First up, NORMA update!

NORMA!

In earlier posts, I spoke of my donkey, Norma Jean, who was suffering a severe bout of laminitis recently.  (You can read the story here)  Let me tell you that I was overwhelmed with the amount of support from you readers.   Wow.  THANK YOU.  I swear, your kind words really helped me stay focused.

She is recovering!  Wahoo!  I can now safely say (veterinarian stamped) that she is on the other side of the worst of it.  She is still sore, but she will make it – unless something untoward happens.

The success of the clinical trial with the experimental drug couldn’t be determined because Norma has a huge abscess (we discovered yesterday) which rendered the trial indeterminable.  Bummer.  We think the trial drug helped her because her right foot healed very quickly.  But, her left foot was still very sore after using the drug.  So, now that we know it was an abscess, we have no way of determining if the drug helped the left foot or not.  However, the fact that the right foot got better rapidly and the left foot had no severe laminitis aftereffects even though she could not use her foot, makes us think the drug could have been working in spite of the abscess.  Dunno.  We will never know.  I would try the experimental drug again, if one of my horses had a laminitis episode.  My vet agrees.

All we know for sure is that the drug didn’t hurt her.

She is bright eyed and much happier.  Thank you all for caring.

MORE HOLIDAY GIFT IDEAS!

OK, I’ve got a bunch  more today!  Some are deals and some are just cool.  Here we go!

RAINBOW HAIR EXTENSIONS

Did you see this in HORSE AND RIDER magazine?  It stopped me in my tracks!  I thought it was hysterical and so full of whimsy!  I am sure Finn would be totally embarrassed by these, but Beautiful Girl might kinda like them.

I also think some tweenage girl might loooove to put these into her horse’s mane. Hours of fun!  Or, maybe girls could trade colors and have manes in all one color like pink or blue…  Fun!  Here is the link.

YUM-MEE!

I am not a Western Wear person.  But, I keep loving Western stuff.  And, I love this jacket – mainly because it has Sweet Bird Studio adornments.  How cool is this?!  You get a fitted and designed jacket that also has wonderful accents.  OKOK, so it isn’t cheap or a deal, but it is fabulous and I wanted you to know about it.  Here is the link.

SKODE’S COOKIE SPECIAL DEAL!

I shared earlier how much my horses loved these ‘good for your horse’ cookies.  Well, Skode’s is having a special sale on Mint Rose Brownies, Pumpkin Spice cookies and Ginger Snaps (Only $22 for a pound of fresh baked cookies in a lovely gift tin!) !  I’m all over these treats because they are homemade, are wonderfully fragrant, have all natural and organic ingredients, are for IR (Insulin Resistant) horses — which I think is great for all horses — and my horses loved them!  So, click on the photo or this link and check out the Holiday deal.

EQUI-SPA SPECIAL HOLIDAY DEAL!

You all know how much I love the Equi-Spa products that I’ve tried.   The natural fly spray is now my only fly spray.  And, the BALM is the bomb!  I swear, I put the Balm on owies or bug bitten areas and my horses heal without flies or pain.  I also used the Balm on their faces and the flies left.  The best part is that my horses don’t run away from the spray or the Balm.  In fact, they try to eat it!  I’m now using the Balm to help chafed areas from winter blankets (I don’t blanket my horses but I’ve shared with some of my friends who do and they love this stuff!).

Anyway, the Equi-Spa Holiday Deal is the Balm (Yay!) and Lavender/Witch Hazel Spray. I haven’t used this spray but it sounds yummy and I know that lavender is a natural calming herb and witch hazel is a natural infection fighter.  I would get this and gift two people with the items!  A great deal!  So, click the photo or click this link

POP-UP BARRELS

Have you seen this?  (I saw this in COWBOYS AND INDIANS magazine.)  I’m not a barrel racer, but I have friends who are.  They always tell me that they go to other venues and just hope that there are barrels set up (which there usually are…).   But, what if they wanted to spend time with me?  I have no barrels.  Or, what if they wanted to go to a horse camp that had no barrels?   Now they can bring their own traveling barrels!  I thought this was ingenious!  Here is the link.

NAG NOSE SHADE

OK, when I first saw this, I burst out laughing.  How embarrassing for your horse!  Even the horse in the photo seems to be pleading, “Please Don’t take my picture in this!”

HOWEVER, when I read what it does, I reconsidered.  So what if you make your pale horse look foolish?!  This contraption would really cut down on skin cancer and sunburn!  After all, you make your kid wear zinc oxide… why not use this for your pale skinned horse?  Here is the link.

MMMMM.  WOOD STUFF.

I love anything made out of wood.  Well, almost anything… Well, maybe not almost anything but almost anything that is made like this stuff.  I saw this wood makers ad in C&I magazine (again) so I went to his website and saw luscious things.  I decided to put up the boot jack  and the hat boxes here.  There are many, many more beautiful handmade wood items on the site.  Here is the link.

WAR HORSE AND CAVALRY HORSE BOOKS

So many of you wrote to me telling me how much you enjoyed my post on COMANCHE.  So, I thought I would research books about famous Cavalry horses.  I looked for books that were rated with 5 stars (the highest).  I came up with three.  Here they are.  If you click on the image, it will take you to that particular Amazon page.

Judging by the huge response to the Comanche post, I think any of these books would be great presents!

SALE  STUFF AND  STOCKING STUFFERS!

I am always afraid to go to the deal pages or cheap stuff pages in horsey websites because I end up spending more than I ever thought I needed to… kinda like Costco.  But, I wanted to bring two “deal” pages to you.

1)  I’m a grab bag, ‘love a surprise’ kinda person.  So, when I went to Jeffers Equine, my excitement was peaked!  They now have a 12 DAYS OF CHRISTMAS sale page!  A different thing for sale each day!  How fun!  It is a great marketing ploy because it makes us continue to go to the site every day.  But, it is fun so why not?!

They also have a SURPRISE DEAL of the day during the holidays.  You can choose from the Surprise Deal if your 12 Days deal wasn’t tickling your fancy!

2)  Chicks Saddlery has STOCKING STUFFERS UNDER $5.99.  Wow!  This oughta get your engines running!  You could go crazy buying little inexpensive things!  Wahoo!

REINDEER HATS

Am I crazy or are these worth demoralizing your horse over?  They light up and fit over the halter.  OMG.  I love Xmas cards that have horses wearing these.  Am I cruel?  Well, anyway, they are on sale for $4.  What a deal on something to torture our poor horses…  ;)   Here is the link.

BUCKET OF INDIVIDUALLY WRAPPED COOKIES WITH A CLUE!

I spoke of these before.  They are made by Gabrielle Sutton who is an equine nutritionist guru.  Because of  my previous experience with Gabrielle, I’m pretty much on board with anything she makes.  She wouldn’t create anything if it wasn’t thoroughly tested.  So, if something is worthwhile enough to get her full attention, then it must be good.

I like this idea because it is one bucket full of individually holiday wrapped samples of all of her cookies.  What a great way to ‘share the wealth’ for a barn party or party favors or just to pass around to all of your friends!  The names alone are great fun!  Belly Bites, Stress Busters, Booster Bites, Chubbies  and Owchees.  I’ve tried the Belly Bites and the Owchees.  My horses gobble them up!

LASTLY, OUR BUCKET FUND GIFT CERTIFICATES

You all know about the donor gift certificates… If you donate to any of our 4 Bucket Fund horses this month:  Tullie (the burned horse), Gump (the ‘different’ horse), Dixie (the old and forgotten horse) or the Wild Horses and Burros (gathered horses) you get a gift certificate made out to anyone you choose which you can use as a gift.  I make them here in the HORSE AND MAN Santa factory so I put in any name or do whatever you like with the certificates.  Click here.

HAVE FUN SHOPPING, EVERYIONE!

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