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The Blogger Gift Exchange, hosted every year by Tracy at The Printable Pony, is quite possibly one of my favorite annual traditions. The equestrian blogger community has yielded me a lot of great friendships over the years, although granted I haven’t met a lot of them in person yet. Being able to do the gift exchange is a really fun, personal, and tangible way to reach out to the people behind the screen. I have not always known my recipient or my gift-giver very well in the past, but this year I was well-acquainted with both! My recipient was Stacie at Amateur at Large (we constantly enable each other to buy things, so it was quite apropos), and I possibly went a little overboard getting stuff for her. I couldn’t help it. Things just kept popping up that screamed Stacie. Like a cheese balls shirt.

I always do feel a bit bad for whoever is unlucky enough to get me though, because I’m very aware of how hard I am to shop for, but I actually knew my gift-giver this year too – Rhiannon over at The Horse is Not Black. Granted, I’m not sure if knowing me actually makes it more or less difficult to shop for me. Either way, she did great!

First of all, you people that are organized and put-together enough to individually wrap things – hats off to you. I literally just toss shit in a box. If I remember to do that before actual Christmas, get all the right things in the right boxes, and address it to the right person, it’s a win for me. Rhiannon totally gets extra points for presentation though, with all the nice wrapping. And Stewie, my JRT mix, absolutely loves to rip the paper off of presents, so he quite enjoyed that part.

Inside all the packages was a treasure trove of treats – for cats, dogs, horses, and humans. Nicker Makers are probably Henry’s favorite treats aside from the ultra-sugary Stud Muffins or German Horse Muffins (which are reserved only for special occasions lest he get The ‘Beetus), so he was delighted. He seriously raked in the treats this year, across the board. Stewie and Quinn both loved theirs too, and the kitten (who SO has named Orlock and I still call Hades, we are a house divided so this cat will probably have 2 names forever) gobbled his up as well. Grem likes to sniff treats, reject them, and then get mad about not getting a treat (it’s kind of her thing), so… Hades ate hers. Serves her right.

For me there was hot chocolate – an excellent choice because while I am one of the rare humans on this planet who doesn’t like coffee, beer, or wine, I do love me some hot chocolate. She also included a nice black Ariat merino wool headband, which will definitely come in handy doing barn chores this winter.

Stewie’s favorite part though?

The toys. He had seen me take them out of the box and set them on the table, so he was already whining and prancing while I was trying to take the first picture. As soon as I snapped it I handed him the reindeer and he took off around the living room. He might be 14 but destroying toys is still his favorite activity in the world. He’s very systematic about it… gnaw off an appendage, remove all the guts, find the squeaker, and then roll around in the gore. Within 15 minutes the reindeer was an amputee.

You don’t even want to see what he looks like now, a few days later. It’s gruesome. You wouldn’t be able to ID the body anymore. RIP reindeer, sorry you ended up in a house of horrors.

Aside from perhaps unwittingly becoming an accessory to reindeer murder, Rhiannon did a great job. Thank you! Another fun and successful Blogger Gift Exchange in the books. Hope everyone had a great holiday.

From our barn to yours, Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas!

Emily over at May as Well Event (have you seen her cute little palomino mare? She’s one of my favorite blogger horses.) came up with a really great idea for an end-of-the-decade 2010’s photo challenge. The rule is that you have to pick one photo, and only one photo, for each year of the 2010’s. Which is… way harder than it seemed like it would be. Thank goodness I’ve had facebook forever so that I could at least tell which year was which. Things really start to blur together over time. But then it got really hard narrowing it down to just one. I found myself picking more “pivotal moments” photos rather than the best or prettiest.

 2010

I owned Sadie in 2010 but she was just a 3yo, so while I hacked and trail rode her a few days a week, most of my “real” riding was on catchrides. It was also still back in my h/j days. This was Otis, a Holsteiner gelding that I hadn’t ridden until the day before the horse show. We did the adult hunters at that show, and I still vividly remember paying that bill (which, coincidentally, is the day I realized I would never really be able to compete at the level I wanted to in that sport, even though I’d keep trying for a couple more years).

2011

In 2011 Sadie turned 4 and went to her first couple horse shows in the hunters, mostly with my trainer at the time. However, I also started leasing an Oldenburg gelding from a friend. I brought him back from a ligament injury and started showing him in the jumpers, which was a real aha moment for me. I hadn’t done the jumpers in many years, and now I remembered just how much I really loved it. Suddenly I really didn’t want to do the hunters at all anymore, despite having a homebred that was specifically created for the hunter ring. Oops.

2012

Luckily Sadie, now a 5yo, was totally down for a career change and humored me without complaint.

2013

Between 2012 and 2013 the shit really hit the fan in my personal life, so I made arrangements to lease Sadie out for a year to get myself back on track. The person I leased her to turned out to be Michelle of Willow Tree Warmbloods, which of course was the beginning of something epic even if we didn’t know it at the time. Granted, I only managed to make it about 6 months without a horse before I had a mental breakdown, and Sadie was now pregnant, so naturally I impulse-purchased Henry on facebook. At the time I reasoned that he’d be a resale project to keep me occupied until Sadie’s foal was weaned and she was ready to come home.

2014

Henry and I started the year in the jumper ring, dabbled in a couple hunter classes, and by the end of the year, through a series of very serendipitous events, somehow found ourselves at Henry’s first horse trial. I hadn’t evented since 2003, but as soon as I left the start box I was hooked all over again. Henry also seemed to really love it, although he was a little bit spooky about XC at first and had a definite aversion to down banks.

2015

We came out swinging as eventers in 2015, and I set the goal of qualifying for AEC’s since it was the last year for it to be held in Texas. We showed a lot with Bobby and got our BN AEC qualifications secured by May, then moved up to Novice in June. We moved back down for AEC, placed 10th individually (Bobby won!), and our team won the Adult Team Championships. After AEC we moved back up to N and now I was definitely mega-hooked. It was also becoming really clear that my “sale horse” was definitely… not.

2016

Our big goal in 2016 was the Novice 3 Day at Coconino. We secured all of our qualifications throughout the spring, and then in July we were off to experience our first classic format. Roads and tracks still stands out as some of the most fun I’ve ever had on a horse, and it was also when things really started to click for us on cross country. I came back from that trip feeling like Henry really understood what the game was all about, and I was finally figuring out how to really ride it.

2017

This stands out as one of the best and also one of the worst years I’ve ever had with horses. Presto was born, and we all know what happened after that. I’m still not okay and probably never will be. But he pulled through, time and time again, and I put in my first season at Training level with Henry, something I had honestly never thought we’d get to. The jumps were starting to shrink, and our confidence was starting to grow.

2018

Things started really coming together for Henry and me in 2018. The XC was now the easiest phase, and the dressage was slowly but surely improving. Now the bugaboo was stadium… ha, go figure. By the end of the season we managed to pull it together and finish on our dressage score a few times at Training, finally getting some good placings at the level at recognized shows. We decided to keep riding that wave and in December we did our first Preliminary, where I crossed the finish line and bawled like a baby. I’ll never in my life forget how that felt.

2019

This year we did three more Prelims. Each time felt a little surreal, since I never actually imagined we’d ever get to that level. That was certainly never the goal at any point, it just… happened. Henry proved his heart and his love for the game by turning in a clear XC round at each one, even at Coconino which was definitely the toughest XC we’ve ever faced, with questions the likes of which he’d never seen before. He gave me the round of my life that day, eating it up like he was having the grandest time. It’s one of the highlights of my life, much less my year. To have brought this horse up the levels, and to see how hard he tries for me… that’s the part that makes it so extraordinary for me.

It’s been a crazy decade. If you’d told me in 2010 that I’d be eventing at Preliminary by 2019, have an eventing-bred son of Sadie in my barn, and be absolutely head over heels in love with both horses, I would have thought you were definitely off your meds. It’s interesting, the places life takes us. Goes to show that sometimes fate has better plans in store for us than we could ever have come up with on our own.

As you guys probably know by now, I love to travel. Ok, specifically I love to travel to do horsey things. Our Europe trips are actual dreams come true, and it seems like with every trip we get a little more crafty at how to cram as much stuff in as possible.

But, while Europe is my favorite, there’s definitely plenty to do stateside as well. I could travel from event to event and farm to farm pretty much all year long and stay busy and happy, I’m pretty sure (hey lottery, wanna help me test that theory?). But, ya know… money. And real life. I have to prioritize one or two things a year and balance that with horse shows and vet bills and all that other stuff too. Therefore I usually start plotting any trips pretty far in advance. This year we hit the FEH/YEH Symposium in Ocala over the winter, and then Burghley/France late in the summer. It was an expensive year for me otherwise, so while I had originally hoped to also hit either Kentucky in the spring or Fair Hill in the fall, it just didn’t happen.

Looking ahead to 2020, there are a few events on my radar. I’m guessing I will probably have to pick 2, but I haven’t completely decided which ones yet…

First and foremost, I definitely want to get to Morven Park in the fall for the first ever 6yo 2* and 7yo 3* to be held on American soil. I think this is huge, and I want to be there and support it however I can. Morven will be priority #1.

I am watching with rapt attention to see how Equitana’s line-up starts to shake out. It’s a trade fair, it’s an exhibition, there’s shopping, there’s education… I mean, it’s got my name written all over it. I’m just waiting to see more about who all is going to be there for the clinics before I commit. The tickets are cheap but the travel part never is, so I want to make sure the trip seems worthwhile.

On a more far-reaching, international note, I think my next “pie in the sky” Europe trip goal is Millstreet in Ireland. I don’t know if that’ll be possible in 2020, but if not, hopefully 2021. I’ve been itching to get to Ireland, and Millstreet has a lot to offer in one show – young horse classes for 4 and 5yo, a 6yo 2*, ERM series 4*-S, a 4*-L, a pony division of the 2*, and of course… a trade fair. Plus there are a lot of stallions/offspring I’d like to see in Ireland (ahem, Tullabeg Fusion) and it would be cool to fit in a 3 or 4 day riding adventure too while we’re there. Gotta get the most of out one trip! This of course would be the most expensive one though, so… not sure whether or not I’ll be able to swing it with everything else going on in my life next year.

If Equitana and Millstreet both end up being a no-go, then that opens up the possibility of Kentucky or Fair Hill 5*… those are always back burner options that I would love to get to, but aren’t as high up on the priority list.

Anyone else started planning their 2020 events and travel yet? What’s on your radar?

On a note related entirely to the title but not at all to the actual content of this post, back in the day I used to ride a TB mare named Jezebel who’s sire was, no joke, Mr. Sparkles (he was Deputy Minister x Buckpasser, what I wouldn’t do to get my hands on another by him now!) and I really did NOT appreciate that name enough at the time.

Anyway.

Presto’s Christmas present (the one from his horse mom) arrived this week, and boy are they delightfully sparkly. Navy glitter does not disappoint. They’ve almost got a galaxy-esque look to them.

They’re from Punk Ponies in New Zealand, and considering how freaking far they had to travel, they arrived pretty quickly, just a little over a week from order to arrival. Their size chart said the boots run small and they definitely were not kidding, I ordered the Extra Full and they fit. Presto is built more like a TB than a WB and typically wears horse sized things. When I took them out of the bag I was a little worried the elastic might not reach around his cannon, especially given how hairy his legs are right now, but it does. Albeit not with any room to spare. If you have a particularly large and big-boned horse, I don’t think you’ll have much luck getting these to fit.

The quality is decent, not like Prestige or Veredus level when it comes to plush sheepskin open front boots, but then again these were only $66 USD for a full set – extremely cheap for boots – so that’s not what I was expecting. The lining of course is fleece, and I’d say they’re more comparable to the LeMieux fleece boots that I’ve seen, which seems more than reasonable to me given the price point. We’ll see how they hold up. Given that they’re…. glitter…  it’s not really something I’d use on a daily basis, more for “special occasions”.

The main draw of these, after all, is how they look. Let’s be real, you’re not buying them because you want the best or most practical boot on the market, you’re buying these because you want some damn glitter in your life (or holo, or patent, or camo, or floral, or whatever other spectacularly weird shit you’re buying from this place). In that regard, they certainly deliver. Once you get a bit of distance there’s nothing particularly eye-catching about them, but up close, boy do they ever twinkle. Which, maybe I’m easily amused, but I think they’re hilarious on Presto, with his punk rock forelock, copious side eye, and giraffe legs. I’m kind of thinking of them as his super hero uniform… without them, he’s Presto, but put the boots on and BAM Captain Sparkles.

Yeah I know, I am for sure going to pay for this some day.

Speaking of which, we continue to creep closer and closer to his 3rd birthday. Less than 4 months to go! I had originally planned to put a few very basic w/t/stop/steer rides on him this month, but then all the sudden he started looking like a weird giraffe/llama/moose hybrid again. Great, another growth spurt. Just what he needed. I may or may not have exclaimed “WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS TO ME?” at him when he went from lovely to heinous seemingly overnight. The neck is… something else. So those plans are on hold for now. No rush. It can wait until his body isn’t so weird and gawky and unbalanced.

For now I just bring him in, put his sparkly boots on, and giggle like a complete lunatic at the sight of it. That’s not weird right?