time with my mom and us. I love everybody!!!! Family & friends!

Art Journaling

I've just started to get into art journaling. It's pretty fun. I glued horse pictures on the inside of my journal. I cut a bird out of a magazine and then cut circles out of blue paper and glued them on a "newspaper" nest that I made. My mom gave me her extra journal to use as an art journal. I LOVE journaling now. My grandma just came over, I call her "Noni". You can see her blog on the blog list below. She's reading to Nature Boy, Little Lad, and Dash. Anyway, at first when I started journaling I didn't know what on earth to put in my journal, so I asked my mom and she said that I can do just about ANYTHING that I feel like doing. So, I did. I cut out of a magazine. I glued a picture of a women who looked like she was thinking about something, so I drew those big imagining bubbles with flowers and a butterfly picture glued in it. I also glued a woman's face onto my paper and drew the rest of the body on her. I made a nest out of newspaper scraps and cut eggs out of a painting. I'm planning to do a lot more in my journal, you can keep up with pictures of all of our art journals if you look here, on this link to our art stuff.

I LOVE forts!!!

Do you like forts? I do. Even though I'm ten years old, I still love to put blankets up and make forts with whatever I can find. Whenever I want to make a fort, I always have to ask my brothers to help me. I like to set the fort up really nicely, and when it's done I get in and set up a pillow, then move paper and pencils into it, then I always invite my brothers to come check it out. We made a huge fort today. We have a Foosball table in our playroom, and me and my brothers hung blankets on that and the little boy's bunk bed. Our mom let us move the kitchen chairs in there since she was going to mop anyway. I spend that half hour just adding onto the fort. Trevor, (my littler brother) turned the light off so my fort would look really dark inside. We shut the curtains too. When I thought it was ready, I invited my brothers to investigate the darkened fort. But..................I made a mistake......................I had put so many blankets up that they couldn't get in. So, I made a path for them to go through so they get in. I didn't get to play in my fort that much because I spent almost the entire time fixing everything when it fell. My mom finally said that we had half an hour to play, and then we would have to pick everything up. I've got to say, that half an hour seemed to go by like a car speeding by. I couldn't believe it when the timer beeped. I said, "Just five more minutes! I didn't even get to play!" But my mom didn't care, she said, "I don't care, pick it up, you've got half an hour before your daddy gets home, and trust me, you won't want to see Daddy's face when he sees this mess. Get to work." And we did. In no time at all we were telling my mom that the play room had been cleaned. She liked it, (I think.) Well, I'll probably do it again tomorrow, but we'll have to convince her to let us play for about..................hm....................probably a little over two hours. That will be enough time. Well, I've got to go unload the dish water, catch you later!

A VERY VERY NICE DAY!!!

Wow, have you checked it out outside? Man it's nice! Me and my mom and brothers spend almost the entire day out there! (We did our school work too of course.) It's nice enough to wear shorts and a tank-top! My family and I LOVE this weather, that' s why we're going to Natural Falls. Natural Falls is a very pretty trail that leads to a beautiful water fall. It's just the right weather to go hiking. I love it when the sun is out, the sky is blue, and the cool wind is blowing in my face. My mom wishes it was in the 70s and 80s. But I told her that this is better than nothing.

going to the library

The library is always so much fun. I love to check out books. I usually check out books about animals such as birds, horses, and dolphins. Horses are the things that I mostly check out, though. I go straight to the children's section and try to get as many good books as I can. My mom and dad let us get up to five books, and one movie. I think I checked out more than five books yesterday when we went! After we went to the library we went to McDonald's to eat. Yum, yum, yum. I checked out one movie from the library. I think you can guess what kind of movie. That's right! A horse movie! It's a movie called, "Flicka". Have you ever seen it before? I haven't. But it'll be fun to watch. Thanks for reading this, I hope you liked it! Have a nice day!
This is my cute littlest brother.

sledding, snow ball fights, and more snowy fun

I actually don't want the snow to melt, because if it does, I can't throw snow balls, or go sledding, or anything like that. We did a snow ball fight a few days ago with some friends of ours, (Tracy Little and her husband and kids.) Then, the next day, we went sledding on some hills. Wow! What a fun time we had. There was a big hill, but above it there was a huge one! When I first rode my sled down the big hill, I was scared, and thought I'd fall off. But, it was pretty safe. I never fell. I went on the huge hill a couple of times, with my dad, and one time with Ethan, (my brother.) We usually crashed, even before we reached the bottom. I didn't want to leave at all, because I was having so much fun. Yahoo! Our friends Jennifer Cobb, and her little girl named Sara, they were the ones who showed us where that place was, they also let us borrow their sleds.

another new hairstyle

Well, now we have another new hairstyle. A one that looks like a heart type thing! I just love it! I really like doing different kinds of hair things. The one we did today is one that looks like an angel's crown! Tomorrow, for ballet, we're doing another very pretty girly hair style. I have never known how to fix my hair, (or even put it in a pony tail), so I'm glad that my mom knows how to braid it, and do other things with it. I usually just sit back and read and relax and leave the "hair fixing" to her. I'm lovin it! You should try doing new things with your hair, too! Well, I've gotta go get my beauty treatment! Hope you have a really nice day! Izzy ;)

hair and great things

I'm turning into a real girly girl. I used to not like wear dresses, or skirts, or different types of shirts and pants. Well, I have changed. I'm starting to get to where I love dressing up, (wear all those things.) My mom found a really cool site about how to fix hair in a lot of different ways. We tried it. My hair is spectacular! It looks like a princess's hair would look like. Oh, the happiness. I cleaned off the counter, wiped it down, swept, cleared the table off, wiped it down, swept again, cleaned the playroom, I feel pretty good now. Oh, and I cleaned the living room too. Now, me and my mom are going out together, (mainly going to get lunch, and dessert, and to run with my mom's sister Julie.) Well, I've gotta to now! Thanks for reading this post! Izzy :0)

Lapbooks

I love our lap books! They're fun to make. If I get bored, I can just work on a lap book. I am the kind of person who likes to get on the computer and look stuff up. I like writing all the information and cutting out the pictures from old magazines that I found in the art cupboard. I love cutting out pictures from magazines.
Okay, I am going to put a puzzle together and work on a new horse lap book! Bye!

game night with friends

A few days ago we had a game night with friends and family, (my dad's family.) It was fun! We played just dance, (a game where you just dance!) He he he! They stayed up till about, 1:00 in the morning playing Wii games and board games. I like seeing all of our old friends.