Arena Sand is Moved Out

This weekend DH moved the excess sand out of the arena.   It's been on the list in the job jar for awhile but it finally made it to the top!   Lucky Me ( and Terrie too!)  We are entering into a deep freeze this week so the ground was frozen (so was DH) and we have no snow on the ground, so it made the travel path solid to move the sand out without dragging mud back into the footing.

Here is what the arena looked like at the start.   This is after about 20+ tons of sand has already been moved out to fill the bottom 2 feet of our 400 feet of hydro trenching.

 Here we are in progress.   I was the operator of the rake and shovel moving the banks from the sides.

Here is DH with the leveller on smoothing out the lumps and bumps.

I can't believe how much bigger the arena looks with all the sand moved out.   We will work on riding in the pen now to find the spots that need to be fine tuned to make the foot just "so".   I am sure there will still be the odd deep spot and light spot here and there that will need a bit of adjustment.  But overall this is a huge improvement from when we moved in.   We estimate that we removed approximately ~80-100 ton of sand!!!   At this point, I am REALLY happy that I never spent the quoted $5,000 to buy the necessary sand for the outdoor ring.   Because....by the look of the pile DH made outside I will have enough here or at least enough to get a really good start on the already decent base.

We had a special visit from my cousin Alan and his wife Laura today.   It was great to see them and visit with them.  Laura is expecting in July and she looks fantastic!!   Alan will be back later in the winter to help us with our coyote problem.  Now that we have seen the tracks as close to the barn as cutting through the outdoor riding ring, he's will help us thin out the pack to make sure we don't have a major incident in the future.   I hate to do this but at the same time I would be even more upset to find that I had horses chanced or a dog lost to a much too brave pack.

On a Molly note...she has got all of her vaccinations now, so she is eligible to attend her puppy training classes.   She weighed in at a whopping 36 lbs at 4 months and 1 week old!   I hazard to suggest that she will be a big boned girl when she is grown!   She got to play with her second cousin Georgia today.   Molly couldn't even come close to keeping up with the sleek, long legged hunting dog of Alan's!

After watching the cat sit on the foot rest of the kitchen island bar, Molly has decided that she also fits well on the foot rest!

 (Please ignore DH's muddy pant leg...obviously he has been working outside...most likely on something that I am the beneficiary!)

From the Kitchen...
I made (for the first time) Creamy Roasted Red Pepper Soup.   It was delicious!  I would have roasted the peppers a slight bit more on the next patch to save myself the headache peeling them.   The bits that were black scorched well, where really easy to peel...so now I know!