Little Dry Roping Club

This evening, the kids and I went to the last roping of the summer at the arena in beautiful downtown Cohagen.  There's a local roping club that meets there on Tuesdays and Thursdays...not EVERY Tuesday and MOST Thursdays...in the summer months.  They have round-robin ropings and kids events like goat tying, pole bending and barrel racing.

I took the Farmer's little camera and not my own Canon, which I regret, because there were hundreds of great shots that I missed; little details and wonderful roping pictures that my brain captured, but the little camera could not. 

It was a beautiful evening, in the 70's and calm, and the light was perfect. I've been missing the roping arena like crazy this summer for some reason and this was such a treat!

Here are the Green Bo-eez, and they are not going to be pleased with this photo, but that's the breaks. Maggie has called them "The Bo-eez" for just ever, and she's in love with T.J. (He's SO strong...batting of eyes, incline of head...) Poor kid. But she has good taste; you have to give her that. 

The Green Bo-eez, again.  Kendall is swinging his rope, T.J. is in the blue cap.  They are great kids and I'm trying to wrap my brain around the fact that Kendall is a Senior this year....he was 5 when the Farmer and I got married.

I love this shot, of the horse trailer, the dually pickup and saddle on the ground. 

Waiting their turn...

This is the way to watch a team roping! (See, Pop-Pops Bill? Angus has his cowboy hat! And a Red Raiders shirt, too....guns up!)

This is where I wish I'd had a faster camera with the big lens!

Kendall is going to be mortified at this photo, too. Sorry, man!

So blurry, but you can see that the heeler caught both heels and the flagger has already called the time, by the way the header is looking back and the slack in his rope.

Here are the poles for the pole bending...an event in which they don't actually physically bend the poles, but weave through them riding their horse.  I like the red-white-blue of the poles with the ropers in the distance.

There were two goats here, for the goat tying.  When they weren't "in competition", they were tied near the picnic table, where every kid in a quarter mile radius tried to throw them.  Here you see one of the little Murnion boys showing Maggie how to wrap the legs.  She took notes.

These are family evenings and there were moms, tiny babies, toddlers, preschoolers, high schoolers, dads, grandparents....it's fun to see everyone! This is taken next to the concession booth, that greyish building you see. The crow's nest is in the distance, where the timers and announcer hang out.

You are going to see some dirty, filthy, sticky, kids in the next few pictures...

The little girl in the light colored tank top, here is holding a hot dog that has been dropped a couple times in the dust. Which, really, is no worse treatment than it got in her dusty little hand. (And I hesitate to call her little top "white", because I'm not sure it ever will be again.)

Also, there's the frazzled goat...

This was one of the cleaner kids. Still, you see the remnants of popsicle on her face, the utter coating of dust.... 

Don't you just want to hug her? I just went ahead and did.

Building dust castles...

If they wanted the dust to stick together, they'd find an abandoned pop can with a little liquid left and pour it on top.  It worked.  It sure stuck. To THEM!

Here's Anne, "the Chef" as one of the kids called her.  The cool thing about this concession booth, besides the pretty cook: you can open a tab at the beginning of the roping season and pay for it at the end. Or, like we did, hand her a check and tell her to just fill it in at the end of the evening and she takes care of the books, bless her heart! So the kids go up and get food and we don't have to keep trying to come up with change. 

You could have sloppy joes, hot dogs, ham sandwiches, ice tea, pop, Icee-Pops...

it's a great way to feed the kids supper.

It was a wonderful evening!

Next time, I'm taking the big camera.  Watch out, Green Bo-eez!