Horseback Riding in the Mountains

On Labor Day, we took our horses and went up into the mountains to ride.  We went with friends - Scott and his boys Tyson and Taylor, Rick and his son Hunter, and Brett and his daughter Haylee. We had 13 horses and 14 riders!  Ages 10 - 40 something.  :)

Peter and Libby rode on one of Scott's horses named Lucy. 

Taylor and Tyson are riding right in from of me.

Jesse rode Mackee (Sleepy River McGee) and Joseph, up ahead on the trail, rode Stormy.

It was quite remarkable that Joseph rode Stormy.  He has been riding him at home, maybe 4-5 times, so to take him up in the mountains on a trail was an experiment, to be sure.  Joseph said he wanted to be at the front of the line, always pushing his way to the front, but then when he got there, he didn't know what to do, so he'd just stop!  Ha ha.  That's a "teenage" horse for you.

Jesse, Libby and Peter looking southwest from the peak.

Joseph, Taylor and Mary from the Lookout.

Mary rode Cookie.  I didn't get a picture of her riding, which is too bad.  She found some cowboy boots at the local clothing exchange in August, and if she'd had a straw hat on, she would have looked like a true cow-girl.  Now Joseph, he had chaps and everything.  All he was missing was a big ol' belt buckle.

Bruce on Strawberry

I rode Lady.  Peter gave up his favorite horse so I could ride her, because I have not been on a horse for three years, since I got bucked off of May and got bruised up pretty badly.  I knew it was time to get back on, and I had a great ride on Lady.

We went 11 miles round trip, which made for one sore Momma the next day!  Oh boy!  I was grateful for OrthoSport and an epsom salt bath with Aroma Siez, both of which really helped with the sore muscles.

Overall, we had a great ride.  It was a dream come true for Bruce to have the family up in the mountains on horses.  We got Strawberry and Lady back in 2008, and we've been slowly building up since then to have enough equipment and horses to go around.  We still had to borrow a horse and two saddles from our friend Scott, but we're almost there.

On Wednesday, we went to the Funeral of Ruth Fisher, a dear ward member (our church congregation is called a ward).  I had been blessed enough to go and visit her the day before with Julie, with whom I serve in the Relief Society Presidency.  (Relief Society is the women's organization in our church).  She spent the whole half an hour we were there trying to name each one of the members of her family.  It was a privilege to know her and feel of her sweet spirit.  Her funeral was beautiful.

Peter received his Second Class and First Class Rank Advancements in the Boy Scouts this week!  He had a great Scout leader, Bill W., picture right at the right of this picture, and has moved on to 12-year old Scouts with Clark L. (the back of his head is on the left).  What a blessing to have great Scout leaders! If you look closely in the picture, you'll see Peter has on his cowboy boots with spurs!  He and Joseph rode Stormy and Lady to the neighborhood in back of ours, where the Court of Honor was held.  Peter is really proud of his spurs!

On Thursday, Joseph and I left with Grandma and Grandpa Whetten in their car to take Joseph over to BYU Idaho!  Joseph drove the whole way, and we had a great talk with Grandma.  She told us about being in 6th grade and lining up to go to Dublan with the 7th and 8th graders.  We said, "Now we know where Mary gets it from!"

Joseph wasn't nervous until he walked into the office to check in at his apartment.  When he was putting food away in his apartment and new roomates were milling about, he said, "Does anyone else feel nervous besides me?"  I think I was the only one that heard him, so no one replied, but I'm pretty sure he wasn't the only one.

That afternoon we got to eat dinner with Craig and Jenette!  Yeah!  We loved being with them.  I got to have a "sleepover" that night with them, as they gave up their bed to Mom and Dad, and they slept on the couches, while I slept on the living room floor on an air mattress.  We talked until I fell asleep listening to Craig tell Jenette about the adventures of the time they came to Poulsbo to help us move in the middle of the storm that lashed the Pacific Northwest. 

Dane (in the blue) and Joseph (in the white) playing soccer

That night, as I was driving Joseph and his friend Dane around, we saw a pick-up soccer game going on, on the same field that Josh had played his championship intramural game two years ago.  They begged me to go back, and so I turned the car around and they went and stood on the sidelines for a few minutes watching.  Pretty soon, they were back in the car saying, "We gotta go get our stuff!"  Most of Joseph's "stuff" was coming the next day with our neighbors, but Dane had enough soccer stuff for both of them!  So I took them to change at Dane's apartment, and they went back and joined the pick-up game for about 1/2 an hour.  In the few minutes that I stood on the sideline watching (because it was cold and I was in shirt-sleeves), I saw Joseph score two goals!  That was fun!  The next morning, Joseph said, "Mom, that just made it feel comfortable."

I am so excited for this next chapter of Joseph's life!  He is well-prepared and will have the time of his life over at BYU-I.  Back at home, when we had dinner on Saturday evening, we had two empty chairs on the one side of the table.  Jesse said, "I'm feeling kind of lonely over here."  Mary and Peter got it in their heads to take out a leaf of the table, and Bruce flatly refused to help them.  But then when they started pulling up, instead of out, he blurted out, "You gotta pull out!"  Ha ha  So pretty soon he was helping and jockeying the table around to get it loose.  When we finally got it back together, we sat around the smaller table looking at each other, and it felt very strange!  Pretty soon we had watery eyes, and said, "This isn't very fun!"  :)  We still have some adjustments to make to having Joseph gone on top of Josh being gone...   Jesse said that people have been asking her, "Are you OK?" since Joseph is gone.  Her answer was that she is going into a deep depression.  Those two were as tight as a brother and sister could be.  In fact, once when someone had just moved in, they thought Joseph and Jesse were dating because she saw them together so often.  :)  Jesse said she went up on the roof at sunrise yesterday morning and talked to Joseph in spirit.  I'm smiling while I'm writing this, but there are pretty deep feelings involved.  But Jesse will be OK, and so will Joseph.  At least they can still text and call, well, for a few more months, anyway, until Joseph leaves for his mission.  But let's not get ahead of ourselves - he's still in college!

I've talked to Joseph at least a dozen times in the three days since I dropped him off, so we're still communicating!  Ha ha

Peter running across the field for High 5's after the game.

Midfielder Peter in his pink socks and yellow shoes.  Nice!

Peter had his first soccer game on Saturday.  Bruce is his coach, and they won handily.  Peter played great in the midfield.  He was smaller than most of the players on the field, but not intimidated in the least.  Maybe when you work with horses all the time, size is not an issue. 

One of Joseph's calls was to tell us to get on the Internet and watch Elder Jeffrey R. Holland's CES Devotional, which we did.  WOW! I loved every word of what he said.  I am so grateful that we have prophets on the earth today, that speak the mind and will of the Lord.  I loved how he talked about the very real challenge that we have in our day of standing up for what we believe, and doing it in a kind, respectful, charitable way.  I have been thinking a lot about this, and talking to my children and others about it, so to have Elder Holland speak about it was assuring to me that the Spirit has been leading me in the right direction!