Post Matthew

Ok guys, Matthew was a dick.  But we are ok.

Started off Thursday with a quick walk with the dog to get him out before the worst of the rain hit. What most people don't understand is that, in the beginning, we were getting rain that was not related to Matthew.  We had a damned Nor'easter that hit the coast and we picked up 2-3 inches of rain just from that before the storm came in.  I thought it was funny to watch the weather channel who was doing all their reporting from Jacksonville Beach, just because it was raining there.  I mean, who wants to do reports about a tropical storm when it's beautifully sunny outside, which it was pretty much everywhere else.

Walking Luke before the storm.

 Thursday we were released early from work.  Of course, it's quarter end, my team mate and I did some work from home.  Friday all places were closed, so the hubby, my brother and I tucked in for a long couple of days.  We all of us anticipated losing power, since we live in an older part of town with lots of old oak trees.  So we took showers and filled the tub with water, did all the laundry and dishes, cranked the A/C, filled the freezer with water bottles, and brewed a couple pots of coffee.  We watched our fill of the Weather Channel and local coverage, then watched Pulp Fiction because apparently according to my brother, it's the best movie ever.  The dog was happier than a pig in slop, because all his peoples were home.

The boy and his dog surveying the storm.

As my brother says "it's wind-ing".  See much tree crap in the yard.

Luke and his favorite toy...a water bottle.

The lights flickered twice hard enough to turn off the TV and we were convinced it was coming. While standing on the porch after taking Luke to visit his favorite palm tree in the front yard, we heard a huge BOOM, after which we all turned to each other saying "that did not sound good".  We still had electric, though.

We went to bed and woke up to a cloudy but much less windy day.  The boy was called to go check out stores with his boss.  Brother and I cleaned up the debris in the front and back yard.  It's a pretty big pile, but no actual branches.  I could hear the generators kicking off, and the chain saws buzzing away in the neighborhood.  It turned into a hot, but beautiful day.

We did sustain "damage" though.  The neighbor's fence blew over.  Actually, the one in the back and the one on the side, although we have chain link in the back, so we don't really care too much.  On the side, the neighbor died about a month ago (he was very sick for years) and the woman staying there isn't really doing maintenance, so we put it back up.  And we have 4 broken shingles.  I'll get up there sometime soon and replace those myself.

Side fence down.  Luke thought he was getting a bigger yard.

Shingles.

And that was the big storm for us.  Neighbors on the street in front of and behind us both had trees down, and they are still waiting on power.  Work had no power until midday on Monday, but is fine now.

Unfortunately, other people and other areas fared far worse.  The beach was badly impacted.  St. Augustine was under 4 feet of water.  It was eerie to see water flooding areas that hubby and I walked a week before.  A1A was washed away in Flagler Beach, just south of us, and we lost a third of the Jacksonville Beach pier.  We still have 46,000+ people without power.  Schools just opened back up. And this dick of a storm hit every member of my family all up and down the coast.  Family in Charleston lost power and have lots of trees to clear, but were ok.  Family in Myrtle Beach are still without power due to trees down on power lines.  Fortunately, they are ok, though.

And the pony was absolutely fine.  Marcy kept great care of all the horses.  They had rain and lost one night of turnout, but were back to normal by the next day.  I got out there Sunday for a lesson, because, you know, only 3 weekends before the show.  Can't afford to lose another whole weekend.

Mare says "what storm?  And where's my apple?"

Grab the Oh Shit handle guys, we're in for a bumpy ride

So, we are getting a visitor.  His name is Matthew.  He looks to be a bastard.

This is Matthew

Ok, so maybe this doesn't mean much to you.  Doesn't look so bad.  For those of you who don't know where Jacksonville is, we are in the little dip, between where that M (stands for MAJOR, FYI) is coming off the coast of Florida and the Florida-Georgia state line is.  See where the H dot is?  That is where Beka from The Owls Approve is.

Here is a different view, this time showing wind speeds.

Pretty, yes?

Pretty, NO.  See the dark red?  Yes, that is us getting hurricane winds.  Right now my phone is saying winds will go up to 40 in the middle of the night and then jump to 70+ midday until midnight, then back to 60+ until about 8am Saturday.  That is in my neighborhood.  The beach (about 15 miles away) is expecting 100 mph winds.  So yeah.  Big deal.

BIG F'ING DEAL!  Luckily, the pony is being well cared for inland and further south.

We are expecting no electric once the winds pick up.  No idea how long that will last.  My neighborhood is an older one, so they house is really well built (concrete block and brick), but all the power lines on above ground, and we have lots of old beautiful trees, so I would expect there will be the sounds of chainsaws on Saturday.

Luckily I'm only a mile from work and they have a generator.  And showers.  And TVs.  And couches.  Now where are those sleeping bags?

We are not in an evacuation zone so are going to weather it all at the house.  So we are buttoned up and squared away with plenty of non-electric things we can do to keep ourselves occupied.

Best of luck to all of you out there in the path of this guy (including all my friends further south along the coast in Daytona/Cocoa who will see the worst of this).  Let's hope we don't see him again next week when he comes back for a second taste.

Goin to the chapel

 So, we went and got hitched over the weekend.  It was a quite thing, really.  Thankfully.  Because I had a couple of freakouts leading up to it.  I cannot even imagine what I would have been like if I had to plan the whole thing with people.

So after a mad scramble in the morning to get too many things done, we headed off with the dog barking in our ears (the car means barking.  The whole 40 minute trip) to the spa to drop him off on our way to the courthouse.

We got there, paid our money, and went to the little documents room where they had set up a nice arbor.  The officiant was nice enough to take pictures while we said our vows.

Before

During

"You may now kiss the bride"

The rings

After that, we headed to the hotel.  We were a bit early, but they were nice enough to hold our luggage while we went off to explore.  We went first down the pedestrian street, St. George, to check out all the little shops, then made our way to the distillery where we tried vodka, gin and run made in St. Augustine.  After that, we went back to old town and visited the Castillo de San Marco, which was very cool.

Trying to figure this selfy thing out.

On top of the Castillo.  With a cannon.

 Then we headed back to the hotel where we checked in, showered and got ready for dinner.  A shuttle came and took us to a really nice restaurant that is a St. Augustine institution, the Raintree, where we had a great meal and tasty drinks.  Then back to the hotel where we sat on the balcony in rocking chairs enjoying champagne from the local winery and chocolates as we watched the ghost tours go by.

Champagne and chocolates in our room.

The next day we got up when we got up, wandered around looking for a light breakfast, and got some coffee at the little coffee shop.  Then we headed to the Whetstone Chocolate Factory for a tour.

We're sexy and we know it.

 After that, we did a wine tasting at San Sebastian winery, hit the distillery up for a bottle of gin, and headed back to town for lunch.

My handsome husband after we discovered the best BBQ we've ever had.  27 Smokehouse.  If ever in St. Augustine, it's worth a try.

We went to the wax museum (request of the hubby) and then got ready for our professional photo shoot.  We met the photographer and did pics around town, changing clothes mid stream.  It was hot, and I was a sweaty mess, but she swears she can edit that out.

Sneak peek of the professional pics

 The last day, we got up and had breakfast at a little out of the way place and checked out of the hotel.

A fantastic Inn.  They treated us well.

 And headed to one last place we wanted to check out on the way home.  The lighthouse.

Iconic

217 steps, and he was willing to hug up on me anyway.  Good thing he loves me despite my sweatiness

Looking up the inside of the lighthouse

After all that, we headed home to pick up the dog, do laundry and grocery shopping and get ready to put our lives back together.  Welcome to the real world.

And while I was out taking a bit of a break from the real world with my new husband, I watched as the rest of the Market Street crew showed at the schooling show to get ready for the show at the beginning of November.  Remember that?  The one that I'm registered for?  Yeah, feeling totally unprepared, but the money has been paid, and the pony is getting clipped, so I better figure it out quick.

Other matters

Yes, I know this is a horse blog, but there are other things going on in my life.  Of course, it all impacts my personal horse-world, so I'll use that as the tie in.

First and foremost is the wedding.  Yes, it is on.  Friday, I will be married.  We have received all the stuff (clothes, rings, etc.), I have found a photographer, and had showers.  Now all that's left is to get my nails done, finish my gift, and pack.

The boy is into all the stuff that goes with a wedding, so we have custom jerseys to wear around St. Augustine, as well as "Team Bride" and "Team Groom" cups to carry around, just because he wanted them.  He's such a sentimental goofball.

Getting my "something blue"

On Sunday last week, I was lucky enough to have a shower thrown by Marcy and Ginny.  We went to the spa and had some things done and had lunch with all the ladies.  Then that night, a few of us met up with the boys for dinner at one of my favorite places.  We had such fun at the spa that we decided we have to do this more often, like once a quarter or so.  I made sure we invited a couple of people who no longer have horses in our program, but are still part of the Market Street crew, and it was so nice to see them again.

I am blessed to have such a great group of people that wanted to help me and Collin celebrate.  There were three people that did not make it that I really wish had, but you know how life gets in the way. At the last minute, Ginny was called away for work and could not make it to the party she planned. My best friend from college could not get away from her full house in MD when her husband was suddenly called away for his job.  And my Mom couldn't make it because her sister was unexpectedly admitted to the ICU with some heart issues.  But I will see them all soon, so it's fine.

I'm still looking for the "something borrowed".

I was lucky enough to have another shower at work, where they got cool things like M&Ms with our picture on them, and a cake made of cupcakes carrot and chocolate that made the shape of a dress, baked and decorated by a very talented woman in our payroll department.  Such sweet people I work with.

The ladies that organized my shower with my cake.  

Participants in my shower.  It was mostly an excuse to eat cake!

Coolest. Thing. Ever.

And then I promptly got sick.  I did not ride.  I did not move.  I made sure to try not to breathe on the boy.  I did make a "just married" plaque to hang on the spare tire of his jeep, and then the front door once we get home.  But mostly I slept for three days straight.  I'm not totally better, but at least everything isn't running now.  That means that I will not ride for three weeks, though, which really sucks.

Another thing on my plate right now is my foot.  You remember when I got surgery last year and all my problems were solved?  Yeah, not so much.  It's doing it's same thing again.  I feel like I'm walking with a stone in my shoe under my toes.  And it hurts when I ride, at least until I start a lesson or something and quit thinking about it.  But I do think it's making me ride more on the outside of my foot on the right, which is adding to my lopsided-ness on the pony.  I'm ignoring it for the most part right now.  I will get to the podiatrist, but not until after the show.

Speaking of the show, entries opened last week.  I need to register, but first had a question about the new BN registration requirement with USEA.  Marcy says don't worry about it, since it does not go into effect until December 1, and the USEA season ends at the end of November.  If I were to register now, I would have to pay the full thing again come December, so just wait.  So now I have to figure out how to work the Event Entries site, since I've never done that before.  It's kind of exciting.  I asked if we were still on track to complete that, and was told at that time yes, so I guess that means I'm good to go.  We'll see since I now have an extended leave from riding (3 WEEKS!) and only a month before the show.

Barn door shot for my blog-friend Emma.  We don't really have doors, though.

Cross-country mayhem

Or how we fared with 10 riders going cross country schooling.

The harvest moon setting as I headed to the barn.

It was a great day.  I got up at 5am and to the barn by 7:30.  Packed up the pony with the five that we were taking from our barn (Violet, Charlie, Riley, JR and Finn) and headed out.  We signed in at the Florida Horse Park around 9, hoping to be out schooling by 9:30.  It was a bit after that, because we had to find the others that were joining us for this schooling.

So there we are, a total of ten riders and eleven people (we had one extra, just in case).  One of those was not schooling, since he was only 6, but he did walk around with us on his mother's retired Training level quarter-horse, lagging toward the back of the group so he could holler "Mom, can I trot?!" to catch up, and asking pretty smart questions for someone new to the whole eventing thing.

"What do the numbers on the fences mean?"
"Do they get to stop between the fences, or do they just keep jumping?"
"Do they try to make it more dangerous as it gets harder?"

A beautiful foggy morning at the farm.

   Yeah, pretty perceptive little one.

Anyway, it was a varied group, with most of the riders doing Novice, a couple that were working on Training, and two of us doing elementary.

We were in the saddle for three and a half hours.  It was fun though.

Pony is ready.  And thanks to Ginny for the saddle loan.

I had one goal.  To not have any stops.  As a bonus goal, I would love to work on some of the BN fences, but that was up to Marcy.

In getting V ready, we discovered I had no rein stops on my regular bridle, so I went with the french link gag that we have used in the past since the reins on that bridle had them.  Yeah, in the future, I will simply switch the reins.

Violet gets a little, well, to be frank, she gets a little bitchy about pressure on her poll.  In the past, we have simply made her deal with it in order to get the control I needed because she was not happy about leaving the group and being in the field with OTHER HORSES, OMG.

This time, she was really very good about separating from the group, and very rideable and controllable.  I didn't need that extra.  What it did do is make her throw her head in the air and become disconnected from back to front.  Which led to "OMG MY LEGS ARE GOING SO FAST, IS THAT A FENCE, I SHOULD PUT MY HEAD DOWN TO LOOK" and a pop-step in front of the fence.

But she didn't stop.  Not once.

My cohort and I spent a while going over the same fence while the rest of the group was working on the banks.  Once we both got our horses going forward over the fence, we upped the ante and jumped the Beginner Novice bench that was next to it.  Neither of us had problems.

I discovered on the second to last fence that part of my issue that day was leg position.  When sitting to go forward in the last few strides, I was pushing my leg forward and losing my pushing leg on the pony.  I am so used to being able to stretch down and around the pony, in both dressage and stadium, in my saddle that I didn't realize when I did that in the cross-country saddle, it actually took my leg off below the knee.  So, I'm looking forward to the next time we school when I can work on correcting that and learning what it is supposed to feel like.  Definitely got better after I was informed.

Accomplished and tired pony.

So, while we were a little worried about the whole mass of riders heading out to the field, and it took a great deal longer than I anticipated to get everyone happy with their schooling, all the horses were good, and it was fun.  Violet and I managed to hit our goal, and we have expanded our group a bit, and I think that's a great thing.

On a more somber note, this was kind of a last hoorah for Marcy who is heading back to surgery tomorrow to redo some work on her clavicle.  Hopefully she will heal quickly this time and be back on and working before we know it.

Dressage and stadium rounds

So I guess we'll start off with the show.  I got there Friday night and we had a decent schooling in the grass between the rings.  I didn't realize, but I was to be riding the true dressage Training test.  In the big dressage ring.  And for once, there were quite a few people who elected to just to dressage tests, or to do a test and a stadium round, instead of doing the full 3 phases.  I was August, afterall, and HOT.

Saturday, I had my test fairly early.  Had a bit of trouble getting stiff in the warm up, and I guess it carried through to the test.  I was not unhappy with it, however.  I knew I got crooked in the last canter down the long wall, and I didn't get my reins short enough after the free walk, but I thought our free walk was better than it has been in the past, and I thought we were pretty accurate.

I did not realize I was crooked in the final halt.  That was very disappointing, as we usually halt like a BOSS.

"Steady test.  Now develop a more uphill and free moving horse to a softer hand.  You can do it!"  Love words of encouragement from the judge.

Total score 60

Just to let you know, the judge is a "real judge", and judges accordingly.  While a 60 (40 in eventing speak) doesn't seem like much for what was essentially the BN A test, The best score was only a 62.  Overall, I was happy.  There are things we are working on, and I expect this score to continue to improve.  I know Violet has it in her.  I just need to work on keeping her loose, mostly.  Watch the test below (thanks Ginny for videoing) and let me know what you think.

After that, we moved on to stadium.  We got up there and they were still on the 2', so we figured we still had time.  Trainer ran back to the barn to feed lunch real quick, and then they started calling for me to go in the ring.  I hadn't even cantered yet, nevermind jumped a fence!  That was very distracting for me, and unfortunately, I think I snapped at the volunteer that was calling after the 5th time she called while I was obviously in the process of warming up.  (I did apologize)  Anyway, I headed to the course, thinking, I have to get forward to the first fence.  I did that successfully, but then dribbled to the second one.  After that, 3 was fine, Violet was on the wrong lead from 3 to 4 and I didn't feel like I had enough time to fix it.  We incidentally blew past the line and lost pace due to crappy counter-canter balance, so I basically blew all three tenants for jumping and dinked through 4 to 5 in...I don't know 6?  Maybe 7?  Anyway, it was not pretty.  But I took a deep breath, got my shit together and finished the rest of the course without any issues.  Actually, the last fence was a pretty big oxer, and Violet seemed to be like "Yay, Mom finally figured out that forward is better!  Whee!"  But we were clear, and we recovered from my little mistakes without incident, so that is much improved from where we used to be!

Crappy guess at what the course looked like.  I need to start taking pics of the course board.

So that was it.  It was a good experience, we had fun.  All the Market Street students that were there walked away happy and feeling accomplished.  And we all got satin.  And Violet got a bag of treats as a prize!

Accomplished pony got 3rd in dressage out of 13 and won the 2'7" stadium!

Very quick update

I'm sorry I haven't written.  There has been much going on, which should give me much to write about, so I will give you a quick summary of what will be upcoming, and you can decide if you wish to come back.

1.  We did a dressage test and jump class at a local schooling event.  It was a positive experience
2.  I have had some fantastic lessons, including a joint jumping lesson with Ginny and Pearl that was really fun.
3.  Lots has occurred around the planning of the wedding that wasn't really a wedding.  Amazing how much planning happens even when you don't invite anyone.
4.  My foot is acting up again.
5.  The dog is still a goof.
6.  My brother is still living with me.
7.  Trying to decide if I should bite the bullet and register USEA BN before the show, even though it's before the December requirement kicks in.
8.  Oh yeah, and I still work for a living.

Yes, this is from the schooling show.