Unique?

Here is some of what went on at Mill Swamp Indian Horses in the last two weeks. Some of the young people from the music program performed at Victorian Station. We did three sets of riding lessons last Saturday. The Sunday afternoon hard ride was wonderful. Tuesday Audrey and I rode 80 miles on a string of four horses. Wednesday night Chris and Audrey conducted a clinic on horse training. Last night Jackie took out adult riders on a slow session through the woods. While that was going on we held a session for teens on improved communication skills and other techniques to increase confidence and resilience in order to fight off depression and anxiety. 

Wendell worked hard with care for the animals and hay distribution and Lisa did some extra feeding. Andrew and Daddy took out our new mower out and mowed pastures. Tim, Samantha, and Terry kept the morning, before going into the office rides, going. Mandy made arrangements to get our sheep shorn on the 18th. Adam worked out which lumber we would need to build our music stage and we used the gift certificate that Rachel donated to make that purchase.

Pam stayed on top of things with a grant that we are looking into. Horse herds were rotated into greener pastures. We worked hard to get the sprinklers in full use in pasture number 3 to maximize grass growth. Tam continued work on the early colonial pole hut that she is building and got the help of several other young riders who learned the use of colonial hand tools. Homeschoolers worked hard in the garden and Will continued planning for his class on orienteering that we will present after school is out. 

We spent a lot of time talking about the importance of courage as a basic Stoic value and how using horses can help us avoid avoidance behaviors. Audrey has done significant reading in Ryan Holliday's book on the matter. Mandy took beautiful graduation pictures at the horse lot. Our records show that we have ridden a cumulative 1,307.4 miles during the first six months of the year and have ridden 11,019 miles from 2019-2022. (The distance from Norfolk to San Francisco is only 2,968 miles). Kate continued with great work increasing Janie's confidence under saddle.

Liz was visiting Tidewater and she came and spent Friday with us. We had three families of visitors show up to discuss riding lessons. Work has begun on the music stage. We started filming our first episode for our new you tube channel. I was contacted by a literary agent about the rights to my book, "And a Litle child Shall Lead Them".

Amanda created a great form for riders to use to record their daily lifestyle improvements, including exercise, sleep, good nutrition, miles ridden, and time spent in study of natural horsemanship and philosophy.

And all of this was done entirely with volunteers. No paid staff.