Have a little Faith

It's taken me awhile to do Faith's update since hers is probably the longest. She's still doing a lot of the same, but has achieved so much over the last few years. I'm so proud of her and can't wait to see how she progresses with everything. She is always impressing me and I am absolutely her biggest fan ever!

We will start with 4-H. Faith has now been to everything from local 4-H shows, to Regionals, to State Championships 2 years in a row. Her first year she competed in Hunter and Dressage with her Arabian Johnny Cash. He impressed us all with how adaptable he was to each new show environment we took him to. They did well in Hunters, despite still struggling with some lead confusion at the time, and ended up Reserve Champion in the State at Training Level Dressage.

This year she took her brother's Paint mare Jazzy and competed Western, as well as taking her Paint pony Chip and competing in Hunters and Dressage. She did outstanding with both of them. Jazzy proved herself cool as a cucumber everywhere and they ended up ranking 7th in the State for Western Division.

Chip helped Faith  win Champion in the State at Training Level Dressage!

Faith has also committed herself to weekly lessons with my trainer riding her wonderful American Sport Pony, Mars...show name Kiss Me. They have been competing together the last two years and are currently competing First Level.

Last year they earned the area Dressage club's Training Level Young Rider Year End Award!

 Faith turns 12 in January, and wants to begin competing at rated dressage shows next year and work towards doing the FEI Pony Test. She is also riding in a clinic with JJ Tate in December.

Along with all her own horses and ponies to ride and compete, Faith is also always ready and willing to help me with my horses and my students' horses. She rides Nitrox (really well I might add) despite him being young and green. They actually look amazing together.

She also has been riding one of my students new horsey purchase, Santa. Taking him to shows and letting him get his feet wet in the competition ring, along with schooling him at home.

One of the things we are most looking forward to, is having Faith start to ride Pilgrim. I'm more than a little nervous, but her riding has improved so much that I think they are going to end up making an awesome team. The ultimate plus...he's ready for FEI Pony if she can handle him!

On top of all of this, Faith has done outstanding in her homeschooling. She has maintained a straight A average and is completely self motivated.

Newest Member of the Family

Introducing Nitrox, the newest member of our merry band of misfits.

He has such a cute face

Originally Nitrox came to me from my trainer. She breeds American Sport Ponies and had several youngsters that needed to be started. Nitrox was one of them, the only difference was he ended up being 16.2 hands. She felt he needed to keep growing and fill out before being started and kind of put him on a back burner. Pretty soon he was sitting as a 6 year old, unstarted, gorgeous boy...who had no idea how to canter. She didn't feel like with all the others she had the time to put into him and offered a trade of services.

I was to get Nitrox started under saddle and get him going at our place in exchange for Pilgrim staying free and training at her place. It was a huge financial break for us and gave me a fun project to work on last fall.

First ride out of the arena and in the fields

He was literally one of the easiest horses I have ever started. I was backing him in a round pen after only a handful of days of ground work. After a few weeks we were walking and trotting around a full size arena with no problems.

We ended up having a pretty yucky winter, so I spent the majority of it going back to ground work since I couldn't guarantee that I could consistently ride him. We focused on improving his canter on the lunge and introducing lateral aides. By spring we were ready to get back to work and I knew there was no way I could let him go. I was in love with him. He's big, fancy, and sweet as sugar...although sometimes can be a bit spoiled and lazy. My wonderful hubby bought him for me this spring so now he is officially mine! YAY!!!

Nitrox loves to take selfies and photobomb

nana nana nana nana nana nana......BATMAN!

I took him to a small schooling show this spring just to get him out and let him see the world. He did very well in a new environment and brought home some ribbons. He looked at a few things here and there, but never really spooked. He wanted to call and talk to everyone while lunging and tacking, but once in the arena he was all business.

Summer we spent working on getting him a little straighter, starting to get him to be a little more accepting of contact. He tends to really fight being bent correctly and then starts playing with the bit with his tongue and gets his tongue over the bit. We have tightened up the cheek pieces, tightened his noseband and his flash and the little bugger still does it. I asked my trainer to come out and ride him for me and get her opinion. I was so tickled when she said I had done a wonderful job with him and she loved him. She suggested lunging in side reins for awhile with the inside one shorter to push him out to the outside rein...where he is avoiding going.

So, that's basically where we are right now. I had hopes of showing him this fall, but he goofed around in his pasture when it was slick and injured himself and what we thought would take a week or two to heal has taken close to 6 weeks. He was finally sound this week, and I've put him back in light lunging and will begin light riding next week. Once I'm comfortable he is staying sound we will go back to full work and concentrate on next year's show season.

Nitrox is big on safety...#mindyourmelon

Cowboy Dwight

Dwight has transitioned to homeschooling really well. I find him a bit harder to teach than Faith as he is more of a dilly dallier and not as much of self starter. We still have days where I hang my head wondering if he will EVER finish his work. I definitely see a huge improvement from 3rd grade to 4th grade though, and still can't believe how big my little boy is getting.

He really found his calling at the farm. Dwight is helper extraordinaire, literally managing most farm duties including fence repairs, feeding, groom duties, tack cleaning, trailer maintenance...if it needs to be done he is on it! He also has adopted our paint mare Jazzy as his own. They have an incredible bond and have had two successful years of showing together.

Cutest Cowboy Ever!

Pilgrim's Progress

As most will remember, my beautiful Quarter Horse Pilgrim is how this blog all started. Kind of a hot mess of horse with all his own emotional/fear based baggage and our journey into the uncharted territory of Dressage. Slowly we have been working it all out through lots of lessons, training, and clinics with top riders including JJ Tate and Janet Foy. He still is not easy, and he still can have those "moments" that we have now nicknamed a "Pilgrim Moment", but he is becoming a happy and willing partner who really tries. You can't ask for more than that.

Pilgrim at the Kentucky Horse Park

I'm so excited to announce Pilgrim is currently and successfully showing at Second Level with my wonderful trainer on board. He is schooling Third and Fourth Level movements and has even begun work on Piaffe. I couldn't be a prouder horsey momma.

Pilgrim showing off his medium trot in his Second Level Test

We recently returned from the National Dressage Pony Cup in Lexington, KY where Pilgrim...aka Dusters Legacy, won the Champion for Quarter Pony Breed Award. He even got his first 70% at Second Level. He is becoming so fancy! Every time we start to think he can't...he proves us wrong.

CHAMPIONS!

 I've taken some time off riding him myself and allowed my trainer to work with him and show him while I focused on improving my riding and starting one of her young horses that I have since purchased. Nitrox, my new 16.2 hand American Sport Pony! But more on him later. Faith actually has plans to ride Pilgrim over the winter under supervision of my trainer and work towards the FEI Pony Test.

It's Been Awhile

More than awhile actually. I knew I totally neglected my blog, but actually didn't realize how bad until I logged in and saw how long it had been.

*Face palm*

I have a real excuse though. I've been busy.

No, like really busy!

STOP ROLLING YOUR EYES! I've been super duper, extra crazy BUSY!

What could possibly keep me so busy?

Our lesson program and show team has grown and almost doubled. I've got consistent horses coming in and out of training. On top of that, we decided to homeschool our two children. No...I swear I'm not crazy.

So how are we doing? Other than busy...really freaking awesome! Now that we've learned and gotten comfortable with our homeschooling curriculum, we all love it. It also allows us the flexibility and time to ride and compete more. It adds a lot to my plate, but honestly I am loving it. I know what my kids are learning and how well they are learning it.

Since I've been away so long, I figured I would post separate updates on how everyone is doing. I'm so excited to share our progress, along with the ups and downs of our journey along the way. So stay tuned!

Dressage Festival of Champions

This is exciting! I'm already making my plans to attend!

USEF Announces Dates and Location for 2013 USEF Dressage Festival of Champions

RELEASE: November 28, 2012
AUTHOR/ADMINISTRATOR: USEF Communications Department

Lexington, KY- The United States Equestrian Federation (USEF) is pleased to announce that, pending approval from the High Performance Working Group and the Executive Committee, the Kentucky Dressage Association’s bid to host the 2013 Dressage Festival of Champions has been accepted.

 These annual championships will be held at the Kentucky Horse Park in Lexington, KY October 10-13, 2013.

The 2013 Dressage Festival of Champions will again hold six National Championship divisions- USEF National Grand Prix Dressage Championship, USEF National Intermediaire I Dressage Championship, USEF National “Brentina Cup” Young Adult Championship, USEF National Young Rider Dressage Championship, USEF National Junior Dressage Championship and USEF National Pony Rider Dressage Championship.

Additionally, the USEF is excited to welcome a new sponsor, AGCO, for the National Junior and Young Rider Dressage divisions. AGCO (www.AGCOcorp.com) is a leading global agricultural equipment manufacturer. The Fortune 500 Company is based in Atlanta and has over 20,000 employees in 20 countries. AGCO products are sold through five core brands; Challenger, Fendt, GSI, Massey Ferguson and Valtra.

This will be the first time the USEF Dressage Festival of Champions has been held at the Kentucky Horse Park, the site of the 2010 Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games.

For further information regarding the 2013 USEF Dressage Festival of Champions please contact Jenny Van Wieren-Page at (859) 225-6949, or via email at jvanwieren@usef.org or Hallye Griffin at (859) 225-6918, or via email at hgriffin@usef.org.

Pilgrims Show....Finally

It took me long enough, but I have finally gotten around to updating about Pilgrim's show. His first show ever out at Windrush Farms was awesome. It had great moments, good moments, bad moments, but all in all I was very happy with him and I was tickled with myself for keeping my cool no matter what was going on.

So here's the run down of how it went. We arrived pretty early, Pilgrim loaded and trailered out great. I rented him a stall for the day. I had one of the last ride times of the day and was volunteering in the morning. My hubby, my trainer, and I all got put on jump arena duty. We worked it all morning, and left in early afternoon to get ready to ride. My trainer rode first doing 2nd level tests with me calling. I was so nervous! I had never called before and it was very windy so I practically had to scream the tests. I made it through it though and she made it look easy.

Then it was time to get Pilgrim ready. He was pretty calm while we tacked up. I walked the outer edge of the warm arena several times before heading in and doing some trot work. He did well except for a few tight moments which led to pop ups, but I didn't stress or worry and just kept riding him forward. That was a proud moment for me as this used to send me over the edge. We started with Training Test 2, and got a 60%. His halt was awful, but only due to my poor prep for it. He had some really nice trot work that we got 7's on. His canter was a bit crooked but prompt at the cues and he gave me a nice stretching trot, I just let him fall in a bit on his circle. All is all I was thrilled with it for our first time out anywhere. Despite the wind and trees and scary flowers on the judges booth, he was solid and not spooky, and mostly focused.

The show was running behind, so after warming up for an hour and a half and then doing my test I was pretty much exhausted. There were only 2 riders between my first ride time and my second one, so I decided to park in the shade and watch the other 2 riders. I figured we could both use a break. This was a bad idea.

For our second test, Training Test 3, the break had caused Pilgrim to get tight and wound up. We entered working trot, halted, salute, rear. I managed to get his feet moving again and we survived the test without being disqualified....that was about it. All of our trot serpentines were done in tiny tight backed canter. I managed to get him back to trot for some parts of it, but it wasn't pretty. He missed his right lead twice before I finally got it, tried to jump out of the arena by A (which only a quick and heavy half halt saved us), and ran off in our stretching trot. I think the judge honestly felt bad for us, after the test she asked me to try our stretching trot again, which I did get this time, and talked to me about how she felt the wind was making him a bit tight through his back today but she really saw his potential in first test. I didn't want to explain that this is a constant issue for us and took it as a compliment that she felt this was an odd occurrence and thanked her.

I wanted to try to squeeze in one more show before the year is out, but all the remaining schooling shows locally conflict with show team and ARHA shows, so I'm out of luck until the spring. My trainer was really impressed with how well we both did and how far we have come. She has us schooling and working seriously towards first level. I was just excited to find they have added a training level freestyle!!!! It is totally calling our name. Goal 1: Get qualifying scores to do our 1st freestyle. Goal 2: Not embarrass ourselves doing a freestyle!

On a side note, I got my saddle checked by a saddle fitter, which was interesting and very informative and helpful. I had some flocking added, and found that it fit both Pilgrim and I pretty well and it is not holding us back. So no immediate rush to run out and get a new saddle. Her exact advice was to keep this one and save up for an upper level saddle, that and intermediate priced one would not do any better for us than what I am currently riding in. (Which wasn't cheap either, but is a used older Passier). He does need a chiropractor visit though and I will be scheduling that in the next few weeks.