Why is it that long weekends always seem way more tiring? In my mind I’m always like “Yay, extra day off to relax and recharge!” but it never actually turns out that way.

On Thursday they let us out of work early so I ran to the barn to ride before it got too hot (hahahaha). I stopped at the tack shop first to buy a Kastel shirt and instead came out with three. Oops. Love them though, will definitely be doing a full review soon. Henry hacked well, although I kept it short because of the heat. When I got there at 1pm my car said it was 93 but when I got back in to leave at 3pm it said 100. Summer has officially arrived. Oh, and I tried to take a confo pic of Henry in the crossties but first he made this face…

which made me giggle but I said “No Henry, for real, stand still and look normal.” So he did this.

Then Thursday night was the first pre-season cyclocross practice of the year. I’m so excited! I will have to explain CX on here at some point, but basically picture something in between mountain biking and road cycling, with a whole lot of ridiculousness and some Twizzlers thrown in for good measure.

Friday night we headed to a block party, armed with the watermelon Jell-O shot recipe from Buzzfeed. Important to note – thank god we read the comments first because the recipe they listed was way off. We modified it and it actually turned out really good… I was picturing all kinds of terrible Pinterest fail results. They packed a serious punch though. Between the two halves we had enough to cover both the block party on Friday night and the birthday party on Saturday night.

Saturday and Sunday were both pretty tame, horse-wise. It was still super hot but I got to the barn early and managed to avoid the worst of the heat. I jumped him a little on Saturday and he went around ok… dragging me a bit, which is a little out of character for him. But the ring is a lot bigger than we’re used to and he’s still not totally settled in yet, so not a huge surprise. Kinda funny – they were having a Greg Best clinic at the barn next door, and the wind carried his voice so perfectly I might as well have been sitting IN the ring with them. I could hear every word. Woo, free audit! 😉

I also tried again to get a confo pic, but he just gave me this look. Whatever. I’m done trying.

 

Did anyone take advantage of the 4th of July sales? I scored a Tekna Pressure Eze girth from Victory Canter for $40! Pretty happy with that considering the cheapest I could find elsewhere was $72. Sir FattyArmpits has been getting rubbed a bit by his Pro Choice girth since it’s gotten so hot, so I’m hoping that this one’s shape will suit him better. It doesn’t seem to be bothering him at all but it’s bothering the heck out of me.

Hope everyone had a good long weekend. And happy Monogram Monday!

 

What better way to celebrate our country’s independence than with a few horse-related purchases? It seems like the emails have been streaming into my inbox and across my Instagram/facebook at a pretty awesome rate, so I figured I’d throw some of the best ones together for everyone in case y’all are interested.

One Horse Threads – 25% off select items

Higher Standards Leather Care – 15% off with promo code BOOM!

Margaret Vera Accessories – 30% off with coupon code july4

Saratoga Horseworks – 20% off with coupon code AmericanMade

 

GoVelope – 20% off of the Navy GoVelope with Promo Code: GoFourth

Lo-Ride Equestrian – 15% off plus free shipping with coupon code HAPPY4TH

Padded Ponies – 15% off with coupon code INDEPENDENCE

myID band – if you often ride alone and would like to always have your medical info on you in case of emergency, or you’re an eventer, these are great bracelets. 20% off with coupon code vivausa

A Bit Tacky Custom Decals – 30% off any order of $10 or more with coupon code FREEDOM30

Divoza – 25% off their summer collection, or 20% off ANY item with promo code VK14ZZ37

C4 Belts – this weekend get the Americana belt for 50% off with free shipping

Smartpak – 15% off with promo code July14

Bit of Britain – general sale, up to 60% off

Adams Horse Supply – $10 off $75 with coupon code Freedom10, $25 off $$150 with coupon code Freedom25, $75 off $500 with coupon code Freedom 75

FarmVet – 10% off with coupon code Freedom

Equestrian Collections – 60% off the Outlet, plus $5 off purchase of $75 with coupon code Parade5, or $15 off $200 with coupon code Parade15

Horze – 60% off select items

ISellTack – Earn $15 in store credit for every $100 you spend

 

Feel free to add more! Happy Independence Day, everyone. 🙂

First of all, the commute is fantastic. I left my house at 6:30 (still lots of rush hour traffic around here) and it took me a grand total of 19 minutes with nary a dime spent in tolls. Fantastic.

I got there and started unpacking all my stuff into my new locker. Then I rearranged it. Then I rearranged it again. Times like these are when it sucks to be so OCD about things. But I finally got it all in an arrangement I’m happy with, although I’m gonna go buy a big Rubbermaid drawer for the bottom and another smaller one for the top, so it will change yet again.

 

Then I got pony out to tack him up. I think he was really digging the giant industrial powered fan in the crosstie, considering it was still 93 degrees. Also interesting to note: he’s had a runny eye for about a month now that has not gone away despite all my efforts, and all of the sudden within 24 hours it’s gone. Coincidence?

 

I rode him in both rings and around all the fields. He was a little nervous and snorty about things, especially the big ring with all the jumps and standards. That’s pretty normal for him on a first ride at a new place though, he thinks everything is gonna eat him. He was really good for hacking out in the fields though.

After the ride I hosed him off then took him out to graze while the sun set. I’d call the first day a success. Pony seems happy, I’m happy… hopefully this is the beginning of a great new chapter.

We have arrived! Trainer (new trainer? soon to be new trainer? almost trainer? barn owner? whatever, let’s call him D.) came to pick Henry up and take him the 15 minutes back towards town to his place. My 35 minute toll-road-included commute has now turned into an 18-20 minute toll-free commute. Score. Henry was a little confused about the head-to-head trailer (I’m supposed to back in to the stall? Pony don’t back.) but rode well. He strode off the trailer and announced his arrival with a lovely piercing whinny directly in my ear. I didn’t need to hear out of that thing anymore anyway.

We got him settled in his stall then I walked back to my car to grab his fan, my checkbook and his beloved salt block. After we got his stall all set up I hosed him off then handwalked him around (while he continued to periodically announce his arrival into my ear, but it’s ok I couldn’t hear it anymore) and let him graze a bit while I took PICTURES.

It’s a little hard to explain the layout of this place because it’s more like a complex. There are 4 barns, 2 arenas, an office/lounge, a pavilion, round pen, fancy walker machine thingy, lots of turnout paddocks, and several open fields for riding.

Starting at the “top”… there are two barns that look like this at the top of the hill, nearest the entrance. The round pen and some paddocks are to the right of this barn.

If you turn around and look directly across from that barn, there’s the top ring. Beyond the top ring on the left side is the happy hour pavilion (yes, I said that). To the right in the back you can see the grandstand for the main ring and in the forefront, farther to the right is the lounge/office.

Standing in the same spot but looking more to the right. You can see the grandstand for the big ring in the background, the office/lounge is the house in the middle foreground, and the big barn is on the far right. That’s Henry’s barn.

Here’s half of the inside of Henry’s barn. The aisle basically goes in a horseshoe shape around the middle, which is the tack room. The crossties are on either side of the aisle. Henry’s stall is around the corner on the other side.

Henry’s stall… guessing it’s 14 x 14 or something around there.

Total goofball loves his new fan.

The stalls are deeply bedded with rice hulls. Very interesting. Seems MUCH less dusty than shavings and all the stalls seem very dry/clean all the time, so I’m interested to see if it helps his breathing at all.

The view from his stall window. To the right is one of the grassy areas for hacking, to the left is the big ring.

Here’s the view from the aisle Henry’s stall is on. That’s the big ring, stands, and all the extra jumps.

If you head down to the happy hour pavilion…

There are more fields for hacking, like this one…

and if you look across from the pavilion, there’s the big ring with the big barn behind it and the lounge/office on the right. You can also see just the very edge of the fence for the smaller top ring.

The one barn I managed to not take a picture of (oops) is the broodmare barn. It’s basically a shedrow with a big area on the end that contains all the washracks. Here’s a few of them.

If you look outside of the door to the washrack area, there’s the crazy awesome computerized walker machine thingy that I will probably never be brave enough to try.

That’s the basic tour. However, my very favorite part is contained in the tack room of Henry’s barn. Are you ready for this? Meet – my tack locker. Or my tack closet, whichever is more appropriate. It’s. So. Giant. The groom is going to scrub it out for me this morning, then I get to go crazy. I can’t even handle it, the possibilities are endless. I see a trip to The Container Store in my future.

 

Also: BABIES. These two are both by Mezcalero, the same stallion my mare Sadie is being bred to this year.

 

It was yet another great, mostly stress-free horsey filled weekend. I started off with a non-horsey thing – a 35 mile bike ride. I pretty much wanted to get hit by a car the entire way home as I pedaled straight into a 20mph headwind. I would have gladly traded my bike (or first born child, or a kidney) for a ride home… talk about pure misery. When you have to pedal downhill just to keep moving forward, it’s too freaking windy. Ugh, fried quads.

After that I headed out to ride the pony, because my legs weren’t quite dead enough yet. We did some flatwork first…

then hopped around the little jumps that were set up in the ring. My friend was there so I actually have video! Mostly we worked on short approaches and turns.

HenryJune from amanda chance on Vimeo.

Good thing to note: he’s no longer curling up behind the bit at any whiff of contact. Praise Jesus hallelujah, the month of flatwork bootcamp was not in vain. There’s still a lot more to work on, but I’m glad to have made progress on what has been the biggest problem we’ve had to date. I feel like the rest of it isn’t nearly so difficult to fix. The video also makes me think I really need to try a figure 8 on him, or – dare I even say it – a Micklem (itssooougly) or a Perfect Sit (iloveit)? Thoughts, blogosphere? He’s a fussy creature.

After the barn I went to Walmart to pick him up a new (seriously heavy duty) fan for the new barn. It’s powerful enough that I’m pretty sure if I ever put it on the highest setting he’d look something like this:

On Sunday we just did a pretty relaxed hack out in the grass ring. He did give me two really nice trot lengthenings across the diagonal, which is seriously noteworthy. This horse doesn’t lengthen anything. I just finally got him to do an actual stretchy trot circle a week ago. Henry generally stays in Henry outline at all times, he’s a very “stuck” creature by nature. The fact that he lengthened – a real true honest to goodness, rocked back on his butt lengthening – was nothing short of a miracle. These are the baby steps that give me hope.

After that I let him gallop down the long stretch of grass by the road. I’m so endlessly amused by his pogo stick gallop, I’m usually about to fall off laughing by the time I pull him up. He’s not quite sure what’s so funny but I don’t think he could outrun a 3-legged goat. After our ride it was spa time, since he can’t go to a new barn looking like a hood rat. Lots of scrubbing, some suds, clippers, scissors, and a mane pull later, he looks presentable again.

Oh yeah that reminds me – the other fun thing of the weekend! My newest batch of Personally Preppy monograms came! Monogram Everything.

monograms before:

monograms after:

Today is moving day… fingers crossed!