So this is Christmas, and what have you done? Another year older, a new one just begun...

Monday, December 21, 2009

Christmas is in four days!! I am so not ready!!! But only two more days of work (yay!) And Blair will be home in two days!!!!!! Can't wait!!!!

Anyway, made it out to the barn Friday after work. Bonnie was just heading up to the house, but Taryn was out in the ring on Bugsy, along wiht Katie on Naughtie and Astrid was on Kaye. But Astrid had said I could have Kaye and she'd get on Fanny bareback. So I quickly changed into riding clothes and put my saddle on Kaye and we headed out to the arena. Taryn was actually pretty much finished with Bugs, so she headed inside soon after I got there, but Katie stayed out and was still working Naughtie some. Kaye gave me a really good ride, she was on the bit and working up in a pretty decent frame without even trying. I was pretty pleased with that. We worked on some laterals, leg yields and shoulder ins. Plus we did the shoulder in, 10 meter circle, haunches in exercise a few times. Then I asked her for some canter work. I have to say, I really regret teaching her to do flying changes. I was trying to do the three loop serpentine of the arena with the middle loop at a counter canter. Well she kept trying to change on me. I was really getting mad at her!! Other than that we had a really good ride though.

Saturday morning I was looking forward to getting out to the barn to ride. But when I woke up I was in a winter wonderland! It snowed overnight. Goody. Roads were terrible in New Brighton, I didn't even try to get anywhere. It was almost 2:00 by the time the got my roads cleared. By that time I didn't think there was any point to me going out to the barn. I figured Bonnie would be heading up to the house soon. Plus it wouldn't give me much time before I'd have to come home and get ready for the holiday party. So I just stayed home until I went to Astrid's at 6:00 for the party.

We had a pretty good time. Everyone was there except for Taryn. She was worried about the roads since her car doesn't handle the snow too well. But there was lots of good food and the kids all had fun with the gift exchange. And then we sat down to watch the cheesy Zac Efron horse movie. Great movie to mock. But Astrid's DVD player isn't working right and so we got about halfway into the movie and then it froze. We didn't even get to the good mocking parts. Well Astrid wanted to try again. And the remote for the DVD player doesn't work, so you couldn't fast forward to the part it had stopped at. So we watched the whole first half again. And then it stopped at the same part. By that time it was after 9:00 and I was ready to head home. It was still snowing a little bit and I wanted to get home before the roads got too bad. So everyone pretty much headed out at that time.

Luckily by Sunday morning it had stopped snowing and the roads were fine so I was able to make it out to the barn. Bonnie and I worked on some stalls and then Taryn came out. So she and I had a dressage lesson on Bugs and Kaye. Worked on some leg yeilds first and then moved on to half-passes. Which both of us pretty much sucked at. Bonnie had us do this half-pass exercise. We only used half the arena, so the quarterline was out centerline. We turned down the centerline and half-passed left to the rail and then half-pass right to the other rail, then half-pass left back to the other rail and then half-pass right to the centerline. It was so hard! Neither of us did it real great, but it's something to work on. We gave the horses a break then and let them stretch for a few minutes. Then we did some canter work. First Bonnie had us do simple changes through the walk both ways. And then the counter-canter serpentine. Kaye was wanting to change her leads, but I was able to keep her from doing it. So that was an improvement. Then Bonnie had us canter a 20 meter circle on the correct lead, halt at the gate, counter-canter a 20 meter circle, halt at the gate and then canter another circle on the correct lead. Kaye is so used to doing things for the little kids that when I asked for the counter-canter she just ignored me and picked up the correct lead. It was like she was saying "Jen that's wrong, but don't worry I'll fix it for you" So I brought her back to a stop and asked for the counter-canter again. That time she picked it up. Good lesson, lots of new things to work on. I'm really having a lot of fun trying out some new dressage things with Kaye this winter. And I think she's actually enjoying herself too. As much as she likes the kids, I think she gets a little bored. And so she likes learning some more advanced things, even if it is dressage.

The new Winter/Spring USEA Omnibus is out. And so I started thinking about eventing this summer. I really wnat to get out as much as I can possibly afford. And I talked to Bonnie about horses to event. Don't get me wrong, I love my horse dearly and I'd love to be able to event him. And someday I will hopefully. But right now, he's still green over fences and he tends to get very exurberant. And that scares me a little bit. He really needs Bonnie to take him out a few times to get some experience. But I can't afford to pay for that and still be able to event myself. So X will not be my event horse this year. Now, Kaye, again I love her dearly. I'm having so much fun doing upper level dressage with her. And I love to jump her at home and in stadium. I just really don't feel like another wild cross country ride liek we had at Erie. So she's out. So then I thought what about Naughtie? It weird because I feel just as comfortable jumping her as I do Kaye and Miss. And I know Naughtie is pretty calm, so I think she'll be a good, solid horse for me to event. So I talked to Bonnie about it and she thought it sounded good, so Naughtie and I will be headed out this summer. I'd like, if I can afford it, to do about 1 HT a month. Lost Hounds in June, South Farm the beginning of July, possibly Gemwood the end of July, EHSC in August and then South Farm in September. I'd like to start in May at Greater Dayton but I'm not too fond of the officials there and I don't think I'd get a fair shot, so it's not really worth spending the money. So hopefully it will work out. If I get the new job I applied for I should be able to event with the pay increase. So fingers crossed.

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