Twenty-Fourteen: A Recap (part 2)

May-October: The Ranch

This next bit is probably going to be incredibly long…so please bear with me.

After staying with Kas for a night, she asked me if I could pick up an espresso machine on my way to the ranch. I agreed to this scheme. That morning I had also gotten wind that one of the girls I had worked with last year was flying in to Denver that morning, but she didn't have a ride. So I volunteered to pick her up. At the time that seemed like an innocent bit of good-will. It turned into a fiasco of driving to the wrong terminal, having to leave the airport and come all the way back around the get to the right terminal, trying to find her, finally managing to pick her up, and THEN going to get the espresso machine.

The good part was that we stopped for late breakfast/early lunch with Josiah, the videographer from last year. He had driven up from Texas about a week before. Once he heard that I was driving my own car, he looked out the window from Chick-fil-A and asked which one was mine. Cue the following exchange:

Me: See that dirty green car? Mine's the silver one right next to it.

J: Oh. *pause* See that dirty green car? That one's mine.

Apparently he had been caught in a dust storm on the way from Texas, and what with the snow and rain and mud on the ranch his car was looking a little worse for wear.

But anyway….moving on to the ranch! We arrived sometime in the early afternoon, and all the way up the mountain I could feel myself getting more and more excited to see the ranch. After all, the last time I had seen it, the place was half-buried under a mudslide. But I knew that people had been working on it all winter. Surely the place was looking better than it did.

When we finally pulled in the front gate…I almost felt like crying. The place looked better, it really did. But I knew that they needed to have the place open in a week, and all I could see was mud and heavy equipment and patches of melting snow. It looked like a construction zone. (The place was cleaned up in time for opening, but the very first impression was a little depressing.)

As a wrangler, the vast majority of the first week was spent on trail maintenance. One memorable moment of walking all over the mudslide, and then walking up a steep trail trying to keep up with Nick (the head wrangler) and nearly dying in the process sticks out very vividly in my memory. The rest of the time we were picking rocks from the new arena—that is, the new arena area, since the arena hadn't been built yet and we wranglers were going to build it over the summer—and getting horses from the lower pastures and helping the farriers and basically spending a great deal of time doing a lot of hard, manual labor. It was during this time that our wrangler group had to get to know each other and decide whether or not we would work well together.

Here are the wranglers, by the way!

L-R, back row: Andrew, Terry (honorary), Austin, Casey, Derek, EB, me, Larry (honorary)
L-R, front row: Claire (honorary), Gabrielle, Tori, Sara (women's work crew boss), Levi (ranch kid)

Can you tell that we have a hard time taking pictures of just wranglers? XD

The one face that I sorely missed was that of EB. 

EB and Copper

 

Me, Gabrielle, EB, Tori (otherwise known as 'EB and the triplets')

She's a few months younger than me, but for some reason it seems like she's much older and wiser (To be fair: though we're the same age, she's spent her years at a much higher RPM than me). I spent a lot of time in 2013 sitting quietly in her workshop and watching her work with leather and talking about people and life…so we became rather good friends. I still count her as a very dear, close friend. So when I heard that she wasn't coming back in 2014 I was pretty devastated. The first reaction, if I'm very honest, was 'if EB isn't there, then I don't want to go'. Thankfully I quickly came to my senses and decided that it would still be good if she wasn't there.

The summer wouldn't be complete without a description of the horses on my string, so here goes.

Chester-pony

Chase (part Bashkir Curly, a horse that has kinky/wavy hair)

Grace (aka Brunhilde, as I affectionately called her)

There was a bay gelding without a name, but I called him 'Patchy' due to some hairless spots on his face and neck. He started off as a major thorn in my side, but by the end of the summer I was starting to like him. Unfortunately I don't have any pictures of him. :/

There's so much that I can say about the summer…to keep everything from dragging out too terribly long I'll try to condense it into the general impression left on me.

I started off feeling very optimistic: I was doing something I loved (that is, working with horses), with people that I liked, and was having a great time doing it. I really fell in love with the horses on my string, which probably wasn't the greatest idea but there you have it. I also came to know the horses in the guest string so well that I could tell who was who at just a glance; I knew their temperaments and little quirks and what set them off and what calmed them down. I was learning an immense amount about riding and training and absolutely reveled in it.

I had also become friends with everyone in our wrangler group—some better than others, of course—and had struck up what seemed to be a great friendship with one of the guys. And that, so I thought, would be that.

About a month into all this, I realized that I was developing slightly more than friendly feelings towards this guy. And I hated it, because (a) there's a 'no-purple' rule (i.e., no dating) and (b) I really wasn't sure if this guy was a good person to feel that way towards. So I tried not to worry too much about it.

A couple of weeks later—well, a long story short, we had something of a falling out. I recovered from the incident and thought it was all okay. But one thing led to another and my interactions with this guy for the rest of the summer turned into one misunderstanding after another. I let it affect how I felt, and spent several weeks feeling like a dark cloud was hanging over me. I tried not to let it affect how I interacted with guests, but I started withdrawing more and more from staff: when work was done I would retreat to make phone calls or write in my journal or draw, and end up not going to supper or to the extra-curricular events most nights.

In short, I allowed the summer to become rather isolated and hellish. There's no other way to put it. I found out slowly that it wasn't just me feeling that way—some of the other girls, who I had withdrawn from partly because we weren't around each other much and partly because I didn't try to see them in my time off, said that the tendency to isolate was same for a lot of people. By the middle to the latter half of the summer, most of the people who were staying all the way through were feeling burnt out and beaten down, like they couldn't wait to go home. This was a huge change from last year, where I felt like I didn't want to leave.

There was a lot of good stuff that happened, a lot of funny things, a lot of sad things, and a lot of bad stuff. Last summer was simultaneously the best, most difficult, most stretching, most strengthening time of my life. I made some great friends, and turned down some potentially great friendships. I made a lot of mistakes, and learned a lot about how people work. I learned a LOT about horses and discovered how badly I miss them when I can't be around them for twelve hours a day. All these lessons were dearly bought.

But at the end of the summer, it was easy to leave. I don't say that like it's a good thing—but I was so ready to move on and have my own space again and to not be living out of the contents of a suitcase.

Oh yes, and before I forget: in September, I cut all of my hair off.

I had been thinking about it for a long time, so it wasn't exactly a spur-of-the-moment thing. I used to say that I would never cut all my hair off, and then I started thinking about it, and mused, and made a secret Pinterest board, and thought some more, for well over a year. In retrospect, considering how the summer had gone, there was something a little symbolic about getting rid of the hair. It was almost as if I was tossing away all of the issues and stupidity of the year with it.

I've ended up LOVING it. Ease of management aside, I think it makes me look older. It seemed that the majority of the time people assumed that I was 18 or 19, and when one is almost 23 that's a little depressing. Now people ask if I'm still in college, so I guess that's an improvement. 

Tada.....

For most of the summer, I had been working out negotiations with my aunt for deciding whether or not I would be moving to northern Arkansas to work with her. That brings us to the month of October…

(stay tuned for part 3!)

Twenty-Fourteen: A Recap (part 1)

The last time I updated this blog, it was April. In the 8 months that have passed since then, it's something of an understatement to say that a lot has happened.

Nevertheless…a LOT has happened.

With that in mind, I'm going to break this down into somewhat chronological order. There will be some criss-crossing back and forth across timelines, but it shouldn't get too confusing.

April-May: ranch preparation

I had applied to work at Wind River Ranch again for the entire summer as a wrangler. Since getting the job, and deciding that I would drive there myself instead of flying/taking a train, I spent most of the time beforehand working and getting my car ready for such a journey. At this point I was still working at the gym 6 afternoons a week and cleaning houses in the AM. (I finished up a 6-month weight-lifting regimen and a Couch-to-5K program around the end of April as well—something I really miss is true weightlifting. But oh well.)

On May 3^rd, my little brother got married. It was a very, very small occasion—originally only the parents were invited, but I managed to finagle my way in under the pretense that they needed a photographer. (The finagling was only just.)

Look at the happy couple!

After the wedding—the day of, if one wants to be particular about it—I drove to my aunt and uncle's house in northern Arkansas. The plan was to stay at her house for about a week, then drive down to Texas to see some friends that I hadn't seen for 4 years, and then drive from Texas to Colorado. I had been on road trips before, but never by myself. I remember being pretty excited at the prospect—unfortunately it seems to have awoken a strange desire to see the United States in its entirety by car. We'll see what happens with that.

While in Arkansas, my aunt and I went to Crystal Bridges (this fantastic museum comprising just of American art), the Bluebird Factory, I shadowed her to work a couple of days…the week ended up stretching to almost 10 days just because we were having so much fun. During this time I was offered a job (jokingly, I thought) by my aunt's boss. It turns out he wasn't joking…but I didn't realize this until some time later.

Then I drove to northern Texas to see Christa and Ashlee!

I've known these two for quite a long time—back in 2010 we had 'The Great Illinois-Texas Transfer' where they flew up to stay with me for a week, and then I flew to Texas to stay with them for the following week. I was only able to stay for a couple of days this time, but it was wonderful. 

Also, here's a picture of me on a longhorn bull. (Or maybe it was a steer.)

I got up very early on a Tuesday (or maybe a Wednesday? The days blurred together) and made the 15-hour drive from Christa and Ashlee's to a town outside of Denver, Colorado. My Google maps sent me up through Amarillo, across the panhandle of Oklahoma, and through the southern deserty-bits of Colorado. It was one of those things that, at the time, seemed terribly exciting (except for the bits across the desert—that got a little boring) but in retrospect was kind of crazy.

I think that doing something like that on my own, with no one else to rely on in the moment (sure, I could call people if I needed something, but I was the one who had to do the actual driving and keep myself awake through the long hours of flat desert) had an interesting effect on me. It increased my confidence in myself as a navigator (much of the trip I had to use a map because my phone didn't have service) and made me realize that I could actually do these things by myself. I mean, I knew in my mind that I could do it. But until I had actually done it, there was nothing to confirm that mental knowledge.

So it was, one very long day later, that I ended up at Kas' house outside of Denver. From her house to the ranch is about 1 ½ hours, and having a place to recoup before going to said ranch was indescribable. I also knew that she wouldn't be going back that summer except for visits, and it was really nice to be able to catch up before plunging into the ranch activity.

(Part 2 will be loaded with pictures, fret not!)

Blood Moon

I heard about the blood moon lunar eclipse the night that it was going to happen, and instead of sleeping through such an interesting occasion I set my alarm for 2 AM and lurked around the house for an hour while the eclipse crept over the moon.

Because I needed to take a long exposure (about 1.5 seconds), I found my tripod and set it up outside the back door so I could go out, snap the picture, and then retreat inside for the next 15 minutes (because it was COLD out, all right? My fingers were freezing!). The result is some pretty darned cool pictures, if I may say so myself.

This was a little after 2 AM. The eclipse was almost complete at that point, and where there had been moonlight everywhere a few hours before it was getting to be very dark. (Stating the obvious, perhaps, but when you're the only one up, and the moon is doing weird things, it still feels a bit creepy. XD)

 

This was about 2:30-ish...getting brighter!

 

And here we have it in all its coppery glory at around 2:45 AM. The little blue dot, according to my reading up in between outdoor ventures, is Mars. I think it's kinda cute how he's trying to get in on the action.

*just realized that I'm anthropomorphizing planets* 

Anyway.

So I read that the reason that the moon turns red is because of the sun's light behind the earth reflecting off of the atmospheric particles and onto the moon; the color wavelengths that don't get diffused are red, and there you have it! (Tumblr was very handy in providing this information last night.) 

Enjoy the pictures!

Also, friendly reminder that in 2 weeks and 2 days I'm leaving for Colorado. AAAAHHHHHH. 8D

Thorin Oakenshield

After I drew the picture of Claire weeks ago, I had promised myself that I could finally start the picture of Thorin Oakenshield. I had it printed off and waiting in my sketchbook for the perfect time to start drawing...

...but that time kinda never came. So last Thursday I said to myself, "Self, you need to draw more!"

My self replied, "Then let's draw!"

To make a long story short, that was the beginning of the Thorin drawing. (I bet I could have saved you a lot of time by just showing you the picture. Meh.)

Please excuse the crappy cell-phone-camera quality of this picture:

Thus it began. :D

And tonight I finally finished it!

After staring at it for hours there are parts that really annoy me. (Like one eye turning out bigger than the other one. *twitches*) I AM very happy with the hair, the metal handle thing, and his armor, though, so I guess those make up for the perceived 'iffy' bits.

I also think that this is the darkest drawing I've ever done. The page was curling like crazy towards the end what with all the pencil lead and pressure...hopefully some time pressed down in the book will be good for it.

Maple Syrup

 Finally, after an experimental batch, we have maple syrup! 

Well...first we had maple sugar. This was because the first batch was put on too high of a temperature all night long, and it crystallized before we could bring it into the house to finish it off. I had read about how to finish the syrup, and completely forgot about that part in my excitement to get a result.

Thankfully the trees have been flowing a LOT, and I was able to get a second batch up and running within the same day.

To finish the syrup, we strained the sap (which had turned an amber color and while thick wasn't quite at that gooey stage yet), poured it into a pot, strapped a candy thermometer to the side, and let it come to a boil.

It actually started boiling at around 208 F, and hovered there for about half an hour. In that time the color darkened slightly and, when allowed to dribble off a spoon, the free dribble turned into a sticky drip.

Once the temperature started rising above 210, no matter how low I turned the stove, I immediately poured the stuff into a jar to let it cool.

And boom. Maple syrup. Easy peasy.

I don't think it will ever darken, but the consistency and flavor are AMAZING so I don't care. I also may or may not have put some on my bacon later....<.< >.>

Now it's time for 'Crazy Things People Say When They Find Out You're Making Maple Syrup'!

The #1 question I've gotten so far when talking about the evaporation process is: "You don't have to add anything to it?"

Answer: No. The sap is mostly water, with a small percentage of sugar. Boiling (or cooking) the sap evaporates most of the water and leaves the sugar behind. The smaller the ratio of water to sugar, the thicker the result (hence the term 'syrup').

Oh, and here is a conversation I had with a guy at the gym (we'll call him D).

D (after hearing that I had collected 4 gallons of sap in one day): Wow, I bet you're going to make a killing with that.
Me: Well...no, not really. *proceeds to explain the evaporation process and sap to syrup ratio*
D: Heck, if it's that much work I'd just go to the store and buy some corn syrup.
Me: *outwardly* But that's not the point!
*internally* DO YOU KNOW HOW TERRIBLE CORN SYRUP IS?! AND HAVE YOU NO APPRECIATION FOR DOING THINGS YOURSELF??

Sigh. I think that doing anything 'the old-fashioned way', just for the sake of doing it and enjoying the process (and the results), are lost on a lot of people that I interact with on a daily basis.

Tapping Maple Trees, Part 2

(I haven't been this excited about a project in ages!)

After the initial 1 1/2 liters of sap, the flow slowed down considerably and we got 3 quarts over 3 days. Considering that our neighbors were getting 2 1/2 gallons a day from one tree, this was a little disappointing. 

But then! Two days ago there was a crazy cold snap where it blew, rained, snowed, and went all March on us. The cold temps resulted in barely a dribble of sap, and what did dribble froze at the bottom of the bottles.

Today I noticed that a couple bottles were about half-full of slush, so I went out and collected the lot before going to work. But when I came home from work, almost all of the bottles were half or completely full! Observe:

This is off the tree on the patio--it has 3 taps and is the largest maple in the yard.

 

This picture and the one below are of two taps on the same tree, and this bottle was OVERFLOWING. I was so happy. :D

There's a bit of a story being this tree too: it's a medium-sized maple, with a big scar going from the base of the tree to about 4 feet up the trunk. I had expressed concern that it wouldn't produce very much, so initially we only put one tap in. Then we noticed that it was producing quite a bit, and put another tap in. And so far it's been producing the most out of all the trees....go figure.

 

That makes something around 5 gallons total--I'm so excited I can hardly stand it! *flails*

The idea of using a roasting pan to boil the sap off was suggested from the lady at church, so we poured 4 gallons into a roasting pan, turned that sucker on, and are letting it go all night in the garage.

(This'll save me from poking at a fire for hours and ruining Mom's chafing pans...heh.)

Now...we wait. And I'll try to get pictures of the in-between stages too--right now the stuff is just steaming on the workbench and it's too dark out there to take pictures. 

In other news, Mom and Dad brought pizza home and I, being absolutely famished after coming home from work, kind of ate 5 pieces. Now I feel awful. BUT IT WAS SO GOOD.

Ahem. Anyway. I'll keep taking pictures and posting as events warrant. Good night!

Tapping Maple Trees

It's been a while since I've posted a project...and seeing as how spring is coming (or it's SUPPOSED to be coming, at least) the latest project involves a brave attempt to make maple syrup.

Needless to say, I've never tried to make maple syrup. But a couple of weeks ago I mentioned to Mom, "Hey, what if we tapped our trees for maple syrup?" She kinda shot the idea down, and I forgot about it for a bit. Then, a lady from church posted a picture of HER maple trees that she had tapped and how much sap they were getting.

So guess who decided to jump in with both feet? :P I read articles for a few hours, perused a book we have in the Forgotten Arts series on the subject, and thusly armed went to the store. We didn't have any spiles (taps), so I had to make do with copper tubing and flexible rubber hose. Then I sent an all-points-bulletin out to Facebook asking people for their empty soda bottles. The result of this rather cobbled-sounding combination of tools can be seen below:

Yes, that is baling twine. Don't laugh.

It didn't end up TOO ghetto, I don't think. Dad drilled the holes and put the spiles in, and I was in charge of tying twine, cutting tubing, etc. We did discover that putting tape around the middle of the copper tubes would prevent sap from leaking around it--initially we were losing about half the sap we would have collected just from leakage.

Today we tapped 4 trees, and tonight while I was collecting the sap I noticed that two trees weren't producing anything. So we ran outside (this was at sunset) and quickly tapped a larger tree in the front yard and added another spile to the tree that was producing the most. Even with only 2 trees producing we got 1 1/2 liters of sap:

The depressing part is that it takes 10 gallons of sap to make 1 quart (yes, I said QUART) of syrup. And it all has to be boiled down outside unless you want the inside of your house to feel like syrup sneezed all over everything. But in the meantime I'm excited to give it a shot, and we'll see how much sap we can collect!

I've also read that sap can be used for brewing tea, coffee, or beer. While beer isn't up my alley, kefir water most definitely is, and I think it would be an awesome taste sensation. So here's to experimentation!

Five-Minute Friday: Choose

From Lisa-Jo Baker, the Gypsy Mama: "On Fridays around these parts we like to write. Not for comments or traffic or anyone else's agenda. But for fun, for practice, for joy at the sound of syllables, sentences and paragraphs all strung together by the voice of the speaker. We love to just write without worrying if it's just right or not. For five minutes flat."

GO

Choose. It's a word that's been haunting me for weeks and months now. I have so many directions that I could potentially go with my life in the next few months: go to Honduras, move out, get a real job that actually pays something, buy a horse (just kidding on the last one...maybe)--the possibilities are, while not endless, numerous. 

And paralyzing.

For fear of not 'choosing the right thing' I've been sitting back, waiting, working 6 hours a day 6 days a week, occasionally making things to occupy my restless hands, avoiding making any solid decisions because I'm afraid that by choosing one item out of many that would cancel out the remaining options. That it would cement my course and make it impossible to re-orient myself should I decide to do something else.

Other people have told me 'you don't have to worry about being stuck'. Or that I can 'always change my mind'. But how is one to learn fidelity if one is always changing their mind?

STOP

(Wow. I kinda stink at this sort of thing. XD)

I'm Making a Comeback....

...with Etsy!

I've had an Etsy shop since 2010, and sold a few things here and there. It was never enough to really make a lot of money, but it kept some of my hobbies afloat and was a fun way to dabble in feeling like I had my own business. Sometime in 2012, though, I lost momentum and allowed my shop to lie empty.

Fast-forward to last year, and I discovered an interest in bookbinding. My first project was kinda mediocre (I mean, it was pretty, and I still use it, but I had no idea what the heck I was doing):

And last summer I made a couple of journals for girls at the ranch. These were softcover, leather, filled with cardstock (something of an annoyance, in retrospect, but nice paper can't be found everywhere), and awoke a desire to actually make something NICE.

So since coming home from the ranch I've made 10 journals and 8 scrappy scarves--which may not sound like much, but they're both somewhat time-consuming projects tucked around working in the day--and am going to start putting them slowly on Etsy. 

I'm kind of excited to be re-opening Etsy, but I'm also depending a lot on Facebook, word of mouth, and the ranch this summer for selling. But if you want to go see my shop, please do!  The shop is a little sparse at the time of this post, but I'll have more stuff up over the weekend and upcoming week.

I also have a page on Facebook where I post upcoming projects, made-to-order projects, and other little personal tid-bits one won't encounter on Etsy. I actually prefer my Facebook page because I can get a little more personal.

One of the reasons I hadn't posted to my Etsy for such a long time was because of my online stalker--he knew of my Etsy, and I knew that he was probably watching it. Obviously that was weirding me out and unacceptable. But I've gotten to the point now where I'm not going to let the possibility of a creeper situation arising freak me out, because I know that if he REALLY wants to find me, he can. 

Last summer was an especially scary example, where he actually called the office at the ranch and asked for me. In the ensuing brouhaha I was issued a radio, told not to go anywhere by myself EVER, and given contact people for dealing out beatdowns should the guy try to come to the ranch. It was terrifying and epic at the same time.

But back to Etsy: I'm not particularly concerned about him seeing my items. And before anyone gets worried: yes, I take precautions and don't post personal stuff where un-okay people can see them. That's been my policy for years, and it's not going to change. If he decides to creep on a public shop, that's his problem. All I can do is maintain a professional shop and try to make some money.

But back to the page/shop...go check 'em out! I love visitors!

May 2014

Guess where I'm going to be in May? 

*happy sigh* I can't wait to go back. I'm just saying.

I've gotten on as a wrangler this year, and I'm super excited: mostly because it means that I'll be at the barn ALL THE TIME and I won't have to leave to clean cabins. AAAAHHHH.

 It also means that I'll get to wear spurs. I have only worn spurs like....twice. And both times were this year while riding the blind mare. But this week I invested in a pair of spurs (they were supposed to arrive today, and I suspect that they're still in the mailbox because we forgot to get the mail. *facepalm*) and as soon as they get here I'm going to find excuses to wear them EVERYWHERE. I might even find places to ride with them! 

But anyway...May is proving to be a packed month because I'm going to drive out to Colorado, but before that I'm taking pictures for my brother's wedding, visiting my aunt in Arkansas, visiting friends in Texas, and driving all over the West before actually ending up in Colorado. So that ought to be interesting. And I also signed up for a Color Vibe 5K in Fort Collins at the end of May, which should also be interesting because I've never ran in a race before.

No...wait....I have, actually. There's a race here in town called the Strawberry Strut that occurs every June. There's a 1-mile and a 5-mile race, and when I was 8 or so my older brother and I decided to run the 1-mile. BIG MISTAKE. I don't remember much, except towards the end I was panting so hard that I was making a weird, coughing, 'HUUUHH' sound in my chest. I can only replicate the noise if I breathe REALLY hard, and when I do people scream at me to stop because it sounds so awful. 

But anyway. The 5K should be better because I've actually been running a bit (started last year and have been running almost every day at the gym--today I walked/ran 1.5 miles! Exciting times!) and have a Couch-to-5K plan that I'm kinda working on (in between sprint sessions). If nothing else, I hope that spending a couple of weeks at 9200 feet and then plunging down to 5000 feet will give me a false sense of endurance. XD

And after that....I have no idea what's going to happen. I've been tossing around ideas for moving to Colorado, trying to get an actual business off the ground, possibly going on a mission trip out of the country (which is WAY up in the air right now)...to put it succinctly, life is exciting and I have no idea what I'm doing. That's what makes it an adventure, right?