Month: May 2022

Happy… Tuesday? I feel like every week I’m like “wow where did the last week go, time flies” and then tada there we are again at the start of a new week. It felt like a productive one though, which is always good.

Last week I had to go pick something up at WEC, so I timed it over my lunch break. I’m not stupid, and I definitely won’t miss an opportunity for tacos and ice cream. I’ve certainly had worse lunch breaks from work, I can tell you that much. I guess there was a Paso Fino show or something going on, someone asked me if I rode Pasos. LOL. No ma’am, no ma’am I do not. There’s always something interesting going on there though, you can count on that.

On Friday I met someone from Instagram for lunch at Yum Yum (Don’t mind me, just eating my way across town. That’s what you’re supposed to do when you move somewhere new, right? It’s called assimilating.) which is this little food truck that’s only open for half the day and only accepts cash. It’s a local treasure and always busy, people always rave about it. I have yet to find the thing on the menu that makes me love it, but the things I’ve had so far have been good. I’m willing to keep trying things until I find my order. For, uh, science.

My favorite thing to do when I go places now is to try to find a different route home, even if it means driving farther. I’m trying to learn the area, #1, and I also am just nosy as hell and want to see what all is where. Sometimes I just turn down a road for the hell of it, to see where it goes. I discovered a whole new connecting road on the way home from Yum Yum with some bougie farms on it (that I drove slowly past like a creeper) so it was all in all a worthwhile expedition. I like exploring the “neighborhood”.

Lest you think all I do is eat, I’ve also been doing plenty of riding. The way I’m rotating the horses around means I’m usually only riding two a day, but it does mean I’m riding 7 days a week. I have zero complaints about this, considering there for a while over the winter I was only getting to ride one horse a few days a week. It’s challenging though because all 3 horses are so very different and want to be ridden very different ways. It keeps me on my toes and thinking.

I’m still figuring Presto out, especially. He expects to be ridden a particular way (he is pretty light and wants a lot of finesse/correct timing from your seat and core… lower your expectations bro, you’ve got an amateur now), and sometimes it feels a little bit like trial and error trying to learn where his buttons are. Not being able to have had that transition period between having him in full training and me taking over the ride has been a bit frustrating, because sometimes I know there’s just something about the way I’m asking him to do something that he doesn’t understand or doesn’t like, and it would be simple to solve if only I knew what he was expecting. Luckily he’s patient, and he’s pretty obvious, so when I do figure it out he’s like “there ya go human, you did it!”. Nothing quite like getting educated by a 5yo.

They’re all getting their teeth done next week, and then after that I’ll get serious about finding someone around here to take lessons with. I feel overwhelmed with options, and I don’t know anyone super well nor have I seen them teach, so… I’ve been a bit hesitant to be honest. There are so many good trainers here, but trying to guess which one will be right for me and my horses is a really hard one. I need to just start testing the waters and see how it goes. Thinking about heading over to one of the schooling shows and creeping around the warmup ring… I feel like that tells you a lot about a trainer. We’ll see though. It hasn’t been super high up on my priority list yet, but it’s working its way up.

On Saturday night I got to experience some super fun pop-up Florida thunderstorms. The forecast said literally 2% chance of rain and there was not a damn thing on the radar when all the sudden a wall of water just appeared from the sky across the street and swept across to us. It stormed like hell for a couple hours, with tons of lightning and wind. That was probably the worst storm we’ve had here yet, so now I have severe trust issues with both the forecast and the radar. It’s made me very hesitant about leaving the horses out at night, at least until their shelters get built (waiting on some backordered metal). I always worry so much about lightning.

I did get one project done (or, well, semi-done) this weekend: I painted the inside of the little farmhouse. It was very tan. Tan tan tan tan tan. It made the floor look very orangey and the whole inside just looked kinda dingy to me. Granted, I freakin hate tan so I might be biased.

I went and got a nice warm gray instead, and it’s amazing to me how much it completely changed the look of the interior. I started on Saturday just painting around the trim, removing the tv wall mount and spackling the holes it left, removing old picture hooks, etc. I wasn’t sure how the gray would look with the floor since it did look so orangey before, or the countertop since it looked so brown, but Rejan (who I shall now refer to as paint guru) was certain that it would work, and she’s got a way better eye for this than I do. As soon as I started painting around the trim in the kitchen I was like oh yeah for sure, this is way better.

She was 100% right, it changed how everything looked. Now you can see how much gray the counters have in them, and it waaaaaay toned down the floors. I think it looks a lot cleaner in general too, and no longer dingy. Also, whoever decided that walls need texture, what the hell man. I had to roll this shit twice to get it all in there. You know what’s not that fun? Painting twice. The outcome was worth it though.

I still have to do the two bedrooms but my arms were killing me after this, so that’ll have to be an ongoing project. I also can’t wait to replace all those boob lights… there are 7 of them in the kitchen/living room area alone, you could nurse a litter of kittens on that ceiling.

As a reward for painting I went to my favorite little Italian ice place and tried the mango. It’s so good. Considering I live kind of in the middle of nowhere I have not been disappointed with the food game around here.

Things are ticking right along here really. It feels like there’s never a shortage of things to do, but we’re having fun with it. I am anyway. And Presto definitely is… he always is. I do love having him back, he certainly knows how to spice up day to day life with his shenanigans.

Hope everyone else had a good long weekend!

There are some technical issues getting new pics uploaded, so instead today I’ve a video of Quinlee being… well… Quinlee. It’s made even better by Michelle’s narration.

Happy Friday everyone, and happy Memorial Day weekend. I won’t have time to put together a list of sales but Riding Warehouse has up to 40% off, if you’re looking to burn some cash. 😉

I was admittedly a little worried about moving Henry to Florida.

Mainly because of the weather. He struggles in heat and humidity, and was basically miserable from May through October in Texas. Like, huffing and puffing all day even under multiple fans, didn’t sweat very well, etc. So I was really worried about how he’d handle the humidity of this area.

What I failed to really take into account is that Texas, at least where we were, is just as damn humid as Florida. It’d be 85 degrees with 98% humidity at 7am, and even when the intense heat burned off some of the humidity, the heat itself was just so incredibly brutal. There was no relief from it until the sun went down (at which point, cue the rise in humidity again). The weather was already starting to do that in Texas by the end of April, setting itself up for an extra long and miserable summer. It has been considerably more pleasant these past few weeks we’ve been in Florida than it was in Texas last month.

It’s humid here, for sure, don’t get me wrong. I’m covered in sweat by the time I’m done riding every morning. That’s not at all new though, it was the same way in Texas. I’m used to moist air. What’s different, and I think what makes the difference, is that the heat just isn’t as intense. Even if it’s the same temperature it doesn’t have that “rip the air out of your lungs” baking suffocating intensity that the Texas heat has. And it’s definitely not as unrelenting either… most afternoons some clouds roll in and make it downright pleasant, even if it’s warm. And when they don’t, it still cools off significantly in the early evening, with a nice little breeze (not a “rip your goddamn eyeballs right out of your head” wind like Texas loves to feature). So even in the heat of the day, Henry stands and naps under the trees in his turnout, and has had no issues at all yet. Not even a hint of a huff or a puff. And the heat of the day isn’t like, 8 hours long anymore. He’s been much happier and is coping way better than I would have imagined.

Granted, I know it’s only the end of May and things will definitely only get hotter, but the fact that it IS the end of May and he’s still this happy with zero signs of struggle… that in itself is so much better. Normally he’d have been on the struggle bus for a few weeks already by now.

The other interesting thing (that I had not accounted for at all) is how much better he feels on this softer ground. The ground in Texas is hard and rocky pretty much all the time, even though he lived on one of the best soils you could find in that area. Still… it was just hard ground. Here the ground is so sandy and springy and soft… it feels like he’s aged backwards 5 years. He’s felt absolutely fantastic since we got here, and we were even able to pull the pads out of his shoeing setup last week. He’s done a whole Benjamin Button thing since becoming a Florida horse basically – def not 15 years old anymore, I think we’ve reset back to 10. Which of course makes me absolutely delighted.

We’ll see how he does as summer ramps up for real, especially with his skin. That was my other concern here. So far so good, but I’m being pretty diligent. Henry and Gemma both have really sensitive skin. Of course, the only issue I’ve actually had so far is Presto’s little pink nose getting sunburned since he likes to nap in the sand pit in his pasture in the afternoon sun for literally hours. Had to get him some stuff to put on his poor lil nose!

I haven’t felt like I’ve needed fly sheets so far either, which I’m glad about. I was worried the bugs would be so unrelenting that I wouldn’t have a choice, but so far daily fumigations with Pyranha and Swat have worked pretty well at keeping the bugs off. I think we’re all glad to have escaped the horrible bot flies that were so bad in Texas in the spring… they drove Henry NUTS, he would start running frantic circles in the pasture to try to escape them, and they weren’t deterred by any fly spray. Horrid things.

Fingers crossed, but so far so good with their general acclimation to Florida, especially Henry. Would would have thunk it?

I’m starting to think that it would be easier to just make it a requirement that all of my horses are shaped exactly the same so that I never have to buy or fit saddles ever again. Isn’t saddle shopping everyone’s nightmare? On the surface it seems like it should be fun… shopping for a fancy nice horse item. But it’s not. It’s not at all. It’s $$$$$$ and a pain in the ass and there’s a lot of pressure to get it very right. So much anxiety. And then horses change shape and you have to do it again. Or you get another horse that doesn’t fit the same saddle. My palms get clammy just thinking about it.

All this to say that, naturally, Henry’s jump saddle does not fit Gemma or Presto. This isn’t news – Henry’s jump saddle has never come remotely close to fitting Presto. Henry is a curvaceous, shapely boy, and Presto is narrow and much flatter-backed with a higher wither. They’re polar opposites. That saddle has always rocked like crazy on him, it’s way too curvy and too wide. Even if you shim it as much as humanly possible, it’s so bad you can feel it moving when you post. Not workable in the least.

The good news is that Presto and Gemma are built much more similarly. They can definitely get away with sharing a saddle. Of course, that means Henry’s saddle doesn’t even come remotely close to fitting Gemma either. And aside from the fact that it doesn’t fit either of them, it’s also too big for me. Forty pounds ago it wasn’t so bad, but now there’s so much extra seat that I get pulled further back than I want to be so I feel like I’m constantly fighting to scoot forward and get my leg underneath me. On Henry it’s not so bad, he’s like riding a barrel so your leg just falls in one spot and that’s where it’s gonna be no matter what. On the others though… it’s awful. I legit can’t even sit the canter on either of them in it, I just slide right to the back and out goes my leg into the front. Part of that is how it fits the horses, part of it is the seat being way too big (I can legit fit almost two hands behind me), and part of it is that it’s 10 year old calf leather that is slick as snot.

Hillary really saved my ass (literally) by leaving her Voltaire here for me to borrow in the short term. Hers isn’t exactly the right fit for me but it’s lightyears better, and I can actually ride Gemma and Presto in it without being on the big time struggle bus. It fits both of them significantly better too – no rocking. But, ya know, she’s gonna need her saddle back at some point, so I knew this summer I’d have to figure something out, preferably sooner rather than later. I feel like a butthole putting miles on her saddle, even if she was nice enough (so freaking nice) to let me use it.

My original plan was to keep an eye out for one similar to Hillary’s but with a more forward cut flap. I’m kind of borderline between forward and extra forward, but if I shorten my stirrup much more at all, I end up with my knee on the block. At Kentucky I was able to sit in one that had the more forward flap and confirm that yep, that was the spec I needed. I got the contact number for the local Voltaire rep and was going to get in touch with them when I got settled here in Florida to see if they could find me a used one.

And then we saw the Arion saddles at Kentucky too. I’d been curious about them for a while, having first seen them on Instagram (whoever came up with this particular marketing strategy, give them a raise):

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A post shared by ARION – Horse Sport Tack 🇪🇺 (@arionhst_europe)

I’d been curious about Arion too because I’d heard that Jean Luc Devoucoux was designing and making them, and I loved Devoucoux before it was part of the CWD conglomerate.

Anyway, as I mentioned in the Kentucky recap, I was really impressed by the Arion saddles there. To me they kind of looked like a mix between the Devoucoux and the Voltaire, as far as the structure of the XC saddle went. The leather was nicer than I had expected (it’s definitely French) and the price point was a bit lower than the other comparable brands. They’re newer to the market, still trying to expand and compete with the big dogs… sometimes that’s a good thing, sometimes it’s not. I liked the saddles enough to ask for the contact info of the Florida rep, because I really wanted to ride in one.

Don’t get me wrong, I like the Voltaire a lot. Do I think it’s perfect for me? No. There are some things I don’t love. I like it enough to buy a used one for sure, and they definitely aren’t that difficult to find used, which is a bonus. But also, I just wanted to try the dang Arion. Curiosity killed the cat, and if I’m gonna be spending bank on a saddle then I want to buy the one I like most. When I went home and did some Googling and talked to people about the brand a lot of people had positive feedback.

When I looked up the rep, Luca, on facebook I saw that we had some mutual friends, and one in particular. I messaged her to ask about him (my general distrust of saddle reps runs DEEP) and she had nothing but good things to say about him. She and I have similar taste in people, so her opinion holds a lot of sway. I talked to him on the phone and texted back and forth with him a bit, and we set up a time for him to drive up from West Palm Beach with some saddles for me to try.

Of course while he was here I was so focused on what I was doing and our conversation that I completely forgot to ask Luca to take any video or pics when I was riding. Massive fail. He snapped one right as I was about to get off. This one was an 18 extra forward, and we both agreed that extra forward was right, but 17.5 would be better. I did sit in a 17 in another model but felt like it was just a wee bit too small. I want to be sat in the right balance point, but I don’t need a cantle up my butt, and especially on XC I want to have a little bit of room to move.

I did like the saddle a lot. It had a lot of the features I liked about my Devoucoux in the first place, but with the security I feel in the Voltaire. I do think it rides like kind of a mix of the two. Fit-wise it’s a lot more like the Voltaire, so it sat considerably better on my horses than the Devoucoux. The panel with a bit of extra shoulder room worked best for both. The demo was calf leather and I definitely did miss the buffalo of the Voltaire on Presto… he’s just got a lot of motion in his ocean and the buffalo definitely helps. I liked the balance of it a lot though, and something about the pommel/twist/seat was more comfortable for me than the Voltaire (which, TMI, for some reason makes my crotch go numb when I go on long hacks). I felt like I could sit in it, I felt like I could get up out of it and gallop, and I felt balanced. At one point I cantered over a cavaletti and Mina ran right in front of it, causing Presto to leap over it awkwardly sideways, and I still felt like I was easily able to stay in the middle of him.

So ya know, then we started talking price and options. Cue the sweating.

I got the quote, and then took the rest of the week to think about it. This is a big deal, I wanted to really consider all my options and not make a rash decision.

In the end though, Arion won out. I like Luca and so far the brand has given me nothing but a good impression. Ultimately we settled on the XC model in buffalo, regular length extra forward flap, a bit of a shoulder cut out on the panel, and dark blue piping. They were able to work with me a bit to help with the price. It’s still a lot, for sure. Especially to me. I have never ever in my entire life purchased a brand new saddle. Ever. Not in all my almost 39 years. Especially not a nice one. It makes my heart skip a few beats. But it would also be really nice to have something that actually fits my horses and myself and doesn’t have someone else’s use and abuse and damage, that could potentially last me a long time. Plus by the time all was said and done it ended up being not much more money than a used Voltaire would have been, so… here we are.

They said it’s taking about 5 weeks right now for custom, which seems impossibly fast to me, but I guess we’ll see. Perk of a smaller newer brand I suppose. Fingers crossed it goes uneventfully and it’s perfect and I love it. Until then if you need me I’ll be sweating a bunch of saddle-shaped bullets.

Somehow another week has gone by. Time flies when you’re having fun. Or when you’re busy. Or both. It can definitely be both.

I feel like I’m settled into the routine now, which is nice. I’ve gotten a handle on how to manage my time and how to structure my days to fit everything in, and in the way that makes the most sense. I’ve mostly got the horse’s ride schedules worked out too (there’s some flexibility in there of course) and I feel like now things are kind of chugging right along. As much as they do with horses anyway.

Last Monday the farrier came, which… it’s always fun when you move and have to re-build your entire team of equine professionals. This guy came highly recommended by a couple friends though, and not only does he seem capable of communication, he also shows up on time and is positive and quiet and patient with the horses. He did a great job on their feet too, especially with getting shoes back on Presto. He’d worn his hind feet down to such nubs that I wasn’t sure the farrier would be able to get shoes on them at all, but with some creativity he did manage it, and Presto is looking and feeling a lot better.

Everyone was warning me to brace myself for the Ocala farrier sticker shock but… lol. It was $25 more per horse. For a farrier who actually communicates reliably and shows up on time and does a good job. I’ll take that, thank you very much. So far that’s been my experience with just about everything. They said hay here was astronomical… it’s pretty much the same as in Texas, but it’s better quality and a much better selection. I guess the key to avoiding sticker shock is to come from an equally sticker-shocking place. Granted, these days I think it’s pretty much just all expensive everywhere. Things aren’t cheap in Ocala, but what I do absolutely LOVE (LOVELOVELOVE) is the selection. Tons of farriers, tons of vets, tons of places to get hay and feed and supplements and supplies and and and and. Soooo many different brands and styles of literally anything. I haven’t even been to all these places yet, it’ll take me months to explore it all. And everything is within 20-30 minutes. There is a lot to be said for that. It’s almost overwhelming.

On Tuesday the Arion saddle rep came out so I could demo their monoflap. If you recall I sat in one and talked to them some at Kentucky, and really wanted to ride in one. Turns out that the Florida rep is friends with a friend of mine (Megan that owns Luxe EQ) so I had a little inside connection. Luca came up from WPB with a car full of saddles, and I sat in the xc model and the dressage model. We’ll talk more about that tomorrow!

On Wednesday our friend Libby (who is also a Patreon member as well as the owner of Higher Standards Leather Care, and she’s been instrumental in getting BreedRideCompete hooked up with event organizers for live streams!) was in town, and she swung by to meet the kiddos. We’ve chatted online for so long that I already consider her a friend, even if it was the first time we’ve ever actually met in person. Presto was on his usual behavior, pulling my hat off multiple times while we were standing there talking.

Libby did confirm that the horses are all exactly as advertised on the blog, so there’s that. I had a couple things to give her from the Patreon VIP giveaway stuff, and she was kind enough to bring me the newest scent of HSLC soap, Lemon-Aid, which is an exclusive they’ve made for Jeffers. It’s like a frosted lemonade or lemon cupcake – lemon with a bit of vanilla. Really nice summer scent. And perfect timing because I was just about down to the bottom of my jar of their Rosemary Mint. Highly recommend… I’ve loved HSLC for years, it’s my favorite saddle soap, and Libby and team are good people so win-win.

On Thursday and Saturday mornings I had to run mares across town again to Ocala Stud. Another race mare getting bred to Noble Bird on Thursday, and then one to Girvin on Saturday. I know the route now without any kind of GPS, so that’s a plus. And the breeding manager there struck up a conversation with me on Saturday, so I guess I’m at least sorta “in” now. We’ll see if these last handful of mares check in foal next week or not… would be nice if they all did, since we’re pretty much at the end of breeding season for the thoroughbreds down here.

We got a lot of rain over the weekend but the weather has still been pretty darn nice (when compared to oven-like Texas anyway). The rain waits for the afternoon/evening so I can still fit my rides in in the morning when it’s cooler. Yesterday morning I jumped both Gemma and Presto, which was honestly a bit entertaining to do back to back like that. Gemma is a smooth little rapid-fire sportscar, and Presto is this big long-striding gallumper with tons of suspension. They are… extremely different. Extremely. And a distance that looks like it’s gonna be a bit long on Gemma or Henry is not at all a long distance on Presto. My eye is going to have to get used to that. He covers ground like nothing I have ever ridden.

Presto seems really happy to be back in work though, and especially hopping over some little jumps again. That horse does really love having something to do, and the harder the better. His brain is always looking for something to occupy it. On his days off from work I usually find myself in his paddock playing with him or trying to find something to keep him entertained (which often consists of putting his fly boots back on repeatedly so he can take them off again).

I love having him back, too. I love riding him, he gives you just the best feeling, even if he requires more physical effort (my abs, omg) and more mental effort (gotta stay 3 steps ahead of him at all times) than the other two. He’s a challenge, but a fun one… something different. At some point I need to find someone to take some lessons with but I’m kind of dreading that part a bit. That’s hard. My brain can’t yet. Maybe next week.