Life Drawings At the Barn and Other Fun Adventures

"Girls Play Too" polo oil painting in progress

TIme really got away from me this summer, and now two months have passed since my last blog post. I can’t say that I have a lot to show for those two months; one would think I’d been busy accomplishing many things but sad to say, I didn’t. One thing I did manage was a couple of sessions adding early color to the polo painting above. It’s still sitting on the easel waiting for my return and admonishing me to get to it. Maybe I will some day soon. 

pencil sketches of horses in pasture

However, this past summer pretty much turned into a repeat of the previous summer on the horse front, but I did manage to  spend some time sketching the horses in the pasture and arena a couple of times. It’s pretty obvious that I haven’t quite caught on yet to drawing grazing horses which are constantly in motion. Life Drawing didn’t prepare me for 5-10 second “poses” as the horses moved from one grass clump to another. I did several sketches of the horses and then gave up and sketched the pastures instead. Perhaps the trick is to use the horses only for partial reference and fill in the rest from memory. It’s worth a try next time. 

pen and ink sketch of horse dozing in the arena

My horse, Scottie, was laid up most of the summer with one hoof abscess after another until we finally decided to treat him for Cushings disease. It suppresses the immune system which would explain his persistent jaw abscess last summer and the multiple hoof abscesses over the past year. We began his medication in July and also put shoes on him which has so far resulted in no new abscesses! (knock on wood, of course)

He was dealing with the last hoof abscess when his nose started draining a nasty, thick greenish glop. Three courses of antibiotic and three months later, it seems to be subsiding. Now we are treating him for a very bad case of Scratches or greasy heel as it’s also known. That, too, is now responding to daily treatment, and I’m hoping that soon I won’t have to trek to the barn every day and will be able to resume some regular riding. We missed a whole summer of trail rides which I think we both missed. 

I was all signed up to take a painting workshop from Colleen Howe in September, but she had to cancel it, and I’m quite disappointed about that. I hope they ask her back next summer because I’ll sign up again if she comes. 

Like most of the country, we had a very dry summer this year with almost no rain. That meant lots of watering, and for the most part, my plants came through the drought in pretty good shape. Maybe I’ll show you some flower pictures next time. 

That’s about all for this post. It’s time to head to the barn again to sit on the dirty aisle floor, pick scabs off my horse’s ankles and slather on the salve that is healing the fungus infection. Ah, the joys of horse ownership!