Month: February 2016

On Saturday I loaded Henry up and made the 4 hour round-trip trek to have a lesson with my former jumper trainer. I rode with him when he was based in Austin but now he’s in the Houston area (which has worked out really well for him, even if I’m pouty about it). I’ve lessoned with him on Henry before but it was about a year and a half ago.

The conversation when I first got on went something like this:

Mark: “Aren’t you getting ready to move up to Training?”

Me: “Hopefully in the fall, I’ve got to work on some things with myself first.”

Mark: “Oh yeah? What’s going on?”

Me: “I can’t ride.”

I went on to elaborate about the million and one things I can’t seem to do right on a consistent basis until finally he told me to just go canter the vertical back and forth to warm up. I didn’t mess that up, so we proceeded to courses. And honestly? It wasn’t bad. I still have those same habits that I can’t seem to ever stop doing (why do I soften my hands and shoulders when I see the long distance? Why do I hold onto my inside rein out of the turns?) and I still need a little help getting the right canter, but otherwise it was kind of decent. I think he even said “good” at one point. Much less of a shitshow than I usually feel like these days.

After we were done I tossed Henry in a stall, unhooked my trailer, and made the short drive further towards Houston to the Great Southwest Equestrian Center to check out the Luxe EQ mobile trailer. I’m pretty familiar with most of what she carries but some of it I haven’t seen in person yet… it’s been about a year since I’ve been in there.

I’m very familiar with most of her stuff (Animo, Le Fash, Samshield, Tucci, TS, RJ, etc) but she’s had a line called Winston for a while, always speaks really highly of it, but I wasn’t very familiar with it. She had me try on a shirt (love) and a jacket (LOOOOVE). I’m not totally sure what happened after that, it’s a bit of a blur, but it involved an order form and these:

The jackets are so nice. And fit so well. And are so classic. And you can customize them. And they can do navy with yellow piping and navy buttons. So, ya know… that happened. But it won’t be here til May so it doesn’t count.

I picked up Betty the trailer from the painter the evening before I left for AETA, so this is the first I’ve actually had time to sit down and put her pictures together from start to finish. Now that the transition from Black Betty to Betty White is complete, it’s time to recap the process.

I bought the trailer from a blog reader/friend for next to nothing. It definitely needed work but had good bones. The layout was exactly what I wanted (I ❤ a 2 horse straight load with a ramp), it had a good floor, was structurally sound, and the lights worked. Ya know… the basics. However, she did need a lot of minor things and aesthetic help.

I started by having the roof fixed. There was a lot of corrosion on the sides where the roof met the body (some googling revealed that apparently there was defective roof sealant with several model years of this trailer, so I’m assuming that’s what happened to make it corrode so much faster than any other part of the trailer) and I was given two options: put on a new roof, or patch the sides of the existing one. A new roof was more than twice as expensive, and the corrosion was only on the sides, so patching was the better option for me. The metal guy patched both sides of the roof, some spots along the front, and sealed up the open vent holes in the top. He also fixed and re-ran some sketchy looking wiring, replaced some of the floor in the very front part of the trailer, replaced the wood on the walls, added two new lights, and put plexiglass back into the front windows (it had none).

After that I ordered some new bits and pieces from Horse Trailer Accessory Store, including some reflective tape, a new coupler pin, new pads for the walls and chest bars, etc. I also got new rubber mats to put on the walls over top of the wood, and got 4 brand new fancy wheels put on.

The last major thing was the paint job – I didn’t want to haul Henry around in a black trailer in the Texas heat – so Betty went from black to white.

Now that she’s “done” and totally road worthy, I found a few more little things I want to do (like mount the spare tire to the outside, put new mats on the floor/ramp, and get new butt bars), but those can happen over time. Pretty damn excited to have a basically “finished” and road worthy trailer! Total investment? About $2000. The freedom? Priceless.

 

And finally: clothes. Although to be honest, there wasn’t really an overwhelming amount of interesting stuff. I did fall completely in love with one brand and see a few interesting things from others though, so that’s mostly what I took pictures of. Lovers of burgundy and/or hunter green, you’re going to have a good year.

We’ll start with the cheaper stuff and work our way up, just because it’s more fun that way. First up, the standard and very low budget Horseware coat now comes in burgundy and hunter green. I know lots of you out there are going to be pretty excited about that.

RJ Classics also added some hunter green and burgundy to their line.

It’s been a while since I’ve seen or felt RJ breeches. I wasn’t much of a fan when they were the cottony fabric, but now it’s more of a tech fabric and feels a lot nicer. I’ve heard mixed things on the fit though, so we’ll have to wait and see what they’re really like.

They had lots of cute shirts too. They’re definitely a little bit sheer in the white part and the fabric on the sides isn’t as luxurious as higher end brands of similar styles, but for a low budget option they have a sharp look to them. I actually like their cuff/collar fabric patterns a lot more than most of the TS or Essex ones.

Colorblocking seems to be the new thing among sunshirt brands, but I have to say that I think EIS has done it best. Their new navy and white shirt is super sharp.

Asmar has a new merlot color that is probably going to prove super dangerous to me. The sweaters look AMAZING in this color, and they even had a merino 1/4 zip.

Samshield lovers, take note: they have jackets and vests coming out!

They only had the jacket, but it’s a nice lightweight softshell with removeable hood, and the hood is decorated to look like the top of a Samshield. Kind of a cool item from them, and the basic gray color makes it easy to wear with anything.

But my absolute favorite apparel that I saw? The entire Cavalleria Toscana A/W 2016 collection. I’ve seen this brand pop up here and there over the past few years (I’ve put a couple of their items in blog posts before, even) but this is the first time I’ve a) seen it in person b) seen such an awesome collection from them. There was a lot of burgundy and navy with some gray and taupe and hunter green thrown in. They are high end pieces, and they look it. The attention to detail is second to none. There wasn’t much in there that I didn’t like.

This show shirt was one of my top 3 favorite items of the entire show. They’ve really mastered the art of being different while still being simple, elegant, and classy.

Pretty excited that Luxe EQ will soon have CT in stock! She picked out some awesome pieces for the shop, from shirts to sweaters to jackets to breeches to show coats. I’m dying to try the breeches and see how they fit. CT might be my new favorite high end brand. Super impressed!

 

The tack and equipment at AETA is generally a little boring to me. A lot of it seems like exactly the same stuff over and over, and when I go looking for something new and exciting there isn’t much to be found that I actually like, because I’m picky. I did find a few pretty neat things this time though, even if I liked some more than others.

First and foremost – the new Majyk Equipe boots. Y’all know I’m a big fan of their XC boots, and I’ve been waiting not-so-patiently for the new line of open front and ankle boots to come out. AETA was their debut, and I was not disappointed. I fell truly, madly, and deeply in love with their new stud closure leather boots.

I’m not usually even drawn to a leather boot but these are wow. The breathable hyperfoam lining (which is removeable), the gorgeous leather, the pretty elastic, the stud closures… it was a swoon moment. For those of you who like the classic aesthetics of a boot like Equifit but (like me) hate the fit and heat retention of memory foam lining and don’t want fake leather, these are the pièce de résistance. I can’t wait to get my hands on them. The price was reasonable too, I want to say retail was like $180 for fronts and $130 for hinds? Excellent price point for leather. I think I spent so much time in the ME booth caressing these boots that I could basically be a rep now.

They also have a new brown leather buckle strap equitation type boot

A stud closure boot with a hard plastic shell

Plus a new incarnation of their previous velcro closure open front and hind ankle, with a new and improved strike guard material called ARX, which is a dilatant foam. All dilatant foams basically are full of molecules that are soft in their every day state so that they move with the horse’s leg, but at the moment of impact the molecules change their composition and harden to form a protective wall. After impact, they return to normal. The idea is that this kind of material doesn’t interfere with natural movement, but provides exceptional protection when needed. Pretty neat concept.

Another boot and equipment company that I saw was eQuick, who had jump boots, XC boots, and girths. I have to admit I wasn’t a big fan but they definitely have a different look to them. The strike zone areas are filled with a blue liquid gel.

Their XC boots have a “quick release” tab… basically you pull the orange stick out and the velcro tabs fall off the boot, so it just drops right off the horse’s leg. Neat idea, I just didn’t love the execution since all I could picture was my disaster of a self losing the orange stick thingy and all the straps. Perhaps people more organized than myself would have good luck with them.

Another item with that caught my eye was the Invictus half pad. I’ve heard a little about it but never seen one before. It’s interesting because it uses D3O (another type of dilatant foam)… it’s thinner like a Thinline pad, but when you squish it down it feels almost like a Supracor. I stood in the booth and watched the video about it a few times, it was a little mesmerizing. Something I’d definitely be interested to try, at least.

Other cool things in the Frantisi booth were the Acavello gel bit guards-they definitely feel different from the traditional rubber ones and are super stretchy and squishy…

and the Acavello Opera stirrups, which are kind of interesting looking but I didn’t really learn much about how they work. The price point is definitely lower than I’m used to seeing for these “space age” type of stirrups though-they retail around $130.

At Schockemohle we found those awesome neoprene lined ear bonnets for those who have horses sensitive to noise. Well… and those who do sports in which it’s actually legal to use them. It’s called the Silent bonnet and comes in several colors.

a shot of the inside ear material:

Schockemohle also had a very CROC bridle, if you’re really into that kind of thing.

Nunn Finer is offering several bridles now with the slightly tapered noseband and browband design, including a hunter version. So for all the hunter riders out there that liked the general shape of the D’yon bridle but thought it was too jumpery, your bridle has arrived.

Or you can go completely the opposite direction and buy a pretty rainbow bit from Lorenzini, if you happen to ride a unicorn.

Tomorrow: the CLOTHES.

 

While it’s impossible to take pictures of everything at AETA, I tried my best to take pictures of the things I thought were the most interesting. Since that resulted in nearly 100 pictures, I’ve decided to break it up into 3 parts. We’ll start with the easy stuff and work our way in.

First – riding boots. While there were several nice boot makers there, the ones that always catch your eye are DeNiro. They just have so many options and such beautiful boots that you can’t help but stop and drool.

As for helmets, it was a lot of what we’ve already seen just with new colors and customization options. Samshield has a new XJ model, which is based off of the XC model (super lightweight carbon) but with a small brim. It’s a nice matte finish and has a new hybrid type of liner that combines features from the Shadowmatte and the Premium. It’s a pretty cool, mean looking helmet.

CO continues to offer tons of customization options for the AYR8

And I loved the GPA with the slightly shiny finish, navy piping and navy leather brim.

There must be a million different belts floating around AETA but the new ones that really caught our eye were from Brian Toohey. They’re simple but still interesting and really pretty.

And on the perhaps less sophisticated and certainly lower budget side, C4 has some pretty cool new patterns coming out in March, including a horseshoe print and jumping horse print in various colors.

I’ve spent the last couple months searching for just the right white stock tie without much luck, so I was pretty excited to come across Style Stock. I of course forgot to take a picture of all of their tone on tone white, champagne, and silver models (which were my favorite) but did get a picture of their big table with some of the more wild patterns and colors. It’s not a brand that I had seen before but I really liked their ties and came home with a tone on tone stripe for myself.

Several t-shirt brands were in attendance, including Stirrups and Phyllis Stein, but One Horse is still the one I like most. Her new Veni Vidi Equitavi was my favorite new design, but she has several really cute ones coming out. Plus she had brownie bites and giant chocolate cookies in her booth, which mean a lot when you’ve skipped lunch.

Home goods aren’t something I usually care much about, but French Laundry had a ton of cute things, from pillows to placemats to totes to canvases. I might have some placemats coming now. We won’t tell the SO his dining room table is about to get horsed, we’ll just let him figure that out on his own. These things are awesome.

As far as bags, there’s a cute new brand called Paul & Lydia that is coming out with some totes as well as smaller bags made from canvas and leather. They have a few prints including a fox, racehorse, bits in a couple different colors, etc. The photos are of the prototypes, so they’re shinier than the end product will be, but my personal favorite was the racehorse print.

Asmar also had a super stunning navy Italian leather boot bag and helmet bag. Totally gorgeous, although jaw droppingly expensive at somewhere around $700 retail for the boot bag alone. Put it on the dream list.

Tomorrow, on to tack and equipment!