And some horse updates

First off, Baby J! He continues to do really, really well. We've had two kind of scary issues with choke due to the barn help feeding him pellets that even adult horses tend to choke on. First time we didn't know what was happening so called the vet out (lovely bill with that one) but the second time our groom recognized the signs, brought him in and I massaged his neck for 30 minutes until it passed. Poor guy. Oh and a disclaimer: I had no idea they were still feeding him pellets. He was in a pasture with a buddy who I guess was supposed to get them, which no one informed me of. It has since been made VERY clear that he is not to get any kind of pellet.

Other than that, he is a pretty normal baby. So super sweet and tolerant. Takes things in stride, and seems to learn very quickly. Not spooky, but you do have to present new things to him before he goes "meh" about it. Makes me hopeful he'll be pretty bomb proof once started under saddle.

He is also looking more and more like Arwen which tells me she either stamps her babies really strongly, or Imothep just doesn't really stamp his babies with anything distinguishable. I guess I'll know if I get another one out of her!

Speaking of Arwen, I started riding her big brown butt again a few times a week. Just w/t/c, and tried to take her over some poles which was...amusing. She lept over them like they were fences, which I think she did because a) she has absolutely ZERO interest in any of that crap and b) being out of shape and a little rusty made it hard. She started out feeling really really rickety, but after about a week suppled up a lot the more I made her walk and use her body. I can tell though that there is some pain in her somewhere because when we canter on her left lead she will generally scoot and buck. So I try not to make her do too much, she gets bute once a week and we do lots and lots of walking. If I were to ride her more than what I do now, she would definitely need some maintenance. However, for what we're doing I don't think the once a week bute does much damage to anything.

I sure did miss riding her though. Her trot and canter are just so smooth and having a horse with an engine is so nice! I've been putting her in a super soft bit and she's actually been great in it-plenty of brakes and she gets really light and foamy in it. For being out of work for over a year I actually think she's carrying herself better than she was when she was in work. Granted she definitely doesn't have the muscle that she did but she just goes on the bit so much easier now and I don't think its because I'm a better rider.

I'm hoping to get a couple more babies out of her, and then she'll just be retired to a trail horse/pasture puff. I don't think she will ever reliably be any kind of lesson horse if I'm trying to be realistic. I recently asked one of the more beginner riders to get on her when I was in a rush and I think Arwen freaked her out. Because yes-she will take advantage of you and will test you which doesn't exactly make a good lesson horse, unless the rider is brave/very confident.

As for my riding horse, I've been riding the assistant's personal horse for the last couple months. Super schoolmaster horse and all around great guy. He was an ex-GP horse until he got injured, the assistant worked with him and did his rehab and he's now been ridden by a few people at the barn. He's not "easy" but he's also not necessarily difficult because he is pretty straightforward. His only flaws are he's lazy and he has a really vicious left drift. Oh, and can be spooky at really random times but that's not too big of a deal. He's basically a big ol' derp who is happy to dink around little fences with me. Not quite sure how long I'll be riding him, but I hope that I can at least ride him through the summer and go to some local shows.

After that, I've actually been thinking its probably time to start thinking of a baby of the human variety. I do want one, and timing to start trying in the fall would be good. We'll see!

Two more horseshows off the bucket list...

So 2014 definitely ended up being the year of the horse show. I mostly spectated, but after my long experience at Thermal I decided that I definitely like being a spectator more than a competitor. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE showing. However, only when its fun. Thermal was fun, but it was also really tiring and way to competitive. Both of those factors take a lot of fun out of the showing equation for me. I discovered that two to three days is really optimal, and my money is best spent locally.

However, that doesn't mean I'm not going to try to get to every major show ground in North America at some point in time. Bonus points if I become independently wealthy and get to do some classes (HAHAHAHAHAHA).

My original list was comprised of:

Spruce
Kentucky (any competition there really, preferably National Horse Show though)
WEF
Penn National
Washington International
Devon

In 2014 I managed to get to Penn, then Washington on a whim. Penn was actually planned and I got to watch the GP there, Washington the timing just happened to be right on my last day in Washington DC so we watched a couple hours of the hunter classes. Both are super historic shows and were awesome to get to see in person! I saw a good number of the riders that had been at the LA National, and totally took a stalker picture of Beezie Madden studying her course map (I know, I'm so creepy!) Again, it was amazing to be so close to some of the world's top riders, or at least close to so many of them.

So my list pretty much stands the same for the future. Spruce is way up at the top of course-everytime I watch that show on any livestream I am blown away by how beautiful it looks. For 2015 I'm hoping to add on the World Cup in Las Vegas and another trip to see the LA Masters, but who knows!