Sun Dogs and some gratitude

In the last 10 days I've seen THREE sun dogs! I was so excited about each of them, but only able to get photos of one. A sun dog is also called a parhelion. As I understand it thanks to the internut, they are formed by ice crystals at a specific angle to the sun. Sometimes they are little rainbow patches in the sky, other times they can form trails, or both - a patch with a trail off of it. One of the sun dogs I saw was a full rainbow around the sun! That was incredible, very hard to see (without going blind) but beautiful nonetheless... Sun dogs are apparently commonly seen at times of cirrus clouds, due to them being very cold and high in the atmosphere. Our weather has been so lovely lately - warm, low 70s, lots of blue sky, with a few clouds to create gorgeous peach, gold and lavendar sunsets at night. We're supposed to get rain maybe on Wednesday, but other than that I can't find any specific "meaning" to seeing sun dogs. I feel like they are just beautiful little gifts.


The Aliso hills as seen through the Y in the horses pepper tree

Mario and I are doing pretty well on our resolutions. We've lost a couple pounds each, and have been active... playing on Wii fit, working, pilates, riding, etc. I have not managed to get to 3 days a week of riding, but I did ride 2 x this week at least. It's actually a little relaxing to know it's not just a short term goal, which is usually the most motivating to me (going to St. John in 3 months?! GET WORKIN' !), but to know this is a lifetime goal. It's who we want to be, so it has to kind of settle around us... get comfortable being with us... and us with it...

I want to say again, just for my own expression of gratitude, how LUCKY I am to have such a wonderful horse as Jordan. I mean it in no way as a disrespect to Faith, because she's my girl! But Jordan is special in that he is just so... hm... what's the right word. He's so right for me? Like the sun dogs, I feel like he is a wonderful (big) gift. Not something wonderful you "deserve", but something wonderful that you get anyway! When I first started riding him and he was still a stallion, I was afraid of him. I used to say that even though he was young and I was supposed to be the guiding hand, the comfort and security, HE was that for me. He has always kind of had my back, even when I don't deserve it (like the last couple rides when I felt weak and imbalanced, totally out of shape!) He's a once in a lifetime horse, for certain... thank you Mario for seeing that in him when I first introduced you to him and knowing he would be ours, and helping make it happen! - and to the Reinholds who we bought him from, for working out a payment plan that was extremely generous, and to Jordan, for being him!! Yeah - that's my Dirty boy, I love him... :-D

Mario and Randy went to a Lakers/Clippers game the other night - and despite the Lakers surprising loss! - I think Mario had a really good time. They had good seats...


We went to my mom's for a special birthday dinner for Mario this past Thursday. She made a delicious dinner - spinach artichoke 'packages' for an appetizer, awesome cesar salad with fresh ground pepper and sea salt, and a homemade mac 'n tomatoes 'n cheese pasta. The grand finale was a special chocolate cherry cake with fresh cherry slices and a secret filling recipe which included a liquor from a South African fruit! Fahhncy. We were stuffed! Mario got a Shaun White snowboarding Wii game from my mom and had an epic competition on it well into the night with Randy last night. The decibel volume in this house reached levels it hasn't seen since our Diamondback partying days of the 90s... good times...