"Project Mini"

Fairah brings a whole new kinda fashion to the tractor world!

We made the decision a few weeks ago that having the minis close to us was more important than having all the luxurious amenities that comes with boarding your horse.  Indoor arena, having someone to always feed your horse in good weather and bad, heated barn bathrooms, someone that always cleans out your horse's stall, lots of round pens to work in, unlimited access to jumps and obstacles ect. heated wash rack and so on and so on...  

When we decided that we would start prepping the 2 1/2 acre lot for the minis we thought piece of cake! The ground appeared to be flat, there were only few small trees that needed to be removed, plenty of shade for themunder some pines, no poisonous plants or trees anywhere near the pasture to worry about, the weather was getting warmer, it was PERFECT!  Or so we thought...

The boys got out there early on a Saturday morning to start putting in the posts.  They are all very handy guys and this is far from the first time they have put up fencing.  After just drilling 3 post holes they started to lose control of their auger.  It was actually getting sucked further into the ground than they wanted and was near impossible with FOUR guys to get it back out.  Apparently there was not only ALOT of clay under the soil but natural springs flowing that they were hitting and drive the auger down. What they thought would take 2 days ended up taking 4.  

After digging 50 or 60 post hole, we thought the hardest part of the pasture prep was done... Well, not exactly!  We plowed down the long dead weeds and briars with the large tractor to discover what will be the BIGGEST part of the "project mini" so far.  The new pasture had been a wild jungle for many years that had never been kept up. The weeds in the summer time would easily be up to my head (I'm 5'2). It alwasy apeared to be somewhat flap.  Well... We were VERY wrong!  In fact the field was VERY uneven to make matters worse it was over grown with small trees, SNAKES! thorny wild raspberry and blueberry bushes, SNAKES! huge rocks,  prickly briars, did I mention SNAKES! and holes holes, holes. So guess what my job was besides being the official snake charmer :)

I had the liberty along with about 4 other family members of cutting down all the tiny trees that the tractor didn't pick up, removing HUGE rocks, snipping huge roots that stuck out of the ground, trimming up tree branches from the trees we are keeping, racking up all the mowed over tree branches and weeded grass the tractor didn't catch, and pulling those nasty briars out by the roots (they will soon be sprayed) to try to keep them from growing back.  My next big job is filling in all those wonderful holes! Good thing I love any type of outdoor work.... Expect having snakes popping up on me!!

On the bright side we had GREAT weather 80 degrees and sunny for our first official day of work.  It was the the first and warmest day we have had since probably last August.... Followed of course by 2 weeks of straight snow, hail storms, heavy cold rain, and lots lots of wind. 

GOTTA LOVE MICHIGAN!

Our weather has more mood swings than a toddler! My girls got to come out and help on the warmer days that we had and my oldest got her first official drving lesson on the tractor with her great grandmother and uncle at the age of 3!  She is already turning into such a little country farm girl and my youngest will be too once she doesn't mind getting her hands dirty but she is already obsessed with farm animals! 



Giselle was so proud of herself



We just finished week three of our new weekend mini project about to start number four tomorrow and like week three it looks like it will be another gloomy, wet, windy day.  We hope to have the boys moved over to their new pasture before the biginning of May.  We will put up a temperary shelter for them while and we work on the next project of contructing their very own barn which hopefully will include a heated wash rack for them.  I just know they are going to LOVE their new home! They may get a little more bored not having all the other horses around from the boarding stable but I think they will be perfectly fine with eachother's company. The barn and pasture will have everything a little horse could ask for.   There has already been talk of adding a filly after the boys get comfortable!!  Now we just need a name for our new little mini farm hmmmm..... Any ideas???

Someone thinks Giselle needs to be sharing that popsicle