William Fox-Pitt and Cool Mountain!
They had a pretty awesome weekend, finishing on their dressage score. The wonderful Phillip Dutton came in 2nd with Woodburn and Becky Holder was 3rd with Courageous Comet. I'm pretty excited to see the footage when it airs. It just wasn't quite the same just sitting and READING about it all weekend!
So, suddenly it seems that winter has returned! I heard tell that there were FLURRIES in Litchfield County this morning... no good! But on the bright side, it's supposed to be downright balmy come saturday.
I've been pretty busy with finals coming up, but it's almost finished. The week of the 10th, the dentist is FINALLY coming (yeah, it took her a month to get back to me. I won't get into it, but I wasn't very pleased with her, and she's lucky she's such a good dentist, because otherwise she most definitely would have lost our business) and I'm going to haul miss Dee up to Steph's for an overnight! I'm pretty excited about that... it will be our first big adventure together. I'm hoping Steph likes her!
Not much else to report... mare's been being a good girl (despite being in raging heat), and is finally almost all shedded out. I'm presenting my senior paper this friday, too. A little nervous about it, but I'm confident that all will go well.
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Sunday, April 25, 2010
Rolex
Yup, it's that time of year again! I really wish I could have been in Kentucky this weekend, but alas, with finals looming and most of my time revolving around papers and presentations, a lovely weekend at Rolex just wasn't in the cards. I tried to purchase the live feed from Universal, but for some reason I can't make it work on my computer, so I've been obsessively watching the live blog that Eventing Nation has been kindly providing. I've also been indulging in the different ride videos, interviews and behind the scenes photos. I suppose it's the next best thing to being there!
It's shaping up to be an exciting day today, with William Fox-Pitt in the lead going into show jumping.
On the home front, we've moved the horses out of the bottom pasture and up into the front pasture. This will give the bottom a chance to dry out and grow a bit more, and the girls are pretty thrilled to be in the big front field. It's a little bit of a pain doing turn-out up there, though. The 1/4 mile walk from the field to the barn is not so fun when you have 4 horses to bring in and then chuck back out, so yesterday I decided to try a different approach. Friday I brought them in two at a time, which resulted in lots of screaming back and forth to each other and me walking an extra mile. Yesterday, I figured... hey, they're all good girls. I may as well just haul them all in at once. Roxy and Casper will pretty much come in by themselves anyway, so they're easy, and Summer and Dee are perfect ladies to lead. I just put Summer and Dee right next to me and had Roxy on the outside of Dee and Casper on the outside of Summer. Getting them into the barn was a bit tricky, but we managed with no issues! I think these are probably the only 4 horses that I would EVER do that with. I used to do 3 at a time at steph's, but those were the boys in the far paddock, and I only had to lead them through the middle paddock to get to the barn, so it was pretty simple... this is four of them down the driveway for a quarter mile. Gotta love the little ladies for being so wonderful!
Here are a few photos of the girls in the front field, enjoying their grass:
And here's a little video. Sorry that it's the wrong way, I'm still working out this whole video thing!
And Finally... Dee and I before our ride!
It's shaping up to be an exciting day today, with William Fox-Pitt in the lead going into show jumping.
On the home front, we've moved the horses out of the bottom pasture and up into the front pasture. This will give the bottom a chance to dry out and grow a bit more, and the girls are pretty thrilled to be in the big front field. It's a little bit of a pain doing turn-out up there, though. The 1/4 mile walk from the field to the barn is not so fun when you have 4 horses to bring in and then chuck back out, so yesterday I decided to try a different approach. Friday I brought them in two at a time, which resulted in lots of screaming back and forth to each other and me walking an extra mile. Yesterday, I figured... hey, they're all good girls. I may as well just haul them all in at once. Roxy and Casper will pretty much come in by themselves anyway, so they're easy, and Summer and Dee are perfect ladies to lead. I just put Summer and Dee right next to me and had Roxy on the outside of Dee and Casper on the outside of Summer. Getting them into the barn was a bit tricky, but we managed with no issues! I think these are probably the only 4 horses that I would EVER do that with. I used to do 3 at a time at steph's, but those were the boys in the far paddock, and I only had to lead them through the middle paddock to get to the barn, so it was pretty simple... this is four of them down the driveway for a quarter mile. Gotta love the little ladies for being so wonderful!
Here are a few photos of the girls in the front field, enjoying their grass:
And here's a little video. Sorry that it's the wrong way, I'm still working out this whole video thing!
And Finally... Dee and I before our ride!
Friday, April 16, 2010
Advanced Horsemanship
So I just registered for next semester classes (sort of/mostly), and upon discussing what I need in order to graduate with ms. Baker, we decided that I was going to need six classes. Sort of a drag for my final semester, but she had an idea. She suggested that I do the EQU363 class, which is called Advanced Horsemanship, but is really just an independent study. I thought, gee, that's all well and good, but what does that mean? exactly? It means that Dee gets to be my class project, apparently! Still lost? Let me explain...
Basically, this summer I will set a goal and keep a training log for Dee, taking pictures and videos to document her progress. Once I've gathered up all the information, I'll make it into a full paper and video presentation. Fun! Class credit for playing with my horse!
So now, the big question: what ARE my goals? I want to keep them pretty loose, but here we go, my goals up until the start of school:
1. Get Dee's canter to be balanced, and get the correct lead on the first try most of the time.
2. Start over fences
So how am I going to achieve this? Through lessons with Nancy, Steph and Bettina, hopefully!
This week has been a good one for Dee and I. Tuesday, she spent most of our ride pretending to be a giraffe, but after a million walk/trot transitions, she finally began doing this absolutely beautiful stretchy trot... I was amazed! She was long, low, forward and totally balanced. We achieved this for the equivalent of 4 times around the ring, so I just quit, telling her what a wonderful mare she is. Wednesday I was running terribly late and didn't get a chance to ride. Yesterday was more transition work.. yay. Her transitions really aren't terrible. She's very sensitive to the seat, both from walk to halt and trot to walk. She was pretty good overall... didn't get the same amount of fabulous stretchy trot, but we did get some, so I was pleased. If it's not pouring this afternoon, I'll be riding her again, otherwise she may have to wait until tomorrow or sunday.
I am also happy to report that she has suddenly decided that getting her butt curried is the BEST THING EVER. However, she shows this by leaning into the curry comb, which eventually ends up with her butt against the wall and me struggling to reach it and yelling at her to move over. As to the mystery gray situation... she has a WHOLE lot of it, especially right around the point of the hip and the butt. There's less on her back and neck, but there is some. What a weirdo... it will be interesting to see what color my horse is this summer!
Basically, this summer I will set a goal and keep a training log for Dee, taking pictures and videos to document her progress. Once I've gathered up all the information, I'll make it into a full paper and video presentation. Fun! Class credit for playing with my horse!
So now, the big question: what ARE my goals? I want to keep them pretty loose, but here we go, my goals up until the start of school:
1. Get Dee's canter to be balanced, and get the correct lead on the first try most of the time.
2. Start over fences
So how am I going to achieve this? Through lessons with Nancy, Steph and Bettina, hopefully!
This week has been a good one for Dee and I. Tuesday, she spent most of our ride pretending to be a giraffe, but after a million walk/trot transitions, she finally began doing this absolutely beautiful stretchy trot... I was amazed! She was long, low, forward and totally balanced. We achieved this for the equivalent of 4 times around the ring, so I just quit, telling her what a wonderful mare she is. Wednesday I was running terribly late and didn't get a chance to ride. Yesterday was more transition work.. yay. Her transitions really aren't terrible. She's very sensitive to the seat, both from walk to halt and trot to walk. She was pretty good overall... didn't get the same amount of fabulous stretchy trot, but we did get some, so I was pleased. If it's not pouring this afternoon, I'll be riding her again, otherwise she may have to wait until tomorrow or sunday.
I am also happy to report that she has suddenly decided that getting her butt curried is the BEST THING EVER. However, she shows this by leaning into the curry comb, which eventually ends up with her butt against the wall and me struggling to reach it and yelling at her to move over. As to the mystery gray situation... she has a WHOLE lot of it, especially right around the point of the hip and the butt. There's less on her back and neck, but there is some. What a weirdo... it will be interesting to see what color my horse is this summer!
Saturday, April 10, 2010
Free Jumping (Launching?)
So, I decided to have Dee do a little bit of "free jumping" yesterday. I didn't let her off of the lounge, because I didn't want her to just run around. I set up the 13" height next to the fence with a guide rail on the open side. First I put a side down and let her walk over it (no problems), then I sent her out to tackle the full 13" solo. She was adorable, to say the least. Approached it just the way I like to see - stretching her neck out and looking at it - and then just LAUNCHED herself over it. her HOOVES were about a foot and a half over top, and her body? I don't even know. I think her reasoning was, 'well, I don't know what to do with these big long legs I have, so I'll just jump SO HIGH that I don't have to worry about them'. Abbett used to do that a little bit. She trotted over it about 5 times and then I got ambitious and put one side of the jump up to 2' (left the other side down for her). It didn't phase her at all. Same ole' quiet approach and huge leap. We only did that once because I really didn't want her to do too much and she was such a good girl. I made a huge fuss over her and told her how wonderful she was, and I swear, she had quite the little spring in her step on the way back to the barn. I think she was proud of herself.
Thursday, April 8, 2010
Bath Time!
Miss Dee got her first soapy bath of the year yesterday, since it was ridiculously warm. It felt weird to be sweating bullets with no leaves on the trees, but I guess that's New England for you.
Sunday, April 4, 2010
Gone Gray?
So, the dentist was supposed to come on Friday at 1:30, but for some reason, she never showed. At 2, I called and left a message. At 3 I called again. I called and left another message yesterday. I don't know what's going on but I'm none to happy right now. I mean, I'm pretty sure now that the weight issue was her worms, but she still needs her teeth done because its that time of year. I won't harp on it anymore than that, but I'm thinking I may need to find a new dentist, because that sort of behavior is incredibly unprofessional.
With the warm weather, Dee's really begun to shed out. That's all well and good, she's looking sleeker and fancier and less like a ragamuffin, but what did I find underneath her fuzzy winter coat? GRAY. Lots and lots of GRAY. That was a bit of a surprise. Her butt and her back have tons of little gray hairs all over... not so much on her neck. Seriously, though, what's up with all that gray? Look:
Weird, right?
I'm thinking that today is going to be bath day, because it's really warm out. The other day, I hosed her legs down because they were just disgusting with wet, goopy mud. Well, as I was toweling them off, Dee expressed some interest in seeing the towel. I let her see it, expecting that she just wanted to take a sniff. She proceeded to grab the towel and start swinging it around like a dog would. I took a few pictures, but I didn't get any really great action shots, just Dee standing with the towel hanging out of her mouth.
Look at that cutie pie:
With the warm weather, Dee's really begun to shed out. That's all well and good, she's looking sleeker and fancier and less like a ragamuffin, but what did I find underneath her fuzzy winter coat? GRAY. Lots and lots of GRAY. That was a bit of a surprise. Her butt and her back have tons of little gray hairs all over... not so much on her neck. Seriously, though, what's up with all that gray? Look:
Weird, right?
I'm thinking that today is going to be bath day, because it's really warm out. The other day, I hosed her legs down because they were just disgusting with wet, goopy mud. Well, as I was toweling them off, Dee expressed some interest in seeing the towel. I let her see it, expecting that she just wanted to take a sniff. She proceeded to grab the towel and start swinging it around like a dog would. I took a few pictures, but I didn't get any really great action shots, just Dee standing with the towel hanging out of her mouth.
Look at that cutie pie:
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