Decision Time

As estimates start to come in for materials, equipment, construction and utilities, we start to rethink our plans from top to bottom.

- Bobble Jo Lieberman

After we spent a few weeks at our new property near Pie Town, New Mexico, in October of last year, my husband Kenny and I came home to Texas filled with ideas and inspiration to make our dream ranch come true. We spent many a winter’s evening sifting through building plans and weighing the relative merits of what to build and where and in what order to build it.

As we would discover over the course of the next several months, keeping a flexible outlook was essential for both our sanity and making good decisions.

We’d planned to return in March to meet with local builders and move forward in hopes of spending the summer in the high country with our riding horses. We were delayed, however, and didn’t make the 800-mile journey back until May. We brought two of our endurance horses--- Annakate and Jazz---with us, along with building plans crafted by Kenny using a program called SketchUp.

Upon our arrival, we were delighted to discover that our perimeter fence was complete, along with a main entrance double-gate and a secondary “cowboy” gate. A few days later, we saddled up the horses to ride the fence line. The four-strand twisted wire fence was strung tightly and expertly. Corner posts were rough-hewn wood, and

T-posts were used for the long stretches. I made a mental note to pick up a couple hundred T-post caps on our next trip to town.

Annakate and Jazz seemed to enjoy the mountain views and fresh, cool air as much as we did. One of our main motivations for relocating from Texas to New Mexico is climate. Escaping the heat and humidity of southern Texas for the higher elevations and cooler air of