When I say tight leg...

Busy Friday

The kids were out of school today. It was a busy work day around the farm. We rode in the morning. Tansey was sound walk/trot. Yippee!!! It's been a very long road back to sound after she scraped her leg. We will take it a bit easy to be sure she is good to go for the next show.

I delivered Maje and Zee to their new home today. They both seemed very happy.

Tomorrow is another full day. We have the show group lesson in the morning. Followed by a well deserved trail ride for a show students sister. I have a new boarder coming to check us out as well. Then it's off to look at a new horse for myself. Finishing off at the auction tomorrow night. I need to pick up some cheap equipment and am ready for a new rescue.

Sunday following church we are planning to clear more fence line. If anyone wants to bring over their chainsaw to help. All are welcome.

Backwards anyone??

Watch closely...

Lorenzo : the Flying French Man...
Uploaded by alatebo

Barn Improvement

Since last week was spring break I thought it would be great to have the kids free to help Beth and I get everything moved to the show grounds. I was wrong. I totally underestimated the efficency of the routine Beth and I have establised. We took a total of 10 horses with us this weekend. That meant two trips for Beth with the big trailer. We got running behind on time and she almost missed a session at LEAP.





The Friedman's prepared our team dinner instead of us all going out to eat this time. They made a wonderful salad with pears, and sugar coated nuts (Diane knows what a sweet tooth I have). Spaghetti with meatballs, and sausage grinders with not one, but two types of sausage. The food continued throughout the weekend with french toast and sausage for breakfast, chicken salad pitas, and more each day.

Saturday was a day of highs and lows. Kenzie showed for the first time. She was adorable in her dress clothes and little saddle on Pickles. We made two laps before we were asked to reverse. K was talking a mile a minute saying she wanted to trot, canter, and "jump that fence". After the reverse she promptly threw her reins down and announced she was done. She had to tell the judge the name of her pony. She received her first ribbon and a small stuffed pony for a job well done.

Sean won his equitation class and took a reserve champion in his division. Paula had a stellar Saturday, and rode to the best of her current ability. Sadly the competition was a hair better in most of her classes. She did bring home seconds in her jr/am hunter division. I was very proud of how well she rode. We did have a few mishaps and learning curve moments Saturday. We ended the day hoping for a much improved Sunday.

Sunday started with Sean and Kaijsa riding in the hunter hack. Sean only last week got Maggie to actually jump a fence. Kaijsa took second on Rosie in the hack and Sean was fourth. Everyone rode better. Nicole F. brought home points on Pip Squeek in the medal class. Nicole A. brought home her own horse. That's right her parent's bought Whistle for her as a birthday present.
Anita managed to improve her steering and speed on Sunday. Gia did a fantastic job on Pickles and showed him to his best. She pushed him out into a fabulous trot.

All in all I'll let the picture talk for itself. It is missing several seconds and thirds from Paula's riding on Saturday. They got left in my truck.

Next stop Ashley Hall show on the 13th. (We're not showing Sat.)

Spring Break... how wonderful

Well it has taken a couple of days for me to really make use of the extra help, but we've got the swing of it now.

We did a show kid jumping lesson first thing. It gave me an opportunity to make some final adjustments to who was riding/showing in what classes/divisions.

Then the kids tackled several projects including moving the feed room, so we can open up another stall spot for a boarder.



The next few days are going to be jam packed with show preperations so you probably won't see another post until the results go up.

Spring Break

Well first off I've been told I'm not posting often enough, so I'll try to be better. Secondly, it's spring break. I've been without husband or child for 2 days and had all sorts of grandiose plans, but ...
I've been busy rehoming horses instead. Big Jake left yesterday. He was adopted by a family in Alabama. I will put one of his going away pics up shortly. He will be joining one of his former pasture mates, so I'm sure will be quite happy.

Then today someone came to look at Maje who was for sale, and is going to take both her and Zee. I will be delivering them both next Monday.

With Zee leaving I will be looking for a lesson horse or two. I have my eye on one at USERL. I'm waiting to hear if she is available.

As for big projects so far I've gotten some tack cleaned, trash hauled to the dump, and my tack trunk cleaned out. Speaking of hauling trash to the dump Paula managed to get herself lost in route to the Huger dump today. Talk about a challenge. Huger only consists of 2 intersections. Tomorrow may not be much more productive. I pick Kenzie up in the morning. Since she's been gone for 2 days I may have a hard time getting her to school. She may just have to hang out at home with me. We'll see.

That's about all the news for now. I'll try to post more regularly again.

Dust bowl 2008

Man is the wind blowing today. I miss the midwest where we can water an arena to keep the dust down. It's crazy out there today. Here are some pics of the midday lesson today.

We're gearing up for the Pinto show next weekend. Man are we taking a crew. If I'd been more on the ball we could have reserved and filled an entire barn aisle. Instead we are going to have the majority of our normal aisle and a couple of stalls the aisle behind us. We will have to put tack trunks in the aisles this time in front of the stalls. Even with two tack stalls we're going to be crowded.

We're taking a total of 9 horses and 13 riders. It was going to be 14 riders, but someone realized this week they have a schedule conflict. Miss Beth and I will be making 2 trailer trips to get all of the horses across town. We'll take the difficult loaders down first to be sure we have plenty of time to load them. This will be my daughters first show. She'll be showing leadline on the new pony, Pickels.

Miss Diane is planning a menu so everyone will be sure to eat well. We're having everyone pitch in a few dollars to help defer the costs.