One of my favorite things about the first few months of the year is seeing all the new collections roll out from various clothing brands. Sometimes there’s brilliance and awe, sometimes there are raised eyebrows and gagging. In the spirit of Fun Friday, let’s play a little game of Hot or Not.

Kingsland Anna show coat – pink fuchsia

Fior da Liso Daria show shirt – Hibiscus. Obviously meant for dressage or eventing folk, with the stock tie. And more pink.

Denim anyone? How about about Le Fash’s upcoming light grey denim City breeches?

Asmar is rocking some pink too with their new Punch color, but they also added Sunshine to their City Jacket color options

As long as we’re on the subject of color, Annie’s brought the Papaya for spring.

WordPress seems to have temporarily permanently eaten the poll for this one so you may or may not ever see it here again. I have no idea, I give up. Move along.

Eeeeeverybody’s on board the sticky butt trend, and judging by their Caja Grip breeches, Cavallo apparently likes red this season. They come in yellow and light pink too if you’re feeling particularly Eastery, but I won’t do that to you.

Kastel is going two-toned with their new Charlotte Studio Collection, coming soon…

Horze sees your trend of colored breeches with tan patches and does the reverse. Rebelz.

Equiline’s Gait show coat is is available in Bordeaux

Lotus Romeo goes for the subtle approach to detailing on their new blouses.

Yet another unique coat, Valentine Equine added some lace side panels to their upcoming Hollywood Jacket.

And last but not least, Roeckl just wants you to have some really fun hands.

Henry and I have now been at the farm I’m barnsitting for since last Friday. It’s a small private barn with lovely Trakehners that the owner does dressage with. Her ring is super nice, a lovely long dressage court with rubber and sand footing.

I’ve had a couple nice dressage rides since we’ve been here, and hacked out in the fields a couple other days. But yesterday I decided we really wanted to jump. A quick perusal found a few standards but no jump cups or poles here in Dressageland. Then as I was out in the ring picking up the letters that the wind had knocked over, it suddenly hit me. Put a bunch of dressage letters together and what do you get?

No, not kvepf. You get a jump, people… you get a jump.

Poor long-suffering Henry has been with me long enough to not be even remotely phased by any of my bullshit or harebrained ideas, so naturally he didn’t bat an eye when I pointed him at it.

 

Every time I think I’m being clever about jumps or courses he’s like “whatever lady, you bore me. But I’m cute and I haven’t killed you yet, so give me cookies!”. Touchè, Henrypants… touchè.

This is what happens when you leave a crazy eventer alone at a dressage barn for a week. Next thing you know I’ll be dragging out the patio furniture. I’m kidding! Be reasonable, I can’t lift that stuff over the fence by myself.

 

Although I am not a breeder, I have worked for breeders, bred one horse of my own, and been avidly interested/semi-involved in the breeding industry for over a decade. Often when I see a horse at a show that I particularly like, I will approach the owner and ask what it’s bloodlines are. 9 times out of 10 I get a blank stare. Once I even had to tell the person that their horse was registered BWP (according to it’s brand) because they had no idea what that “wagon wheel” was. Serious facepalm moment.

I understand that sometimes papers are lost and people just don’t know anything about the horse, but the amount of people who also just don’t care in this country is pretty shocking to me. If you ride sporthorses, and have any interest in riding them in the future, you should care! The breeders are the ones that produce the horses, but the riders are the ones that end up with them. We wonder why Europe outproduces us? Do we just enjoy paying 10k+ on top of purchase price to import their horses?

I think what a lot of people just don’t understand is how heritable many traits are. It’s no coincidence that certain lines are known for producing a certain temperament, or requiring a certain type of ride, or being slow to mature, or jumping over themselves in front. If you ride a horse that was purposefully bred for sport, someone somewhere planned that breeding with an end goal in mind. They picked out both parents and considered traits that they hoped both would bring to the table. The results may vary, but they are no accident. You can often tell a lot about a horse just by looking at the papers.

Even those of us sitting on OTTB’s (or QH’s, or Arabs, or Morgans, or or or) should not consider this a reason to be uninterested in pedigree. In the same way as sporthorses, any breed has lines that have become known as standouts for certain abilities (or lack thereof) in sport. Study well enough and eventually you’ll be able to look at a pedigree and make a guess as to what the horse might be suitable for, even though it was originally bred for something else. Sure, there are exceptions, but you’ll be right most of the time.

Dr. Ludwig Christmann did a really interesting study on heritability with the Hanoverian registry many years ago. Want to know the two things that were found to be MOST heritable? Head and jumping ability. What ranked lowest? Legs and correctness of gaits. If you want to read more about it, go here. Of course, some stallions pass on certain traits more than others (for good or for bad), but those little nuances are the things you learn along the way.

Really I cannot wrap my head around why anyone just plain wouldn’t care about breeding. Even if you say “I don’t need a top level jumper or an amazing mover, I just want something that is enjoyable to ride!”. Guess what else is highly heritable – temperament, character, rideability, and willingness to work. Guess what some of the qualities are that they evaluate at stallion testings – ding ding ding, you got it.

I know it can be mind boggling at first, but in the internet age where we have so much information at the tip of our fingertips, it’s easy to learn. Be that weirdo that sits in the stands with me at horse shows and looks up bloodlines on USEF, only to be super frustrated when there’s nothing listed. If we want to get better we have to fix this, and it starts with changing people’s minds about how much it matters.

We’ve all got them to some degree. You know those things that you’re just really particular about? Some people might call it obsessive, or persnickety, or… well… anal-retentive. I was thinking about this today after I did stalls, because I couldn’t just walk away from the shedrow without raking a crosshatch pattern into the dirt in front of the stallion’s stall. When I was a working student all the shedrow barns had tiny pea gravel in front of the stalls, and when we raked it every day after cleaning, we always did a nice neat crosshatch pattern. Granted, it didn’t last, but it sure did give a sense of satisfaction and made the job feel complete. It was very zen, like Japanese sand garden style.

Besides my weird raking fetish, there are a few (million) other things I’m kind of nutty about. I can’t polo wrap a leg without doing a perfect upside down V at the front of the fetlock. That’s how I was taught as a kid, it’s how I’ve always done it, and any other way looks horribly wrong. Don’t make me look at a badly done polo.

Do you pay attention to how you’re tightening your girth and make sure that you’re on equal holes on each side? I do. Because being on the lowest hole on one side and way up on the other is just lopsided. CHAOS.

You know what else is chaotic? Bridle straps not contained in their  keepers. If I see loose straps flopping around I find myself hypnotized by them. Yes I’ve put a random person’s cheekpiece back in it’s keeper at a show. You’re welcome, random person.

I also have a texture issue with tack conditioner. I don’t like thick and sticky, or really thin and greasy, or super waxy. Hopefully I’m not the only person that has stood in Dover and opened every conditioner to touch it. I would say sorry but I’m not. I’m just weird.

Anyone else get twitchy when a horse’s mane gets too long? I have a friend who I’m pretty sure didn’t pull her horse’s mane for years because she knew if she let it get long enough I would do it for her while she wasn’t around. I’m looking at YOU, Stacy. Way to benefit from my craziness. It continues to this day.

What are your crazy person issues? Surely I’m not alone here. Honestly, I could probably keep going all day…

 

It’s been a bit of a whirlwind since I got back in the States. Between getting caught up at work and the weather finally being decent enough to get some rides in (hallelujah) there hasn’t been time for much else. Then on Friday I started barnsitting again, this time for 9 days. Poor SO… I was gone for a week in Europe, home for 3 days, and then gone again. I enjoy barnsitting though, I like the quiet and the solitude and working in the barn. Or at least – NORMALLY it’s quiet.

Since it’s such a long period this time, the barn owner invited me to bring Henry along so I don’t miss any riding time. Her place is pretty far out of town, it takes me an hour to get to work, so I wouldn’t otherwise have time to go to the barn to ride him. On Friday night Brandy brought Henry out to stay with me here in the land of the black Trakehners. Right away the older broodmare Quinnie took a serious shine to him, and she has basically been winking at him and screaming for him ever since he arrived. Henry is super confused. He knows that he’s supposed to love her but I don’t think he really knows quite why. Every time she neighs, or if he can’t see her, he gets a little upset and starts pacing and neighing back. In the meantime, I just want everyone to shut the hell up and stop being dumb. Surely after a few days they’ll get over each other right? RIGHT? Poor Toni (the actual stallion) is just standing over in his stall like “Hello!!! I’m STILL HERE!!!”. Sorry Toni, Quinnie has chosen.

 

 

I’ve ridden Henry a couple times and he’s been fine once I’m on him, but only half of his attention span is present because the other half is focused on Quinnie, the love of his life. Irritated. I am very irritated. And it’s supposed to start raining again tomorrow, so that’s super. Since when did Texas become the PNW? Agh.

On the bright side, the fact that the Euro and the dollar are almost equal right now is kinda fun. Just for giggles I perused all my favorite European sites to make sure there wasn’t anything I “needed”. The first perusal turned up nothing so I thought I was safe, then someone mentioned Calevo, which I had somehow forgotten. So over I marched and immediately fell into The Trap of the Calevo Sale and nabbed an Equiline coat and Pikeur breeches for $300 shipped. I can live with that. The coat is exactly my colors – navy with golden yellow trim – and the breeches are exactly what I was looking for color and style wise as well.

 

Plus the retail therapy slightly eased my irritation at the horses, at least temporarily. If anyone needs me I’ll be in the barn chanting the Serenity Prayer.