Looking for Wild Horses

      
         I had to get out of the house the other day. The husband took the daughter too the museum so I had some free time! Yay!! I had heard there were mustangs in the area and I always wanted to go find them.

 

I took this road for what seemed like forever. I know I was on it at least 20 miles!

After about 10 miles I passed some ruins. It was an old abandoned mining town that was built in 1906

Some house ruins

After I passed the windmill I spotted a mustang on the hillside

See him??

Then I spotted some more! They spotted me too!

They stood there and stared at me for a long time trying to decide if they were going to run away or not

Then they seemed to get a little more comfortable

Its a pregnant mare and stallion

He got tired me watching them so he herded her away

 

The road got more interesting from there. There were some big rock cliffs on the side of the road.

I found some petroglyphs! 

 Here is another one but I am sure someone from the old mining town carved it. The date they carved in it was 1916. I like the woman's head with the bun in her hair.

There was another herd of mustangs but they were farther away. It appeared to be an older stallion with some mares and yearlings. One of the yearlings was having a good time scratching her back on a low branch of this juniper.

This little filly was cute!

What a beautiful mustang!

I could have stayed all day watching the mustangs but it was getting dinner time and I had to head home. Even the scenery I saw as I was driving out of there was beautiful.

 Goodbye mustangs. I will definitely be back!

Adjusting

So its been hard adjusting to New Mexico even though we had lived here before. Its familiar, and I have friends here, the brownness  is depressing and I miss having a "home". I'm the kind of girl that likes to put down roots and stay somewhere for a very long time. I have had trouble finding things to blog about. I think once we find a house (we are currently renting) life can resume and all will be well. Recently I have gone out with my camera. The beauty here is different than in Ohio and its been hard for me to see it. Here are a few pictures I have taken within the last few months.

We had freezing fog one morning. The frosted everything was beautiful!

I love the fields of grass here. When the sun hits them they are golden.

Leaving the farm

     Has it really been since December that I have written a post?! I guess time got away from me again. I had started working full time at the end of December. I got a job cleaning at a high school in the evenings. Then in June we moved back to NM. I really miss our farm.  I sold our calves, and our crazy duck went to live with Aunt Cheryl. Its been quite an adjustment, even though we had lived here in NM for 10 years before we moved back to Ohio. There is no place like home. I will miss the geese that would fly over the house in the mornings and honk, the fog that settled in the hills across the road, and the lushness. I just thought I would post some of my favorite photos I took while we lived on the farm. I was glad I got to live there, even if it was only for a few years. I will always remember it.

our dog tried to swim across the pond and catch this goose, it was so funny

I loved the mums that were for sale at the farmers markets in the fall

my daughter feeling moss

The Odd Duck

We have owned many animals. Seems like we have had it all, horses, cows, goats, rabbits, chickens, ducks, geese, turkeys. They have provided us many crazy stories. Each one has had its own personality. We used to have 4 muscovy ducks that would line up facing you when they saw you with the water hose because they liked their chests sprayed with the hose.
 We now have one female duck. She is the only one left out of some that we had bought as ducklings in march. The rest of them got picked off by some kind of predator. This is the strangest duck I have ever seen. The duck will have nothing to do with our pond, she will not swim in it. She will not swim in a kiddie pool either. She will not get her feet wet!  The duck quacks constantly and occasionally flys away quacking at something obviously invisible. Maybe she has PTSD from seeing her friends get eaten?  Who knows. All I know is that she is one ODD duck.

This was taken before her friends got picked off.

Now she just hangs out in the barn standing next to the rabbits all day or hanging out with the calves.

Reminessing

Its a cloudy and rainy Sunday. The daughter is taking a nap and the house is quiet and dark. I got to looking at old photos since I had the time. I came across a file of photos I took about 4 years ago, it was a vacation we took to southern Colorado before our daughter was born. We camped every weekend the summer and fall before she was born. This particular trip was to Vallecitos Lake in southern Colorado. Being from Ohio originally and then being transplanted in the desert made me miss certain things.....like water! New Mexico was beautiful in it own way but sometimes I missed seeing water so bad I couldn't stand it. The dust and dryness got to me after a while. Looking at these photos made me remember that, there were lots of closeups of the water lapping the shore and what not. I had to laugh at my own silliness.

Our camp

First thing I wanted to do was walk down to the lake and smell that water!!

I saw tracks in the sand of all kinds of animals that had been there earlier that morning

Seagull

I think this was a mountain lion

Racoon

Mule Deer

During lunch we heard a bunch of rustling in the brush by our camp. Scared us to death, we thought it was a bear or a more than one bear! Then we see this!

A large herd of free range herford cattle came walking through the camp. they made them selves at home hanging out at the camp right next to ours an starting licking the fire ring and grate. I hope they know what was cooked on top of that grate!

yummy!

They hung out for a little bit and then wandered off back into the woods

Another camp critter

 It was so beautiful there! I took alot of pictures that weekend. These are just some of my favorites.

At the end of the weekend I didn't want to pack up and go back home. We talked about going back but we never did. Maybe one day.