Between all the Chatt recap posts (of which I still actually have one left that I need to finish) and dog drama, it’s been a while since I did a general update post on here. Granted, not all that much has been happening aside from Chatt and then dog drama. The only things I really have left on that front are 1) Mina continues to settle in well and we love her

And 2) I got a little memorial plaque thingy to go on Stewie’s gravesite under his tree, which helps bring a little closure I think. Now that it’s been a week and a half without him (geez, time flies) it’s feeling less raw, and having Mina to focus on has helped a lot. I went and put his plaque on his grave yesterday morning, and he’s nestled right in the corner of the jump field, which is freshly mowed and has a new course set now. He’s got the best seat in the house.

I also managed to watch a little bit of the dressage at the Olympics this weekend. Admittedly I can’t just sit there and watch hours of dressage but I watched a handful of rides, and was really impressed with Sabine and Sanceo. I don’t keep up with dressage really at all, at any level, so this is the first I’ve seen of her. What a great pair though, so lovely to watch. I also caught some of Charlotte and Carl.

I swear I’ll watch more when we get to the Freestyles. That holds my (very short) attention span a bit better.

There was of course some drama on social media right out of the gate, with The Horse Magazine posting criticism of Edward Gal’s riding and his team’s orange shadbellies. That kind of exploded. I’m sure there will be more Olympic drama yet to come, and indeed I was greeted with some first thing this morning when I woke up to the news that Tom Carlile withdrew Birmane. Noooooooooo. She’s one of my favorites and was the cornerstone of my team on Eventing Manager, dang it. It took me days to even settle on my team in the first place. I got mad and chucked my entire team and will start again as soon as I have the brainpower to do so.

While I didn’t watch a lot of the Olympic dressage, I did watch a lot of the Rebecca Farm live stream. Mostly to stalk Mickey, because if stalking Mighty Magic offspring was a sport I’d be the world #1.

Mickey led the 4*S from start to finish and seemed to have a fantastic time romping around the XC. He’s such a nice horse for only 9 years old, and it’s fun to have two young Mighty Magics (Mickey and then 10yo Mamas Magic Way aka Mason) doing so well in the US and primed for much more to come. I spent most of the live stream looking up pedigrees, as one does, even though I probably should have been spending my time looking up the Olympic eventing horses pedigrees to prepare for my In The Blood post that’s coming later this week. It’s a work in progress. So many pedigrees, so little time.

And of course as it does every year the Rebecca live stream mostly just made me sit here and scheme about how I could possibly justify trying to make the trek up there one of these years. It’s totally a bucket list event for me but it’s also REALLY FREAKING FAR (30+ hours each way, but who’s counting) so that’s a tough one. I wish they ran two weeks back to back, at least then you’d get a little more “bang for your buck” out of such a long drive. Oh well. Someday.

In other eventing news, Presto is keeping his summer eventing train rolling and is entered for River Glen in a couple weeks.

Megan has a training camp thing in Arkansas this week anyway, which is kind of partway to River Glen. Her string is all going to camp and then will head over to Tennessee next week from there. If nothing else this boy is definitely learning all about traveling this year, and being part of a string of horses rather than being individually catered to. It’s good life experience. Presto already got his AEC qualifying placing by finishing second at Chatt, so assuming he gets his 3rd and final USEA completion at River Glen he’ll round out all of his qualifying requirements, and then he can go to AEC. The chance to experience that kind of atmosphere would be great, and I think he’d really eat up a Championship course at KHP. That’s our new “redirect” plan instead of YEH Championships. We’ll see how River Glen goes!

As for Henry, I’ve been able to keep him in more work so far this summer since our temps have been so mild (well, upper 80’s low 90’s is mild compared to our normal 110 anyway). It’s still a bit hot to be hauling him much but he’s getting ridden plenty at home and I haven’t had to dial back the intensity too much. Of course, I think our luck with the mild summer is about to run out and we’ll be getting closer to triple digits, but still, I feel like we got two “free” months and the grass is still quite green for the end of July in Texas, so I won’t complain. Oh, and I got Henry’s pics from our little jumper show we did… he’s too precious for words. Chonky little dolphin.

I’m still on the lookout for some green Horze Grand Prix breeches if anyone finds them in stock anywhere in the US. I need a 26. I’m beyond sad that everyone is sold out, those are still my favorite color breeches ever. Le sigh. I did find a new pair while I was at Chatt that fit pretty well (sadly not green) so I at least have one pair of breeches that fits. You know what doesn’t fit though? My everyday Mountain Horse tall boots.

They were a little big to start with and now they’re a lot big. They’re still functional though, aside from some bunching. We’ll see how long I can ride it out because the thought of buying new everyday boots has less than zero appeal right now.

I think that’s pretty much everything else that’s been going on though, aside from a few bigger things that are still in the works and aren’t ready to be discussed yet. We’ll get there eventually!