Long December

Last year we spent a cold, long December in Florida. Without my sweet Pie and Sovereign to keep me warm and with no oil paints in sight, I did what every horse-lonely painter would do - I picked up my laptop and snuggled up on the sofa with my new best friend, Photoshop. Honeysuckle Faire Custom Posters was born! Over the next twelve months, I had the amazing opportunity to design custom horse (and sometimes dog and people) posters for old friends, new friends, and family. I thought I would share some now. Above, is a surprise poster celebrating the amazing Cody, from Bay State Brumby to the talented and always helpful, Bill!


Above and below, Lilly and Laz, of Bay State Brumby and Sweet Horse's Breath, my patient and kind and unbelievably helpful first guinea pigs in this fun poster journey.








Sweet Kacy over at allhorsestuff held a fun contest and gave one of my posters as a prize. Even Song at Mountain Music Even Song Paints on the trail won the contest and then she worked with me to give a surprise poster to one of her boarders. The surprise posters are really fun to do. Even Song shared the story of Royal Tardez on a recent post.

These two posters were designed for my blogging friend, Kate, at A Year With Horses. Kate's dear, sweet Noble with the lovely ears was a kind, perfect horse for 30 years. I cried while designing these. Noble was a special boy - I really felt his loss here after reading about him on Kate's blog for a few years.

Cocolish!

My step-daughter, Sage, and boyfriend, Aaron, started graduate school at Shepherdstown this past summer. I thought an Arts and Crafts/concert-like poster was the very thing!

More of sweet Kacy's kind gifts to others!

Above is a fun sweet sixteen poster for Madrid, an aspiring Broadway actress.

And, of course, the gorgeous boys.

Thank you everyone for all your kind comments and support with these posters!!!!

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This year has given us more record cold temperatures here in sunny Florida. Again, without my sweet Thoroughbreds! Oh no - what is a horse riding painter woman to do? Stay tuned...

Hurry down the chimney tonight

Happy Christmas, Everyone!

You got to make the morning last

Today was rainy and cold, just like last Sunday. I went to ride Mac, the Appaloosa gelding. He was very good for me on Wednesday. We successfully circled the lake twice on that day after early stubborn turn-arounds. Today, I am sad to report that we didn't make as much progress. I have only ridden him in the bitless. He tries to pull many stunts in the ring. I think he is used to frightening his lesson charges in the corners by side-stepping and pretend "shying". I got him to work through that by leaning over and dropping the reins while patting his neck. That sounds weird, but he has these buggy eyes and I don't think he can see too well. I like to lean over so he knows that I am there with him if he actually is scared. He stopped the silly side-steps and walked through the scary corners perfectly. Then, I sat back and pushed him through the corners seated properly. He was very good and obviously smart enough to get this exercise. I know he is attached to his ring from all the lessons there, so I wanted to take him outside to see if we could bond a little like we did on Wednesday. Sadly, just getting him through the gate to the lake trail was a feat this morning. I had a sinking feeling that I wasn't going to be as successful as I had been before, so I kept trying to ask for little things he could do well. Unfortunately, he kept making each goal smaller with each try. I walked him down the first straightaway on a loose rein. He got to the end and then wheeled around and attempted to head back toward the gate at a fast walk/jig. We did this a number of times in both directions away from the lake gate. For the first few minutes he would increase the distance, but after he figured it out, he started to decrease it before his quick return attempts. There is a steep hill leading down to the lake and I used the hill to work him in serpentines. He seemed interested at first, then, he was done with that and started rushing the hill, diving for grass - just being ill-behaved. The barn owner's daughter (age 8?) was out walking around in the lake area so I enlisted her help to be a "lead pony" for me. I encouraged her to make small talk (we couldn't really hear her because she got so involved in her conversation that she was walking way up ahead of us!). I gave him the reins and he plodded along super well until we made it 3/4 of the way around the trail. Then, stubbornly he wheeled around again in a nervous frenzy. I decided to make our return in a calm manner more important than finishing the full trail in the direction that he obviously didn't want to go. By asking for small circles, serpentines, and figure eights we did finally return on a soft (fake - looked soft, but really wasn't), long rein, but I was frustrated because it was clear that he wasn't happy throughout the whole process. That irks me a little, because it seemed like Mac enjoyed the ride around the lake on Wednesday. It was a damp, depressing day in Florida punctuated by a frustrating ride. I heard Feelin' Groovy on the way home from the barn and made a mental note that I felt many things, but not groovy.