Welcome to Friday

Ah! Not a moment too soon! This picture is for Xander's foster Mom who saved his life, led him to us, and sent him this tub of milk replacer that's bigger than he is! And which he's in love with :D

Hey Mom, open this up wil' ya'?!

 Willow's one remaining refuge: the dining room table. I keep telling her pretty soon he'll figure out how to get up there...she's taking advantage of the peace while she can.

 Meanwhile, Xander can find peace anywhere!

The Light of God surrounds me. The Love of God enfolds me. The Power of God protects me. The Presence of God watches over me. Wherever I am, God is.
---prayer by James Dillet Freeman (This is a prayer that Robin Roberts of Good Morning America shared that her mom taught all of them. I really like it.)

Conflict at the Watering Hole & The King's Horses

Because I'm not managing to post every day and because there's no lack of subject matter...just lack of time, I'm jumbling several subjects in together today.

As is seen in the wilds of Africa, sometimes conflicts break out at the watering hole:

By the way, they all love this waterer!

Just because there's more random cuteness than we know what to do with:

And even though I don't have time to fully explain and/or discuss, one of the amazing parts of the Medieval Times show is that when they show off the king's horses, they are demonstrating the same airs above the ground as seen in the Lipizzaner shows (which usually have one or two Andalusians in the mix as well). If you like horses and you've never seen these (or even if you have!) it's breathtaking!

And the culmination...the capriole...frequently hard to capture on film...

I was ecstatic to get this shot! It's amazing how high these horses can leap. Truly fantastic athletes. We got tickled that as part of the instructions we were given they asked us to not bang the metal plates and bowls together when we sat down at the table as it might spook the horses. Yeah, right! Like the yelling and cheering is quieter. Am guessing these horses are all "bomb proof"...that the staff just got tired of hearing it :D

Further Xtreme Cuteness

Here are some stills I pulled from the overwhelmingly cute video posted yesterday:

Too Far?

I may have gone too far this time...the following video is off the charts in the xtreme cuteness quotient. Be warned!

Falconry

Yet another reason to love the Medieval Times show: the falconry exhibition:

We got to see her up close when we came in...I've forgotten the bird's name, but she's 11 years old. While it's hard to capture truly good shots, it was fantastic seeing her flying over our heads at liberty. :D

Today's Pix

Yep. *Way* too much going on! No time for catching up...will just share a few pix:

Does this measure how cute I am?

Hangin out with my big sis'

More Cuteness & More Pageantry

One of Xander's favorite falling asleep poses:

One of the angles that show he still has to grow into those ears!

Some more of the pageantry of Medieval Times. I'm ready to go back there today!

The king riding in to greet his people

Precision riding

The king and the princess up on the balcony (btw, this is a shot from all the way across the arena)

We were cheering the yellow knight

The king's horseman enters with his steeds (it's hard to see definition with a black horse, but he is rared up on hind legs)

Weekend Getaway

LoML and I had a package deal for a little weekend getaway...We stayed at a very fancy place (in exchange for the high-pressure sales pitch to buy a time share...which we declined, much to our salesman's chagrin):

The view looking down from our penthouse balcony! (Apologies to Mom for making you queasy!)

The highlight of our trip was going to the Medieval Times show. Here's just a teaser...more details soon (day job interfering with the fun stuff).