We had a very successful weekend, with all four of the boys bringing home a ribbon! Guppy had a rail in stadium which dropped him to 3rd place, but he was much improved from Chatt Hills and we are pleased with him. Flaggles was also 3rd, he moved up several spots with a clean stadium round. Val was 5th after a clean stadium round and is really jumping much better with his body. He was an angel all weekend so we are excited about him. Deon was 7th after getting robbed in the dressage but a clean XC and SJ round! Yay, boys! We are looking forward to our next outing at Chatt Hills May 20th.
Cory's stadium round. Please pardon the lack of zoom on most of the fences. The camera doesn't let me zoom while recording, and I'm also a terrible recorder!
Monkee had an excellent, if short, jump school today with JD. JD is one of the most renowned hunter judges in the country and stopped in on his way home from CA to his next show in VA to school the big horse. He's been working on getting the Monkee to jump around his fences rather than just across them. I fiddled with Windows Movie Maker today and made a stupid little video for your viewing pleasure.
Then headed out to trot Guppy. I finally spent my gift card to the local tack store last night...it was a sympathy gift after losing Aidyn and I hadn't wanted to spend it until I got another horse. Finally I decided to just spent it on myself...Aidyn wouldn't have minded. I have had my eye on the Kerrits Flo-Rise riding tights for more than a year now and never had the money to buy a pair...so I bought a pair. And an Equine Couture polo shirt for lessons and clinics (provided those happen again one day!). And some very cool sunglasses. So for some reason, I truly believed my new riding breeches would make me a better rider today. Boy, was I wrong. I had a terrible trot on Gup, and am not sure how much of it was my fault or his. He was in a crabby mood from the moment I got on, with a big hump in his back. He hacked fairly nicely, only a few spooks here and there. I was trying to remember Silva's words in my head..."Don't force his head down, just set your hands in front of you and ride him to them and he'll soften." Well, I'm not Silva, and he didn't. He ran through the bridle and trotted around with his head straight in the air, resembling a giraffe. He also spooked at the same log every single time we trotted past it. I tried to just be patient and ride him through it, but after a while it just became ridiculous and I got after him a bit. Regardless, he never relaxed, he never softened, and he never let go over his back. I trotted for 15 mins and headed home, defeated and cursing my new breeches. Gup had no idea that anything was wrong and marched home with ears pricked, probably tickled that I hadn't actually made him do anything constructive. Arg! Trying to just remind myself that this horse has off days where he never does let go in his body, and this may have been one of those days since he did have a day off yesterday and no Equissage today (it's in KY with Susan at Rolex!!). Tomorrow is another day.
Supposed to get to try a redheaded mare this week. I am very excited about it despite my sensible side telling me to just be, well, sensible about things. I can't help myself! Fingers crossed!
God Bless :)
-Ry
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