Quick recap (no, I haven't forgotten)

I know.  It was a big weekend, followed by a big week.  So I'll do a little recap before doing the analysis.

A nice start to a show Saturday

Ride times were late.  Dressage Saturday 1:53, stadium and cross country at 3:42 and 4:38 Sunday, respectively.

I had a good, but not perfect, dressage school Friday night, working on pushing for more.

Super pony!

After waiting around with no job on Saturday, watching everyone else ride, we were braided and dressed and ready to go.  Then it was done, and we were right in the middle of the pack score-wise and oh so happy because it was a great ride.

Caroline, Jean, me and the Super-pony, and Jane post dressage.  Lots of reason to smile!

Sunday I jump judged in the morning through Intermediate, Prelim and Training, and made it back to the barn in time to watch my fellow team-mates all have great rides.

Next thing I know, I'm in warm-up and they are calling my number.

Through stadium with my best round ever, double clear.  Moved up to second.

A short break, long enough to take a drink, pamper the pony a bit, retack, and head back out to cross country.  Walk around a bit, warm up with a little bit of stickiness to work through, which was fantastic, then 5...4...3...2...1...HAVE A GREAT RIDE!

The pony and I after successful completion of our first ever BN event together

Yes, I met my goal.  I finished my first ever Beginner Novice.  My first ever...crap, can't remember the word now...rated?  No, that's the hunter world.  Whatever, my first ever big show with braiding and jackets and bit checks and running martingales and solid fences and water and ditches and a 2-stride, etc.

I got through it.  We had time, and finished in 7th out of 10, but we did it!  The pony was spectacular. I didn't feel like I was going to throw up.  I actually know what I did wrong for time and how to fix it. And I'm ready to go again!

Violet ribbon for the Violet pony!

The Market Street team results were pretty impressive:

Jean and Jr 2nd JTR
Olivia and Keebler 1st NR
Lindsey and Willa 2nd NR
Caroline and Charlie 3rd NR
Cameron and Breeze 1st BNR-B
Me and Violet 7th BNR-A

Caroline and I were on an adult team together with a couple of other people whose names I don't even know.  We finished 5th out of 6.

In my mind, she has reached that status.

So, to recap, I am thankful to be part of such a wonderful team, to have a great trainer and two wonderful twins that have taught my pony so much, a pony that has turned into the horse I always knew she could be, and to walk away from this with a smile on my face and a confident pony!

As soon as I find my dressage test paper, I'll post a more in-depth analysis of the weekend.

Lots of lesson info

Yeah, if I thought it would get better after the wedding was over, I was sorely mistaken.  Life marches on, along with kid visitations, birthday, Holloween, work demands, illnesses, and receptions.  I am looking forward to...I don't know...Christmas maybe?  I might be able to take a breath then?

Anyway, I ended up with a sinus infection last week, so had a forced day off, which I guess was good.  Saturday on the way back from visitation with the kiddos, the boy started with a head cold, but appears to be getting out of it after a couple crappy days.

The good news is I have managed to get in some terrific lessons, and this post is all about this.  Lots of words.

Dressage

• Be adamant about getting the result that I ask for, don't nag
• From the BEGINNING of the ride
• Make sure I keep the communication working between both reins
• The more inattentive the pony is, the more movement between the reins
• GIVE on the first stride up into a new gait
• Take the time to set up for the canter transition in the test, especially after the diagonal
• If I have to blow a movement to get the pony back, do it.  Don't let it escalate and take down the whole test.
• Push into the halt

Basically, we ran through the test.  As usual, the two movements I have issues with are the right lead canter after the diagonal, and putting her back together from the free walk.  Other than that, I feel pretty good.  We'll see how she feels on Friday when I school with everyone else in the world around.

Because what's a pony blog without the pony!

Stadium

• Stay forward to the fence
• Use the counter bend on the turns to balance for the fence
• Remember to put the outside shoulder on the line to the fence I would like to take
• The first fence will have to be ridden harder than anticipated
• Make sure to keep head up and heel under hip
• Concentrate on not allowing the leg to swing forward when I sit the canter a couple of strides before the fence

This, especially the leg position, was a continuation of many lessons.  We set up actual courses and went outside the ring and started like it was a real course.  When I got done with the first course, my first words were "well, that was a shit show".  So we did a different course.  That time, my brain was screwed on and we did much much better.

This past weekend, I made a deal with the boy that we would stop at the farm on the way to Clearwater so I could get in that one last cross country school before the course designers showed up and the course was really closed.  It meant getting up at 5:30 after the boy closed the night before, which resulted in him sleeping in the car and not getting to see my awesomeness, but I did get in that much needed last school, even with a sinus infection.

This part has the best grass.

Cross Country

• Get a good gallop going from the start box
• If there is any playing, stop it as soon as it starts
• If there is a missed distance, prop, etc, make sure to ride the next fence that much harder

During this school, she was a bit up.  Marcy says mostly because she was alone.  We had a little bucky, bucky playtime while going over the mound, but I managed to get over it, stop it and go on to the next fence.  We also had a runout, which was probably fantastic. There is a fence that they are calling the wishing well that looks like an intro to a trekahner, hanging log over a base thing.  It was not actually pulled out to be ridden, but was pretty much facing a tree one stride out.  I was to cut around the tree and slice over the fence at an angle (not something I do.  I like straight.  Must be the hunter rider in me), since we know it will be on the course this weekend. Yeah, I got to it and kind of said "oh god, take the wheel" and Violet said, "whee, let's go around it!" It was a good reminder that I actually have to ride every fence, especially those I'm not sure of.  Several of the fences have been repainted and now look different, so I have to take that in account as well.  The good news is that, on the second try, she sailed right over it.  We are both confident and ready for this. I have to say, I think I'm actually looking forward to doing this!

And then on Sunday, after driving to Clearwater Friday and back with a sick man on Saturday, still on antibiotics from the sinus infection, I drove back down for another stadium lesson on Sunday.  

A cool sunrise in the morning.  Violet in her sheet on the right, Finn on the left at his gate.

Stadium

• Establish the forward stride
• Continue the communication between the reins to keep her paying attention, especially when she is distracted
• Make sure, if I move up into a line, that I establish the canter again on the backside of the line
• Keep that leg underneath of me and not in front
• Keep the head up and looking a quarter of the way ahead
• Weight in the outside stirrup around turns
• Counterbend around the corners
• Lighter inside rein on the turns

The quarter ahead.  This means a quarter of the way around a circle, a quarter of the way down the line, etc.  It is simply a way to remind myself to look forward to whatever is next.  This stadium practice was in the grass field, and Violet was distracted, which was good practice.  We worked on ridability doing a figure 8 around a small fence, then moved on to the coursework.  Violet was jumping out of her skin!  Marcy says she's jumping like a horse that really likes her job, and it felt like it.  Yes, she gets a little head tossy sometimes, but is listening for the most part, if I remember the rules.  We are learning the different gears, and I am learning to trust myself.  My first instinct is beginning to be to go forward, not pull, and I'm getting better at going with that instinct.  

We finished up the last two weekends of lessons with a confident rider and a confident pony.  I think we are as ready as we are going to get.

Lessons from days past

Ok, I'm a slacker.  We all know this by now.  I actually outlined three posts for last week and didn't get a single one done.  Partially because I do this at work and my staff is out and I'm picking up the slack (or at least I did...for like three days).  Partially because it was my birthday week and I had other inconsequential things going on.  Partially because I just didn't get back to it.

So here is the weekend recap from two weeks ago.

We had a cross country school on Saturday morning.  It was to be the last one before they close the course before the show.  It was just me, Ginny on Pearl, one twin on Riley and one twin on her horse Jr.  Pearl is going Novice and schooling Training.  Riley and Jr are both working up to Prelim.  And me on the derpy pony doing BN.

They're all like "we jumped the Prelim coffin!" and I'm all like "I cantered through the water!". They're like "did you see us go over that Intermediate oxer?" and I'm like "you know I cantered over my first ditch!"  And actually, they didn't say any such thing, and they told me I did a good job when I did my little stuff, since they've all seen where I came from.  It's just me being jealous.

Can't quite compare, but I did things I hadn't done before.  We started off (after cantering a log and a little house for warm up) by going into the box and learning about how to work the watch.  Marcy's system is to walk in the box between 15 and 10 and face the back of the box.  Start the watch when they say 5, and start to turn to the front.  Then you are ready to go from there.  From the first fence, Violet was ON!

Freshly clipped pony.

We jumped all the things, logs, houses, tables.  Then we trotted up the little bank (haven't done one of those in 2 years) and cantered over the rolltop.  Stopped to watch the bank work of the others, then headed back down to a table, left turn to the dinky coop of death.  I got in my own head and muffed the coop, but we got over it.  Came back, did it from the other side, left hand cantering turn to the ditch in the woods

This was a huge deal for me.

The last time I tried to canter a ditch, I ended up on the ground and Marcy had to school Violet over it for me.

Very satisfied post-cross country pony.

After the ditch, we came to a newer jump.  It's like an open coop, or a triple bar, but the base inside of it is painted shiny.  And it was raining.  It read like there was water in there.  Three strides out, Violet and I saw it at the same time.  She said "huh?!" and I said "mm, do it anyway" and she did.  Then up and over a very steep hill down to another table.  Marcy was happy with my ability to get the fence done and get on with the next thing, but we headed back up over the hill the way we came and back over the new fence just to make sure our confidence was good.  It was.

After that we headed to the water, where we did a little mushroom jump and cantered through the water.  Again, a first for me, although Violet has been telling me for a while now that trotting through the water is stupid.

After that, all that was left was a table right hand curve past the turnout fields back to a table and the finish flags.  Violet slowed down a bit coming up to the fields, but then picked back up heading to the last.  She got a bit flat, so I balanced her about 10 strides out and had a decent last fence.  Again, we had a great time, and walked away from schooling saying "we got this"!

Takeaways include to be prepared for shenanigans for the first three fences.  If she's going to act up, this is where she will do it, going away from the other horses.  And don't forget the last fence.  So there we go.

Maddie, the most perfect puppy ever.  In her own version of heaven, sandwiched between her dad and her favorite Miss Mary.

Sunday morning we had a dressage lesson.  We worked on a lot of the same things.  Work on forward first.  Make sure to move hands between the reins when stopping.  Not see-saw, but more a move of the shoulders.  These movements can be more or less depending on the horse I'm riding.  Give reins right before asking for walk from a halt to allow that first forward step.  The same goes in the walk-trot and trot-canter transitions.

We worked on some sections of the test.  The biggest challenges for me are going to be the right lead canter coming right off the change in rein across the diagonal, and going from free to medium walk.

Prepare for canter off the change in rein with one full stride of straight before asking for the canter. Make sure I set up properly for that one, because it will be difficult (for me, not Violet, she's got this) to prepare without bracing.  After the circle, make sure to support going into the final corner before the long wall in order to keep from breaking to the trot, and encourage a very forward canter down the long wall.

A very tired pony after a great weekend.

In the walk work, I should use the rein opposite the judge (left) to encourage her to stretch her head down.  Start to pick up the reins before hitting the long wall.  Pick them up with purpose and insist on Violet remaining balanced and not throwing her head up.  Not being mean, just insistent that she respond.  While training this move, I should stop as soon as she becomes resistant and insist on her putting her head down before starting again.  By doing this over and over, we got more and more steps before she threw her head.

So these were my take-aways from lessons the weekend of October 15-16.  October 22-23 coming soon.

A nice walk after a busy weekend.

Back to lessons (after 3 weeks)

Back to lessons after a little over three weeks off for me.  Fortunately, Violet has still been in work.  

She was not happy to see me.  

However, we had a great lesson.  I got on and we went for a nice long walk around the cross country field before our lesson.  

We worked on canter transitions.  Something I have to remember is leg, seat then hands.  In most horses, you would kind of do them together.  But V has a definite order or else she either gets stuck and trots/canters in place, or throws her head in the air.  Either way, she tells you OMG HOW VERY WRONG YOU ARE!  And yes, she yells it.  She did that a bit, but if I don't bid into it and remember to keep my hands UP, she gets over it pretty quickly.  So we worked on our canter transitions, 20 meter circle, and going down the long wall to the downward transition.  I have to remember to sit into the transition in order to bring her shoulder up into the downward transition.  We did that over and over, side to side, then worked on the walk transitions.  Concentrated on using the rein on the other side from the judge to encourage Violet to reach down, which worked pretty well, then getting the transition back to the working walk without getting stuck.  After that, we worked on the trot to halt on the centerline.  Again, almost have to sit the last couple of steps to the halt in order to keep her front and back together and not string the back legs behind in the halt.

After that, we headed back out to the fields, where Violet just wanted to wander around in the wooded parts.  It was a beautiful day, and a great lesson.  I didn't feel too out of shape, partially because Fall arrived!  The heat just kills me.

And although the temps were much better, and I wasn't huffing like a dragon midway through the lesson, Violet was a sweaty mess.  Her winter coat has arrived, and she turned into a shaggy mess. When she gets sweaty and the hair is long, I swear it gets curly.  So she looks a little like a ragamuffin with long hairs, but she was lovely.  We'll take care of the hair closer to the show.  No need to clip now to have her grow it back before the show.

Tomorrow we head out for our last cross country school before the show.

And I may or may not be absolutely freaking out because I have outgrown all my show coats and absolutely cannot find anyone that carries a true plus sized coat.  Found some in the UK, but they won't ship here.  Ugh.

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.