Another great Saturday

I finally took my granddaughter horseback riding this past Saturday. We’d been waiting for a suitably warm and dry day to go with her, as that’s what she’d wanted for her birthday outing.

Her birthday was last fall, but I was out in South Africa so couldn’t take her anywhere then.

We had a grand day! She made fast friends with the fattest barn cat I have ever seen and spent the time we were waiting to saddle up being slave to this feline’s bottomless desire for endless head scratches and tummy rubs.

Out on the trail, her horse took the lead and mine hung back, so we didn’t get to do much talking on the trail. I really wanted to show her the woodland and field wildflowers that were there. I saw wild strawberry blossoms, blooming crabapple trees, the end of the dogtoothed violets, masses of trilliums, Mayapples popping up and a couple things I couldn’t identify.

But she did see two blue jays and an Eastern bluebird which I didn’t see – and though I heard the red-winged blackbirds I didn’t see them.

After a leisurely hour and a bit walking through the woods, we came back to the farm, watered the horses and finished giving out the apple slices and carrot chunks I’d brought as treats for the horses. Some of those we gave to the new colts.

The granddaughter stretched out in the grass, not seeming in any hurry to leave the peace and get back to the city. I sat and watched a half-dozen red-tailed hawks circling overhead, and was told by the farm staff that the past couple of years they have also had some turkey buzzards in the area. I didn’t know that they came this way at all.

The granddaughter’s horse was great. One horse ran away for a brief period with it’s tiny female rider, but that was controlled very quickly. Since our group was so big, they had to dig down to get enough horses and I ended up with a Belgian, usually used for draught horses and more used to pulling in teams than being ridden singly. It was really rather like trying to ride a card table, she was so wide, and my thighs are feeling it today. Oh, well . . . I love it out there and don’t much care, just wish I could go often enough that I’d get used to it again. Until I started taking my grandkids last summer, I hadn’t ridden in over 40 years, so a bit out of practice.

But what a lovely day – sunshine, fresh air, time in the bush and with animals, and time with my granddaughter.

Boys, birds and wildflowers

This has been a glorious weekend.

I went to visit my grandsons in Cambridge. It takes a couple hours to get there, depending on the traffic, and this time I went across the QEW and up highway 6 to Safari Road.

Going west on Safari Road, first I thought I spied some May Apples, which I haven’t seen since I was a child living in the country with plenty of time to roam through the woods and just look to see what was there. Then I DID see a Snow goose. It flew very low across the road right in front of me. I’ve never seen one of those before and didn’t even know what it was until I looked it up. What a beautiful creature!

Just after I arrived at the boys’ house, I was sitting on the side porch and heard the youngest grandson coming up the walk with his friend in front of him. His friend stopped when he saw me on the porch (we hadn’t met before) and I heard my grandson say to his friend – as he passed my car – “Granny’s here! She’s really nice.” What a great treat to hear an endorsement like that when it wasn’t necessitated by duty.

The best part of the weekend was seeing my oldest grandson’s latest spelling test. He got 28/30, and it was handwritten beautifully – this from a child that his previous school had forecast would never learn to read well or write at all, despite his well above average intelligence. They said he’d have to use a keyboard forever for writing and have an aide to read things to him.

He’s been in a new program for a couple years now. It falls under the PHAST banner and I think is called Empower Reading. It has done absolute miracles for him and he’s pretty much functioning as he should now. He’ll stay in that school for one more year to solidify his gains and then he’ll be off and running. It is *so* wonderful to see him being what he was meant to be.

Coming home along Safari Road again, I kept my eyes open to see what wildflowers I might see. It was wonderful! Dogtoothed violets, trilliums, May apples and a couple other things I couldn’t immediately identify, since it was raining really hard – much too hard to get out of the car and look. And if I slowed down too long another car would surely come along. It was such a nostalgic experience – I know where I’ll be with my camera next May. Makes me want to pull a Thoreau and move to a cabin in the forest.

Unfortunately, there’s this thing called snow-shovelling that also has to be done, and I’m not up for a real lot of that anymore.

I got home and the English wild violets were blooming under the big maple in the backyard, and the buds on the lilac are fat enough to burst open soon. This will be the first year I get a lot of blooms on the lilac as usually the maple blooms first and shades it too much. I’m going to have to move it.

I’m so content and happy I just keep sighing and smiling . . . life should always be this good.