What A Wonderful Day for a Hack

Finally, a day off of work! I actually really love it that I don't have to work Sunday's much. Gives me a day during the weekend to spend with the hubby. And seeing as I haven't been out to the barn lately, I decided to go see my boys and ride.

Left the house around 11:30 and quickly got out to my parents place. Didn't see anyone around, so I went to the back to grab Dollar from the holding pen. And man, was he MUDDY!!!!! I almost thought I had a black horse instead of a chestnut. Sheesh Dollar. Just because there is mud around, doesn't mean that you have to roll in it ALL THE TIME!!

So I got him out, tied him up to the fence and got to scrubbing all that mud off. Luckily, it wasn't caked on too bad. Once he was all cleaned up, I threw my English saddle on him, got him out of the arena and off we went!

Decided for today that we were going to do a 4-mile hack with basically just walking and trotting to build him back up and build up his feet. So out on the road we went. Started out casually at a walk and then progressed to a trot to let him stretch out. He seemed to be moving out OK and had energy, even though he's FAT! Oh Dollar. Actually it doens't bug me that much because he'll be staying outside during winter (and it gets frigid up here in Winterpeg, Manisnowba), but on the other hand, it doesn't help his heaves. What to do, what to do. I guess we'll stick with doing hacks right now, just to keep him moving until spring comes and then we can get to working really good. I don't have an indoor arena, so that means we'll be doing a lot of work in the snow. See what happens.

Anyways...back to the hack. Once he got trotting, Dollar had figured out that we were going in the direction of another place that's just down the road from us and used to go there all the time when he was younger. Well, we weren't going there today. He was moving pretty fast and tried to get me to go there, but once we past the driveway, he knew that we weren't going, although he was still trying. Once we got past there, he slowed down and was a bit hard to get back into the trot again. Old Man, why do you have to do this to me??

We continued alternating between walking and trotting for the next mile and half. And we did get some walk work on pavement done! There's a stretch of paved road about 1 mile from my parents place, so when we got to said stretch, I let him walk it (which was about 1/2 mile), turned the corner and back into a trot.

Now, about this 3rd mile. He actually did really good. He managed to stay trotting almost all of the first half and then when we got to the 2nd half, I decided to ask him for a canter. This part of the 3rd mile is really packed down and hardly any cars go on it at all. It's actually situated between 2 fields of cows, so it's basically a farm road that's really packed. So Dollar picked up his canter right away and then decided that he wanted to stretch his legs. And of course, I agreed. He started gathering speed faster and faster until I realized that he was doing a medium-fast gallop. And he did that for almost the entire half mile! Once we started getting closer to the intersection, I just lightly pulled and asked him to slow down. Which he obliged like the gentleman that he is. He was huffing and puffing and wheezing a bit, but he felt so good!!

We walked/trotted the next mile home (he knows that he's not allowed to run home at all) and once we got home, I untacked him, checked him over and put him back into the holding pen. Lovely ride!!

October 2010 Goals Assessed and November 2010 Goals

Wow, fall is going by really fast. And I'm not liking it. This means that the inevitable winter is coming and will freeze my @$$ off if I go outside. Brr....  Nothing much has happened this month. Work has decided to give me more hours (which helps the bills a lot), but it's a lot of evenings, which start at either 2 or 3 and go until 10 or 11. So it really cuts into my riding time. Which really sucks. But I do manage to get out there when I can and take either one of my boys for a ride.

October 2010 Goals:
1) Start Dollar on more lunge line work - PASS
Been working on this as you can tell from this post (put link here). Just trying to get down there more often to do more work with him.
2) Start Reno on lunge line work (please pray that he doesn't kill me) - PASS
And I lived to tell the tale!!! Actually he was pretty good and you can read about it here.
3) Do 3 things on my 101 list
Umm....only got 1 thing done. Shucks. I did manage to do #56 on the list, which was to find/make a list of all the stuff needed for a show and put in grooming kit. I found a list of Dressage Winnipeg's website and absolutely loved it. So I printed one out and put it in my grooming box so that I have it for future use. Yeah!! Now I can quit forgetting things!!
4) Try to find more Dex for Dollar's Heaves - PASS
Boo Yeah!! Found!! And duh....at the Vet's. Pretty cheap too. Just have to go pick it up now.
5) Do conformation photos of both Dollar and Reno - PASS
Yup - did for both. And they both turned out really well too. Except for the evil grass that was distracting them. Oh well. Dollar's photos are found here and Reno's are found here.

November 2010 Goals:
1) Go for a minimum 2-mile hack at least once a week with Dollar and Reno
2) Winterize tails again and do PROPERLY!
3) Start working on more dressage-y stuff
4) Do 3 things on my 101 list

Lunging Lessons...Again...

Had the day off today, and seeing as I had the car, I decided to head over to see my kids. And a little sad. I talked to Dad a little while ago and he said that he was talking to a lady about trading Reno for a Reining mare that she has. But he hasn't gotten anything back from her yet. So I guess my time with him is limited :(. I'm not sure how I feel about that because I know he has a lot of potential, but for all I know, she could do the trade with Dad, end up hating Reno and ship him off to auction. I've grown kinda fond of him, but don't have the money to own both. I'm just hoping that everything works out OK.

Got down to my parents place and went out into pasture to grab them. Started calling them as soon as I started heding out there and of course, Dollar lead the pack right to the fence. Love him ;-). Grabbed both him and Reno and managed (again) to get them out of the fence without Mars getting out. That's a challenge every single time. Brought them up to the barn and started getting Dollar ready to do some lunging.

And I decided to try something new today. I've been wanting to get a surgincale, but don't have the money to get one. So I improvised. I grabbed 2 lead ropes, tied one to either side of his halter and ran them between his legs and up over his back and then adjusted them, not tight, but not overly snug. I  wanted him to know that he has to work and not just play around. And seeing as I was trying this out, Dollar was my guinea pig. Lol.

Once I got everything adjusted, we went out into the coral and proceeded to do some working. Or at least I tried to get him to work. He decided to be snarky today. He behaved very well at the walk and trot both ways on the lunge, but once I asked him to canter, he was REALLY snarky. He started pinning his ears, swishing his tail a lot and doing small bunny hops. Of course, I had to laugh at him and then he settled down.

Once we went both ways working at all 3 gaits (walk, trot and canter), I called it a day with him and called into me. I brought him into the barn and put him in his stall with some supplements for him to chew on and then I got Reno-boy. This would be interesting for sure. I adjusted the ropes loosely and headed outside.

Reno wasn't sure what to make of it at first, so we started with going to the left. Then I noticed that the ropes were way to long because he could still put is head up nice and high. So I re-adjusted them and went on our way. And it worked way better! He was listening fairly well and not pulling too much, so I was pretty happy with him. I didn't ask him to do any loping because he's still fairly new to the lunging and I didn't want him freaking out as he likes to do and then we have hell on our hands. So we stayed with walking and trotting, although he just wanted to stay trotting and show me that he could really extend. Man, I wish that Dad would let me show him in Dressage. Sigh.

After we went left for a while, I turned him around and tried going to the right. As if. Nope, he balked and just eyed me as if I was crazy amd asking him to do something stupid. Sigh. Why do you have to test my patience Reno?? So I grabbed him from the right and just started walking around in a circle to make sure that he understood that he was supposed to go to the right. I let the rope out after a little bit and pushed him out into the circle. Nope, still didn't work. Then he started throwing little shit fits and I raelized that he didn't really like the ropes that I had on him. So I went up to him and loosened them up a little. That seemed to do the trick and then he was no problem at all. He went willingly to the right, so I 'm guessing that he just didn't like the ropes too much because the right side is his weak side.

Once I had put him through walking and trotting to the right, I called it a day with him and went to grab Dollar out of the barn so that I could kick them both out. At least Reno seems to be getting calmer. That's always a good thing.

1st Reply!!

Woo!! Got a reply already!!

Jen I can answer a few of your questions on the finals

Yes we did pull the reining saddles back after meeting with all the reiners.

The barrel saddles where set up as a jackpot where the monies split by the two winners to go towards a saddle
The entry fees where the same as last year which was 138 this in included everything under one price entry stall and added lunch and t shirt.

And your very wrong Swynar's did not put up anything more to the finals as promised.

It was the final committee did not get the sponsor money they needed to make up all the prizes. The committee dug into their own pockets to help make up some of the short comes.

Swynar did not get anything more then the rest of the people that paid monies toward the finals

An E-Mail Rant

Well, time to rant once again. Below is my e-mail that I sent to a club that I'm part of called CWHA and have a quite the time with. Notice the sarcasm? Anyways, here's the e-mail.

Hello,

I'm e-mailing your with a few questions in regards to the CWHA AGM on November 6.

My first question is: why all the changes to the AGM? In all my years in the club, we've never had to pre-nominate someone to the board and have it passed by an electing committee. I could see this being helpful in a bigger club, but for our size, it doesn't really make any sense. As well, in the past years, all the terms were a 2-year term, unless someone opted out.

Define a current curriculum vitae because some of us do not speak fancy english and have no clue what you want.

Why are we having a parliamentarian at our meeting? Can we not run the meeting ourselves without getting other people invloved?

Also (this is more a personal matter), I would like some questions answered for myself. I was very disappointed with the club after I paid my overdue fees that I did not receive an thank you email stating that you had received my monies and that my membership was reinstated. I'm interested in running for the board for website/newsletter, but I have no clue if I would be allowed to. The reason I'm bringing this up is because my friend (who we'll just call K) wanted to run for the 2010 board, but was pulled aside at the AGM and was told that she couldn't because she was in bad standing. All because her cheques got cashed at the end of the season and had an NSF cheque (which was from the beginning of the show season) that she took care of right aways. And know I'm not sure if the same thing will happen to me.

And also a question about the Finals: I've been hearing that saddles were pulled from Reining and Barrels, but there has been nothing said on the website or via e-mail about that. Many people are wondering why they were pulled with no answers. And why the ridiculous high fee of $140 A CLASS for the Finals. Unheard of. I've also heard that Swynar Tack Shop stepped up to the plate with saddles, but I haven't heard any thank-you's towards them.

I would really appreciate some answers as soon as possible, so that I can know if I'm going to be coming to the AGM.

Thank you

Jen Neufeld

I'll keep you updated with what happens.

Hacking and Winterizing

Another lazy day today. I did have plans to go ride both my horses, but as always, plans never really work out. I was getting ready to leave my house when my Dad called, asking me to do some stuff for him on the interwebz. Turns out that his "stuff" took me close to an hour to do. Not happy.

After all the stuff was done, I quickly high-tailed it out to my parens place to quickly ride the Old Man. Got there in no time and went out into pasture to find him. Luckily as I was walking out there and calling his name, he started coming towards me, therefore no need to hunt for him (sorry to make you jealous Kelly!).

I quickly got him tacked up and headed out for a 2-mile hack, seeing as I didn't have time to do a 4-mile. Grr... He did pretty good throughout the 2 miles, but I could tell that his steroid shots had worn off. He was weezing at the trot, but it also doesn't help that he has a nice big grass belly on him. I really do need to come out more often and ride him. Stupid work. I did get him loping about 1/4 mile, and as usual, he was lazy.

Out on our hack

Once we got back home, I untacked him and got to work winterizing his tail. I'm trying to make it grow longer, but with him living in the bush, it's not working. That and I'm not down there everyday to comb it out. although I do everytime I ride. My friend Kelly had given me a good idea on how to winterize his tail.

Basically it was to put leave-in conditioner in there, comb it out to get rid of all the dreadlocks, braid it like normal and then wrap it up in vet wrap. Sounded simple enough. So I did. And yes, that is purple vet wrap. I made sure that it wasn't tight around the tail bone and I'm hoping that it will stay on.

The newly winterized tail. Lol. Love the purple.

After I was done with his tail, I decided to take some photos of how his feet are looking. It's been about a month and a half since his trim and they're looking really good. See for yourself!! The only crappy thing is that it's been really wet out here adn he's out in pasture, so it's not the most ideal conditions for his feet, but it's all I have.

Left front

Left back

Right bck

Right front

Sigh....gotta love my old man. Lol.

Reno's Fall 2010 Conformation Pics and Lunging Lessons

Yup, finally got around to doing Reno's conformation photos today. Finally!! Got to my parents place around 3 and headed out into the pasture to grab my boys. I was calling for them and of course Dollar just came walking up to me, leading Reno!! Lol. Grabbed both of them and brought them up to the barn and got Reno cleaned up for his conformation photos.

Once he was all cleaned up, I got my sister and brought Reno out onto the lawn (praying that my Mom wouldn't kill us). And he was awesome!! Except the evil grass taht was distracting him. Sigh. Have a good look :-)

After we were done with the photos, I let him loose in the arena to get some action shots, he didn't really feel like moving around because Dollar was still tied up to the fence and that's where he wanted to go and stay. But I did get one good shot...

After I caught him, I put him on the lunge rope because I currently don't have a lunge line right now seeing as it got destroyed. And went to see how he would do. To the left he was actually pretty good. He's pretty used to voice commands so I was using that while lunging him, and also had to whip for a little bit of encouragement. He was good that he didn't try to pull too much while going to the left and even got him loping a little bit.

Then we went to the evil side: the right. He didn't like this at first, so I just walked him around to the right for a bit until he knew what I wanted and then slowly let out the rope. He was pulling quite a bit, but I think he might have been a bit confused or something. He did work pretty good with the voice commands and once he was moving nciely, we called it a day.

Reno lunging

Oh, and video!!

Yup, he's coming along nicely.

October 2010 Goals

Sigh. Fall is here with a vengeance. It's getting chilly outside and all the leave are changing color and littering my lawn. Maybe if I wish hard enough, we'll skip winter and go straight into spring. Yeah right. This is what I get for living in Canada.

Anyways, I've decided to start setting some goals for me and Dollar (oh, and Reno as well) just to keep things on track and mark what progress we're making. Probably won't be big goals starting out seeing as we're entering the start of winter and with that means SNOW :-(. The only good thing about snow is that it makes for a good workout in the fields.

Without further ado...here are my goals for October:

October 2010 Goals
1) Start Dollar on more lunge line work
2) Start Reno on lunge line work (please pray that he doesn't kill me)
3) Do 3 things on my 101 list
4) Try to find more Dex for Dollar's Heaves
5) Do conformation photos of both Dollar and Reno

As you can tell, I'm going to be starting more lunge line work with both kids. Dollar's really good at it, but it never hurts to go back to the basics and get him really working on there. Reno on the other hand, only lunges to the left. Last time I tried to lunge him to the right, he almost tried killing me. OK, maybe that's exaggeration, but not by much. So I want to start him all over again on the lunge line and get the basics down pat. I have a feeling that I may have to use the Old Man to help me with this one. Sigh, please don't kill me!!!

Dollar's Fall 2010 Conformation Pics

So, we decided to do some conformation shots today of Dollar and 2 other horses that my family own. I don't have any of Reno yet as we ran out of time. Have a good look!!

Heading for photos

Not interested in photos....grass better. Lol.

FAIL

Leg fail

Looks ok....

Person fail

Head shot

Soo cute!!

Yup, he's a handsome one!!

Just had to do this for fun

So yeah, not looking too bad, although you can tell that he's put weight on. That will come in handy for the upcoming cold winter months, seeing as I'm cruel and kick him outside all winter. Ah, he's fine.