Dating

Dating....it has been so long since Eric and I have "dated" that i am not really sure how to anymore. We are giving it a go and loving it. With our constant moving, traveling, and Eric's work schedule it makes it difficult to spend time as a family and then have time for Eric and i to go out. Going out without the kids is vastly different than watching T.V. after the kids go to bed. Now, we are in a place where we have an awesome babysitter and Eric has a little more flexibility so we started dating again. Kim came for our anniversary, Melissa came over while we went out to eat, last weekend it was Italian food and a movie, and Saturday was lunch and horseback riding in Love Valley. It is so nice getting to enjoy Eric's company.


We left and stopped for lunch on our way up. It was a short drive and upon arrival I could tell we were in for an experience. We only saw a few buildings before we found the horse stalls that we were looking for. I was a little nervous considering everything, houses and stores, looked like they had started out as campers and trailers and had been "upgraded" with porches and wooden siding. Anyway, we get set up and go outside to find our beautiful horses waiting. An old man is waiting as well. He looks cute enough. A Dickies coveralls with the sleeves cut out and baby mutton chops. As he smiles and begins to talk to me i realize he is missing a few teeth and i have no idea what he is saying. Turns out he was giving me directions because i was riding Squeaky, the lead horse. Score for me. Eric hops on Lady bug and he continues to give us directions to the creek trail. These directions were like "go to the paved road take a left, go on down and you will see a road to your right , then take a left and that will be a dead end road, and another left on another dead end road, then you'll see three driveways and there will be a trail between two of them and you take that. When you pass Starbucks you might have to hit her on the shoulder with the stick (looked like a whip to me) to make her go on because they are tired and she will want to come on home." We smile and i have no clue what he said to me and we have no road names or anything. Off we go. As soon as we are out of ear shot i tell Eric if we see a Starbucks i am going to stop and take a picture in front of it with my horse. :) Anyway, My horse feels like she has a bit of a gimpy leg, it was like my horse was from the hood. Both horses were moving slower than i could walk on foot. HAHAHHA! We sit back and enjoy the conversation, scenery and the slow pace. Finally a gravel road. Eric says take a left, i thought it was a right but we go left. Then our horses have the urge to stop and eat. So they do. What do you do when you are sitting on a horse and it stops to graze??? Anyway, we spot some kids who tell us we are headed in the right direction but i was a little skeptical that he really knew so we stop and ask a lovely women in a blue bikini top, cut offs, tattoos and cigarette in hand, who was crusin' on her 4-wheeler. Yes, totally wrong direction. So we turn around and go back.Some miles and a lot of stops for grass later, we find it....Starbuck......road. We have a nice laugh and then my horse hangs a right onto Starbuck road. NO, STOP, WHOAAAAAA. She stops and proceeds to snack. Why am i surprised? Anyway, I finally get Squeaky turned around and back on the main road and we walk....stop.....eat....turn....back to Starbuck road. What is going on with this horse. I get her turned around again and she isn't moving. She just keeps shaking her head at me when i pull her reigns. I didn't want to, but i used the stick. She squeaked...hence her name i guess. I felt bad so after a few more turn arounds and snacks i finally offer to trade with Eric. Maybe he would have better luck. In the middle of the road we swap horses. Eric gives it a good effort, by good effort i mean he said "no", but Squeaky was not going to the creek trail. So Eric allows the horse choose the route. Ridge Trail it is. Just my luck, i am on the "follower" horse and Squeaky started "squeaking" from the rear end. While my lazy Ladybug grazed Eric tried to hand off the camera so i could get some pictures of him since i wasn't going anywhere and Squeaky let her gas fly. I almost used the stick on her again! Anyway, it was a beautiful ride through the woods. A few times Squeaky took an alternate route around some mud but she always made her way back to the trail. slowly we made our way back to town. The horses were obviously telling us something. They did pick up the pace as we came through town. We only rode 2 out of the 4 hours of our time. Mutton chops says we can make it up next time. I noticed he didn't bother to take down our names. We spent the next hour and a half walking around the town. How we took that long to walk in 6 stores is beyond me. Two were bars so i think they get a little wild at night. We finally tracked down a trail map that would have been VERY helpful before we got the horses but it will be nice for next time. Picked up shirts for the kids and made our way home. It was a great day. Now we are trying to restrain ourselves from buying a horse. :)