Moving!

We got home from Death Valley on January 1^st. I had to hit the ground running. Our move was planned to start on January 2^nd!

Long view from top of driveway

The property manager for the new house called about midday and we set up a time to meet. Up to that point I had been working on making sure the books were correct and getting other stuff taken care of. After the call, however, it was time to get moving.

Hoss, DC and Uh-oh enjoy dinner at the top of the pasture

My husband helped me pull the floor mats out of the horse trailer and we proceeded to start loading with what was ready to go. We met the manager and did the final walk through, and then the work started.
It took the remainder of the week, and the help of a friend with a flat bed truck to move the corral panels, but we had everybody moved to the new place by Friday night.

The bottom of he pasture and side of the house

The funniest part was getting Uh-oh, the semi-feral goat. I had a tube of sedative in the glove box of my truck, and my husband and my friend were headed back to the old place for more stuff. The plan was for them to get the goat moved, and we'd go back for the horses rather than try to move horses and goat together.

It didn't take much work to catch Uh-oh, so the guys gave her the dose of sedative I'd told them to use, and went back to work while waiting for the sedative to take effect. The mistake they made was letting Uh-oh go after giving her the drug. Although she was effectively sedated, sleeping on her feet, as soon as she saw anyone trying to catch her again, she wasn't having it. I explained later sedation is not the same thing as anesthesia!

Our water tank and pump -- 2500 gallons (the neighbor's is 5000)

Later in the day, we went back and tried to get Uh-oh loaded in the trailer again. I took the horses out of the pasture and tied them to the trailer. Uh-oh was having nothing to do with any human being. She did not like the way the sedation made her feel and wasn't taking any chances we'd do that to her again.

Eventually I decided to load the horses in the trailer and see if she'd get in with them. I was at the point where she was spending the night alone if she didn't get her fuzzy butt in the trailer! It took the three of us, and the sight of the horses already in the trailer, but Uh-oh was finally wrangled and she came home with the horses.

The front of the house

There's been lots of work going on at Chalice Ranch's new digs. The horses now have a 100 ft by 175 ft pasture to roam about in. It will be larger soon. We need to complete the fence around the property. Tanner has already discovered the neighbors across the street have a habit of leaving their trash out. This had led to some problems, with my daughter and I having found Tanner digging through the garbage on several occasions.

We're still working on getting everything unpacked and finding "homes" for everything, but we're well and truly moved in. The house is quite nice. The kitchen, despite being physically smaller, somehow has far more storage space and is much easier to use. I even have a separate office.

Celeste's painting hangs above the fireplace

It'll take some time, but we'll be fully settled in before too terribly long.