Growth Spurt

I just had to share this – I measured Chance today, and he is 13 hands and 460 pounds! When did he get so big??? I thought for sure I was measuring wrong, but I did it twice. The baby is getting huge. Look how big he looks when he tries to nurse now:

We took our longest trail walk yet today. We went up and down some more hills. Natty was pretty excited to be going a new way and really wanted to trot, but she stayed fairly under control. She did want to run down a big hill (I let Chance do this, so I guess she figured she should get to do it too), and she ended up sliding a ways because it’s so steep. She didn’t freak or anything, and after that she walked more carefully down the rest of the hill. We all worked up a sweat on this walk! We all love berries, and the blackberries are ripe all along the trail, so I’ve been picking them for all of us. Chance sucks his up like a vacuum cleaner, nice and neat, but Natty grabs them with her lips and smashes them while she’s trying to get ahold of them. Here’s a picture of one of my berry hands:

Most of it washed off, but I will be going to work with purple fingernails tomorrow. Natty loved it, though, so it’s all worthwhile. She has some berry marks on her coat from scratching itches with purple lips. Too funny. She tried picking her own a few times but quickly realized it was better to let me do it – saves her from bitter green berries and prickly vines. She watches me to see when I pick them, and if I only get myself some, she sometimes gives me a shove with her nose as if to say, where’s mine? She pays careful attention to everything I do, and it seems to help her learn things really fast. Only the important things, of course, like where the berries come from!