After false starts Monday and Tuesday (due to freezing pipes, bursting pipes, guests, etc) Desire and I finally made it to the lake today to squeeze in a ride before this big rain storm (finally) hits us. We rode with C today for the first time in a few months and it was also the first time riding Desire with C’s big gelding. I always felt like  I was on the verge of getting left in the dust by C when I was riding Blaze but Desire and her gelding rate pretty darn well together. We did the short loop around horse camp since it was cold and gray and C’s guy hadn’t been out in a while but it was a perfect length for leg stretching, some trotting fun, and not getting the horses too sweaty for the chilly day and rainy night to come. Desire rode really nicely in the trailer again, the husband reported no tap dancing when we pulled out and I didn’t hear any coming home. I had to stop at the feed store for shavings and she was dancing around a little bit and nickering at me when I was loading the shavings but she still came out of the trailer at home mostly dry and much calmer than previously. I looked at the divider itself and it’s actually easily removable, just pull two big bolts and it’s out, so I think after the rain I may just take the whole darn divider out.

The shavings I stopped for were for bedding down the stalls in the barn. We’ve got 100% rain in the forecast for the next 4-5 days and with Sheza’s latest blanket already not fitting I decided I’ll put up the herd in the stalls for at least a day or two, depending on the severity of the storm. Our stalls are so ridiculously large, I still laugh in disbelief every time I walk into one. I’ve literally seen paddocks smaller than our stalls! We bought the place with all the fencing, stalls, horse stuff already installed and we really lucked out. The gal we bought it from was a breeder and trainer so all six stalls are large, stallion-secure, and ready to go. It’s a mare motel style barn so the stalls aren’t fully enclosed but still, pretty luxurious. I realized when I was getting water buckets ready that I haven’t used the barn at all since Sheza was born 9 months ago! Wonder if Desire will have any weird birthing flashbacks 😉  I don’t think she had a clue what was happening or happened when Sheza was born so probably not, Lol. I still remember the evident bewilderment after we helped deliver Sheza and Desire just stood in the corner with her back to us like “Woah, okay, woah, I need a breather, what the hell just happened.” Then we showed Sheza to her and she kept the filly in front of her at all times in good eye shot and didn’t want to let her go around to nurse, Lol. Got to keep an eye on that thing that just came out of her! I only had to halter her the first few nursings and she got the point though. Silly mare. She was a great mom, kind and tolerant of baby but not over zealous and always ready to leave the nutty baby and go be a REAL horse again.

This evening was herd round-up, which was pretty entertaining. We had the usual fracas trying to get El Bandito into his stall–picture Bandito running circles around the barn snatching mouthfuls of grass w/ people and dogs hot on his heels. Blaze was at his arch necked, snorting, stallionwannabe best when we took his girlfriends away first. Sheza was convinced she had NEVER been in the barn EVER before (Despite being born there and staying nights there for weeks after). Desire had eyes only for her mash bucket. They all have their priorities, Lol. 


Once the herd was settled the husband arrived home with Chinese food for dinner–and a very exciting box!

Whoop there it is!

The seat is Sooooo cushy, it feels like it’s made with memory foam! Can’t wait to cruise down the trail in this puppy. Won’t happen til next week at the earliest if the forecast holds, but we’ll see. In the meantime I can do a refresher course on fitting with the DVD and my notes from the demo etc. I also got a forest green pad for riding Blaze–and coz I don’t own any other saddle pads and thought 1 might not be enough for competition.

A couple of days ago I finally got the much-awaited shipping notification in my inbox that said my Specialized Eurolight saddle will be arriving within the week. I just checked the tracking with UPS and it says my 20 lb box is on time and will be delivered this Wednesday by end of day–hip hip hooray! I’m sooo excited! Blaze better get himself together because once the saddle comes and we get it fitted to him, his fat butt is rejoining the ranks of the working Arab world! 

It’s a new season buddy, there’s a saddle coming, get ready for some miles!

Desire and I joined N and her mare at the lake today for a gorgeous, sunny, warm 16.9 mile ride. Then I came home, fed the horses, ate an epic steak dinner prepared by my miraculous husband. And then I tried to get up off the couch–umm, I think I broke myself!! I can’t believe how sore my seat and thighs are already, only a few hours after the ride. Once in a while I’ll feel a little tight the next day but I am fully 100% sore from the waist down tonight! That’s what the holidays will do to you. All the drama with our heater and visiting family etc meant Desire sat for 2 1/2 weeks. And so did my bottom. I bet I’ll feel interesting tomorrow. 

Took some photos of my wild and silly filly this evening before feeding. On Saturday she will be officially 9 months old!

I had a fantastic morning ride to the top of the ridge today, about 7.4 steep miles in an hour and a half. It was a little chilly down below, especially at the bridge over the creek, but by the time we charged to the summit (it really is a good long steep hill, I’m always kind of re-surprised at how steep it is) it was probably 60 degrees and bright blue skies. Cantering along the flat at the top of the ridge was fantastic, I couldn’t force the grin off my face if I tried. I carry my crop when I ride from home and I’ve found it very useful. Desire has a tendency to drift to one side of the road in a casual attempt to turn around for home. Blaze did something similar but Desire is a lot sneakier about it, lol. I try to keep her to one side of the road in case we hear a car coming (it’s paved road for a mile and then a very wide dirt road up to the top of the ridge after that). She always has other ideas and tries to choose HER side to walk on. We have discussions about it and sometimes a little sharp tap to the neck with the crop will snap her out of it and refocus her forward. When I ask she willingly trots out and we had some really nicely paced short canters today as well. But at any speed when she felt me start to ask for slowing down she would immediately angle her hind end to be ready to stop and turn for home, Lol! It’s a little annoying but not that bad, especially since she always easily goes into a higher gait when I ask. She isn’t turtling it like Blaze does but she does take advantage of any attention lapses, that’s for certain. We had a couple of long, sustained 6 mph jogs on a loose rein on the way up, it felt fantastic. Of course once we turned for home we were having talks to stay at a walk and at the trot I was having to fight to keep her below 10 mph. Mostly we just worked on walking home. I’ve found that circling her doesn’t do a whole lot of good, it’s too easy for her. So today when she tried to break into a trot downhill I immediately stopped her and then collected her and asked her to back uphill. It took about 4 attempts per gait-break for her to continue on at a walk, but that’s better than the 10+ circles I had to do in previous attempts. Backing uphill ain’t easy and though she smoothly did it, by the last time around (let’s see, probably a total of 14 reps of 3-step backwards uphill) I could tell she was getting a little muscle tired. About a mile out from home she finally found her loose relaxed walk again, that’s pretty standard for her. She isn’t racy or pushy about trying to break gait at least, just persistent, lol. We had a brief moment of spazz on the way home on the very last flat stretch on the dirt road before the pavement began again, she wanted to trot faster and faster and break into a canter and I was asking her to slow which became a half trot/half canter head shaking/mini crow hop protestation. Pretty funny and I did my “EH EH” naughty noise and we were back to a walk with no further issue.

The Bomber is back home this afternoon, after a new fuel pump, some hoses, and O-rings. I’ve got plans to ride Friday and possibly on the weekend, and meet up with my riding buddy C again at the lake next week, now that she has her saddle back from refitting. I’m milking this weather all I can but the dry dead grasses around are pretty worrying! It’s supposed to be lush and green right now. We’ll see. When we got home with the Bomber I was hugging and scratching on Sheza, boy oh boy she is big now!!

My great barefoot trimmer came out this morning to take care of the girls’ hooves and get Blaze started on the  barefoot track as well. I tried keeping Blaze barefoot a few years ago, before I knew about boots, but he was always too tender up front. With winter on and my saddle that will fit him not arrived yet, I’d gone through two sets of steel shoes without riding him and it just seemed pointless to keep shoeing him. He has great tough hind hooves, I rode him with bare hinds in all but 1 of my LD rides last year, so I was only concerned about the fronts. I finally wrapped my slow brain around it and figured why not pull the shoes I’m not even using, and work on transitioning him to fully barefoot with the aid of boots. Now that I’ve got some miles under my belt using Easyboot Gloves on Desire I feel confident enough to attempt it with Blaze.

 My trimmer is also an Easyboot dealer so we fitted Blaze for boots and concluded that with his very high (too high) heels the Gloves are much too low-profile for him and the Easyboot Epics will be better. They are so much higher in the heel that they will accommodate his current hoof shape and should continue to work out as we transition him. I’ve never used the Epics but my trimmer said that they are much more forgiving in fit in general and they clearly fit him better than the Gloves today. When we were fitting the boot shells on he was a size 1 Glove on the left front and a size .5 Glove on the right front, Lol. In the Epic he’ll just be a size 1.

He was kind of a punk to the trimmer but then it was her first time with him and he had to do a little bit of testing. She mentioned that he has a very smart eye and asked if he was a smart alec in general; he really isn’t, in fact the slight lip curl and leg pulling he exhibited today is about as smart alec-y as he gets, and was kind of funny considering how peaceful he is in general. El Bandito the mini was stealing Blaze’s hay out of the big feeder the whole time which no doubt aggravated him, Lol. As soon as Bandito saw Blaze coming home through the gate he was away from the feeder and down the hill in no time.

The girls’ hooves looked good, Desire’s are really coming back nicely. Almost 3/4 of the hoof is healthy new hoof growth now, the old flare and junk is growing out so quickly. Sheza’s hooves (and body!) are growing just as fast as Desire’s but are in good shape and Sheza was only a brat about half the time.

Unfortunately things did not go so well for The Bomber this morning. My husband took it in early to get some leaky O-rings replaced but it turned out the fuel pump and a couple of hoses were bad too, so there’s yet another fun big bill to pay out of the blue. *Sigh*  So very very sick of auto repairs. Of course the fact that we buy older vehicles that are pretty much at the point where parts are expected to wear out doesn’t help, but that’s the budget we have. Anyway the Bomber runs great and pulls wonderfully WITH a bad fuel pump so hopefully with the new pump in all will be well and no more repairs will be needed for a while. Key word hopefully.

Hmm, almost middle of January, must be time to take down the Christmas tree…