Month: June 2018

Yesterday I sent the entry in for Presto’s first Future Event Horse class! Despite my pretty gung-go attitude earlier this year about taking him for FEH, I admit that I’ve really been waffling a bit. It took a lot of convincing and second guessing and back-and-forth on my part just to enter this one, and honestly it kind of left me wondering why I was being like that.

I love Presto. I think he’s going to be exactly the type of horse I was aiming for when I bred his dam, and I’m pleased with how he’s developing. His temperament is super, his gaits are good without being too much for an amateur to ride, he doesn’t have any major structural issues, and he’s brave and smart. That said, I have always been able to very easily see the flaws in all of my horses, and Presto is no exception to this. My eye is probably more critical than anyone else’s and I always go the imperfections first, like I have some kind of weird case of reverse barn-blindness. It’s made me hesitant to take him to FEH, although I don’t really know why, because logically it doesn’t make sense.

It’s not like he’s for sale. I don’t even put much weight on FEH scores translating to useful feedback about a horse’s potential – all they can do is evaluate confo and walk and trot on a baby horse, which are definitely not the most important things for an eventer. Not to mention that babies go through some seriously funky stages, and the judge may or not be able or willing to see through that. I tell people these things ALL THE TIME. Some babies score really well at FEH and totally flop as eventers. Some score really meh at FEH and are fabulous eventers. Line classes are really hard when it comes to predicting horses that will do well in a sport like this.

For all of those reasons, his scores don’t actually matter. At the end of the day, it’s just one person’s opinion of a horse on that day, given what they can see. I know all of this. I know it really well. But that hasn’t stopped me from being hesitant about entering him. I already know his scores will just be average (y’all, the llama phase, it is real) and I already know that it won’t matter anyway. But I was still hesitant. I just… I dunno. I’m not sure if it’s that I don’t want to take him out in public when he doesn’t look his best, or if I just don’t want someone handing me a scoresheet telling me that they think he’s gross. It’s not as though I’m not already very used to the concept of subjective judging and one person’s opinion.

After thinking about it for a while, I still don’t really know the root of my hesitation. I don’t totally understand my own psychology here, so I’m probably just being dumb as hell. But after talking it through with some people, and realizing that this next show is my last chance at getting him to a FEH class at all as a yearling, I decided to just buck up. Yeah so he’s gawky and he still hasn’t sprouted his chest and the orientation of his neck can change 100% from day to day (today: upside down). Who knows what he’ll look like the day of the show. But we’re gonna go and support the program and trot around that triangle like a real horse with no actual expectations (aside from good behavior), because why not? And if the judge doesn’t like Presto then oh well.

So Henry has a schooling show this weekend where we’re gonna play with a few new ideas and get an XC run in (we haven’t been out on XC at all since our March show, I think?), then Presto’s FEH is next weekend, and then Henry and I leave for Chatt! The next month is going to be busy.

If you follow me on Instagram at all, you’re probably thinking that Presto spends his entire life tied up in some place or another. While it’s not quite THAT much time, he’s definitely logged his fair share of “patience hours” lately.

Since his weekend adventure with The Tree of Knowledge a few weeks ago, he’s become quite reliable about tying. It wasn’t a one-and-done for teaching him how to stand quietly, but it definitely taught him that resistance is futile. I’ve been tying him in the barn for grooming every day, either straight-tied in the aisle or crosstied in the grooming area, and he’s been rock solid. Not totally STILL, per se, he still wiggles and tries to chew on things and sometimes tries a few half-hearted stomps that are the saddest attempt at a temper tantrum that I’ve ever seen. But the thought to pull back or resist or try to escape does not exist in him at all.

So, as I mentioned a couple weeks ago, I moved on to tying Presto at the rail in the arena while I rode Henry. He was a little mad the first time, but honestly handled it better than I thought he would. I could ride Henry right behind him and he didn’t care (I mean, he looked more mad, but he wasn’t upset). I don’t ride in the arena very often though… generally only when the fields are too wet or too hard.

The next time I rode Henry out in what I call my “dressage field” – a smaller, flatter field in front of my jump field – I noticed something that hasn’t really registered with me before. Tall, very solid poles that I assume used to be part of an old fence. Now it’s a lower wire mesh fence, with my dressage field on one side and a corn field on the other, but a few of the taller poles are still in place.

So after one more session hanging out on the rail in the arena to make sure he understood the game, I ponied him out with me for a dressage ride one morning, tied him to the tallest pole (which – it is not that easy to tie one horse on a fence line while riding another, btw. Put THAT in field hunter classes!), and rode away.

Not like… far away. I slowly spiraled Henry away from him, watching to see what Presto’s reaction would be. After all, he was tied next to a loud corn field (it’s kinda scary when it’s windy!), out in the middle of nowhere, and the only horse he could see was leaving him. This was definitely a lot different from just tying him to the arena rail, right by the barn. I could see the wheels turning as he decided what to do. It only took him about 30 seconds to choose the “good boy” option and start nibbling at all the grass that was tall enough to reach.

I heard nary a peep out of him that day, and he’s been out on that post three other times since. I ride Henry past him and towards him at every gait, but Presto never seems to care. Sometimes he gets bored and tries to paw or pace, because yearling, but he never seems worried or upset. He’s become a bonafide Railbird.

I’m hoping that, in addition to continue developing his patience skills, this also helps make him a little more independent and not worried about what other horses are doing around him, especially under saddle. I guess we get to find out in like… 2 1/2 years.

Several people asked me to post my impressions of the Quick Knot once I’d had a chance to try them out. I haven’t actually shown in them yet, but I did pop a couple braids into Henry’s mane the other day and go for a ride, so I’ve definitely at least got enough feedback about them to hopefully be helpful to those of you who were curious.

First: keep in mind that these ship from the Netherlands (yeah, even when you order from the USA site) so order them at least a couple weeks ahead of when you need them. Mine took about a week and a half to arrive, which isn’t bad from Europe at all, but if you’re expecting 3-4 day US-based shipping, you’ll be kept waiting.

I’ve been eyeballing these things since they first hit the market last year, but the price has always kept me a bit hesitant. At $40 for a pack of 100, they aren’t that cheap when it comes to braiding implements. And while they say you can get at least two uses out of each piece, it still made me wince a bit. I mean, $5 for a pack of rubberbands or $15 for a spool of nice waxed thread are prices that I’m more accustomed to for braiding products. At my core, I am cheap.

But I friggin hate sewing in braids, and I also friggin hate rubberbands for about a thousand reasons, so finally I just said screw it, had a “Treat Yo’self” moment, and bought the overpriced paper clips. Well, ok, first I did try following a suggestion I saw online that said to do the same thing with bobby pins going up through the braid and then an “arm” bent to each side, but a) it didn’t blend with the mane very well, the bobby pins were pretty clearly visible even from 10′ away b) it didn’t seem very secure. So after that I said fine, admitted defeat, and ordered a package of Quick Knot.

I got a good giggle out of the fact that the customs form listed them as “paper clips”, but really that’s kinda what they are. They’re very simple little things, basically just a little metal T that you stab down through the braid and then bend the end up to lock everything in place. I wish I’d come up with this, the profit margin has to be great.

My main concerns were that a) the metal piece would look like a big staple from the backside, b) they wouldn’t stay in. So the day after they hit my mailbox I took them out to the barn and popped a couple braids in Henry’s mane at 5:50am before our ride. He eyeballed me hard. But the first thought I had was “wow, that was fast!”.

So after taking the obligatory photo of the first braid, I turned on my phone timer and did the second one. Despite some fumbling with the rubberband that secured the braid itself (#manhandsproblems), it still only took 41 seconds start to finish. Rolling up the braid and securing it was ridiculously easy. The Quick Knots were stiffer and harder to bend than I had anticipated, but I quickly got the hang of how I needed to manipulate it to secure the braid. They blended pretty darn seamlessly into Henry’s mane though, making them almost invisible.

BUT WOULD THEY STAY? After a 45 minute w/t/c conditioning ride, those buggers didn’t even move. And taking them out? 5 seconds, including pulling out the band securing the braid. I hesitate to say that I’m sold until I actually use them at a show, but my interest is hella piqued.

My only real complaint so far, aside from grumbling about the price, is that I absolutely hate the container they come in. I wish they came in a nice, thick, sturdy zippered bag like some of the bands do. If you tried to use these at a show, out of that cumbersome box, they’d be all over the stall floor in 2 minutes flat. And that thought makes me more than a little nervous, being a piece of metal. I’ve already transferred mine into a baggie.

In trying to justify the price to myself, I did a little math (oh dear god). I bought the package of 100, and let’s just say that I put in an average of 15 braids (I usually have 10-12 on Henry, but erring toward the side of caution). That’s 6+ uses if I only use each one once. If I use each one twice (I’ll probably try for 3 times but let’s account for some losses and/or failures here), that’s 13 uses. Aka 13 times being braided, which for me is 13 shows. That’s about 2 years, at the rate I’m going. 13 uses equals out to about $3 per use, or if you’d rather break it up by year, $20 a year. Definitely nowhere near as cheap as bands or thread or yarn, but a palatable cost. Especially when you consider that it should save me at least 10, probably more like 15 minutes per braid job. That’s over 2 hours of my life that I get back.

So, I’ll come back to these and update you guys again when I’ve used them more, but for now the first impression is generally positive. Hopefully they don’t let me down! We’ll find out at Chatt. And next weekend at FEH… but more on that later. 😉

As I mentioned yesterday, Sunday was ADVENTURE TIME with the boys. I’m really loving the rare weekend days where I have nothing to do but play around with these two idiots.

I took much the same approach this weekend as I did last weekend. We started out with ponying – which Presto has gotten a little bit cocky about as of late. I think he finds it to be a really fun game, and he’s not intimidated by anything at all, so sometimes he tries to nip at Henry or canter in place. He’s funny though, in all of his antics he never actually pulls on the lead rope. He’s just really excited to be there, bro.

Originally I had wanted to just do a nice long walk on the hills, but Mr. CanterOnTheSpot had ants in his pants, so we went for a big long trot lap of the entire field first. That 10 minutes was enough to take a lot of the cockiness out of him, after which we were able to settle and walk, with a few bits of stopping to practice standing still (Henry’s favorite – Presto’s least favorite).

I brought them back in and decided to chop both of their manes off, then it was bath time again. Henry is trying his hardest to do his “I don’t have hair here or here or here” summer routine, so I’ve been keeping after him daily with my variety of shampoos and tinctures. Presto has stayed funk-free so far (he’s fading into a buckskin really quickly in the summer sun though, which is sad) so he just got hosed off and then had to stand in the wash rack and wait politely while I attended to Henny. And when I say “wait politely” I mean wait not-at-all-politely, as he proceeded to try to very deliberately stomp on the hose for the next 15 minutes.

Since Henry kind of ruined courtyard grazing privileges last weekend with his attempted escape (why do they take turns being brats?), I stuck them into the little front paddock with the citrus trees. I took Henry’s lead rope off but left Presto’s on at first, to continue his lessons with the drag rope while I supervised.

As soon as I let them go I could see the mischievousness in Henry’s eyes. Sometimes he just gets that cheeky look about him where you can tell he’s just waiting for the right excuse to be naughty. But they both just walked off and started grazing, and I figured maybe I was wrong.

I was not wrong.

A few minutes later Henry spotted the chickens, and that was exactly the excuse he’d been looking for. He took off bucking and leaping and galloping and squealing and farting. Poor Presto was tagging behind like “Oh, are we spooking? FUN!”, while Henry proceeded to run around like a rodeo horse for the next 10 minutes. Even Presto got tired of his shenanigans and tried to go back to grazing, but Henry would come blazing past him again and Presto would have to duck and cover to get out of the way.

I decided to rescue Presto a little bit and at least take the drag rope off, since he already had enough problems with his idiot brother the bucking bronco.

Presto alternately chased him and then got chased, but he kept it mostly to a trot, because he’s never impressed. It was almost like they were playing tag.

I eventually had to stop their game and take them in, because Henry was getting a little TOO rambunctious. Total idiot, I dunno what wild hair got up his butt. Clearly being ridden 6 days a week with a ramped up conditioning schedule isn’t taking anything out of him. Not feeling particularly guilty about the summer horse shows anymore.

When I put Presto back in his pasture he tried his best to continue the game of tag with his donkeys, but they were 0% interested.

Watching Henry and Presto interact definitely brings me a lot of joy, even when one of them looks like a coked out dolphin and the other is a baby giraffe. Life is never boring with these two!

This past weekend marked my last “free” one for the next, like… 2+ months. I don’t know how this always happens, but it does, and while I do generally like being busy (especially since a lot of those weekends will be at horse shows!), I also sometimes enjoy having less on my plate. Of course, I still managed to fit A LOT of horses into the weekend, because would I even be me if I didn’t? At the heart of things, I’m still just a kid who loves ponies.

JenJ hit me up at the end of last week and asked if I could fill in for a day of barnsitting for her place on Saturday, which I was happy to do.

I was planning on giving my two boys the day off anyway, so it worked out. Then she asked if I’d be willing to clip Taran while I was there, and since my day was open, I said sure. I have to give Taran many props, despite being very annoyed with me and ready to go back to his turnout, he was one of the best-behaved horses I’ve ever clipped… and I used to have a little bodyclipping side business, so I’ve clipped a lot. He was almost a statue. Hopefully he copes a little bit better with these high temps without all that extra hair.

After that it was home to shower and eat lunch, and I found myself with many hours left to kill before Belmont time. Naturally I did what any obsessed self-respecting horse person would do and put up the Belmont undercard races on the TV and the live stream from the jumper ring at Upperville on my laptop.

And yeah, I saw Olivia go, because stalker. Frankie was a beast, I recognized him instantly even among an endless stream of bay and brown horses. I had a couple other friends in that division too, so I wasn’t just keeping an eye out for her, but I found her easily anyway.

After that it was Belmont time. In 2015 I watched American Pharoah’s historic win on a screen outside the videographer’s trailer at a horse show, where I just happened to walk by as they were coming into the stretch. I didn’t really follow the TC races much that year, so I was a little bit removed from everything. This year I followed it start to finish, and loved Justify start to finish, so I was on my feet whooping and hollering and jumping around like an idiot for the entire stretch drive. The dogs scattered, I almost sprained my damn ankle, and I got at least a whole day’s worth of cardio. Say what you want about horse racing, but there are few things that can rival the thrill of watching a magnificent horse running flat out into the history books.

Also I about came undone when Mike Smith was talking to him and giving him smooches after the race. It really showed just how one special horse can make all of someone’s wildest dreams come true, just by being their fantastic selves. Horses… we don’t deserve them.

By the time I capped off the day by going back out to feed Jen’s crew, I’d definitely managed to fit all sizes, shapes, and kinds of horses into one day.

Sunday was filled with my two favorite and most familiar faces:

but those adventures (because whenever these two are involved, it’s ALWAYS an adventure) are stories for another day.

You know when you’re doing so well with resisting the urge to buy things, not looking at sales, and talking yourself out of stuff you don’t actually need?

This is not one of those times for me.

Yeah I know, as of Monday I was doing pretty well. I’d resisted the idea of buying a new coat and a new pair of breeches for Chatt. All I’d really succumbed to was a package of Quick Knot. Okay, that was actually a lie. The Quick Knot was the only show-related thing I had succumbed to. Okay, that’s still a lie. I forgot about the fact that stupid Dover got me with their stupid 50% off sale and I grabbed a few shirts (the shirts don’t get called stupid because I like them. Just Dover and their sales are stupid, even if they do manage to get me like once a year with something and then I feel really dirty afterward for months. Is there a 12 step program for this?).

To be fair, the shirts averaged out to $25 each. It barely counts.

The things I deliberately didn’t mention on Monday (and they’re really small things, so again – BARELY COUNTS) are:

1) A noseband taper gauge

I actually mentioned this handy dandy little tool in my post a couple weeks ago about nosebands. I was intrigued by it, but too cheap to buy it and pay the shipping from the UK. Plus, like… why do I need to own one of these, aside from sheer curiosity and an obvious lack of impulse control? Oh right, I don’t. BUT THEN, as if by sheer magic, Blackjak Refinery posted on Instagram saying they had a few extras for sale, and it was really cheap and I was like omg nifty little toy thingy ooo shiny and then I dunno, I blacked out or something and ta-da now I have a noseband taper gauge.

I already played with it on my own bridles (I actually DO have “2 fingers” of space in there, by their standard!) so I don’t really know what to do with it now. I really want to go full batshit and volunteer for bit check somewhere and run my own private study on what % of people have their nosebands set to what adjustment, but I figured that might get me volun-fired and volun-told not to come back. So instead I’m thinking that if anyone else out there wants to try this out and check their own nosebands against an actual measurable standard, let me know and I’ll let you borrow it. But if you lose it or don’t send it back I will absolutely 100% send a glitter bomb to your house because yes I would in fact have your address. Make good choices.

2) A bonnet for Presto

Yeah I know, you’re sitting there screaming “You idiot, he’s a YEARLING!”. You’re not wrong on either count. See, what had happened was, I was sitting there chatting with Sierra of If the Bonnet Fits about how funny it would be if Presto had a bonnet with spikes. He’s so freaking punk rock/emo with his side eye and his “whatever, man” attitude and his ridiculously voluminous hair. If any horse ever deserved a spiked bonnet, it’s him. And then Sierra is all like “I can make anything, just watch” and then again I blacked out and a few months later, BOOM.

Tell me it’s not magnificent.

Actually don’t, because I love it and it’s okay if you don’t. But yeah, that’s how the yearling got a bonnet even though he’s at least 2 years away from realistically wearing one. If you came to my blog looking for good decisions and things that make sense, you made a wrong turn.

But those were the only 2 (ahem 5) things I didn’t fess up to earlier. And they’re all in the “under $50” category so none count.

Then, yesterday happened. I’m still not sure if we should call it an epic win or an epic fail, but here’s how it went down.

I’ve been keeping my eye out for a good deal on a new schooling helmet for the past few months. I wanted brown, and I’d narrowed it down to either a Samshield or a One K, whichever I could find the best deal on. I even got in low-key bidding wars over a couple of new-in-box helmets on ebay, but both went above what I felt was the price that warrants FANTASTIC DEAL in my mind. No problem, I’m not in a hurry. I can hold out for the deal.

Yesterday an auction was ending on another one of these ebay new-in-box helmets, a brown One K in a large long oval (which is like, semi-miraculous in and of itself to be able to find the exact weird thing I need). I’m feeling extra penny-pinching these days since I just mailed off 2 horse show entries, so I set up an auction price for something even lower than my previous FANTASTIC DEAL price and promptly forgot about. I figured no way it would go for that, since even with several hours left to go it was already only $15 less.

Then, while I was waiting for that auction to end, a friend messaged me and said that eBay had a 20% off code running for the day. While that was not applicable to an auction item like the helmet, something else did immediately spring to mind. A few days prior (when I was being a big whiny baby about whether or not I should just bite the bullet and buy the Motionlite coat) I had seen a UK seller with a few different colors and sizes of new Motionlites listed around $175. When I looked before they didn’t have my size available, but when I wandered back this time, they did. So I was like “hmmm, wonder if that coupon code works on this?”. So I put it in, and it DID. Now it was $137 with free shipping. Whuuuuuut. Another blackout, and I awoke to another completed Paypal transaction. Maybe I should see a doctor about this.

As I was heading to facebook to tell everyone else about this fabulous deal, I got a “Pay Now” message on my ebay. I had won the brand-new-in-box One K for $99. Again: whuuuuuuuuuut.

So while, yes, I did not intend to make any of these purchases, I don’t feel particularly guilty about them either. However, I’m officially cutting myself off.

Probably.

Because let’s face it, I really just can’t be trusted with the internet.

If you’re on facebook at all, you’ve probably seen the video thats been going around this week of the gray sale horse freejumping and clearing the fence by about 3 miles. I think at least half of my friends have shared this freaking video (or pictures of it) by this point.

 

The general concensus from most people is “wow” and “I’d love to own that horse” and “so much talent”. I guess I am in the minority when I’m sitting over here with this face:

First of all, if that horse hasn’t been poled/hot wired/worn pinch boots/been prepped in any other myriad of ways, I will eat my helmet. Literally. Eat. It. The fact that a lot of other horses from this same place also have a tendency to majorly overjump makes me even more sure of that. Sure, horses sometimes get taken by surprise or are quite green about things and they’ll overjump, of course, but a) not THAT extreme b) not repeatedly. It’s very hard on their bodies to do that, so sometimes a very extreme effort can scare them a bit and make them not want to jump at all.

If the horse HAS been prepped, you’re going to have to un-train that, mentally. Sometimes the ones that get prepped too much end up overly careful, which can turn them sour or make them want to stop. If the horse HASN’T been prepped (which again, I’ll eat my damn helmet if it hasn’t) and jumps like that naturally, who the heck could ride it? Definitely not me. Probably not you. Maybe McLain could stick that.

Not to mention that I sure hope you have a really freakin good vet and equine (and human) chiropractor, because good luck keeping something like that sound.

So I guess, yeah sure, that jump is an impressive feat as far as sheer athleticism goes… but I just can’t get on board beyond that. I don’t like it. I don’t like how it’s produced and I don’t like the effect it has, mentally and physically, on the horse. Someone explain to me why the rest of the internet does.

I need to think of a name for this Dynamic Duo. They’re like Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum. Starsky and Hutch. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Batman and Robin. Abbott and Costello.

This past weekend I was pretty excited to be home and have no other plans. That’s a rare occasion these days. I planned a big, exciting (to me), day of fun (for me) with the boys. Henry worked hard all week so I figured he could have an easy riding day, and Presto desperately needed a bath. I planned to spend a nice long leisurely morning at the barn doing whatever the actual heck I wanted, and taking however long I wanted to do it. Those are the best days.

I showed up before 8 while they were getting fed, so I spent some time organizing and cleaning up my stuff while they ate. A friend let me borrow her western saddle to help make ponying a bit easier, so I cleaned it up a little and went off in search of a pad to borrow. Side note: why do so many western pads have neoprene bottoms, directly against the horse’s back? Is that a thing? I had to dig to find a felt-bottom one.

Then I brought both boys in, tied Presto in the aisle and put Henry in the crossties, just like I’d done the day before. This time Presto found plenty of ways to entertain himself while I tacked Henry up.

Jokes on you kid, I got your brother a relatively indestructible fly mask. RIP to the lid of that supplement box though, that’s going to require a drill and some screws to fix. Although in his defense it was already mostly broken off. Sorrryyyy. Add it to my bill.

It’s been many years since I put a western saddle on a horse, so I had to spend a few minutes remembering, but once it was on I could not stop giggling. Poor Henry gets mistaken for an Appendix ALL THE TIME (which is fair, he looks like one), and putting the western saddle on just took his natural QH-ness up a notch.

Presto was fascinated by the weird new thing that Uncle Henny was wearing. It must have smelled different to him, he’s never seemed interested in my other saddles but he just kept resting his nose on the seat and taking deep whiffs.

Then we went out for a pony session! I had intended to go for a nice long walk on the hills but someone was feeling mighty full of himself and kept trying to nip and play with Henry, so I decided to do a lap of the field at trot to take some of the friskies out. It was more like a Henry trot/Presto leap and canter lap. The good part is, Presto gets tired fast. After a trip up the big hill he decided maybe he should just trot, and after the full lap of the field he thought my original plan of a nice long walk was sounding better and better.

Every once in a while he thought maybe he was ready for another frolic, and Henry would without fail start pushing him over toward the tree line. At one point he pushed Presto right into a bush. Honestly, he had it coming. He was acting like a kid that belonged in a bush. I can’t fault Henry for putting him there.

We spent about 45 minutes out there, and by the end they were both just chugging along like a well oiled machine. It was already HOT though, so they were a pretty sweaty well-oiled machine. This was part of my plan though, because confession: Presto has never had a real soap bath before. I wanted him to be kind of sweaty before we started, so that maybe it would feel nice instead of offensive.

I brought Henry along, because role model, and stuck them both in the wash rack. Originally I had one of them on each side but they kept play-biting at each other and getting each other’s lead ropes over their heads, so eventually I gave up and put them on the same side. Sometimes I feel like the ringmaster of the circus with these two.

The bath itself was actually pretty easy, aside from when I was rinsing the conditioner out of Presto’s tail and apparently shot some cold water up his buttcrack, judging by the way he curled himself up like a roly poly. Whoops. All things considered, though, it was a good first bath and I was able to scrape a lot of that crustiness off of him.

Then I took them both out in the back corner of the courtyard to graze while they dried. I’ve been slowly introducing Presto to the concept of a “drag rope”… letting him drag the lead rope around while he’s loose and learn to not freak out and panic when he steps on it. I prefer to do it supervised, just in case. Each time he stepped on it he figured it out a little bit more and started trying to drag it to the side (Henry has never thought to do that, it was interesting to see Presto’s smarts at work!), and by the end if he hit resistance you could see him trying to figure out which foot to pick up to free himself.

Of course, Henry tried to exit stage left during all of this and take off for the barn, until he realized that Presto was still just obliviously grazing next to where I was sitting. Henry stopped, looked at Presto, looked at me, and came walking back in a huff. So much for the grand escape. From babysitter to instigator and back again, all within 2 seconds flat. Never change, Henny, never change.

After that Henry was shopping for new friends, because apparently Presto betrayed him.

The boys went back to their stalls after that, since it was already getting really hot. Oh, and I did actually stick both of them. For some reason I had it in my head that Henry was 16.1h, and I don’t think I’ve measured him since the day I brought him home. I’ve been shorting him all this time – he’s actually 16.2h on the dot. As for Presto, he’s 15.0 1/2 right now, which means he’s grown 2″ in the past 4 months. That’s not hard to believe. He doesn’t show any signs of slowing down either, if the sudden re-appearance of his ribs is any indication. The growth spurts are constant. His dam seemed to do all of her growing at one specific time of year and not really grow at all in between, but Presto seems like more of a slow-but-steady type.

It’s getting to where he looks more and more like a horse and less and less like a foal. Ok, maybe not horse… maybe giraffe, or llama. But not a baby, either way.

It was a good day. ❤

Well, you guys helped convince me! We’re going to Chatt Hills at the end of the month!

It’s not very often that an opportunity presents itself so impeccably, and I felt like I would be an idiot NOT to go. No one else had taken those days off at work, I can afford it (PLEASE DO NOT TAKE THIS STATEMENT AS A CHALLENGE, HORSE GODS) thanks to my endless stream of side gigs, and plenty of people are going, so hauling and places to stay should work out fine. Trainer is one of those organized people that is really good at pulling things together quickly, and that’s exactly what she did. Within a few days of me saying I would go, she had a whole plan worked out and 8 horses going.

The cool thing about this trip, compared to the Great Coconino Adventure of 2016, is that I feel a lot less pressure about it. That trip was both Henry’s move up to Training (with Trainer) and our Novice Three Day. Both of those things were stressful, and with a lot of build-up and planning. This time we’re just going to have fun, jump around a new venue, and get some miles. I feel a lot less stressed about it, and since I’m hauling with other people, won’t have my own vehicle, and am not in charge of accommodations… for someone who is normally a total control freak, it’s a little freeing. I’m feeling very “go with the flow” about the whole thing. However the details unfold, I’m cool with it. I really did NOT think I’d have an opportunity like this this year, so we’re just gonna go have some fun.

I sent in my entries last week, because, well… closing date is already next week! Yeah, we’re only about 3 weeks away from leaving, really. Now I’m trying to get my brain in hardcore “Um, yeah, you should probably start getting your shit together because we’re about to go on a 2 week road trip/horse show spree”. Eep!

Gear wise I have about everything anyone could need, it’s just a matter of 1) remembering what all I need, 2) finding it, 3) making sure it’s all clean, 4) figuring out how the eff to pack all this crap into as little space as possible. I also need to schedule a vet appointment to get Henry a health certificate, maybe move up a farrier appointment, and order whatever extra stuff we might need for the trip (ie Gastrogard, paste electrolytes, etc). It’s like all the crap involved with going to a regular show except on steroids because it’s 2 weeks long, 4 states, and 14 hours away.

I strongly considered having a “Treat Yo’self” on a Motionlite coat, but thought I should probably quit with the not-actually-necessary-or-justifiable money hemorrhages while I was ahead. I did cave and finally order a package of Quick Knot though, so we’ll try that out and see if it saves me some time and fuss. The barn is doing an order of polo shirts, so I’ll probably pick up one of those too. I really wanted to get an extra pair of white breeches, too, but I managed to talk myself out of that. Which is a good thing because this morning I found a pair of whites in the closet that I haven’t even worn yet and completely forgot I had.

Otherwise the purchases will be limited to whatever is required to keep Henry comfortable and happy.

I’m actually stupid excited about this trip, at this point. Horse shows have been kept to such a minimum over the past year, and I’m longing for a little “showcation”. Plus totally brand spanking new-to-us XC!!! I’m hoping it’s as fun as I’m imagining.

But for the next few weeks, if I seem a little… crazier than normal… no one be surprised. Anyone want to come organize and pack for me?