Christmas Card Time!

By this time all of the Thanksgiving leftovers have hopefully been ate, and maybe you've even put up your Christmas tree! Well RHD is making it easy for all of the busy moms to cross another item off their "to-do list" this holiday season with our custom holiday photo cards. Visit http://www.ranchhouseinvitations.com/ or click here to get started on your custom cards.

Personally, I like to choose a few of my favorite photos from the year to include on my card. Through our affiliation with Tiny Prints, we are able to offer totally custom, personalized holiday cards made especially for you. Upload your photos, type your custom text, choose what font you like, choose your colors, etc. You can even make your photos black and white or sepia tone to give it that nostalgic look. It's your card....make it as special and as creative as you want.

Here are a few more of my favorite holiday photo cards. This design is a new style of Tiny Prints that offers unique photo collages, easily done at the click of a mouse. To get started on yours, just visit the Ranch House Invitations holiday page!

Won't Ride Sidesaddle....

It's no secret to anyone who knows me that one of my all time favorite ladies is Cherie Carrabba of Crockett, Texas. That's why I'm happy to recommend this book to anyone and everyone's who's been involved with showing livestock. This is a great book and I've been saving this blog for a while so I could publish it closer to the Christmas holidays as a gift suggestion.

This book is a collection of short stories written by Cherie Carrabba, a mentor to me and editor of The Showbox Magazine.

Last Christmas, my Dad got this book as a gift for each of us in the family. We even got autographed copies! As soon as we got the books, each of us including me, Catherine and my mom pretty much just stopped opening our presents and started reading the book. We couldn't put it down! We kept flipping around reading different stories and laughing about all of the great short stories Cherie talks about in the book. The stories are written from a stock show mom's point of view and many of the stories are ones that everyone can relate to. Since we grew up showing with Randy and Ryan Rash, lots of these stories bring back first hand memories of the shows we were at together. It's a GREAT book!

You can purchase the book online at http://cheriecarrabba.com/order.php. Happy Reading!

Purple Banner Designs

In keeping with our Christmas gift hints for livestock people, here is another great idea for that little showman in your life!

Purple Banner Designs is a business created by Bethany Cooler, sister of Josh & Katie Ramsey of J3 Cattle. Bethany came up with this cute line of custom apparal for little showman. She has a variety of options including t-shirts and jackets that feature livestock.  (We've even got her a Brahman cutout to use!)

To order your Purple Banner Design, just go to Bethany's web site at http://www.purplebannerdesigns.com/. You first choose what cutout you want (i.e. steer, tractor, Brahman, etc) then you choose the pattern you want from her extensive pattern gallery. Oh and let her know the size shirt you want. And that's it! It's' super easy and totally customized for you. Each shirt is hand-sewn by Bethany.

These shirts have been a huge hit recently on Steer Planet. They are so adorable, any little livestock person would love them! So order early for Christmas at http://www.purplebannerdesigns.com/

Congratulations Bethany on this very unique idea! I've already ordered 5 for my little Brahman cousins :)

Wild West Trailer Sales

In the past year we have started working on advertising campaigns for several of the nations leading trailer manufacturors and dealers. We've done work for Sundowner, Neckover, and now this month we are happy to create a new web site for Wild West Trailer Sales.

Wild West Trailer sales is based out of Lewiston, Idaho and builds their business on the philosophy of providing top of the line trailers at everyday low prices. They carry Sooner, Exiss, and Miley trailers exclusively, and chose these brands because these companies offer nearly 40 years of research and development by the founding fathers of aluminum horse and livestock trailers.

At Wild West Trailers, you'll find quality components, industry leading designs, and low price points give you some of the best built trailers in the industry that can last a life time. Wild West Trailers are eager to assist you in every aspect of your next trailer purchase. They also offer trailer service. Check out their web site for their featured products as well as updated specials.

Welcome Wild West Trailer Sales!

Salacoa Valley Farms - Georgia

If you love powerful Brangus breeding bulls, you will definitely want to check out the new web site that we recently designed for Salacoa Valley Farms of Fairmount, Georgia.

Salacoa Valley Farms is one of the nations leading registered Brangus ranches, and offers top of the line genetics matched with a great customer service program that is very popular amongst commercial producers in the southeast. As SVF's owner David Vaughan comments, “We have a long history of supplying seedstock to the beef industry and plan on having a lasting impact on the cattle business. We are dedicated to increasing market opportunity for SVF Genetics and profitability for our customers in the beef industry of tomorrow.”

I'm going to attempt to contain my excitement over RHD doing this web site, because I'll be the first to say that I love Brangus bulls. Plus, I've always known of the SVF program because they are a premier Brangus operation, and as everyone knows, RHD likes to work with only the best producers! I guess I particularly enjoy following the Brangus programs because some of our V8 Brahman genetics were used in the initial creation of Brangus cattle and even today lots of Brangus breeders use our Brahmans for Brangus breeding-up programs.

The ladies in the RHD web division did a great job on this web site, and it is full of information about the upcoming SVF sales, bulls, and donors. Serious beef producers will love visiting this web site! So I hope you will check it out at http://svfbulls.com/.

HRM Simmentals, Iowa

It's been a great pleasure working with the Henderson family of HRM Simmentals in Wiota, Iowa. This is an excellent family of good ol' cow people who believe in being progressive contributors to the beef industry as well as good stewards of the land and cattle resources they manage.

The HRM mission is to produce commercially targeted seed stock that excels in functionality, efficiency, end product merit and customer satisfaction. The cattle at HRM must calve easy, grow fast, rebreed annually and provide desirable carcass characteristics. They believe in production, performance, and profitability.

HRM Simmentals is a founding member of the Iowa Beef Connection, which is a cooperative marketing group that connects cattleman to profitable SimGenetics.

One look at the new HRM web site and it's easy to see how the Henderson's have been able to build a successful family business focusing on their practical cattle that fit the needs of the beef industry. We invite you to check it out at http://www.hrmsimmentals.com/.

Thanks to Mike and family for choosing Ranch House Designs!

American Music Awards

This morning I had a urge to get to the office a little early this Monday morning. No, not because I had a major pressing deadline or anything, but because I had made a list of a few MUST DOWNLOAD songs that I saw last night on the American Music Awards. So my iTunes account was working in overdrive this morning as I began searching for my favorite songs I saw on the show last night.

I love music, and I love watching the celebrities and seeing what's new, what they are wearing, who they are dating, etc. etc. So last night was a real treat for me to watch the few hours of the live show.

So my first song download was "Empire State of Mine" by Jay-Z and Alicia Keys. I've been seeing this song in the top songs on iTunes but never actually heard it, becuase I listen to my iPod and not really a lot of radio anymore. I thought this song was awesome. First I wished that Sex and the City was still on, because I could just picture this song playing as a great ending to a show with Carrie and Big walking down some New York Street during Christmas. Then, I thought of the only person I know who actually DOES live in New York...Cari Rincker. If I lived in NYC, (which will never happen, I'm actually too intimidated by that big of a city to even travel there....) I could picture myself running in Central Park with that song playing in the background. I love the line "These streets will make you feel brand new; big lights will inspire you" - even though you could totally re-write that for our country living with something like the dirt roads and fresh air....because I would probably have a panic attack in NYC, but I do get my inspiration from living on the ranch.  Very cool song.

Next, I downloaded Bad Romance, Lady GaGa. If you saw her performance, all I have to say is W-O-W! How does she come up with her creativity!!! Catherine equates Lady GaGa with our generations Madonna. I don't understand how she just keeps coming out with these awesome songs, each one topping the other. Now Adam Lambert's performance, on the other hand, um....what was going on there? Same thing for Rihanna's outfit, first I thought, that outfit must be extremely uncomfortable with a thin strip of white material perfectly placed right over her crack. Then I thought...is she wearing underwear? But it was pretty cool when the laser's started going and it started hitting the spikes on her outfit.

I also loved the Black Eyed Peas performance. Since I recently colored my hair a little darker, I was happy to see Fergie going a little darker too. Oh another great one was Kelly Clarkson. I love that Already Gone song, and she sounded awesome. Did anyone else think Kate Hudson's boobs were going to fall out of her dress?

My biggest happiness of the night was for Taylor Swift. Everyone here at RHD is a big Taylor fan, and I just love her. Her sweet personality, her originality, her creativeness, and the fact that she is just so "real" makes her a great musician and a great young lady.

So my morning downloads....Empire State of Mind (Jay-Z), Half of my Heart (John Mayer/Taylor Swift), Bad Romance (Lady GaGa).