These Are a Few of My Favorite Things ...

This time of year brings many of my most cherished moments. I love the music, the hot cocoa, the lights and the warm feelings of good cheer that permiate the season.

My Moma jokes that I'm part crow because of my attraction to shinny objects so you know I go all out with any opportunity to decorate. My husband and I take pride in our holiday lights display at home.

I take no less joy in illuminating the Angeli Carriages. This year was even more exciting with the Cinderella Carriage (sometimes called the pumpkin top carriage).

Its design does create some decorating challenges, but also great creative opportunities.

My inspiration was a holiday favorite, the candy cane. So I wrapped red tulle around the white carriage stays of the pumpkin top, added green garland, large red bows, and covered the whole thing with white lights.

It looks like a giant glowing orb rolling down the street and think it is quite the eye catcher.

A City Worth Seeing

So I often tell people that I never really SAW downtown Austin until I began training to drive carriages. For nearly two years, I worked at a restaurant on 6th Street where carriages frequently parked.


Having fallen in love with one of the horses, I began to train as a Coachwoman. It was during this time that I first began to SEE the city of Austin.


The first European settlers moved to the area in 1831. By the 1860's, the little metropolis had become the capital of Texas. One decade later the railroad brought on a boom in construction that is still evident today.

Many of those grand old buildings have been preserved and stand proudly amid the modern skyscrapers and contemporary condos of downtown Austin. The juxtaposition of these combined structures still intrigues me.


The attention to detail in the unique facades of the older edifices is beautiful next to the clean reflective lines of new buildings.

I also love driving the carriage down the street and knowing that in some ways things are still just as they were a hundred years ago. Austin is both bustling and romantic, a charming must see combination.

Tips from Thibs: Tip #1 - Improvise to Accessorize

Even though the distance from country Horse Home to our downtown Carriage House is short, we always provide a little hay for ride. Now most ponies think that hay nets are for eating from, but our Thibs has devised another use for his.





When we arrived downtown Saturday afternoon, we opened the trailer door to find Thibs had finished his hay. And there he was, peering calmly over at us, hay net draped jauntily over one ear. And he does look good in red!









He almost dozed off as we scrambled to get the camera to capture these shots. Note, Thibs doesn't recommend this accoutrement for all ponies!

Riding a giant

I rode Cormier for the first time. I have to say that I can’t wait to do it again! The view from that high off of the ground is exceptional. I would prefer to have a saddle for the simple reason that if he even tripped I would have a six foot drop to the ground. Should he do something slightly more exciting to remove my presence from his back side, I could only wave to him on my way to the ground. Thank goodness Cormier is a gentle giant!

He is great for cuddles too, although we have noticed that when we hug him this way in the paddock he is prone to forget that you are there and may amble on, inadvertently going over you. When you remind him that you are there he looks down at you, all sweetness and surprise, and sniffs at you again. I call him a big lug and go back to sharin’ the love.

I am special ordering a bridle and riding pad for him. Because of his enormous size, local tack shops don’t have equipment that fits him. In our first ride, he was a good boy, although we had to turn in several circles near the tack room before he realized that I really did mean to go somewhere other than backwards.

When we got out of sight of the other horses he called to them. Feeling his whole body quake from his call made me burst into laughter. He also did a pretty little prance on the way back to the barn.

So what is it like to ride the white whale? It is amazing. I’d like to do some trail riding although I'm not sure I’ll be taking Cormier on trail rides. Not unless I want to trim the trees with my head, anyway!

Rain plus Dirt plus Thibodaux equals…

So people have asked if we have to bathe the horses and if so then how long does it take? The answer to the first part of the question is yes, the horses must be bathed nearly every day they work. The second part of the question is not so simple. It takes anywhere from thirty minutes to two and a half hours. Why such a range?


Exhibit One today will be Thibodaux. The first photo shows Mr. Mud Pie happily eating dinner, but you don’t get the full effect at this distance.

Check out the close up … yes, that is hay stuck in the dried mud on his hind leg. On this day he decided that maybe pigs had something to that whole wallowing in the mud thing and quite possibly he had been born into the wrong species. There is a small run off pond in his paddock that fills during any substantial rain. When the sun comes out it begins to dry up. Thibi and his sister, Evangeline, loved it best in its muddiest phase.


Evangeline getting ready to roll in the “mud hole”.

So the cleaning process begins.

First, we pick out the feet. This removes any dirt or tiny stones that might have gotten stuck under their hooves. I will be posting a whole blog about this soon. Exciting, I know. Try to restrain your anticipation. No, I jest. It will actually be really cute.

So we start bath time with a rinse. You can see a small white spot where the spray from the hose has started?

And the water continues to work its magic.




Boy, was he dirty!

After the water comes shampoo and conditioner for his mane and tail. A full body scrub with very sudsy water paying extra attention to his legs and feathers (the long hair near the base of his legs.)

This is followed by more rinsing. Then comes the fun part. Braiding. This is where the greatest amount of your time can be spent. A simple braid in the mane and tail will take about 15- 20 minutes depending upon dexterity. More ornate braids or hair-dos can take up to an hour especially if you add in flowers or ribbons.

And then Presto! You have a beautiful, clean Thibodaux; all shiny and ready for his harness. Man, I love that “new-pony” smell. I can’t even count the number of times that people have come up to sniff our horses. It makes all the hard work worth it when you run your hands over their soft warm bodies and know the difference between the before and after. As I get them I will post more photos of our handy work on our life sized My-Little-Ponies.

From 0 to 7 in under three.

So for my first blog I thought I might begin by saying hello, and thank-you for sharing a moment with me. Last December this was all a fantasy, a daydream if you will, about how great it would be to be out on my own in the world of horse drawn carriages. Initial steps towards this end had been taken but it never got very far until one day when all the pieces just started to fall into place almost by chance.



One week I am driving to work at another carriage company, and talking to a friend about how wonderful it would be “if only”, and the next week I see an advertisement for a carriage company for sale. We inquired, emailed and phoned a lot, and before we knew it the whole kit and caboodle was on its way from Utah to us!



Likewise, my wish of having a spotted driving team was also fulfilled as I found a lovely pair in North Carolina. More emails and phone calls, and they too were on their way to Texas.

Since then, the road from just owning horses and carriages to having an operating business, has been a laborious one, but I wouldn’t trade a minute of it (except maybe for a bit more sleep). I can’t remember ever working so hard, but I can promise you that the rewards have never been so many.



I couldn’t have done this on my own though and this is where I owe a huge thank-you to so many of my friends and family. From building fences and stall walls, feeding horses and shoveling poo, to setting up bank accounts, purchasing a truck and teaching me how to pull a BIG trailer, to this very website and the business card that likely led you here, people have come out in mass to support Angeli Carriages. Owning my own business, working with horses has been my dream and I know it will be a great success.



As for the heading of this little tribute, well that is a glimpse of how far we’ve come is such a short time. We have gone from having zero horses and no place for them to tending seven, including the horse who shares her lovely home with my babies; and we did it all in under three months. Just think of what we can do in one year!

With high hopes for the future this is me, Fiona Siciliani, President of Angeli Carriages, signing off.

Fiona

P.S. Check back for regular blogs including the comical goings on in our herd. Since they sometimes act like they’re in a soap opera, I’m calling my blog “As the Herd Turns.” They do make us laugh!