Something to Tide You Over...

Hi Folks,

Though there is plenty to blog about, I'm pretty flat out around here, so the probability of me writing much for the next couple of weeks isn't too high.

For now, here's what you need to know:

~I'm in Wisconsin (home) for 3 days this week
~I was at Kristi Smith's in Iowa through this past weekend, assisting in her workshops
~South Dakota is alright--I've learned a lot, and we've had a foal born on the premises who's been my greatest teacher, along with Crest.
~My goals and time-line for the summer have shifted drastically, more details as I work things out myself.

In the mean time, here is a video of Crest and me playing at liberty last weekend. Some of you may have seen this if you follow my life on Facebook, but I thought it would be nice to post here, too. Enjoy, and I'd really love to hear your feedback. My relationship with Crest has becoming extremely important to me at this phase of my life, and I am so proud of how far both of us have come, in seeing this video!



So, that's it for now. I'll be back from SD in a couple of weeks, and my life should resume with relative normality. I hope everyone is well!

My South Dakota Adventure

So I've mentioned it, now it's time to elaborate some.

Prin, Crest and I will be leaving for Heartland Ventures (Click link to check the place out!) on Tuesday, March 23rd. I'll be working full time as kind of an all-around helper--Farrah I think referred to me at one point as the "Sha-BAM Instructor-in-Training". Yes, that will go on a name-tag, just watch!

Anyway, my duties will be as follows: playing with the young horses Farrah started (a few 3-year olds, several other yearlings/2-year olds), general barn-management/maintenance stuff--feeding, turning horses out, grooming, cleaning up, stalls (I am nothing if not ace at picking stalls by now), as well as developing my own horses, assisting Farrah while she's teaching, and keeping things running smoothly. Like I said, pretty general responsibilities, and all-in-all more great experience.

So that's what I'll be up to. I'm not sure how long I'll be there, (pending when I leave for my externship), but I look forward to it! I shall keep you posted as best I can--I intend to keep an album of pictures on my facebook page as we progress and move along in this adventure, so please add me as a friend if you haven't already, and keep track of it that way, too :)

Savvy on!

What a Week!

Life went from "busy" to "insane" this week, and since I've been eluding to some new opportunities on Facebook, I just wanted to share what I can about them :)

First of all, my externship audition package is off! I sent it out in the middle of the week last week. So begins the game of waiting. Usually I'd be nervous and unable to get it off my mind, but with all the stuff that's going on around here, I'm actually having to use that as a positive reminder to myself to get my mind off the STUFF I've to be doing! I'll keep you posted, hopefully I'll hear back on that in a couple weeks.

Secondly, I am relocating to South Dakota sometime in the near future! (I'd be more specific, but my coordinator is being a little vague with me about timing) Farrah called me a couple weeks ago and made a pretty interesting proposal. Apparently Farrah was asked to take up the position of barn manager at her current facility. Trouble is, she's taking that as well as instructing full time, and playing with their young horses, and even though Farrah is the queen of getting way more than I could get done in a 24 hour day, that's still just too much. So she asked if I'd be interested in coming out, taking up some of the management responsibilities, as well as finishing the young horses she's started. I'll be bringing Prin and Crest with me, and in exchange for my work, Farrah's offered me a series of lessons. I'll use that to finish up my L4 and get Crest going, I think. Talk about an awesome opportunity and more experience, which I'm so excited for.

Finally, slightly less for the positive, Prin has been sick. I'm still not entirely certain what's wrong, whether it's an upper-respiratory infection brought on by moldy hay, COPD coming on from the moldy hay, or some other kind of allergic reaction. In any case, she's been snotty and coughing some, right now I've got her on antibiotics and some anti-inflammatory, antihistamic, and soothing herbs. Poor little lady. I have lots of faith that she'll be okay, but it's just sad to see them when they're not alright.

So that's what's going on here. As I find out more of what's going on, I'll keep you posted.

Parelli's Newest 3* Professional

Hey all,

I just wanted to share some super exciting news. I talked to Farrah Green today, and she shared with me that she received her 3* PARELLI PROFESSIONAL RANKING yesterday!

If there's anyone I know who deserves that promotion, it's Farrah. She's been working hard to achieve that for 3 years, and it's so time for this. She's 3* and more in my book, and I'm SO PROUD AND HAPPY for her. She is amazing. I cannot wait to see what she continues to offer the horse world with this. Congrats, Girl!


Farrah and her two super horses, Caesar and Wesley.

Ioway? Iowa? Whatever...

Hi all,

So happy to announce that the venue where the first clinic was has internet. Thank goodness, too. I never realize how much I miss my computer until I come back to it after being away.

Anyway, keeping pretty busy. We're in Hampton, IA for one more day before moving on to Madison, WI for almost 2 weeks. The clinic here went very well, we had a full group, with 6 enthusiastic participants plus the hostess and me, as well as several lovely auditors. The focus of the clinic was building excellence in all 4 savvys. We covered a ton of information in 3 days, playing with many patterns, games, and simulations. It was very neat to watch everyone's transformations with their horses. There were some genuinely FASCINATING partnerships and things going on, and it was really fun to watch.

Also, I have to say, this clinic I think holds the record for the largest number of absolutely STUNNING horses. We had a golden palomino, a red dun, two TALL auburn-y sorrels, a jet black morgan, a 6 yr old Dapple gray who looks like she'll stay dappled with no fading until the day she dies, and then a deep dark liver chestnut. And then of course Farrah's cuties, and then Prin. Stay tuned for photos. I need to dump them onto the computer later today, and I'll hopefully get a few up on here tonight.

Let's see...what else...I played with Prin in Farrah's Natural Performer last night, and I have to say, I'm thinking I might have to have one for myself. She actually moves better in it than in the Fluidity, I *think*. I'd have to see it to know for sure, but judging by how excellent our finesse play was last night, I think I have a keeper on my hands...now...to find the $3200 I need to get one of my own-haha.

Today, we finish up private lessons, we'll play, I'll have a lesson, and we'll maybe go out dinner, and then pack up and head out bright and early tomorrow. I'm not sure what opportunities I'll have to blog, but stay tuned anyway, because I could pop up at any moment ;)

Now, off to watch the lesson Farrah's giving to that GORGEOUS gray mare.

Savvy on!

I CANNOT Believe...

...the difference ONE TRIM can make in a horse.

WARNING: VERY roundabout post ahead!

For those of you who have been following me for more of an extended period of time, you'll recall that Crest has had some very annoying, border-line serious bio-mechanical issues going on in his body that were caused by a nasty accident we had a couple years ago. Results of these issues are things like a block in his ribcage on the right, a stiff stifle on his right, and a tight hip on his right.

About a year ago, after viewing some of our issues, Linda saw how largely Crest's uneven body played a role in his reactions, and suggested that maybe I look into having him shod using Jim Crew's method, a method that focuses largely on lateral balance and causing the horse's body to be symmetrical through shimming and padding of shoes. Instead of jumping on the shoes (I won't even get into that), I decided I wanted to do some research on bio-mechanics to better understand what was or wasn't happening in my horse's body. Since, I've done about a 180 in knowledge on the subject, and have developed a pretty keen eye for it.

Anyway, for the past 6 years (the first 4, inadvertently), I've been playing with Natural Barefoot trimming. I say the first 4 years inadvertently simply because I just trimmed by what looked like needed trimming, and hoped it worked. For the past two years, I've been seriously researching and playing with methods, most effectively being that of Pete Ramey, and more recently, KC La Pierre. I'd put some of these trims to the test on Crest. A lot of times, I'd see a little effect, but nothing dramatic or helpful, and it would gradually go away over the course of the next trim cycle.

Now, obviously I just got done spending 2 weeks with Farrah, who is also very interested and playing with Natural Barefoot. This time around, I needed to do Prin's feet, anyway, and so asked if Farrah would be interested in watching and giving me some feedback. A long story short, Farrah had been investigating La Pierre's stuff, introduced me to it, and we did his HPT (High Performance Trim) on her this time. The results were PHENOMENAL. We discussed it afterward, and she gave me her thoughts on Crest's feet, as well, and what might help him, too.

The high performance trim is based upon the principle of lateral balance, and subtle changes in the angles and planes of the hoof. Most of the trim is done on the file side (the fine-toothed side) of the rasp. It's all in the subtle changes, and overall balancing. I won't go into the serious details here, but let's just say the subtleties were just what Crest's feet needed.

I started out on his back feet, picked them up, cleaned them out, and now knowing what I know, realized just how unbalanced his feet were. He had worn the insides of his feet down, but the outsides were high. The hoof wall was worn practically to the white line on the inside, and was nearly 1/2 an inch thick on the outside. The plane of his hoof was literally tilted inward. There were thick, angular flares on his heels and quarters on the outsides, and the insides were practically vertical. Wow...how did I miss that?! I should mention, this was all developed since last trim, done sometime in March.

I immediately set to work. Please note that these are not in order, nor are they the correct order of steps in the HPT, I'm just listing what I found. I exfoliated the frog, trimmed it back, and found a ton of bruising. Yikes. I exfoliated the sole. Same thing. Yikes again. I took his bars back, (That was a CHORE!). I took a great deal of time balancing the wall to itself (Heels to themselves, heels to quarters, heels to toe, etc), and made sure it was all even. I took his outer wall back so it was relatively uniform. I used a guillotine stroke to address the outer wall flare, and then rolled only slightly.

After I finished, I only had a short time to play before I had to leave for a meeting. I had a great deal I wanted to examine and observe--I wanted to see how Crest stood, how he tracked at the walk and trot, if he could pick up his bad lead (right) at the canter without cross-firing, if he could do a flying change without a slip in the back. Wow...okay. First thing I did was tie him so I could go get my 45' line. He stood quietly...and square...Wait...square?! Yes. Crest's hind legs were solidly under him, and he stood evenly. Wow...there's a change. I grabbed my 45' line and snapped him up. I yo-yo'd him back, and sent him out on a circle at a medium trot.

Not that Crest has ever had a problem tracking up (he's got a pretty big stride), but the track in his trot was unbelievable. He was actually OVER-TRACKING in his medium trot, and all with his head low and using his back! Usually when he gets moving, his back hollows and head comes up. Next, I asked him to canter out on his tough lead...and...IMMEDIATELY he got it. There was no hesitation, no break in stride, he got it IMMEDIATELY, and maintained it, on a hill, for a lap and a half, before doing a snotty change of direction, squeal, buck, and lead change on his own.

Needless to say, I'm thrilled. Not only did I see a little bit of improvement, I saw 2 years of issues melt away before my eyes! I'm totally sold on this trim. Totally sold. I cannot wait to see how Crest's body and posture changes as I keep this up. He's always been a hunka horse, can you imagine how he'll look one his body is totally correct?

I'll post pictures, for sure.

That's all for now, but if you're at all curious about anything, want more description, photos, explanation, anything, please let me know, I'll be happy to share.

Savvy on, and leave me a comment :)

F

CONGRATULATIONS FARRAH!

Okay, perhaps some of the more exciting news in recent times, I'd like to throw a big shout-out and congratulations to Ms Farrah Green, who totally passed her Level 4 yesterday!! She has been waiting for the result on her liberty, and jokingly been telling people for a week now that she has 4.5 feet of her black string. Well...now she's got all six! She passed her liberty L4++, which is AWESOME.

Congratulations, girl!

I'm off to go teach now.

F

PS--I'm through filming my L3 stuff, as well, I'll have those up soon!

Updates from Madison

Hi All,

Life has been crazy the past few days, and is liable to remain so for the next week or more, so I thought I would shoot you a quick update and let you know what's going on in the life of Fran.

Tuesday evening, Farrah arrive at my house to teach private lessons on Wednesday. Her horses stayed at Sherri's. We had a nice low-key evening and hit the hay relatively early. Wednesday morning started at 5:30am, and involved lots of running around setting things up, etc. We got everyone rounded up (including LB's second ride loading up in the back of my car!), the arena set, and all that jazz by 9:00am, and lessons began.

Long story short (I'm going to avoid posting details of people's lessons publicly, if you'd like to hear specifics, please shoot me an email) it was as fantastic day and fun was had by all. Farrah and I ended with an inspirational demo with the 4 of our big horses (LB watched). Crest made an AWESOME cameo, playing double online while I rode Prin bridless. Pictures of all this next week (you'll understand why in a moment)

For the rest of this week and all of next, I'll be traveling with Farrah. We headed out for Madison, WI, on Thursday morning, to spend time at the Midwest Horse Fair, and then teach a clinic next weekend. Our trip down was uneventful, thank goodness. We had a lovely sushi dinner that night, and then hit the hay.

Friday was day 1 of Horse Fair, and Farrah and I both woke up with the beginnings of a cold. Nonetheless, we spent the day handing out flyers, editing website stuff, talking to customers, and promoting Parelli and The Horse First (AWESOME new all-natural boarding facility built by some good friends of ours, check out the link!) After the fair was done for the day, we went out riding and we had a FANTASTIC ride. I rode Prin, of course, and Farrah rode Wesley and turned Caesar loose. We rode like crazy people for an hour and a half, trotting, cantering, galloping (I haven't done that in a year at least!!!!) and just generally enjoying the gorgeous evening. I think the particular highlight was Caesar, overall. He's not a very naturally round horse, and Farrah's poured a lot of energy into getting him to look good and carry himself better, and BOY did that show! He looked FANTASTIC! He and Prin were having "extended-trotathons", and he honestly looked like he'd blow them away in the high-level dressage arena. Awesome.

Saturday, I was super super sick. I could hardly breath, let alone do anything productive. I kind of stuck to myself for most of the day, did some website editing for Farrah, and then moseyed around watching presentations for the rest of the day. We hit "The Old-Fashioned", a restaurant owned by another friend of ours, for dinner, and then headed home and after doing chores, crashed (almost literally!) for the night.

Today is the last day of horse fair. After this is finished, Farrah and I plan to go for a ride and do some playing. This week is going to be fun, Farrah will be teaching private lessons on Thursday and Friday, and then a clinic on Saturday and Sunday, and I'll head home Sunday night.

Somewhere in there, we plan to film all the L3 auditions for Prin and me, and see if we can attempt some Level 4 stuff (we'll see how that goes, I think I may be able to do online and freestyle, but like I said, we'll see). I'll get those videos up ASAP. So anyway, just keeping busy for now. I'm going to finish up editing Farrah's calendar, and then head out to lunch with a Parelli friend of mine.

So, I'll try to keep updated, but if I don't, it's only because life is crazy good :)

Savvy on!

Fran

Busy Busy!

Just a quick update because I'm a bad blog host. I'll try to get some real information up soon, but for now, just a general update will have to do :)

It's been pretty busy around here. We've had several days of crappy weather, with several days of nice weather. Fortunately, regardless of weather, I've been chained to the computer arranging things for something I'll mention in a minute.

On the nice days, I've been able to play quite a bit. Cricket is doing extremely well with her riding, and has been enjoying daily brushing, online play on the hills, (actually, much to her dismay) and a little bit of light riding here and there to get her conditioned. I plan on taking her on some longer walk/trot rides on varied terrain to get her in condition starting later this week. Prin and Crest are keeping me busy and progressing in the patterns. Prin and I are smoothing out our Zone 5 long line driving patterns in the hopes of auditioning for not just L3, but possibly L4 online. Also, today we uncovered some interesting porcupine games that need some play. I'll report back on that as it goes. Crest and I are just having a fantastic time progressing for once. Every session I've had with him within the past two weeks has built higher and higher. He's a super horse!

My lessons have really picked up now that there's no snow and it's not 20 degrees, too. I'm having a blast teaching and learning from my students and their experiences, and I'm really enjoying being back into my routine. Let me know if any of you want to get back into lessons and training! Always looking for more contacts!

The vet was out today to do vaccinations and pull Coggins, etc. All went fairly well, we've got a few that need some play with needle prep, though! Some of these horses hadn't been handled much at all in the past year or two, let alone vaccinated, so that was an interesting time. I also had him do an exam on Cricket's weird leg, and he diagnosed it as mild string halt that wouldn't get better or worse, and confirmed her totally sound for riding.

Also, recently, (as referenced to in the previously-mentioned computer bondage-hehehe) I've been pulling out all the stops to organize a private lesson day with my primary instructor, Farrah Green. She'll be passing through Pepin on her way to the Midwest Horse Fair, and asked if I'd be willing to set a day up for her. That'll be Wednesday April 15th, weather permitting. I still have two spots available, Cost is $115/90 minute lesson, and well worth every penny. Farrah's incredibly knowledgeable and ready to share! If anyone from our area (MN/WI or otherwise) is interested, please let me know!

Other than that, life is good. Plans are slowly but surely coming together. I'll try to keep this as UTD as possible as we go along here.

Until next time, savvy on!

Steps in the Right Direction

Much to my relief today, I was able to attend my lesson I had set up with Farrah. We loaded up (Prin actually loaded herself-lol) and drove out to Stillwater to our mutual friend Michelle's barn. Prin was her usual charming LBI self, lacking motivation, etc, etc.

We started out by basically disecting the problem into "Which principle game is broken?"--both driving and porcupine in Prin's case. Or rather, not broken, in the case of the driving game, but confused. What it breaks down to is this: Prin has a respect issue going on in zone 1 porcupine game: "No, I don't have to yeild to that pressure." Sounds like a simple enough problem, but Farrah pointed out something really amusing that I do that DOES NOT help. In her words "Now, Fran, don't get me wrong, you have been trained REALLY WELL, Pat would be SO PROUD, and I bet you never get rope burns because of it, but you NEVER CLOSE YOUR HANDS! Like I said, it's GREAT. You allow a horse to drift. But in the case of Prin, here, You NEED to keep a firm grip UNTIL she gives, then you can give. Otherwise, she leans and gets away from you." This whole thing became a huge laugh during the entire lesson. Periodically, Farrah would randomly shout "FRAN! HANDS!" and I'd have to grasp again.

Now, back up a second and let's get serious; doesn't Linda say something along the lines of NEVER RELEASE ON A BRACE? I had NEVER thought of that phrase in this context before, but it made PERFECT sense. When I held, it was only a matter of time before Prin relaxed and released! Of course.

We played with finding a rhythm and intention in my phase 4, because to be quite honest, Prin has never taken it seriously, even though she never really WANTS to be swatted, she kind of shakes it off after one and goes on ignoring me. What Farrah had me do was instead of touching Prin once, she had me touch her with the intention of touching her 3 times (or more if needed). If she got out of the way, great, if not, smack, smack, smack on her zone 5 until she skedaddled. Didn't take long. What this built was a really snappy send and some attention, which carried into a much more quality allow. All while paying attention to whether my horse was leaning on the halter, using herself, etc. When she made the slightest effort at purity and decent movement, she came and got rubbed to death. Amazingly, this was enough--I didn't have cookies, but she loved her scratches...something about proper position and timing rings in my head here...

Now, all this while, we'd been playing at the walk/trot on the 12' line. We bumped it up to the 22' line next, and we started playing with heading into the canter. At first, again, Farrah had me playing with trot, only this time, we added a change of direction for two reasons--first, to practice with my snappy departs/leaning issue (I was supposed to do these changes of direction without opening my hands) and also to get Prin to sink back and engage her hindquarters, preparing her to depart into a canter. This went well, and soon enough, Farrah asked me to ask her to canter...And here's where it all adds up. While keeping my hands closed, I had to keep a good rhythm in my effective phase 4, while trying to accept a try and release after she quit bracing.

While I wouldn't call it a miracle session, I'd say it was a start. After playing at the canter for 1/2 an hour, Prin was maintaining for 2-3 laps with me basically neutral. Still not totally there, but MUCH improvement, and more effort from my horse than I'd EVER seen before--even in her "I'll do 14 laps" phase, and the look on her face said it all. Huge hugs to Farrah for helping through this puzzle. I think I've got some good things to play with until we leave for our course. Can't wait to watch the improvements!

Here's a general overview of my notes. Most of this is included within the story, (but these will be easier to follow):

*Pressure on Z4/Z5 means forward as well as disengage/sideways

*Porcupine trouble on Z1--CLOSE HANDS!!! Don't release on a brace

*Bring back when horse falls into a good rhythm/cooperates

*Keep at a managable distance (6-8 feet) until responsive--bring it back in if it regresses

*If it EVER gets unmanagable, SHORTEN ROPE

*Snappy send=snappy allow=snappy bring back

*Rhythmic intention w/ Phase 4--3 slaps as opposed to 1, stop when she puts efford into forward motion vs. sideways

*Do change of direction into canter

*KEEP HANDS CLOSED--Changes of direction especially

*Quicker phases--point, lift, swing, touch, touch, touch.

*Reward WAY often. FRIENDLY FRIENDLY FRIENDLY!


That's all for tonight, folks. let me know what you think!

Clinic Break-Thrus

Okay, so I think instead of writing a full clinic recap (too much happens in a week to retell and give justice to in print), I'll just write about my BIG break-thrus that I personally had with Prin at the clinic Katie and I attended last week, and if I have time, I'll fill in with a broad recap.

I'm just going to start off by saying that this is just NOT my year for car care! Guess what happened today! My car broke down driving to Kris Fulwiler's place to audit a Karen Rohlf clinic! Not only did I miss the clinic, but my fuel pump may need replacing. YARGH! (more on that later) Anyway, with that out of my system...

I took Prin along with me to a week long clinic series with Farrah, and just had a fantastic time. The break thrus we had were mainly physical (okay, so the mental changed and the physical followed, but STILL!) and were HUGE.

Starting off, Farrah asked to use Prin early on to demonstrate a figure-8 pattern. Prin did great, but then did something mildly rude (don't remember what) and Farrah asked her to back up in response. Well, Prin completely flipped her the finger, figuratively speaking, and wouldn't back off, so Farrah REALLY got after her, and that's when she met Prin's swishing tail habit. After much energetic play and observation, Farrah turned to me and says "Does she do this a lot?" and I said "Um, yeah? I'm fairly sure I've mentioned it several times." and Farrah says "Hmm...It's interesting, it's almost like she's unaware that she's doing it! I'd say it was negative attitude, but 99.9% of the time, her ears are forward, and she's asking questions, but her tail is going." I responded with "I've noticed that! I have had trouble reading into it for exactly that reason. The tail isn't fitting the rest of the picture. It's almost like a nervous twitch that she's unaware of."

So, Farrah suggested that instead of playing friendly up front after I finished a game, I go straight back and love on her TAIL, to help her be more aware of it. So I did, and realized after one try that her tail was TIGHT! Which didnt' make any sense at all. I checked, and her lips were loose, ears floppy, head down, and yet, for some reason she bottled all this physical tension in her tail. So after every time I did something, I'd go back and massage her tail until it was loose and "Jello-y" as Farrah put it. Later on in the afternoon when everyone else was doing 2 rein driving, I did 1 rein on her head, one rein (savvy string braided in) on her tail. The observation I made was toward the end of the day, she was hardly moving it at all, and if she did, it was really at an appropriate time (if my phases were too high, etc) Very interesting.

Later on in the afternoon, Farrah put us riding a Figure-8 pattern, but instead of keeping zone 1 closest to the barrel, we were supposed to keep zone 4 closest. That was TOUGH, because I discovered that Prin was HARDLY using her hind end, and falling on her forhand...A LOT. Once she figured it out though, it was like someone flipped a switch. We also played with alternating engagement with flexibility on the figure 8, and just had a lot of fun playing with the body. OH! and we straightened out a very resistant, forhand-based back-up from atop Zone 3.

So anyway, fast forward to the next morning. I went down to Prin's pen to clean up, feed, water, etc, and the first thing I noticed was the way Prin was standing. Taller, straighter, HQ farther underneath her, and generally looking more comfortable. Very odd, but kind of neat, I thought. I went around, cleaning up and filling buckets, and then something else dawned on me. Prin has had a block in her ribs on the left, and tension in her left stifle, and has had mane flips (majority of her mane lies on right) to mirror that for as long as I've owned her. That morning, the flip that had been there for 5.5 years at the base of her neck was GONE. THAT freaked me out. I flipped it back, thinking "Oh someone must have smoothed it out this morning saying hi." Nope. Looked all wrong. Like it had never been there.

As the week went on, Prin just got more and more uphill, to the point I took out two shims from her pad! Her ability to collect, flex, bend, and engage went THROUGH THE ROOF, and the final night we were there, she offered me about an arena's length of true extended trot, which previously wasn't even in her ability to do in the PASTURE, let alone with a rider, and she also jumped a 3'6" or 4' tall cross-country fence bareback for me. And what's really neat is that since being home (tomorrow will be 4 days) the mane and posture has stayed, and the tail swishing is definitely going down! YAY!

So...HOW COOL?! Oh, and I also had the opportunity to test ride a Balance Zenith for a couple hours one day. Definitely like my fluidity better, but the Balance was VERY lovely too. Might think about selling my Wintec Wide and finding an inexpensive (haha, RIGHT) Balance.

So anyway, thats just some things we picked up. VERY helpful, even with Crest in some areas. And now...*poofs* I go to bed. Thank you all for being so patient and waiting for me to write something :)