Author: Amanda C

This is it, the final new foal of the WTW 2025 class! And in a “T” naming year, with a dam named Headleys Chatterbox aka Gossip, what other possible name was there besides The Tea? We think it fits her.

Her barn name is Ivy, and she’s looking like she’s going to be a little carbon copy of her mother. Which definitely isn’t a bad thing at all, because Gossip competed through the 3* level in the UK before being imported. Ivy’s sire is Weston Justice, who competed through 4* level in the UK and has produced multiple 4* and 5* offspring. With parents like that and 78% blood, you could say this one is bred to event, for sure!

Gossip did make us work for it a little bit though. She was a maiden, and you never really know how maidens are going to handle the whole birthing process. Sometimes they get worried, sometimes they just don’t push (looking at Vee with her first one), and in Gossip’s case… sometimes they just don’t lay down. She stood there and pushed Ivy out like a giraffe.

It took three of us to get Ivy safely out and guided down to the floor gently (which is harder than it sounds, picture trying to hold/carry a slippery dolphin) but other than that, all went well. Gossip has been a great mom so far, and Ivy sure is ridiculously cute.

Although she’s an interesting black/bay ombre right now, Ivy will definitely gray out – the hyperpigmentation is a dead giveaway on that front. My guess is she’ll gray out really slowly though, as her dam has done, and go through the very pretty steel gray phase. She has very very few gray hairs in her coat right now, as opposed to our other gray foal this year, Lily, who was born with solid gray around her eyes and a gray nose.

And if there’s any doubt that Ivy is bred to be a serious event horse, well… she’d just like to put that to bed right now.

This girl loves to gallop, and has been jumping stuff in her pasture since day 2. Maybe she’s born with it….

It was a one day show so why not make it a one and done recap? No cliffhangers of suspense this time!

My ride times for this show were fabulous – dressage at 8:15, SJ at 9:44, XC at 10:36. Less than 2.5 hours from start to finish is my idea of a horse show day. Originally the forecast was really shit, it was supposed to storm all day, but the closer we got to the day-of, the further the storms got pushed back, and we actually made it through the whole day before anything really came through. It was warm and very humid, but no storms, so we got really lucky with that.

I was on my own for this show since Trainer was at Tryon, but I don’t particularly mind that. It’s always nice to have boots-on-the-ground assistance, but I also feel like we prepare well enough for me to be capable of being an independent thinker on the day, and it doesn’t stress me out. We do a lot of “if this, do that” in my lessons, which serves us well for unassisted horse shows. Presto started warmup feeling a little bit against my hand and tense, but I knew what to do to improve it, and felt like he ended warmup a lot better than he started.

There were a few places in the test that could have been better – I particularly didn’t really “go for it” in the lengthenings as boldly as I might have on a different day, and that’s what several of the comments were about – but overall it was pretty obedient and consistent. Much better than a few weeks ago at Ocala, and close to the first test we had at Prelim at the last Majestic show. The score was similar to that one too, with a 29.5. Anytime the score starts with a 2 I’m pleased enough, and it left us tied for first after dressage.

I had enough time before SJ to go over the course a few times in my head before I had to tack Presto up again. It was a little twisty, with a couple kind of odd jump placements or lines that were just barely bending and walked a little weird. I wished I’d been a little later in the day or that there had been a division before Prelim so I could watch how it rode, but I was 7th to go for the day. I watched the first person go as I was walking to warmup and it seemed to ride ok for her, so… good enough.

The hardest part of showing without a trainer for me is SJ warmup. People tend to claim jumps these days, which I don’t mind, but it does make it necessary to have someone to set for you. Luckily Hillary and Lija were available, so our warmup went off without a hitch. Presto was jumping great, so we only jumped like 6 fences and then headed over to the ring.

The course was… ok. We just switched to this bit/running combo and I LOVE it, I can actually ride him up into my hand and take a real half halt when needed without him wanting to hide, but I’m still getting used to how that changes my timing and my aids. I was a little late/wishy-washy with a couple of half halts that resulted in getting him there too deep, one of which caused a rail. Totally my bad. Really though the rideability and balance is so much better in this equipment combo, I just have to get used to how it changes the ride I need to give him.

I was pleased with how he jumped though. He’s using his body more, he’s not wanting to drop behind my leg, and I can actually ride him UP so much easier. I just have to… ya know… get my shit together. Per usual.

We had a little bit of an awkwardly long gap before XC, so we went back to the trailer so we could do studs and boots, and I got all my XC gear together (which is really just putting my vest on and re-upping my sticky spray, tbh). I also had a time to go over the course one more time and make sure I knew my plan and could visualize everything in my head. Truth be told I have a perpetual fear of forgetting a jump so I always run through them multiple times by number, just to make sure.

I had walked (well, biked) the course the afternoon before, and texted a couple videos to Trainer to get her advice. I also happened to run into the course designer while I was walking, who is a friend, and he happened to be near 15AB, which is the combo I couldn’t quite figure out the line for. I asked if he could show me his intention there, which was massively helpful.

When I texted Trainer my comments were “do I go the straight/forward/more angled route at 15AB” (listen, I knew she’d say yes but I just needed someone to say it), and that I hated the upbank out of water with no related distance, and that I thought he might be a little looky at fence 3, which was a half roll with a massive hedge behind it. He’s not seen something quite like that before, and fences 1 and 2 headed the opposite direction with 3 turning back towards the big field. Prime territory for a lack of focus.

Her advice was to come out of the box really forward, put him out in front of my leg right from the start, and gallop the first few fences to set the tone. He def left the box a little bit with his head on a swivel, but he was willing to go forward and get out in front of me and 1 and 2 jumped great. At 3 I saw the forward distance from a ways out and was like “well I hope he doesn’t spook at that hedge” but he didn’t, he just jumped the absolute snot out of it.

He landed from that and I asked him to open it up and boy did he. I’m not sure he’s ever been as eager to gallop as he was up that hill. Maybe he’s starting to get it? We jumped through the first combo, a bending line at the top of the hill at 4AB, and I think he was in such gallop mode from the first few that he was a little bit like “oh crap there’s a B!” not in a dishonest way, just in a “whoops I forgot that those happen!”. He was super genuine and happy to jump out of the B, but it did kind of dial him into the fact that maybe he should pay attention and look for the next one.

Then we went up the hill to a table…

and then into the trees to the MIM oxer. That oxer used to look ginormous and now it looks small, so if you’re wondering if I’m getting more deranged over time, the answer is clearly yes.

Then it was another bending line combo coming out of the trees, back into the big field over the mulch bench thing (that is so wide) before we came to the coffin. The coffin was a MIM rail, one stride to the ditch, bending four to a big corner. It walked very dead-on one to four, and I was determined to actually get the damn four (adding in the coffin at Ocala wasn’t my favorite thing that ever happened). He hopped over the MIM rail, stepped over the ditch with zero fanfare, put his eye up on the corner, and popped right out in 4 like it was the easiest exercise in the world. Once again, the harder it is, the better he is.

Then we turned and went back down the hill over a ramp…

to another hedge down in the bottom, before turning and coming back up to the water. I hated the water the most, if I’m being honest. It was a house set like 3+ strides before the water, then we cantered all the way across to an upbank out of the water before turning left and going a ways out to a mound that had a skinny at the bottom. I wished that the house had been scooted in significantly so that there was actually a related distance to the upbank. When there isn’t one I always feel like they ride like crap, and it did this time too. There were lots of horses scrambling up it. Mine opted to leave a stride out and do a launcher, which also wasn’t my favorite, but ya know… we lived. He popped down the mound and over the skinny like it was cake.

Then it was over to the Palisade, which we’ve jumped many times before and is always a favorite. This time though it had waaaay more decoration than usual and he really peeked down into it at the last second, which made the 3 strides to the brush wedge kinda sketchy. I had to stay in the backseat on a long rein to get out of his way, and Presto did some magic (no pun intended) footwork to shuffle his way out of there cleanly. He was very clever there. The downside of showing at the same venues is that sometimes when something changes, the horses read it in a way you wouldn’t expect. Note to self. I should have been more positive all the way to the base.

After that we turned and went back up the hill again (I feel like we just zig-zagged up and down the hill for the entire course) over a table at 14, then we were to the angled combo at 15AB. Basically the line the designer was really wanting you to go for was a direct route from the right side of A to the left side of B, jumping both elements on opposite angles. That route was a forward, going 4 strides. You could theoretically ride them both center to center as a bending line, but the angle was awkward and it walked on more of a half stride. You just had to try to get your line right and find a forward one to A, then hold your line and keep kicking out to B. No worries. Not like our issue lately has been adding an extra step into combos.

By some miracle tho I did find a nice forward one into the A and committed to either making the 4 or I was gonna die trying. And indeed, he popped through that line in the 4 like it was easy peasy. Again with the hardest questions being where Presto always thrives.

Then we had another bending line combo down in the trees, to a trakehner, to another table, to the last hanging log, and voila – done! There were things I rode well, things I didn’t ride well, some things that were improvements, and some things that still need work. But for his third time out at Prelim, I was happy with how easy it felt for him, like he’s still not really having to try and honestly sometimes he’s barely paying attention. Like I’m still boring him immensely.

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We added like 7 time, which honestly considering how twisty the course was and a couple mistakes I made that interrupted the flow, seemed like not too bad. Only one person made time in either Prelim division, and I had fewer time faults than most. Progress maybe? The rail and the time dropped us from 1st to 3rd, which I’m still plenty pleased with.

Mostly it feels good to have another Prelim in the books, and to have done it on my own, and it didn’t feel/look massive or worrisome or anything like that. It felt like another day at the office, and that’s always a nice boost to the confidence bank for both of us.

Another Friday and we’ve got another new baby to introduce! Say hello to Tobias WTW aka Toby.

This handsome dude is by the French stallion Usandro, who is 3/4 Hanoverian and 1/4 welsh. His dam is our big boned, classic looking TB mare, Blue.

Being that Toby is part pony I think we all expected a foal that was a bit on the smaller side, but I think he’s actually got the longest legs of everyone so far as a newborn.

He definitely seems to take more after his mom in size and type, but he’s also got more suspension (and potentially more hops?) from his sire. The best of both worlds with a cross like this!

The best part about Toby (aside from his magnificent hair) is his temperament. He’s smart and bold but not overly chaotic or in-your-face (apparently some of you aren’t fans of that? Weird.).

He’s available for sale if anyone wants a mega-adorable and amateur-friendly eventer or jumper. My guess is he’ll definitely be horse size, probably in the 15.2+ range. Not too big and super sporty!

Toby makes a great addition to this year’s crop and we can’t wait to introduce him to the other babies. Until then, he’s having a pretty good time with his mom.

Happy Foal Friday! We might already have another new one to introduce you to next week too. 🤐

Henry is SO DELIGHTED to be back in regular work.

Knock on wood, he’s been feeling better and better as he gets back up to a full work load. Last week his feet grew out enough to reveal a horizontal crack behind his clip that we suspect was an abscess track – a really big and weird one – which could explain the on/again off again that he did over the winter. Either way, he looks good now, so we’re taking advantage of it.

I started jumping him a little bit last week, obviously being mindful of his fitness or lack thereof. He was just so freakin happy to be pointed at a jump again, if horses were capable of smiling from ear to ear, that would have been him. He acquiesces to the flatwork, he enjoys his long hacks, but he LOVES to jump. Doesn’t matter who is on him, doesn’t matter the format, doesn’t matter what he’s pointed at, he just wants to jump the dang things. His swagger has returned, and so has his sass. Never change Henny, you’re the king for a reason.

Presto also returned to his regular schedule this week after a little break post-Ocala International while I was in Kentucky. I think the little reboot was good for him (aside from the fact that he was wild for the first like… 4 rides back. He was only off work for 5 days…). He got a couple training rides last week, after which we decided to change up his tack setup a bit. He’s been in a beval bit with a running martingale for the past maybe year and half, which really worked great for him for a long time. It’s got a little bit of leverage but not too much. BUT, now that he’s gotten more rideable and we’re at a level where he needs to be taking me a bit more boldly forward, it was feeling like I had more bit than we really needed. Trainer and I agreed that it would be nice if he wanted to come forward into the hand a bit more when he was jumping.

First we just took off the running and put him in his dressage bit, which didn’t quite do the trick. As soon as he figured out the running was gone (which, btw, is set SO LOOSE it doesn’t actually do much, but he’s nothing if not clever) Presto decided he had some games to play. No one liked the games but him.

So for my next lesson Trainer brought out one of her bits, a loose ring eggbutt single joint. Have to admit, I’ve not tried this one before. She thought that it would be a little more stable than a plain loose ring (and be better for turning), and he might like having less tongue pressure with the single joint.

Upon realizing it was a $30 bit and not a $300 bit I thought surely Presto wouldn’t like it, but lo and behold, he felt GREAT. He was staying more steadily into the contact through the half-halt on the way to the jumps, and not wanting to drop behind the contact. I could really ride him more forward into it and he stayed there.

We also put on the SoftTurn martingale that I picked up at Kentucky (Trainer has one too, so she’s familiar with the design and how they work), still adjusted really loose, and I think that’s been a big contributing factor too.

I think it must feel less binding to the horses, because if Presto does come anywhere near feeling pressure from the martingale, he has no reaction to it. With a regular running martingale if he came anywhere near it, he would almost immediately drop behind my leg. With the SoftTurn he doesn’t seem to feel as offended or restricted… which is exactly what it’s designed to do. Go figure.

Since changing the bit and martingale we had a couple of really good jump schools, so fingers crossed we’re on the right track with some equipment changes!

He’s also been getting lots of bodywork, and I feel like I’m really starting to dial in the best ways to use the Magnawave in conjunction with the rest of his program. He does stretches every day (and I started adding in a couple new ones for his SI that the vet showed me) and Magnawave once a week. Rubes and Henry have been enjoying the Magnawave too.

I also got curious about KT Taping, which I’ve used a lot on myself over the years and really enjoyed. I got a book and did a couple online courses to get the idea of the best ways to use it for horses, and I’ve been playing with that some too on Magnawave days. I mean, why not?

In other really exciting news, Fey had a positive heartbeat scan this week! She’s confirmed a little over a month pregnant now, in foal to Future Guilty Pleasure. This one will be for sale, but I’m super excited to see what she produces.

We’ve been breeding mares left and right, waiting for more pregnancy checks and then still have several more mares left to breed, including the one we’re breeding for me. I also have new faces to introduce you to… maybe check back on Friday. 😉

I was REALLY looking forward to Kentucky this year, y’all. We didn’t get to go last year, and I haven’t been away from the farm for more than 24 hours since like… the last time we went to Kentucky in 2023. A change of scenery (and a few days without horses to take care of) sounded like just the ticket.

This year we opted to drive, and luckily my SO let us take his hybrid. 50mpg? Yes please. I literally spent like $100 in gas for the entire 1500 mile round trip. Every time I filled it up I thought surely something was wrong with the gas pump. I’m used to trucks.

Anyway, we left around 5am on Thursday morning, and with a fairly uneventful drive we rolled into the KHP campground at 3:45. We were staying with our friend Kim in her camper, which was fantastic. In years past we’ve rented an RV and either drove it ourself or had it dropped off at the campground. Staying on site is for sure the way to go, it’s just really nice to not have to park or deal with traffic getting in and out of KHP every day. Plus there were multiple times where we came back to the camper to either drop things off, or grab something, or just chill for a bit before heading back into the hustle and bustle.

When we got there we quickly headed over to do a first perusal of the trade fair just to scope it out (and maybe grab a couple things…. ya know…) before heading out to get our what-has-become-tradition kentucky tattoos. Hillary and I got the number 42 (to be explained at a later date) and then we grabbed some dinner and headed back to the camper.

Friday was WET. Like wet wet wet. I was a walking prune all day long. Alex (trainer’s husband and sometimes-fill-in-trainer) had a horse in the 4* at 8:38 so we headed out early hoping to get some breakfast and hit the official merch store before his test. Breakfast was a bust – nothing was open yet at 8 – and as we were standing in the merch tent I started to hear rumblings of thunder. I pulled up the radar and there was a big line of angry red on the radar, close enough to where I was like there’s no way Alex is gonna get through his test before this hits. Sure enough, another horse later they went into a rain delay and sent poor Alex, who was warmed up and ready to go, back to the barn.

We took refuge in the Arion tent for a while, trying to hang out near the stadium, but the delay kept getting longer and longer, so eventually we gave up and retreated to the trade fair. It worked out fine, we were able to watch Alex’s test on the big screen in there, and we made a big thorough lap around all the stores.

By the time we made it through everything it was lunch time, and then we headed back to the rv to try to dry out a little bit before we got in the car and headed over to Spy Coast, a big breeding farm that’s right next door to KHP. Some of you may remember that I bought a dose of Nice de Prissey frozen in Spy Coast’s Valentine’s Day sale, and when I reached out to my contact to see if we might be able to come see stallions while we were in town, she said absolutely. I won’t pass up that opportunity. Seeing them in person is always so beneficial.

They have a lot of stallions on site, all of whom have jumped to a high level. We got an up close and personal view of all of them, and they pulled them out of their stalls so we could get a good look at how they’re put together and see what their general temperament was like. Every time we get to see stallions in this format there end up being some that I thought I’d love from their pics/videos and just don’t, and others that I didn’t love from their pics/videos but like a whole lot more in person. This time was no different.

Luckily Nice de Prissey remained a solid favorite – I really like him a lot – but my other favorite was a stallion they just recently got, Clockwise de Greenhill Z. I wouldn’t mind adding a dose to my tank at some point.

After that we headed to get some BBQ for dinner before blasting ourselves with a very hot shower at the campground (the water pressure is legendary) and were actually in bed pretty early.

On Saturday morning we dipped over to the trade fair again because Ride Equisafe posted on Instagram that they’d marked down their sale stuff even more. I didn’t find anything else to tempt me, but Hillary was cold (it felt a lot colder than I expected) and bought a couple jackets. While she was getting rung up I wandered into the booth next door and realized they had Grand Prix tech fabric show coats on sale for $75. Um, whut. I tried on the navy and gray one and it fit me like an absolute glove, so yup, had to have it.

Then we made our way back up to the Hill for breakfast and FINALLY got our crepe (honestly, how much do I have to pay that guy to open before 9:15, I’m dying of starvation by that point) before heading out on the XC course.

The wind was so cold I ended up putting my show coat on as a middle layer. Kentucky really went for it with the wild weather swings this year. I was wearing shorts on Thursday, was a walking prune on Friday, froze to death on Saturday, and on Sunday I got sunburned. On brand.

Anyway, I had a couple people I was planning to find/meet up with on course, and since Alex wasn’t going until the later group in the 4*, I decided to start trying to find the first person – Jim, the CEO of FLAIR strips. We’ve chatted via Zoom about some products they’re developing and he texted me on Friday asking if I was going to be at Kentucky and if so we should meet up. So I found Jim, we chatted with him for a while and got a look at some prototypes, and then spent a while helping him spot rider numbers and whether or not their horses had FLAIR strips on.

Then Alex was out, and I positioned myself in between the coffin and the Cosequin Cove water so I could see him come through both places. His mare (a homebred!) was on fire and absolutely ate up a tough course. That was fun to watch.

We walked around the course for a bit longer after that, then headed back to the trade fair for lunch and to buy some damn gloves because both of us had frozen hands. We ended up running into Jim again, and he introduced us to his friend JP who owns the brand Zentora. I’d seen several upper level horses/riders wearing the martingale he developed but didn’t know anything about it, so he told us about that and his halter (which had caught my eye on an earlier pass-by but I didn’t stop to look closer). The design and thought process behind both is really cool and innovative so it was super interesting. We ended up talking to JP for longer than I realized and the 5* already started by the time we booked it back out to the course. I missed the entirety of Calvin’s round and didn’t even hear about it until that night when I got on facebook.

We headed over to say hi to Jen at her tailgate first before meandering around the course. Along the way I met up with one of the companies I do social media for, so we could actually get a picture of all of us together for the first time. Then we kept walking, ending up down in the far field where we could see several jumps at once. I was delighted watching Commando come through – absolutely LOVE that horse.

After XC we headed back to the campground for our Patreon happy hour (I think I ate 90% of the cheese by myself) and then back into the stadium for the Grand Prix show jumping. Kent Farrington and Greya were absolutely phenomenal, although I also really loved Eddy Blue.

And then you’ll never guess who we ran into again: Jim. He just kept popping up everywhere. He ended up sitting down by us to watch the GP, and then invited us to go grab a drink at a Mexican restaurant with him and a couple of other people. By the time we got back it was past 10pm, so it was a long day but a very good one. Granted, I think I used up the entirety of my social skills for the next 6 months.

Sunday morning we headed out early so we could make it to the jog (the jog is right up there with XC on my list of cannot-be-missed things… I like to see the horses up close and get a good look at their conformation). Originally we weren’t sure if we’d end up staying for any of the show jumping on Sunday since we had an 11 hour drive home, but we did sit and watch a good chunk of the 4*, mostly to see Alex go. After he was done we made a run for the food so that we wouldn’t end up having to stand in long lines at the lunch rush. We’d made one last round of the trade fair that morning, and thought about staying for the 5* show jumping, but it was such a long break before it started and it seemed like a foregone conclusion that Michi was going to win, so we decided to head home.

All in all it was a great trip to Kentucky, I got some stuff done work-wise, we got to see lots of friends and make some new ones, found some great deals (always a perk), have some fun new stuff to try out, and saw some fabulous horses and riders. Can’t beat that!

Until next time, bluegrass.