Whoring and Vaca FTW

FL was wonderful. Not really rested, in fact I got sick on the last day, and am still fending it off, but it was nice to do some fun things with my family! I haven't been anywhere for a good 5 years, so this was a welcome nicety. My parents were extremely fantastic and we did all sorts of fun things! Jet skiing, Seaworld, Cocoa Beach, Pasa Grille beach, Ron Jon, Blue Fin restaurant, icebar and resort pool days!

Pasa-Grille beach in Tampa Bay

Off to dinner at Blue Fin with the famly and boy :)

Ice bar! It was 20 degrees in the bar and everything was made out of ice. Including the drink glasses! Its one of 2 in the nation, so it was pretty cool we got to go :)

Very fun vacation! I feel blessed to have had the opportunity, and am now looking forward to going to Rolex at the end of this month :D

Back to the real world though as of Friday, and my first day back at the barn was today. Like I said before, I've been pretty sick so even today I only hacked Yankee out.

ALSO, I got my Ebay purchases in the mail while I was gone! It was like Christmas. CHRISTMAS! Yay for tack whoring.

Silly pony somehow made himself a unicorn.

This is his, "Really?" face.
Also modeling the schooling pad I got for $2

LAWL.

Leather boots BO gave me!!

AND DRUMROLL PLEASE.............

I give to you, a Charles Owen Pro II in silver that retails for $200+, that I got for $140!! FREAKING STEAL!

SO yeah. PUMPED.

In other news....I graduate in 6 weeks and begin Vet Tech school. Also I've been job hunting, which is scary. And looking for places to move to when my lease expires. And preparing for Rolex visit. And Yankees first legit show in 2 weeks.... And the thought about entering the real world in less than 6 weeks....FRIGHTENING.

The Wives

Watch "Announcer Larry Collmus calls the 7th at Monmouth Park" on YouTube

This is hilarious!! And mywifenoeseverything is up for adoption at New Vocations

Drumroll Please

As promised, magnificent glorious wonderment that was our jump school last week. Really, the pics are different this time. I was trying to be all photographic and whatnot. With my crappy ass walmart camera. WHUT.

I wish I could have gotten a video of the course because it was BAMF. Yeah I should become a jump course designer. New goal in life.

I wanted to challenge Yankee with tons of verticals and lines and Jackie with her turns. I started with an airy oxer, round to a 3 stride, vertical/oxer. Then a rollback turn to a ridiculous vertical and bending line to a rolltop. Rollback to vertical wall, bending line to another vertical wall. Rollback to vertical bounces, 2 strides to triple bar. Yeah, Boss.

But first, Pronto.

BA HAHAHA Saddlebredin' it upppp.


Aw, so angry.

This is the ridiculous vertical, jump 4. He jumped it like shit. Everytime.

Jump 3, part of the vertical to oxer line. Always jumped it nicely.


Wall #1, of the bending wall line. Jumped like crap, everytime. As usual with verticals.

Fence 1, the airy Oxer

The first of the vertical bounces, jumped kinda crappy, but never knocked over

to the....

Triple bar madness. LOVE this shot

Um, can we say artistic please?? And BOSS

Fly without wiiiiings

I realize I could have posted the pictures in the jump order, but thats for people who play by the rules.

After that fun, I was like, lets school a water jump!! Not like you've ever done it before or anything!! YAY.

Yankee was not very amused...

"Um, WTF, this is not sanitary. What about bacteria?!"

I was actually surprised-it took us about 2 minutes to get him to go in the first time. NOT COOL Yankee. You are 10 years old and have been jumping in to water since you were like, 5. My guess was that because her hasn't competed since August, he was like, say whaaaaat? But then he got over himself....

"Oh right, this is easy."

SO yeah. Fun day!

I leave for FL tommorrow morning at 4am! After the Hunger Games. Pretty stoked. What I am trying to say is that I won't be posting for a week. Try no to miss me.

Sexy and I Know It Dressage

Hilariousness aside, this horse can one tempi like a BOSS. Like hot damn.

The Weekend.

I've been extremely unproductive for 4 days.

Blogging. Pinteresting. Buying things I shouldn't...Sleeping. Working. Pretty much just wasting time like a boss.

Perhaps its the fact that I can't focus on studying because FL is looming about 4 days away now. Perhaps because I am frustrated with basically everything. Perhaps the fact that I have extreme anxiety and lay awake all night, then can't function all day. Perhaps because its been storming all weekend, and I am literally deathly afraid them. Or perhaps because the thought of all the shit I have to do before I leave is overwhelming and my brain implodes. Or perhaps because I have a wicked case of senioritis. I can't decide.

Yankee got his ass kicke dby Jackie and I this weekend with a dressage school, jump school and hack out. But before all that.

This is the most BA cross country jump. Ever. Oh to live in the south.

Drew this while tying to convince my body to let me sleep.

I bought this.

Can we please talk about how sexual this helmet is and how STOKED I am to get it??!? I realized while talking with friends, that I fell off a year ago and hit my head on the jump (as well as my back). Continued riding with said helmet for a year. OOPS. This ligitimized my lusting for this Charles Owen Pro II. I got it for $175 on Ebay, retails for like $250+. Winning, yeah?

You're about to judge me for this next picture. I know it.

Yeah, I hacked out in shorts today.

Let me explain. vet was supposed to come at 3:30. I got to the barn at 2:45, planning to just do chores until then. Then I got a text from Hannah, saying her appt was also for 3:30. Well shoot. I was all alone at the barn, so no one could judge me in person. What the heck dude, let's go for a hack. Not like there are looming thunderheads in the horizon.

It brought me back to my crazy childhood days were I rode bareback, in shorts and tank tops basically every day.

And it felt so nice out, with the thunderstorms rolling in! I've been DYING in the 80+ degree temps.

We hacked out for 40 minutes on a lovely gravel road with tons of rolling hills for trotwork. Yankee was a piece of shit, spooking at every leaf blowing. Which is like, a million. I rode him in the hackamore, trying to give him a break, which he responded to and seemed to like, thank God-even if he was psycho. He made up for his daft-ness with some stellar trot/canter work on the hills. Love that road for conditioning.

BO gave me these! UM.....WINNING!

Ba hahaha, ohhhh Pronto, you are so huge and muddy and sleepy.

I love my vet. He's like, the nicest guy ever, and super good with horses. Yankee was scheduled for his coggins, 5-way shot and teeth float. Wanna find the quickest way to drop $200+ in less than 15 minutes? Call the vet out! YAY! not.

Actually, despite that, MO vets are CRAZY cheap compared OH. Like by almost $200. My visit today for one horse, would have been about $375+. GASP. Actually everything is cheaper here. Farrier: MO-Full set-$90; OH-$200+. Board: MO-$180-$220; OH-$375+ Hay: MO-$3/bale; OH-$5-$9/bale etc etc etc. So I can't complain.

Drugged

So sleepy. So very sleepy.

The vet peaced out, and thats when I noticed the blood pouring from his mouth and pooling on the floor... I looked for a cut, but I couldn't find one. Just blood. lots of blood. Felt bad for him :/

I also took the opp to clean his sheath which was, uber fun, of course. Gotta love horse ownership. Where one doesn't blink at smegma and blood covering their hands, and goes about carrying on conversations. BA hahahaaaa.

So tomorrow, I told Jackie to limit to walking and he needs to be ridden in the hackamore for a few days since I'm not sure where he got cut. Luckily, he was able to eat and drink just fine.

Jumping pictures coming soon!

Some Dress-age.

Yesterday, I decided it was time to practice a "real" dressage test with Jackie. In April she is doing a dressage show to practice for her first event in May (Queeny Park).

I wanted to do work before we both left for a week for Spring Break. I think the pony will enjoy the down time, since he's been worked almost 6 days a week since January, but since the show is the 2nd weekend in April, and we get back on the 30th, time is running out!

Yankee was NOT amused when he heard our plans.

Did I mention it was 82 degrees? Again. in March. I'm dying.

My plan was to watch her warm up and give her some tips from the Claudia clinic last weekend. I don't remember if I ever explained what she had me work on, so I'll give you a quick run down.

Since Yankee is an OTTB he is always crooked and stuck to the right. Even after 7 years, he STILL struggles to the right and gets hella tense in the neck and shoulders, cricks his head, crooked in the barrel, and opposite crooked in his haunches.
Exibit A:

Oh man. What a disaster.

I've tried everything in the book to keep him from doing that. (Look at my header photo. Can you see the crooked head in dressage?) We always get lower scores to the right, and its SO frustrating. Nothing I've tried has worked though, until Claudia came along last weekend.

She had me put him on a circle and take up a very strong (but giving) hold on the outside rein ONLY. The inside rein had minimal contact and was only used for half halts where needed. OK, so on the circle. We started at the canter since that is his easier gait. Oustide rein, STRONG inside leg (full contact, not just calf/heel), encouraging him to pick up that inside shoulder and barrel and counterbend him to the outside. The goal was to use counterbend to straighten/lengthen his frame. Confusing right?

It was at first to me. BUT, since Yankee does not respond to half halts on the inside rein, both rein contact, leg yeilding to straighten, keyhole method, etc etc. The inside leg, drop inside rein, contact outside rein to counterbend was almost like MAGIC. Its very hard to explain and not be able to demo, but basically, using inside leg with the outside rein contact in a pulsing motion, encouraged him to straighten his whole body, lifted his back, lengthened his frame and reeeeally let him stretch into the contact.

The results were crazy good. He responded so well to this excercise, and even though he was only able to lift his back and actually be straight for more than 3 strides, it was a step forward!!

Jackie demonstrating the "Claudia" method. You can see his nose tipped, but he hasnt quite swung his barrel over, however, he is actively moving forward.

We worked on that for about 15 minutes. Jackie got the hang of it! While she finished her warm up, I drug about a million poles in place to make a make-shift dressage ring. I was ridiculously sore from kickboxing the day before (gotta get sexual for FL) and it was basically torture. Oh, what I do for horses/friends. After I got them in place, I realized I made the ring about 15 m too short. Yeah, F that, we went ahead and practiced in a tiny ring.

Gettin that walk sexual

I LOVE this trot :)

Really reaching!


canter lovelies

Active walk: accomplished.

Relax Yankee, reeeelaaaaaxxxxxx

During the practice test, LOVE the uphill-ness here

Can we please talk about how nice jackie's position is here?

Butt muscles!!! Stomach Muscles!!!

Collecting back up from the free walk

Overall, it was a great school. hot, but productive. Jackie got the run down of a basic training level test, and Yankee got used to her riding him in a test. Jackie also worked on her position in the dressage saddle, since she rarely rode in one.

Love mah pohnee

Jump school

Before we dive into the juciness that is this post, I wanted to share this photo with you all!

This is Dolly, my first horse. She was 18 and I was 10 in this picture, fresh off the broodmare farm. Her baby ate her tail, she was fat from foaling and was extremely high spirited. She is only 14 hands, so you can see how tiny I was!


Here she is at 24- we had just won the hunter jumper class in 4H


And here she is today! She turned the big 3-oh.
I love this mare and was so happy that she is still alive and well with her family in SC

OK so anyways. Normally I don't ride during the week. Sun/Mon are my days and Jackie rides T-W-F and sometimes Saturday. He gets Th and Sat off. However, my boss told me not to come in today so I had the day free! And it was 84 degrees. And Hannah wanted me to jump Pronto. And I wanted to give Jackie a XC lesson. UM. ABSOLUTELY.

So we got out to the barn at 5, handy boyfriend in tow. Myself on Pronto, Hannah on her old-man pony and Jackie on Yankee. We were pumped for XC schooling! Even though the fences were tiny and nothing special, better than nothing! One of these days we will legit go schooling somewhere but i'm pretty lazy and hate paying someone.

Shun Yanke. Shunnn-n-n-n-n. He says "Whatevs. All the shits I do not give".

Not 100% sure what I was explaining here

AND I love this picture.

Jackie has never done down/up banks so we worked on that. She did pretty excellent for the first time. All the other fences were cake, but I really need to get her someplace to school combos and tougher, bigger fences.

We did some grid work because we got bored out on the XC. Yankee was a PISTOL. Pronto loved it and I hope next time we can raise them a bit for him.

Pretty good for a first timer


Too easy


Ba hahahaha oh Pronto, so cute

This cracks me up!!


So scenic

So yeah. Thats about it. Not much else really to explain, hope you guys enjoyed that!