Well, this is kind of embarrassing, but, um… Henry is a bit of a porker at the moment.

I’d noticed that over the past couple months he was looking more fluffy, but I just figured that it was because we’d cut back on conditioning work for the summer. It’s not that unusual for Henry’s weight to fluctuate a little, depending on his work load. So I didn’t really think much of it, figuring that as he went back into a more normal schedule, the weight would start to come back off.

But when I showed up for my dressage lesson, and Trainer hadn’t seen him for 2 months, she said “He’s so fat! Look, he has a fat pad above his tail!! HAHAHAHAHA OH MY GOD!”. So rude. Poor Henry.

It’s ironic that she said that on that particular day though, because when I went to get him out of his pasture before we headed over there for our lesson, I was walking up to him going “OMG he’s fat… is that a halter horse or a thoroughbred? Maybe it’s just the angle?”. Because really from certain angles he doesn’t look fat at all, but then from others, well… halter horse.

Henry is no stranger to FattyFatLand… I don’t think I’ll ever forget that very first day when I unloaded him from the trailer, pulled off his blanket, and was greeted by this:

Yes, I leaned down and checked to make sure he had boy parts. Then sent his DNA off to the Jockey Club to confirm he was a TB. No, he’s not a pregnant mare, and yes, he’s a thoroughbred. He’s just a bit of a fluff when he’s not working.

I also found out that the weekend feeder has accidentally been giving him double rations, which I’m sure hasn’t helped. Henry was probably delighted, but I don’t think he needs THAT MUCH Triple Crown Senior (his standard ration is the lowest recommended daily amount).

It also kind of made me think about how different the ideals are for each sport. If Henry was a hunter, he’d be pretty perfect. But he’s not a hunter, he’s an event horse. He has to gallop a lot and jump solid stuff for a living, so we don’t want a lot of extra weight on him. I’d already started adding his long trots back into our repertoire, but I think it’s time to start bumping up the time. Somebody needs to lose a bit of that fat lard before fall season starts, and hey, maybe his rider will lose some too?

Not gonna lie, I was getting desperate for a dressage lesson. It’s been a few months, and the last one we had was SO BAD (yes, horse, let’s pretend like you’ve never heard of contact before in your life), I’m not even sure it counts. So I was bound and determined to get one in this weekend, and wasn’t even deterred by the fact that the only time Trainer really had available was 3pm on Sunday.

Spoiler alert: this was a mistake.

I think I let myself be lulled into thinking it really wasn’t all that hot anymore, since this past week we’d had a good 10 degree drop in temperatures. What I failed to consider is that it was still in the low 90’s. With 70% humidity. And you know who’s not really acclimated to the heat anymore, since we ride so early in the morning? Me and Henry both.

I got there early so I’d have ample time to walk around the XC field and get some stretchy trot before our lesson started. Whatever was in the air yesterday was bothering us both, because we were both sounding a little bit wheezy. I’d given Henry a double dose of his allergy med before we left, but that didn’t really seem to help. Once I got him thinking forward I decided to just walk and wait for our lesson time. But we were still dying so the walking quickly morphed into standing under the trees while sweat poured freely down my face.

Trainer showed up and we got right to work, fixing our crookedness to the left (my bad), working on some sitting trot and 10m circles and shoulder-in. All was fine at first. Then we got to the canter and were doing a shallow counter canter loop down one long side, lengthen down the other side, and repeat. That was all fine (you know, when I let go and use my leg so the horse can actually move his hind end), so we took a walk break.

OMG HUGE MISTAKE.

As soon as we stopped working, my world start spinning and I wasn’t sure if I was going to pass out or throw up. I quickly slid off my horse and sat in the shade for a few minutes, head bent over. Trainer kept handing me more water bottles (please don’t die in the dressage court) and eventually I figured I felt as good as I was possibly going to feel, so I hopped back up so we could do the exercise to the left. We did it 3 times that way and finally got a proper counter canter loop, so we called it a day and I promptly went back to collapse in the shade. I loosened Henry’s girth and undid his nosebands and we both just looked at each other like “This was an idiotic idea”. The glare I got from him was well-deserved. Sorry, bud.

I think it’s safe to say that we’re done with afternoon lessons until like… October.

Cats are weird, y’all. And kittens? Kittens are crazy. Next level insane. At one point in my life I knew all this, but not having had a cat for a really long time, I kind of forgot.

Gremy has settled in to her new life as a dog terrorist inside cat, and she’s starting to get a lot more comfortable in her surroundings. In the beginning she spent a lot of time clinging to us and was much more subdued. These days she most closely resembles the Tasmanian devil. What’s this bullshit I read on the internet about kittens sleeping 20 hours a day? HAHAHAHA. If that’s what’s normal, mine is broken, because she plays and plays and plays and plays for hours and then naps for like 20 minutes before she’s off and running again at full speed. Her favorite trick is to dash between your feet while you’re walking, causing you to perform acrobatics in an effort to avoid stepping on her, which tends to result in the human crashing into something. Hilaaaaarious.

She had her first vet appointment last weekend where she officially weighed in at 1.2lbs. She got a couple of her first shots, they did bloodwork, checked her for ringworm, did a fecal, etc. She was PISSED. I had to sacrifice another hair tie to keep her distracted (I’ve somehow lost approximately 557 hairties in the past two weeks).

She also got her tag, so she’s officially official now. My name and number are on the back and everything.

And the SO got her a harness and leash because he’s deadset on having a cat he can walk. Of course she’s so tiny right now that even the tiniest one they had is too big, so he’ll have to revisit that endeavor once she gets a bit bigger.

The dogs are still terrified of her, which has emboldened her a bit. She is not at all shy about coming at them with a needle-filled claw if they get too close, and she quite enjoys playing with Delia’s tail. They still have a little more settling in to do before everything is seamless, but so far everyone has at least escaped unscathed and for the most part they seem satisfied to leave each other alone.

So far so good! She’s definitely in that lunatic kitten stage, but she seems to have transitioned to her new life happily enough.

And she’s still really damn cute when she sleeps, even though those moments are getting more and more brief…

I got quite the kick out of one particular part of William Micklem’s last article where he shared his thoughts on breeding event horses:

Yep, you got it, the warmblood registries were not big fans of Sam. This is specifically referring to when he was presented as a 2yo for stallion licensing, where he was rejected with the overall impression being “He is nondescript, his head is too big, he has no presence and has a funny jumping technique”. Of course, this all worked out in Sam’s favor in the end, because it set him on the path to end up with Michael Jung, but it’s funny to hear the impression that a whole lot of breeding specialists had of him (and they were not necessarily wrong at the time) when he was a young horse.

Sam was a late bloomer, and of course even now there isn’t much about him that would immediately WOW most people. He’s fairly plain and not a particularly flashy mover or jumper. But he’s got a ton of heart and a huge desire to please, and that, more than anything else, is what has made him one of the best event horses of all time.

Sam’s story is also just one of many examples of why I personally don’t put much stock in inspection scores, especially for babies. There’s definitely a lesson in Sam’s story for all of us with foals or young horses. Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t a slam on the judges and inspectors at all – in most cases they are supremely well qualified, with an abundance of experience. This is just an observation of the nature of horses and how hard it can be to see their true potential.

For dressage horses, there’s a lot you can see in a young horse. The gaits will be there at least in their raw form, although the conformation can change a bit, and of course you can’t tell what the horse’s mental capacity for the work will be. For jumpers, or especially eventers, I think it’s very very hard, even impossible, to judge the potential of a horse that young, especially if they are a late bloomer.

I’ve been to a lot of inspections, especially foal inspections. Many people, especially new breeders, put a lot of emphasis on the scores, getting really excited about a good score or extremely disappointed with a bad one. But really, there are a lot of variables at play here. First and foremost, the judges can only give a score for what they see in those few minutes on that particular day. If the foal is in a funky stage of growth, or if they’re tense, or if they just won’t show any trot… the scores will suffer, obviously. It doesn’t mean the quality isn’t there, it just means they can’t see it. The premium foals, the ones who score the highest, are usually the well-developed, pretty ones who decide to trot around with lots of spring in their step on that particular day. Does that translate to a successful sporthorse? I mean… maybe… but not directly.

And with jumpers and eventers, of course they don’t actually get to see the foals jump at all, since they’re so young. The judges can see the canter (if the foal stops bouncing around like Pepe LePew long enough to show some real canter, that is), which can be some indicator of power, but does the horse have the ability? The scope? The technique? The heart? The boldness? The rideability? None of that can be seen on that day, and those are the most important qualities in a jumping horse.

Foal inspections are fun and important, don’t get me wrong. It’s fun to braid, get everyone bathed, and show them off. And of course I do think it’s VERY important for the breed registries to get out there and look at what is being produced. To see the mares, see the offspring, possibly make some breeding suggestions, point out potential future stallion candidates, and see what bloodlines are working out well. That’s selective breeding at it’s finest, after all, and it’s what has made the warmblood registries so incredibly successful at producing sporthorses. It’s also a great feather in the cap of a breeder if their foals score really well.

But am I, the average amateur who bred a horse that is destined for packing my ass around mid-level eventing, going to place a ton of emphasis on what score Presto gets at his foal inspection? No. Honestly, his probably won’t be high, and that’s ok. He’s just not the typical “premium” type. I bred him to do a job, not to get a good foal score. We’ll go out there, and he’ll probably bounce around like a cracked out monkey, and we’ll take our score, listen to the comments, thank the judges profusely for their expertise, and get his brand. Will any of that have any bearing on his future? No. He will be a gelding and a riding horse, not breeding stock.

The same theory applies for young horses classes, too. Hunter breeding, dressage breeding, future event horse… even the beginning of their career under saddle. It’s just a day in the life of that horse, not a be-all-end-all declaration of it’s future. It’s not fun to hear the negative, especially if you know the horse is better than that, but it’s all a part of the game.

Time will tell what kind of quality we really have, just like it did with Sam. So to anyone else out there with foals, or young horses that are starting out in their show careers – if you get good scores and placings, enjoy them. If you don’t, don’t sweat it. Relish the horse you’ve got, and savor the journey you’re on. Remember, this is only the beginning. Sam wasn’t born a superstar either.

You know what’s fun? Planning a trip to Europe. You know what’s even more fun? When said trip is mostly horsey. You know what’s the most fun? The fact that it’s less than 4 weeks away.

The main reason we’re going is for Bundeschampionate, which is in Warendorf Germany from August 30-Sept 3. But of course we’re flying over a few days before, and staying a couple days after, so we have ample time to visit some farms, see some babies and stallions, and do some touristy things along the way, naturlich. This week we finalized all those other days, made an itinerary, and booked the hotels.

Day 1 will be mostly spent at a farm just outside of Brussels, looking at stallions and youngstock,

then we’re heading north to Bruges.

We definitely plan on eating our weight in waffles, but beyond that we’ll just see what looks appealing.

There’s also an entire museum dedicated to Pommes Frites though, which IMO that’s like a must-do. Yes, please teach me all about the history of pommes frites and then reward me with some at the end of the tour. Those are the kinds of things I really need to learn about in Europe.

The next morning we hit the highway that runs along the coast, out of Belgium and into France, on down to the Rouen area. Here we’ll be visiting a pretty awesome pony jumper breeder

and then staying in a small village outside of town, on the Seine. Like literally right ON IT.

The next day we have a pretty long drive all the way across France, back across southern Belgium (with a pitstop at the Zangersheide Studfarm to look at stallions)

before we finally get to our little farmhouse Airbnb in Germany, about 10 minutes from Warendorf.

Funny though, it takes almost the same amount of time to drive from Rouen to Warendorf as it does for me to drive from my house to Michelle’s farm. And we’re in the same damn state.

Once we get to Warendorf we have several things on the agenda. Of course there’s Bundeschampionate itself, although we’re going to just kind of pop in and out during the preliminary days and really only plan on staying all day for the showjumping and cross country finals. 

Luckily there is a TON of stuff within about an hour of there that we can do. There are a couple more studfarms we plan to hit, including Schockemohle and Ludger Beerbaum’s stallion station.

Mostly these four days that we’re in Warendorf are pretty open, by design. We’ll just see where our adventures take us, and figure out what all we can fit in. I had originally mapped out several awesome tack shops, but then one of the BuCha organizers told me that the shopping is supposed to be awesome at the event, so we’ll see what kind of trouble I can get into there. Either way, these are definitely on my list of things that will be coming home with me from Europe.

If I have any money left by the time we leave Warendorf, it’ll be a total miracle.

After being fully immersed in everything horsey for 4 straight days, we head back over to Brussels for our last afternoon and night. We both really loved the Grand Place last time we were in Brussels, so we’re going to spend our last evening binging on cheese and sausage platters and drinking framboise. Perhaps more waffles, too… let’s be real.

Our hotel is literally IN the Grand Place, and we paid a little extra to have a room with a view of the Grand Place itself. Because how the hell do you beat that view?

By then we’ll probably be ready to come home, and hopefully all of our stuff will still fit in our bags. I may or may not be 10lbs heavier, both of body and of bag. I’m SUPER RIDICULOUSLY excited though, especially now that we have a really good plan and everything is booked.

And now, we wait 26 more days. But who’s counting?