Monday, June 25, 2012

Summer Fun

Comes a time in every eventers life where we learn to enjoy a few non horse show weekends.  I've taken on trying to adapt a few of these weekends into the summer months.  I love competing and training, but when it's this hot it's nice to give the horses a little break and get our minds refreshed as well.

The upper level horses have stayed in work but have really lightened up their competition and fitness load to just take it easy on the hard ground pounding.  They are now going to begin to gear up for the big fall competitions starting first with a fun run at the MD Loch Moy event in July.

The youngsters enjoy this time in the limelight to get some well deserved attention and this weekend we will be taking them over to the NJ horse park- this is one of my favorite venues; nice arenas with good footing and friendly staff!

The farm here at Principia Stables is really looking great.  Our jump area gets more and more exciting all the time, I'm becoming addicted to jumps (I feel I need more and more!!).  It's fun creating and designing things to help my students and the horses understand the questions that will be asked of them as they move up the levels. 

Big shout out and thank you to Steve Parisan who builds a lot of these jumps and keeps the fields ready to be galloped on AND a big thank you to John Nunn for the long term loan of much of his equipment.

See many of you in New Jersey!

Tuesday, June 12, 2012

The weekend before rain....

I hope this post finds you all enjoying cooler temperatures and less dust, just as I am.  FINALLY it rained.  This last weekend was a tough one, very busy day on Sunday at the Plantation Fields starter trials with exceptionally warm weather.  We survived and I should stop complaining! 

Saturday was wonderful, I had one student competing two horses at Plantation Fields.  A few students and myself brought some young horses over for "hang out time" at the show while we cheered Quinn Anderson on with the flying Palomino Sprite and her amazing Google.  Both mounts did well for her, especially Sprite who came in 6th with one of the only clear jumping rounds of the day wire to wire!

Sunday, well I already said it was hot, besides that it was good .. not great.  I moved a few of the green greenies up to BN and one of them just wasnt quite ready.  Poor little girl mis-calculated a jump and the two of us ended up laying in the sticky, yet very soft new footing.  We both hoped right up and although covered head to toe in sand we were and are fine.  The other rides I had did very well, Tipper is proving to be a great eventer once again scoring in the 20's and jumping very well. Rio is starting to be less ADD in the dressage and just loves to jump. SKF Bugsy is showing that he's quite solid at the novice level with his 3rd place finish.

Robyn Weaver and Jennifer Nunn also moved up to BN... they were champs, hopefully I'll get them to NJ for their next event! Last but not least Steve B. and Whiplala continue to develop their partnership and as always Steve impresses me with how fast he is coming along in this sport.

The week has already started out with a whirlwind of horse shoppers and in barn training for our newest employees.  Luckily they are all getting the hang of things quite well because I'm playing hookie and off to go camping for a few days at the beach! Bye for now, hopefully I'll have tan legs next time you see me :)

Monday, June 04, 2012

Waredaca A+

This last weekend consisted of many of my favorite things.

Lovely spring weather
Wonderful horses
Good courses
Nice footing
Pretty ribbons
Killer students

and one very special fiance :)

Saturday was grand. The Diesel Boy competed in the YEH 5 year old class, Bryce and I have thought highly of this horse for awhile and today he really shined.  Winning the dressage and conformation portions of the YEH and getting a high score in the jumping left him with a blue ribbon.  I'd like to syndicate this horse so I can try to make the US team on him when he grows up, let me know if would like to join Team Diesel!
I also had the pleasure of receiving a red ribbon on Alpine- the very pretty pinto Dutch mare I ride for her breeder/owner Susie Bardel. "Piney" was just broke one year ago, so it's exciting to be part of her growing up process, whoever purchases this mare is going to have lots of fun!

Sunday we did it all over again. I rode Puttin on the Ritz in the preliminary. He had a wonderful SJ round and got some more good miles to educate him closer to his next shot at the FEI events... and a lovely 6th place!

My students are amazing me every day.
Maddie Parisan - 2nd place Preliminary Rider
John Nunn - 6th place Preliminary Rider
Hannah Metz and Quinn Anderson strong finishes in the training classes

GO TEAM!

Next weekend we'll focus on the up and coming youngsters at Plantation Field!