Rolex purchase

I always have a great time at Rolex, it's like Mecca for eventers.  Without a bunch of things on my shopping list I was struggling to burn through the money in my wallet, until that faithful moment.

I've been kicking around the idea of a new dressage coat.  I have one, but you can't have just one coat.  I wanted a navy one with sparkly buttons from Horze

I also looked at this coat from smartpakequine.com

both fantastic stretchy softshell coats that fit my wonderfully.

If any of you have been following my blog for awhile now (gosh I hope so) you'll remember this post from Xmas when I talked about a few of my "wants."

What's on your Christmas List?

I posted a stunning dressage coat from England with purple highlights.  Drool.

Imagine my surprise when I stumbled upon that exact same coat at VTO Saddlery.

I tried it on.  Fit me like it was made for me.  I put it down to think about it.  I milled about the shop.  I didn't NEED a coat.  Although it was WAY cheaper than a bunch of coats I've seen it's still a chunk of change and frankly I'm a bit stingy spending my money.

Then I had a moment of giddy weakeness and found myself carrying around the coat with a big stupid grin on my face.  Then checking out with the coat in hand.  MINE!!!!

I'm glad I did.  It's exactly me.

It's also popped  up EVERYWHERE.

Behind The Bit Blog  showcased it in a post.

It even showed up on the famous Eventing Nation

Now, will I ride well enough to deserve it?  Who knows.

Will I get extra points for wearing it?  "I'd give you a three for whatever the hell movement that was supposed to be, but stunning coat so here's a 5!"

and most importantly, can I find a stock tie to compliment it?!!!

This stock almost works, but it's cream and wouldn't match my breeches.

Rope Halters

Rope halters can be great tools in the right hands for natural horsemanship, remedial horses, or pretty much anything.  They are unbreakable, washable, and provide the right amount of give plus bite just when you need it.  

I have a plain ol one at home, and there are a couple attached to Parelli style leadropes in the barn, but I wanted one that was a little bit special.  Some sort of extra detail that set it apart from other halters.  

I found this great Ebayer.  Her prices were very reasonable, she had lots of options, and she has this unique way of adding accent cord on the ends to make the halters special and pretty. 

http://www.ebay.com/usr/thehandmadehomestead

She's even willing to do some custom work in special colors for you, has great communication, and loves to make people what they want.  I was very pleased with how my halter turned out.  I ordered one with riding rings so I could attach reins to it and use it more as a sidepull instead of using the fiador knot on the bottom.  I also had a chin strap added as using it as a sidepull sometimes causes the halters to swing around on their heads.  The chin strap is removable and adjustable.  I also like the accent on the nose which takes away some of the bite since I don't have control problems with Annie.

Here's Annie modeling her new halter.  

Heartland Wrap Up

First show of the season is over and out of the way!

First up we had dressage.  Annie was braided and looking semi spiffy, her winter coat went all curly when I gave her a bath on Friday.  I have no idea where my chestnut thread went so I had to use black, but at least it stayed in.  I'm not taking a picture of her forelock until she gets over her refusal to have it braided so I had to do it while it was dry and her head was moving.

It was difficult to get Annie's concentration in warm up so I decided to take charge and be a rider and not a passenger.  I did lots of serpentines at the trot, did some leg yielding, worked on 4 strides of trot, then halt, then walk, then trot off again.  I wore my spurs to help her be more obedient to my leg.  I asked her to trot straight down the middle of the arena, halt, TOH to reverse, then trot off in the other direction.  I trotted figure 8s.  I had to work hard on getting an obedient canter depart when I asked for it, and to work to make her engage at the trot instead of sucking back and picking up a crappy canter to avoid the bit.

Annie went tense as soon as we set foot in the dressage arena and I worked hard at keeping her forward.  She did much better then I thought, the HHP  is a big and scary place.  I liked her trot work, I felt like she hid behind the contact and wasn't as forward as she could have been but I sensed tension under the surface and know if I kicked her in a confidence lacking moment she'd explode.

She picked up her left lead willingly and was nicely on the bit but I let her break when I got her too deep into a corner and didn't keep my leg on.

She had a very nice freewalk and a nice right trot circle but she was not feeling having to pick up her right lead in the scary arena so she let me know how she felt about that

She was also resistant to our downward transitions, which is something I knew coming in as I've only started trying to polish those up within the last week or two.  I went back over to the dressage warm up after I was done on the advice of my friend and I was glad I did.  It helped teach Annie that she wasn't done after dressage so no reason to hurry through it and I got a phenomenal trot lengthening.  On the bit, driving of the hocks, toe flipping, honest to God lengthen.

I got a score I figured I'd get but it's hard to be so far behind everyone else.  I feel like, as an arab, she gets double penalized for her head being above the bit, where a non arab gets "green horse" points.  When she's more on the bridle she gets penalized for having a "stiff neck" Even her freewalk where she reaches for the bridle all the way down and really swings forward with a huge overstride gets fewer points.

Show jumping warm up was CRAZY, I'm always nervous warming up for stadium and 90 people barreling around makes me woozy so I jumped 4 warm up fences and headed over.

I had to whack Annie into the stadium ring and then whack her several more times along our tour around the arena toward the start flags.  She's a cautious horse and would much rather stop and look at the spooky thing than barrel past it, which is great for staying on top, but not so great for forward motion.

She neatly jumped all her fences clean but powered back to the trot after almost every fence without my asking her.  I had to work hard to keep her moving in between the fences and to keep all four legs under me, I made lots of adjustments to keep her attention focused,  I did have a much better trot than I've gotten before, and a better trot even then when we have jumping lessons, but the canter was horrible.  I felt like I could have forced her into the canter but the rhythm would have suffered so I made the choice to let her pick her gait as long as she jumped clean.  Once she was lined up with a jump she was "ohhh I understand why I'm out here."   In my lessons she has this bold "let's get down to business" canter that's easy to ride and I know she's on a mission and I have nothing to worry about.  She's never as confident at the HHP as she is at LAZ's barn and I feel like I should help support her and not chase her.

Still I couldn't help feeling like I was letting people down by not cantering around the course.  The fences were no problem, they were ridiculously tiny.  So why can't I get it together?  I saw plenty of people who had no business in the division they were in barreling around or riders stronger than I am shoving their green horses around the course so why can't I?  Here I am wanting to move up to BN and I'm trotting around the course.  In the end it didn't matter as I was dead last after dressage anyway and stadium wasn't timed.

After I was done I went and walked the BN showjumping course and all the fences looked doable except one airy oxer, in fact I've been jumping bigger in my last couple lessons.  It wasn't a max course but it felt doable.

First show of the season

After a winter that just WILL NOT DIE (it was 75 yesterday and it's going to snow tonight!) I'm more than ready to go horse show.  Or am I?

Where are my boots?  Do they fit?

What do I wear, did I bother to clean my show coat from last year?

New Dressage tests?  What new dressage tests!  Many thanks to Cobjockey for mentioning it because I would not have bothered looking.  I've been doing BN A for the last 15 thousand years and I had it memorized.  I think Annie had it memorized too.


OMG, my horse is mostly dirt and hair.  She looks like a clydesdale her legs are so hairy, her mane is filthy, her ears have sprouted tufts, and there is a layer of hay in between the hairs of her mane.  I have part of her mane braided in an attempt to train it over to one side but all the loose bits just stick straight up in the air.  Plus she keeps rolling in the mud.

Will it be warm enough to give her a bath?  Is there enough hot water for a 3 hour bath?

I've had two really great jumping lessons that are going to set me up for a good round at Starter and a move up to BN.  My instructor has taken it upon herself to push me, which sounds like a great idea until she starts making the fences bigger.  So I just try  not to look at the fences.

Sunday was a gymnastic day.  We built off one big gymnastic then added several other jumps that had canter placing poles in front of them.  A challenge for me, I hate lots of poles.  If you hit a bad distance to one then you cathunka down the rest of the line.  What started off as a sea of poles eventually turned into:  pole, pole, jump, pole, pole, jump, bunch o poles, jump. A one stride to a two stride ending in a sizable oxer.  Then around the corner over a couple more poles, a jump, bending line over two more poles and a jump, jump a single, jump the bicycle fence, then a long gallop to the scary wave fence (LEG LEG LEG LEG).

It was a challenging day, I want to override in gymnastics and my instructor wanted me to keep my hands on Annie's neck and make adjustments with my legs.  Eeeepppp.

Cantering down to the wave fence was a challenge. Annie had popped over it deconstructed two weeks ago, but here it was fully assembled and we barreled down to it.  I debated trotting then decided to just wing it and canter down to it.  Keep your leg on!  Don't look at the fence!

 She took a peek and jumped it a bit big (for her) but didn't think about stopping.

It was a good confidence building lesson before our show.  Now, to worry about that bath.

Spring is Springing?

The winter that never ends seems to be continuing on right through spring here in Indiana.

I've been able to put more consistent rides on Annie and even had a jumping lesson a few weeks ago in which Annie seemed to have not missed a beat but where I looked like an idiot (although I always look like an idiot so maybe I have not missed a beat).

Last Sunday I got a spur of the moment call from a friend who asked me if I wanted to go on a trail ride.  As I was sitting in my PJs eating a bowl of CocoWheats and a mug of tea of course I said yes!

We both thought it was a little bit chilly when we tacked up but the parking lot was full of people there with their mountain bikes and children of assorted ages.  Turns out it was a brisk 35 degrees.  Apparently 35 degrees feels warm enough for taking your horse/child/bike out for a spin, an indication that everyone was used to those -14 degree days.

I thought that Annie did really well, she's a funny horse.  She isn't terribly BAH!!! spooky but she's more STATUE! spooky.  If she wasn't sure that a rock/tree stump/person was a danger to herself or others she'd freeze like a statue and stare at it.  Once she decided it wasn't a threat she moved on.  I worked on both letting her figure things out for herself and reinforcing that forward meant FORWARD! by using my stick.  She grew more confident and was soon trotting down the trail (occasionally slamming to a stop to STATUE!) and did some "hand galloping" in the lead as well.

A good experience to get her out of the ring and to work on her obedience, her trust, and her bravery.  All important things for an eventing arabian.

Here's Annie posing on the trail.  Notice the purple biothane bridle.  REQUIRED equipment for an arabian on the trails.

Moooo

It's nice to have friends who encourage you to do potentially stupid things on horseback.  A friend of mine was taking her all around arabian mare back to another "intro to cows" clinic with a localish trainer.  Due to the Worst Winter Ever her clinic was moved and several people ended up having to cancel, leaving a last minute opening for me at Turning Point Equine Center with clincian Ed Chambers.

Take Annie to a clinic full of cows having never seen a cow before when I've ridden her 5 times in the month of January and once in the month of February?  Sure, what could go wrong?

First I started off with some visual aids in an effort to explain to Annie what a "cow" was and what "cutting a cow" was.  I hoped that this was enough to not give her a stroke when she saw her first cow.

 

Then we actually had to get there.  We were supposed to go Friday afternoon but our "light dusting" turned into 5 inches of snow and the trip was postponed.  Driving up Saturday morning at o dark thirty we were very glad we hadn't tried to head up Friday night.  No way in heck would we have made it.

 

When we got there I had to hitch Annie up on the rail next to her first mules.  Notice how concerned she is and my total lack of any sort of cow appropriate western tack.  Oh well.  Her biggest bother is that gosh darned slow feed hay "prison" that is keeping her from getting to all the hay as fast as possible.

 

 

 

Here's a view of the entire arena from the clinician's website.  At the far end is an extra set of panels that fences off about 60 feet across and inside of that is another little pen to contain the cows.  The arena is heated by a wood burning stove outside so it was toasty warm. 

 

 

The clinician made sure everybody knew that Annie had never even SEEN a cow and we were the scheduled entertainment for the day.  Awesome. 

 

First they bring the cows in from the pasture into a fenced off area and then put them in a little tiny pen inside that fenced in area.  Annie stared and stared and stared but at least she didn't try to run away.  Then we got to into the bigger pens with the entire group and sniff the cows through the fence up close.  Annie had to get a lead from a buddy horse to get within ten feet of the safely contained cows.  Then they let one cow loose at a time into the fenced in area and a horse goes into that area to "track" the cow.  They wanted the horse to keep his eye on the cow the entire time and to follow it closely around the arena.  I let Annie watch for a LONG time.  She was mesmerized and I had no idea her neck was that flexible as she refused to let the loose cow out of her sight.  I also hoped that having her watch the other horses not get eaten would bolster her confidence.

 

Eventually it was Annie's turn and she had to face her demons/cows.  We had to get a lead into the fenced in area and a lead up to the loose cow.  The clinician used us as a demo of building confidence in our horses around cows.  Using his horse to block the fenced in herd and push the cow out to us so we could move it around.  He noticed that she ok facing the one cow on her own from a safe distance but the herd of cows was too much to handle.  Annie grew braver and braver and was quickly trotting after the cow trying to sniff it.  Then she put her teeth on it to find out what happened.   That cow RAN.   After that the clinician had us back off the cow because he wants to leave the horse at the height of his confidence and wanting more. 

 

After everyone would work a cow the cow had to be herded out of the big pen, across the open arena, and into a roundpen at the other end.  The waiting horses formed a corridor and tried to keep that cow from getting loose and helped herd it into the roundpen.  I let Annie follow the cow a bit as it passed each time to build her confidence.  After we'd worked all the cows and moved them to the roundpen we had to move all the cows back out of the roundpen, across the arena, and into the big pen.  I let Annie follow as close as she wanted as the other horses helped push the entire herd back where they came from. 

 

Next the cows were let out of their little pen into the big pen and we were supposed to go into the pen and with a partner move the cows around the pen in a figure eight. 

 

Annie entered the pen willingly with her friend but stopped dead 20 feet from the cows. The clinician said that she was now ok pushing around one cow but pushing 15 cows was a bit much and reminded everyone that she had never seen cows before.  Then Annie snorted and the whole herd moved.  Then she snorted again and the whole herd moved again.  Then Annie snorted a third time and it was like something clicked in her furry little brain.  THE COWS ARE AFRAID OF ME.  Then she advanced on the entire herd with her ears pinned.

 

The cows moved out of the way. 

 

She got even bolder and was soon pushing the entire herd of cows around the pen while the clincian told everyone how much her confidence had increased and how she now realized she could make the cows move at once.

 

We didn't exactly make our figure 8.  Moving cows around is a lot harder than it looks!!!

After that the cows were let loose into the entire arena and we were supposed to cut one cow from the herd and move them down the arena and through a set of barrels and back.  First, cows don't like to leave their cow friends, second, cows move FAST!

Here is Annie's second time facing the herd of cows.  She marched right into the herd and when they didn't move she started biting the cows.  Not exactly what I'm supposed to be doing but Annie's change in confidence was amazing.   It was really difficult trying to cut one cow out of the herd.   They stay glued together and Annie kept trying eat all of them whenever they got within eating distance.  We did eventually cut one cow out and then we had to fly down the arena after it to try and turn it back through the barrels in time.  I had a few seconds to admire the amazing trot she was giving me with her rounded back and arched neck fixed on the cows.

 

In between turns we were supposed to keep the cut cow out of the herd and keep the herd in line.  Annie took this job a little too seriously.  She didn't want to turn her back to the entire herd and she got a little worked up and kept stepping out of her spot and going after cows that she thought got too close.  A few times a cow came running right toward us at top speed and Annie not only stood her ground but advanced toward the cow with her ears back and her teeth clacking shut. 

Here's a picture of everyone at the end of the clinic.  You can see we're the only two horses there in english tack although at least my friend has her trail saddle!

 The clinician was very complimentary about Annie and how quick she caught on to cow work and we got lots of compliments from the rest of the people there who said that she was well trained and we made a good partnership.  They were all amazed at how well she handled the entire experience and I hope that she represented arabians to the western world.

On a side note I found it amazing that every single participant was wearing a helmet by their own choice and several were wearing air vests that they said they trail rode in on a regular basis.  Great to see other disciplines making the choice to be safe with their heads.

I'm really glad I got talked into going to the clinic and it was a welcome respite from the grind of this winter. 

 

Another arctic tundra update

This is a blog post about nothing.

I've not been doing any of this and it doesn't look like I'll be doing any of this for a long time.  This is the reason I don't make goals, because the thought of not reaching them sucks.  I had a major goal of coming out strong in the spring at BN but that is far and distant right now.  

I've been showing up at the barn in this

Not very attractive but it keeps me warm and surprisingly I work up a sweat when I'm bashing ice out of buckets.

Speaking of, I'm tired of bashing ice out of buckets so I'm getting creative.  I saw this great product online

From http://www.wildangelcozy.com/.  I know several people that have them and they work exactly as advertised.  Super idea but a little expensive for 19 horses.  

I found a homemade option at Thepitchforkchronicles.com and decided to experiment with my own version.

The buckets at the barn all sit inside bucket holders like this only permanent so you can't really wrap the buckets. 

So I decided to wrap the holder.   Project Keep Damn Ice out of Damn Buckets phase 1 is a failure.  Too much airspace between the insulated part and the buckets.

On to Phase Two - Cry to myself.