Helllooooo again. I hope everyone survived the BoomBoom holiday with little to no emotional or physical damage. It was actually pretty calm here… definitely some loud booms but the rednecks were oddly less excited about the fourth than they’ve been about New Years. I was probably the most anxious animal on the farm, but kept my pacing to a minimum.

Aside from that, Presto and I also had a jump lesson last week. Finally! FINALLY! First jump lesson since right before International (so like two and a half months but who’s counting ya know?) and our first jump lesson ever with Ellie.

We kept things small and simple for both my sake and his. I thought Presto was gonna be wild, and to be fair I think he really WANTED to be, but the heat and humidity zapped all the yeehaw right out of him pretty quickly. He definitely lost some fitness while I was laid up but it might be working in my favor at the moment.

We started over a half circle of death with some small cavalettis, working on using the outside aids in particular. To be honest my ankle just feels weird now. It doesn’t hurt necessarily but it’s tight and it just doesn’t hang the same way, so learning how to use it again with some new limitations is a work in progress. It improves slowly week by week but I think it’s just gonna take time for it to be back to normal. In the meantime, I have to learn to cope with the new normal and not feel lopsided.

Anyway. After our warmup we moved on to jumping into a line, making a big circle, and then jumping out of the line. She wanted me to focus again on my outside aids (particularly leg, particularly when it was the right one) and not letting him get overbent in neck thus ending up crooked. We ended the lesson by hopping through a teeny grid a few times to get Presto’s feet moving quicker. All in all it was a great first lesson back, and a relief to know that I haven’t forgotten how to jump after all that time off.

In other exciting news, Fey’s papers arrived from Belgium. She’s officially registered and DNA verified, with a fancy Belgian passport and everything.

Big thanks to Studbook sBs for helping make this possible for me. Her dam is registered and approved Hanoverian but her TB sire hasn’t been presented for approval to the warmblood books, so they had to grant special permission based on his pedigree and performance history. It took over a year all total to get everything done, from the microchip to the DNA for both parents and for her, to the approval of the sire, to the issuance of the passport. A lot of people were involved and it’s much appreciated, because now she’s official! Her future foals will be eligible for full papers and registration.

I rode Wally quite a bit last week too, although this week his mom is back in town so he’s off the hook with me. It was cool riding something different for a while though. I got more swims in at the gym too, and I really really love being back in the pool. It’s not the most convenient thing but it’s worth it.

For all the other nerds out there, we had our FLAIR Strips webinar last night and it was really sciencey and cool. Science. Research papers. Proof. We love it. There was lots of stuff in there I actually didn’t know, particularly in relation to EIPH.

As a follow-up I looked up some of the studies, so now if nothing else I feel qualified to answer questions. I do still have a couple samples too, so if you’re interested hit me up.

Last but not least, I do have some really big (good) news to share. It was very random and happened really fast, and it was a little bit like being on Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride for like 24 hours. I think I said “wtf is even happening” like 50 times. However, it’s also a long story (at least if I’m the one telling it) and it really deserves it’s own post. So for now, here’s a teaser.