Debbie De Witt (boarder and GP dressage rider) and I were walking around the arena this morning talking and I mentioned that my 4 year old, De Novo, was just beginning his schooling to understand dressage. He is being asked to become round, bend and listen to yielding aids from the legs. I asked her how it was that you can look at any video on Youtube of a 4 year old warmblood in Germany and have it look like it was in a 2nd level frame? Here is one. Made no sense to me why or how they did that. We ended up having a long discussion about the direction that modern dressage is going. (more…)

I am sooooo sorry folks. But the field that we use for parking is too wet to hold up your trucks and trailers!  Ironically, we would have been more likely to host the hunter pace in February, when the weather was dry.  I spoke to Penny Leggott, who was the push for the hunter pace, and we have decided to still host the XC clinic on Saturday May 1st.  Others may also come for another XC clinic on May 16th or 17th. Stay tuned on that one, we will pick the better weather day for the clinic. Im really sorry, and I promise to wait until June in the future to plan activities on the XC course. Regular lessons are just fine out there, its not the horse footing that is poor, it is the truck footing that needs Rolex studs.

Modified:  Ok. sorry the “cancel” word was a poor choice. We really would like to acomodate everyone as best as we can and think we can still have a fantastic time!  We just need to keep our numbers properly spaced out over two days. Penny is going to help with notifying those of you who signed up and we will try to make it so that the parking works out. We are very limited without the use of the field for parking.

Wow, what a long drive. We have arrived home after 14 hours of non-stop rainy driving. We even encountered snow on the top of Siskiyous. It was the kind of driving that makes you tired because you have to focus so hard on what you are doing.  But we have all arrived safely home and I have 3 dogs and 2 cats staring at me in disbelief, I think they thought I had left them for good.

I got a phone call from Liz, who owns Ria, from Jordan! The country, that is, not the working student. She got a brief update on Ria’s great trip and she is having a life changing experience in the middle east seeing the sights. Im jealous, Ive always wanted to see Petra.

Tomorrow is Jordan’s 21st birthday – if anybody wants to come partake with us!!!!

Hi guys,  Like a previous poster commented, I should definitely include the website to where we currently are. We are at Twin Rivers Event. This has to be one of my most favorite events down here (like Ive been to many! ha!) but it is great. You can search the results from their site.

Dressage day included waking both horses, Taco and Ria, up from intense naps at the very last minute in order to get to our test on time. It was very difficult as they are so cuddly and cute. (more…)

Jordan and I separated ways for a day! We called to tell each other that we missed the other, funny how you get so used to being with one person. I feel incredibly lucky to have Jordan on board, she is not only a great assistant, but a good friend. She drove Brooke’s horse, Savoy, and Dice back up to Twin Palms in Loomis. Dice was showing a few concerning signs about being stressed at the show. She seems to have every sign of ulcers and was very tense and “racetracky” in the warmup arenas. I think we are looking at a horse who was very good at her job as a race horse (won over 200k at Santa Anita) and being a mare she puts her whole heart into what she does. Jordan needs a little more time to reprogram Dice.

I packed up Dino, Taco and Ria and drove a short 2 hours to Paso Robles. (more…)

Although I am writing about stuff that happened on Monday and Tuesday… I am STILL excited about it. Dino was the focus of our attention once Ram Tap competition ended. Ria, Taco and Dice (sort of) got a break and we could spend some time with Dino without all the confusion of busy warmup arenas. Dino went out on Monday and jumped around the introductory stadium course. It had teeny tiny fences in it, but flowers, flags and numbers were still all up and flapping around. He was amazing – never batted an eye and seemed to really enjoy himself! He is brave, confident and once he was introduced to the water jump…… BOLD. He loves water and would drag me into it. He even jumped a little log into the water – a bit more than a green bean should do, but he was so sure of himself.  The next day, Tuesday, he went out with Taco as a babysitter, and did the whole introductory course all by himself. The fences were no bigger than 2′ but for an almost 4 year old boy who has never seen it before, I was thrilled! Beyond thrilled really, to have a homebred horse have so much potential, skill and good looks is pretty exciting. I cant wait to see what he will be like in a year…

Hi all, sorry that I couldnt tell you yesterday how XC was. We got a little busy and I did not make it to a hotel parking lot to mooch their wifi.  

XC was great! Cool windy day that produced a little more excitement for Ria and Dice than we planned. Ria experienced some very very scary jump flags flapping in the wind! and she protested at fence 1, of all places. Once we took a small tour around the jump so she could see that she was not in a parade, she continued to the rest of the course just fine. She darted and doged at least 5 times, which was distracting, but we managed. It was an excellent course for her – 4 opportunities to get in the water jumps (I sneaked in an extra little detour to get her feet wet without getting penalized). She also had a ditch combination and some related distances. Really good school. Needless to say, since she was so unfocused around the course, I am really glad that we will be going to Twin Rivers right away to repeat the exercise. (more…)

Welcome to the central valley…. just in case I forgot how much I *love* it here, I have a screaming headache, allergies to the dust, trains running down the tracks at all hours and flat flat flatness.  I dont miss it here at all. But we are glad to be at the show. We left Jordan’s dad’s farm on Thursday morning and had a frantic arrival in the late afternoon to unpack, setup stalls and ride the horses. I flopped into bed around 8 pm, much to the humor of Brooke Bayley and Jordan. I think being in this forsaken valley makes me depressed. But, fortunetly we have a show to perk me up!
(more…)