I was hoping that show photos would be up by now but no such luck, so we’re gonna have to do this with the media I’ve got.

The Ocala Summer 1 show at the Florida Horse Park this past weekend marked our second Modified. The good thing about shows here once everyone leaves after season is that they get considerably more casual. Especially if ride times start early or it’s a one day, a lot of people don’t braid and don’t wear a coat. Which… generally if possible I’ll always opt to braid and wear a coat, but this time I didn’t. It felt weird, but also my dressage ride was at 8:20, my finger is still pissed as hell, and it was hot. Summer casual, it is.

We were on the road to the Horse Park by 6:40, got parked by 7:30, and I was on Presto and headed to warmup at 8. The ring was very full, which was 99% fine because it was almost all pros and Modified/Intermediate, but I will say there’s one pro here that just has a real hard time steering. Every time I’m in warmup with him he’s running people over left and right, and has gotten me twice. Steer, man. STEER. I tried to avoid him like the plague. Also, entirely unrelated, but at one point I looked over and saw Off The Record exiting the warmup and a few minutes later in comes Tight Lines. Look at you kiddo, warming up with the 5* horses. LOL.

Anyway – Presto was actually really stellar in warmup and I was like “ok maybe this is the time I actually pull out a good one”. And then I went in the ring, did 3 movements, and promptly went entirely blank. Like my brain just went eeee-errrrrr-pssshhhhh and blue-screened. I had to stop and ask the judge what the next movement was. Fucks sake. That hasn’t happened in a really long time. So, ya know… it was not my best work.

Still we were tied for 4th after dressage out of 11 horses on a score of 34. The judge was scoring everyone high, but she did so across the board, so although painful it was fair. We did manage an 8 for our entrance and an 8.5 for our final centerline and halt, so… there were good scores in there. One of these days I’ll actually put it all together consistently, not just like every 4th or 5th show.

After dressage I had a few hours before show jumping, most of which I spent grazing Presto next to the ring so I could watch the Intermediate and some of the Prelim. I also walked the course while they were setting for Prelim, with me going “I feel like these oxers should look smaller than they do considering Modified is only a hole lower…”. I never really stand next to the things we jump, and they always look considerably smaller from on top of a 17.1h Presto.

Also while I was grazing him there was a western drill team practicing in another ring and when they pulled out their flags Presto thought they’d morphed into dragons. That was fun.

By the time I got on and headed to warmup the day was turning warmer and swampier by the minute. Again though, Presto warmed up great (he considered shenanigans briefly but was convinced to abandon the mission) and we just popped over a handful of oxers. If he’s jumping well there’s no point in boring him or making him tired, so we tend to take the “as much as necessary but as little as possible” approach.

He went in the ring and jumped like he had springs for feet. Well okay… the first jump was great, a single oxer off the rail. I saw a bit of a quiet one to the vertical at 2, then made the rollback to 3 and saw another quiet one. As I turned to 4 I was a little behind where I needed to be and thought “If I try to micromanage this whole round instead of just sending him forward, we’re gonna have no flow whatsoever” so I closed my leg and rode him up to 4. He went “YES THIS IS THE WAY” and absolutely pinged over it. It’s not very often that this horse actually gives a lot of effort so when he does I’m like oh dang, he really can jump.

That was what we needed, just a bit more forward of a ride, and once I clicked that in, the rest of the round was super.

He jumped great, everything came up out of stride, and I swear I think he was having a good time.

Almost too good of a time at one point, because when I tried to steer him inside of jump 2 to make the turn to the one stride, he momentarily locked onto that one again, which, bro, if I was actually aiming at that we would have jumped the standard on a most impossible angle, but I do appreciate your dedication. I had to be like “NO NOT THAT ONE”. Bless him.

Patreon folks, you have the full video on your dashboard!

It was a good round though, much better than I rode at Majestic. The clear round (one of only 4 clears out of the 18 horses in both Modified divisions!) moved us up to 3rd, just one point off the leader. No pressure for XC.

Also many thanks to Hannah who was the patron saint of media this show, since Hillary and I had conflicting ride times. Thanks Hannah!

Lucy’s mom Lija caught this super cute clip of Rhett and Lucy last night… I felt like it sums them up perfectly.

Happy Friday!

Well ok I’m willing to admit that my beginning of the week update is perhaps running a wee bit late this time considering it’s now Thursday. Don’t worry, you haven’t missed anything too exciting.

Last Friday the horses all got their teeth done. We’re lucky to have an amazing dentist here in Ocala that has a super cool, specially modified dental trailer. It works amazing, so convenient and a great set-up. She came and did everyone last year too, so this was their second visit from her. No one had anything particularly crazy going on, just kind of the usual stuff for each of them, and they were all well-behaved. It was quick and easy!

I also had her check the fit of my bits and bridles while she was there, just to make sure everything was sitting well in Presto’s mouth and not potentially causing any issues. He’s got particularly fleshy lips so it can make him harder to fit and more prone to pinching and discomfort, so I just wanted to check and make sure she was happy with everything and how it sat/was adjusted. She raised my dressage bit one hole (his canines sit a little high in his mouth) but otherwise all good.

Presto got Saturday off, but the weather was divine so Henry and Lex went for a road hack. I’ve been able to get on Henry a few times over the last week to start trying to build some his topline back up and get him back in some kind of shape. He mostly seems happy to be getting more cookies again.

On Sunday we took Presto and Lex over to Sweet Dixie to hack the hills. Typically that would have been our gallop day but Presto was at the end of his shoeing cycle and I wasn’t loving how long his hind toes were looking, so we just opted for some trot sets on the hills. Again the weather was beautiful, so it was a nice morning out.

Presto spent the rest of his day partaking in some serious naps, during which I served as Pillow for long enough to make my leg fall completely asleep. These horses and their tough tough lives.

The farrier was here on Tuesday, and yesterday morning Presto had a chiro appointment (for those who are keeping track, yes the past week has been just as $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ as it sounds). He was a bit sore in his lower lumbar, my guess is most likely from those long toes he’d been sporting there for the previous week, and needed a bit of extra work on his poll area too. His feet are looking superb now though, much better with a fresh set. He’s on a 5 week cycle but if he gets that long again this time we might move to 4 weeks for the summer. The horses seem to be growing a ton of foot right now for whatever reason.

I also had the farrier pull Henry’s hind shoes. We’ll see how he does. I’d really prefer for him to be barefoot behind in case he finds himself babysitting/ponying any of the babies, but I’m not totally convinced his feet will stay together. The farrier felt pretty optimistic that it would be ok so we figured it was worth a shot. So far Henry hasn’t shown any discomfort or anything so fingers crossed (and Keratex activated) that it works out. He was barefoot when I got him but the ground in Texas was so rocky and hard that it destroyed his feet and he’s been shod on all 4 the whole time I’ve owned him. Florida’s ground is much more forgiving.

Yesterday we had a jump lesson, just a quick pop around a few things since we’re showing this weekend. Presto was a righteously egotistical turd for like 75% of it (HE KNOWS WHAT HE’S DOING), so that’s cool. Hopefully he decides to be a good child this weekend.

Hope everyone else is having a good (although perhaps slightly less expensive) week!

Fans of the show Parks and Rec will immediately get the reference in the title – it’s the name of one of the main characters of the show. Loveable, goofy, and perhaps a bit of a derp, Andy is one of my favorite characters ever on TV. And there’s a reason why Randell WTW went from his nickname of Randy to quickly having his barn name morph to Andy instead… he is 100% Andy Dwyer.

He’s so incredibly sweet, but he does have a penchant for getting himself into a bit of a pickle. Like the time he took a nap and woke up on the wrong side of the fence. Or the time he fell face first into his water trough. Or the time he took a nap like an upside down turtle up against the stall wall and was baffled when he couldn’t get up. Luckily his response to such things is “Huh… what a conundrum” as he waits patiently for assistance.

He also LOVES people. It’s hard to even get pictures of Andy because most of them end up like this.

We are the very best of friends and he would prefer to be glued to me 24/7. I absolutely adore him. But getting far enough away from him to actually take pictures where his whole body is in the frame… that is a challenge.

I resorted to sneaking into his paddock while he was taking a nap in his stall and then waited for him to come outside.

There is nothing subtle about this child. He is unapologetically Andy, he lifts his leg up like a dog when you scratch his inner thigh, he would come sleep in your house if you let him, and just wants to do whatever you want to do. His mom has a very hands-off approach to parenting (she feeds him and makes sure he’s safe, but she also won’t let him near her food and does not tolerate any hint of shenanigans in her vicinity) which has made him very people-oriented. It’s great.

But on top of that, he’s also a really nice colt.

Even though he’s butt high right now, he’s such a nice type. Leggy and tall. I have a feeling he’ll be quite awkward in his early years (just like another certain kiddo we all know and love) but he’s going to be really lovely I think. He’s very much my type!

His new mom came to meet him last weekend and they instantly loved each other, so I think it’s gonna be a great match. This kiddo is special, and I’m only like 98.2% biased. How could you not love Andy?

Happy Friday!

It’s going to have to be a quick one today because I have too much to do and not enough time to do it, but I figured I should at least pop in and do a quick update on what’s happening here. Which is a whole lot but also not much. You know what I mean? Like when you’re very busy with a lot of things but none of them are particularly noteworthy or exciting?

The 2yo’s got gelded last week so between all their daily care and doing all the stuff with the babies, it’s time consuming but also kind of mundane. Groom Lead Medicate Cold hose Walk Clean etc etc etc. We’ve also officially entered summertime rainy season, so there’s a lot more shuffling horses in and out of stalls during storms, thus more stall cleaning. If I’m not doing that I’m probably working on pedigree reports or writing something. I’m assuming y’all probably don’t want a whole blog post about any of that, but the truth is that that’s most of my time at the moment. My finger is definitely still janky and I’m pretty sure it’s going to be swollen forever, but the good news is that I’ve become quite adept at just not using it.

A few other things have been going on though. Andy’s new owner came out this weekend to meet him and they both loved each other, which is awesome. I am particularly partial to him because he reminds me a lot of baby Presto (with a touch less chaos and mayhem) so I was hoping he would win her over too, and he definitely did. I also finally got his DNA kit yesterday so today I’ll be pulling some hairs to send off so we can finally find out which one is his baby daddy. If I had to bet my money is on Lingo, but I could still kind of see it either way. He’s tall (Araldik is taller at almost 17h) but he’s very leggy and rectangular (like Lingo), but he’s got Vee’s face so it’s hard to get any clues from that. So in summary, who knows. I guess we’ll find out for sure soon.

I haven’t jumped since the show, but Presto did get a ramped up conditioning day this past weekend when we went to gallop at Majestic. Where he proceeded to spook at basically everything he jumped the weekend before. He looked at the keyhole like WHAT FRESH HELL IS THIS and denied having ever seen it in his life. He went sideways past the steps and the corner. He also had a spinning heart attack about an auto waterer near the last jump, which was also definitely there the week before because indeed, as I told him, “THAT’S ALWAYS BEEN THERE!”. Event horses, y’all. They don’t make sense.

I’m also trying to leg Henry back up a bit as I have time. He’s woefully out of shape and has lost most of his topline, which sucks. It’s light by 6am now so I’m able to start my days earlier, so I’m hoping to be able to squeeze in at least a few rides a week on him.

On Friday we’ve got the dentist coming for the horses, which I’m looking forward to. Dr. Bess is great and I’m curious to see what’s going on in their mouths.

Hopefully I’ll have a jump lesson later this week. I did submit my entries for our last two shows before summer break, Ocala and Stable View. I have already settled into my Ocala Privilege thoroughly enough that I’m feeling whiny about the extra effort that Stable View will require with hauling (its about 6 hours) and stabling and all that, but also it’ll be good to get out somewhere new that we haven’t been yet. I love our local facilities but we’ve seen a whole lot of them lately and a change of scenery will be nice!