Month: May 2014

I have owned and loved my Royal Rider Flex stirrups for over 4 years now with no complaints. Before they came along I had used HS 6 way irons for 9 years, and didn’t realize until I tried the RR just how unstable the HS had made my leg. It was love at first ride and we’ve been together ever since.

Of course now USEF has come along and thrown a wrench in our romance by no longer allowing black stirrups in equitation classes. Really this wouldn’t normally effect me much… my equitation is more reminiscent of Quasimodo than Lillie Keenan, but I have had my eyeball on some medal classes lately. Ya know, personal challenges outside of one’s comfort zone (ie masochism and terrible ideas) and all that. Our local circuit offers a medal at both 2’6″ and 3′, both of which are appealing enough for me to at least want to try it out a few times. Hence that would mean new stirrups. If I’m being really honest I also can’t blame it 100% on USEF – I have to admit that I’m a little “over” the black plastic look. Metal is just so much prettier and more classic.

I have had ankle and knee issues my whole life, and even just 5 minutes in regular stirrups makes my ankles feel like they’re on fire and I slowly lose circulation to my feet. My flexibility is also not that great (read: horrendous). I’ve had a lot of success with the wide footbed and really like the more cheesegrater-esque pad for stability. What I’m not sure about is if the “flex” part of my Royal Riders or the super lightweight composite really makes a difference for me. Hence why I have been ogling new irons like an indecisive lunatic for months now.

I’ve narrowed it down to a few options. I wish some genius tack shop out there offered a trial program on things like this, so I could get two or three different pairs at a time and compare them. Alas that’s not the case so instead I will become maniacally obsessive and take forever to make up my mind. We’re lucky I haven’t made an excel spreadsheet yet. Here are the finalists I’ve got so far:

MDC S Classic

These have the features I’m really looking for: metal, wide footbed, lots of traction. Do I need the 45 degree “forward stirrup positioning technology”? Not a damn clue. Would I like the fact that these have a little more weight to them, like a traditional iron? Also not a damn clue. At $150 I’d call these moderately priced.

Jin Kinko

Also metal, also wide footbed, also lots of traction. But these are aluminum. Again – do I like how lightweight my Royal Riders are or do I prefer more weight? Still not a damn clue. I do like that the footbed is slightly angled, that sounds helpful. But at $265, these things are expensive.

Equitaly Greep

If I were picking based solely on looks, these would be my winner. I think they’re pretty and sleek but still modern. Like the Jins these are lightweight aluminum. Still wide footbed, still super grippy. They ring in around $230… still crazy expensive, but not quite Jin crazy expensive.

Amidale Jin knockoffs

I’ve never been one to shy away from a good knockoff. These are also made of aluminum, have the wide footbed and lots of traction. I like that they offer a kind of a matte/flat metal coating so they aren’t super shiny. But as with all knockoffs the question is – are they comparable to the original or just a sad wannabe? The price on these is really appealing though at only $75.

Knowing me, I will waffle back and forth on this for months before eventually making up my mind. That’s my standard MO for any kind of “big” purchase. Then I’ll compulsively online shop to find the best price, so we’re not looking at any kind of immediate decision here. What do y’all think? What’s your favorite stirrup at the moment and why?

Before I get started on relaying how the long weekend went, I want to congratulate Carly S. on winning the One Horse shirt giveaway! Thanks everyone who participated. I hope if you didn’t win you will consider buying some shirts from onehorsethreads.com … I wore one of mine to the show on Friday and had several people ask me where I got it.

On to the weekend recap. I wish I could come back here and report that the show went fantastic and was all sunshine and daisies and happiness, but it wasn’t. I would be lying if I said I wasn’t super bummed and a little sad/upset. But I am one of those people who really focuses a lot on the negative and beats myself up to a bloody pulp, so I’m going to try to point out the good along with the bad here, even if only to help myself out a bit.

The Good – Henry schooled great on Friday. A little hairy eyeball at a random trash can or oddly placed standard but for the most part he was super in both rings, even amongst some really intense tragedy happening with other people. He jumped around everything just fine, maybe even a bit over-enthusiastically as he was pulling me around a little. Also, super fantastic Megan from The Tack Shop of Austin was able to ship my new Ogilvy pad straight to the show to make sure I would have it in time, so it was a little exciting to arrive and have that waiting for me. Alas, that’s a whole ‘nother bunny trail and I’ll have a full review coming up in the next few days.

The Bad – it was hot, humid, and Henry was a little screamy. He’s normally not a particularly vocal horse at shows, but he was letting loose with some really ear piercing ones. In general he just seemed not quite 100% settled.

The Good – On Saturday (henceforth known as the Longest Saddest Day Ever) we had a hunter class first. I had him entered in one hunter class and two jumper classes during the day, just to make sure he got in both rings at the height of the two night classes we were doing. He was pretty fussy about temporarily losing his “Bitless Henry” status and made himself a bit nervous chomping on the bit but he marched around pretty well and was 2nd in the 2’9″ warmup out of… a lot. Then over to jumperland and again he marched around the 2’9″ and the 3′ like a champion, although had a couple cheap rails. He just got a little flat and blah. It was still very very humid though and he doesn’t seem to handle humidity well so I just figured he needed a break. He got a bath and hung out in front of the fan for a while and had a few hours to recharge.

hunterland

jumperland

The Bad – He did not recharge. In fact, he just put on a sour attitude and decided he was done playing the horse show game. I still don’t really know quite what happened. I got him back out for the jumper classic and he was just pissed. He didn’t seem sore or particularly tired, just DONE. He gave me a big eff you to both the jumper classic (nope, I will not take a longish spot to a big oxer going into a combination just after passing the ingate) and the hunter derby (nope, I will not whoa in the line and still jump out of it). I ended up sitting on an oxer in the derby, which had taken until 11pm to run in the first place. So… that went well.

The Good – Um… he looked cute braided? (Thanks to fellow blogger Lauren of She Moved To Texas! Most of these pics are hers too.)

The Bad – His mood continued to Sunday. Still had a big ol’ grumpypants on when I got him out for his jumper classes. I had decided to add a 2’6″ and scratch the 3′ just to back it way down and make it easy for him. He stopped in the warm-up ring (what is happening??? says my now panicked inner self) and I ended up having to smack him. A barnmate passed me her whip for the 2’6″ class, just in case, and that sent poor little Henry brain over the edge. He jumped around super honestly, but at Mach 10 and I had zero control other than steering. He seems to think that stick = death and that means take off 15 feet away from everything and leave strides out. Here is the point of the horse show where I decided to quit while we were kind of ahead (alive).

“OMG SHE HAS A STICK!”

The Good – Well, at least we ended on an okay note? He jumped around everything fine again and seemed to understand that it’s still his job to jump the jump even when the distance isn’t perfect. And after I bathed him and gave him a bunch of cookies his personality seemed to be returning to normal… he had his head back over the stall door begging for love, instead of hiding back in the corner like he had been.

The Bad – Well obviously this was a big fat fail. We both lost confidence in each other somehow. I still have no idea what really happened. The horse I had from Sat night to Sunday morning was not my normal horse. I don’t know if the humidity just really wiped him out more than I realized or if he truly had a “I’m really green and overwhelmed, let me have a meltdown now” kind of time. He’s never done anything like that before so I’m at a loss as to what that was really about.

The Good – Regardless of what caused it, we’ll fix it. I think Sunday was enough to fix it really, but we’ll fix it more in the next few weeks. He is always such a good egg, this was completely out of character for him. We’ll also take a step back. Obviously he’s still got some kinks to iron out at his current level before he’s ready to take on anything more ambitious. We’ll go home, iron out those kinks, rebuild, and be back to try again another day. He’s still adorable and I still love him. No permanent damage done.

The Bad – I completely over-committed myself for the whole weekend. I got very little sleep last week, even less sleep over the weekend, and have had a cough/sinus issue that I haven’t yet been able to shake. I had the horse show on Friday, Saturday, Sunday and then on Monday I had a triathlon. Only the bike leg of a relay team, but still. Yesterday was an even EARLIER morning (5am on a holiday is just stupid) and even more physically taxing activity. I feel pretty dead right now and still have a nasty cough along with some really interesting stuff coming from my lungs.

The Good – My team won the female relay and we were the second fastest overall relay even against the men/co-ed teams. The fastest men’s team only beat us by one minute and I was the fastest female on the bike for any of the relay teams. I pedaled as hard as my dead horse show legs possibly could go, and left it all out there to the point where I was borderline blacking out when I staggered back to the relay pen and handed off the timing chip to our runner. But our win at least helped salvage a little scrap of my self esteem and dignity for the weekend. A little teeny tiny microscopic scrap.

If anyone needs me I’ll be wallowing in shame and regret for a few days until I manage to get over it and decide to move on. I already hid my feelings in a cream cheese kolache this morning and ate them. Because everyone has to be good at something.

On Tuesday we had our last pre-horse show lesson. I opted for a private since I’ve had so few lessons lately and was thinking a little one-on-one would be beneficial. The only slot available for a private was 6pm, and I usually get to the barn around 4:15pm to avoid traffic, so I had time to kill. I cleaned some tack, put my new charms on Henry’s bonnets, tidied up his mane a bit, curried him a few times, and clipped him up. I was really itching to clip his legs to the knee/hock but he’s super ticklish about them and I was afraid I’d get halfway done and be screwed, so I restrained myself to just some coronary band and fetlock clean-up.

Bonnet charm and no more whiskers

I finally succeeded in wasting enough time and dragged Henry to the ring (“Mom, it’s hot, let’s just stay in here and eat cookies.”) and warmed up. Then we did a few quick and easy warm-up fences, a little warm-up course, then the jumps went up to 3′ and we did a few harder courses. One with hard turns, one with longer slightly downhill approaches (stay at one pace, whaddyamean?), etc.

There were a few main themes that emerged:

1) I really should make a decision and stick to it. Any decision. Just don’t sit there in fetal position and constantly change my mind and confuse the hell out of both of us.

2) My horse, although only 7 and pretty green, is well on his way to being a saint.

3) When I sit up and focus, it’s amazing how well things work out.

To the first point – most of the time I see a spot. Maybe not a great spot, but usually I can at least see whether I’m going to die or not. But when I don’t see anything, I have one of two standard responses: deer in the headlights or constantly changing my mind trying to make something happen. Way to go self, those are helpful. I can practically feel poor Henry down there rolling his eyes at me, wondering how he drew the short straw and got a speshul owner.

Which leads me to the next point… he is SUCH a good boy. He’s so content to do whatever you tell him to do – long, deep, angled, short approach, it doesn’t matter – he does it happily and without question. He never complains and never gets mad or upset when I’m wrong. He might not leave the rails up every time, but I’m glad he doesn’t because it makes me have to ride better. As long as you give him some kind of a reasonable chance to make it, he will at least try. His attitude toward it all is “Meh, it’s cool. You’re kind of stupid, but I’m used to it so no worries.”, which is such an awesome trait in an amateur horse. Unflappable is a great word for him. He keeps earning those halo points, and to thank him I just keep stuffing him full of an obscene amount of cookies. Seems like a win-win. I appreciate him a lot and hope I never mess up his innate desire to please.

As for the last point – one of these days I’ll make it through a whole lesson without forgetting a course or having a complete derp moment. One of these days.

He gets a light hack tonight then tomorrow morning we’re off to San Antonio!

In the midst of a fairly boring pre-horse show week, the latest Blog Hop from Viva Carlos came at the perfect time! Plus it’s a great topic for Henry… what bit do you ride your current beastie in and why?

For as easy as Henry is about everything else in life, he is picky about bits. Picky picky picky. He chomps obsessively on bits and has a tendency to want to escape behind the vertical with any kind of sustained contact on his mouth. I don’t know what his history is in that regard but he’s got some issues.

We went through lots of bits before finally settling on a hackamore.

We tried this

And this

And this

And this

And this

And this

so on and so on, repeat ad nauseum. There were a lot.

Finally I gave up on all things bit and tried the mechanical hackamore, which he liked a lot, and so began his journey as Bitless Henry. There was a learning curve at the beginning since it’s so much harder to steer in a hack but as he got more tuned in to my seat and leg it became easy.

But eventually even the mechanical hackamore got to be a little bit too much leverage, so I tried a plain leather sidepull hackamore (which I like to call The Haltermore since it’s essentially like riding in a halter) and voila – magic. Sometimes I could use a little bit more oomph when he gets heavy or I have to make a quick adjustment, but for the most part this thing works like a charm. He is much less likely to curl up behind the bit – still does sometimes, but not nearly as much or as badly. It looks a little goofy, and to my great annoyance it does not quite match any of my bridles (and adamantly refuses to darken), but he loves it so I try really hard to just not look at it.

Every once in a while I’ll ride him in a loose ring french link, on the days where we just do a lot of intense flatwork (ie Henry Torture).

His “derby bit”, since he can’t wear a hackamore in the hunter ring, is a twisted D. He only wears it in the ring, in the one class, because any more than that and he starts to get fussy again. But of all the hunter appropriate bits we tried, that was the only one he didn’t raise serious objection with. I have no idea why, other than the simple fact that he’s a complete and total weirdo who makes no sense.

As I’ve mentioned a few thousand times by now, Henry and I are doing our first hunter derby this weekend. I’m pretty certain that I’m going to do something really stupid, like walk in the ring and pick up the wrong lead. Or totally eat the first fence. Or fall off. Or forget my course. Or chip every single one. But I’m hoping, really really hoping, that at least we get some good pictures before any of that happens.

Therefore I’m going to try to make Henry and I look as good as possible. I’m bribing (forcing?) Lauren from shemovedtotexas.com to braid him, he’ll be brushed and polished to a shine, I’m re-dying his tail, I got a new blindingly white saddle pad, and I acquired a shadbelly (for $50 it was a deal I couldn’t pass up). But once I had the shad I knew I had to have custom points. Enter: my mother. Well sort of. My mom has been a lifelong quilter, although she will give you a very solid “I AM NOT A SEAMSTRESS” at the mere suggestion of her sewing anything apparel related. Luckily she has lots of friends who also sew, including some who enjoy a challenge. One of those such friends was kind enough to take on my custom points project and she did a great job (thanks Dana!). So now I have a blue diamond pattern on the front side and a burgundy flowery pattern on the back.

Excuse my uneven buttoning that makes it look wonky.

So cross all your crossables that I am able to at least not make a fool of myself this weekend. It’d be a real shame to get the shad dirty.

I also have some exciting stuff coming in the next few days – perhaps a giveaway? You’ll have to keep tuning in to find out. 😉

If you haven’t figured it out by now, I’m the queen of overdoing. If something can be done, it can be overdone, especially by me. Navy looks good on Henry, lets buy navy EVERYTHING. I love the helmet monogram, lets monogram EVERYTHING.  Ooo, bonnet charm… lets add that too! You get the idea. I love lots of cool little details. I also love anything from the “days of yore” – brown tall boots, rust breeches, etc.

So when I saw pictures of a few horses sporting a checkerboard quarter mark on their rumps in a derby, I geeked out. Two of my favorite things combined – old school and details! And when I found a quarter mark stencil online in the clearance section for $2, I just figured it was my destiny. Yesterday I finally had the chance to try it out on Henry and see what it looked like.

Close up

A little farther away

The one I got is called a triangle pattern, which I liked because it was a little different from your standard checkerboard but not too “out there”. It almost has a flowery or pinwheel look to the pattern.

Mine is the bottom left stencil.

What do you think of quarter marks in the derby classes? A nice finishing touch, or tacky?

As I mentioned a couple days ago, while Henry is my current ride, he is not my only pony. I also have a 7yo Hano/TB mare by the stallion Westporte who is away on breeding lease. Her lessee Michelle and I have gotten to be great friends and she also recently acquired (read: I may or may not have forced her to acquire) Jezebel, the mare I evented about a decade ago. Jezebel is now a broodmare and has had a couple of really stunning babies by Valentino Z (another equine love of my life that I will have to blog about some time), so hopefully she will have a couple more for us in the years to come. I have ridden and absolutely adore both parents, so I’m really excited about these babies.

Back to Sadie. I leased her dam and bred to the stallion in 2006. Originally I had a jumper stallion in mind but there was just something about Westporte that I fell in love with. Sadie was born in May 2007 and started a journey that has been pretty fun. There’s nothing quite like knowing your horse from birth, and being there for every major milestone in their life. It’s very challenging to raise one though, and GOD is it ever expensive. Whoever thinks breeding is a cheaper way to get a nice horse, I have some majorly huge bills I’d be happy to show you! But things like this are priceless…

Day old baby Sadie, napping in my lap

Luckily for me, Sadie did not get the memo that she was bred to be a hunter, because while she started in the hunter ring…

at her first show, in the PreGreen

she quickly showed to have the same opinion about hunters as I do (it’s a snoozefest), and we switched her to a jumper. She’s very honest and loves to jump, but needs something challenging enough to keep her attention, so it was a much better fit for her.

Now she is off with Michelle at Willow Tree Farm for a while to have a baby. So on Friday I loaded up my car, making the 5 hour trek to Midland to visit my “girls” – Jezebel and Sadie. They both spotted me as soon as I got there and starting mugging for treats and love. These two not only look alike, they have the same “love me. love me more. I said LOVE ME.” personality. They want treats and rubs and scratches, and they want them all while sitting in your lap. Imagine two very large needy dogs – there ya go. I almost got smooshed in between two big brown mares several times as they each wanted my full attention.

On Saturday I decided to hop on Sadie. Michelle has been riding her a little bit off and on just to give her something to do (Sadie is a PEST when she doesn’t have a job) but not with any regularity. She was so happy to get out, and while she is always polite about it she had a good ol’ time crowhopping her way around the ring. I popped her over a few little jumps for fun and she went WHEEEEE way over them, in true Sadie style. This mare loves to work.

I am back home now after another long drive, missing my girls, but I know they’re in a great place getting the best of care. And I get to see Michelle and her Willow Tree gang again next weekend when they meet us in San Antonio to horse show!

The girls – which one is which?