Smoky Hills RBA

Saturday morning found us up early and loading up rabbits at 5am to head out to Abilene. This show had been iffy for us. Jacob had a football game and wasn't home until 12:45am. We ended up going, but he slept all the there, and even took a nap in the truck in between showings.

Loading up rabbits at that hour, as funny as it sounds, is one of my favorite things.  There is an excitement in the air, the bunnies know something is going on.."They have CARRIERS OUT!"..and start begging at doors and running around their cages... Its fall, so the air is crisp and the stars are big and bright and breathtaking. The fox was behind our neighbors house, doing her "bark" and after a few wide eyed glances around, we figure she's probably out every night.

On the way to the show we passed the pink breast cancer awareness fire truck. I had seen this truck in pictures on peoples Facebook pages so it almost felt a little like a celebrity sighting. Its very cool and covered in signatures of breast cancer survivors.

Tristen took his Dutch for the first time ever. These are ones that had been born and raised in our barn and we've been itching to get them on the table.  His time and hard work, and a little frustration, paid  off!! In show A, his little black buck, Ricochet, won Best of Breed, and his little blue doe, Chanel, got the best opposite sex award.   In Show B,  Spencer, a tort buck, won Best of Breed, and Chanel took the best opposite again.

Chanel

Spencer

Ricochet

The best part of the day came at the very end. My "always along for the ride"  kid, stood around with his arms crossed watching the judge look over the BIS rabbits. I was standing next to a youth Havana breeder, chit chatting, when I saw the judge go back and pull out his Dutch. T wasn't paying attention, so I caught his eye, pointed, and suddenly his back got a little straighter and he was very interested in what was going on. ;)  He announced Ricochet has the 2nd Reserve in Show!! (3rd best rabbit at the entire show.)  Tristen got a balloon filled with cash as his prize.

Jacob had a wonderful day too! He and his friend, Maddie, dominated the Havana table. In both shows he was awarded Best of Breed with a frisky little broken doe named Fruit Loop.  Maddie won Best Opposite in both shows as well.
Fruit Loop also got a 2nd look over during the Best In Show judging, but no such luck this time!

Fruit Loop has a fun story. Her mother, Golly, was Jacob's very first Havana. She's special.  She has slowed down a little in her age, producing smaller litters,  and he had bred her this spring at least 3 times, but she hadn't taken any time. I told him that he could breed her one more time, but if she didn't take again, he would need to move her out of a brood cage to a smaller one, so that a mom that could have a litter could have hers. (Think moving from the house you've raised your kids in to a cute little retirement condo. ;) ) Anyway, he bred her and 32 days later Fruit Loop landed in her nestbox. Fruit Loop. Just Fruit Loop!  So being a singleton, she grew up fat, beautiful, and socialized, and was always loved on a little every day at feeding time!  The odds of her being THAT rabbit..well, the odds were pretty low. She's been fun to have in our barn! And Golly is still in her big cage.

We hadn't shown in 3 months, except for county fair, so we were so happy to be around our kind again.

Hope everyone has a fantastic week!