Horses and an unexpected house guest

There are some things that you really do not expect to here from a family member at 8:00 at night.

"Mommy, mommy, mommy......There's a praying mantis in my room!" falls into that category.
Sarah was reading in bed before going to sleep, and looked over to see this young praying mantis on the wall next to her head. We relocated her (the mantis) outside so she could find a better place to hang out. We have no idea how she got in the house.

The horses are doing great. I haven't ridden them as much as I had hoped to this summer, mainly because I keep getting injured (foot bridge, raccoon, etc.). So we've mostly focused on ground work, but the effort is showing results. Sarah had not been out with me in quite a while and was pleasantly surprised at how much improved Meeka was in her willingness to be handled. We worked on mounting today, and Meeka willingly stood next to the mounting block and allowed Sarah to rub her all over on her off side. She wasn't too sure of weight being placed on her, but we'll get there. She did stand nicely while I put the bareback pad on her.

Mahogany, on the other hand had a great day! After standing nicely for the bareback pad, Sarah was able to mount her from the mounting block with no trouble, and rode bareback around the pasture. Both horses are wonderful to handle. They nicker every time they see us and come over to the fence for twice daily rubs. I feel incredibly fortunate that Steve stumbled across their ad on Craig's List.

This is Meeka watching our other unexpected visitors. I was working from home the other day, and looked out to see two little white tail bucks on the hillside in front of the house. They were browsing in the fodder just outside the barn lot, and are still in velvet.