I'm still alive...promise!

This blog is WAY over due... but like they say, better late than never!

Picking up where I left off would take me to Sunday, February 3rd...

Early Sunday morning, Jenny, Nick, and I loaded our horses into the van and headed to White Fences for a schooling show. This show was kind of a big deal to me even though it wasn't a USEF/USDF recognized competition. 

1. It was the first time at a show with Livingston.

2. It was the first time without one or both of my parents.

3. It was the first time I wouldn't have a coach or at least eyes on the ground.

4. It was my first stab at Prix St. George in public.

Thankfully, I had Nick and Jenny to keep me distracted from the "deer in headlights" feeling. Okay slight exaggeration... I honestly wasn't that nervous. I had a plan and wasn't afraid to use it! With having Nick's 6-horse van, we had room to sit and have some quality bonding time sharing stories, cracking jokes, and making fun of the odd expressions our horses made. Braiding was not necessary, but since I am still trying to master the "sewn buttons," I figured oh why not. I had plenty of time and Liv loves to get braided (Literally, he stands there and falls asleep). My first ride was a little after 11. I gave myself the perfect amount of time to warm up and then to the ring I went. I had some personal mistakes in my riding which of course brought a few movements down score-wise. I was very happy with the overall test and was ready to correct my errors, ride more accurately, and prepare & finish each movement better. One thing I am definitely still working on is my ability to get my feel and the judges score to match up better. I felt like it was a solid test, but beat myself up over the little things. Apparently it wasn't too shabby of a test because we scored a 66.184% and placed 1st! Ironically enough, I received another 66.184% from a different judge riding the Young Rider Individual test later that day. All in all, I was thrilled with the day and looking back I really had nothing to worry about. Now onto the national shows starting tomorrow at Global!

Those ears! ^^^  

I'd say we had a good day!

Monday was our day off and it was a well-earned day off for Livingston! He enjoyed spending a few hours in the field and I worked on all my horse show entries, declarations, school homework, and studied for our anatomy test. Monday night, we received our weekly schedule from Lendon. Tuesday's lesson topic: Caveletti work in the front field. Oh geez. 

There is a reason I love dressage. Besides the more in-depth and meticulous reasons, it is also because I am not the most confident jumper around. Louie, my first pony, is the only horse I am okay jumping...mainly because he is super close to the ground compared to the giants I normally ride (16.3h is the usual minimum). In reality, cavelettis are nothing more than raised PVC or wood poles. And when I say raised, I mean six inches or so off the ground... something I felt pretty capable handling. So out we went to face the cavelettis. The great thing about caveletti work is the fact that is magnifies your strengths and weaknesses you have in normal work. For me, my weakness comes in the half halt and my strength comes in straightness. These strengths and weaknesses showed over the first set of cavelettis... I lost all brakes. By the end of the lesson, I had Livingston trotting over them without tension or running.

For our Tuesday lecture, we headed over to meet Janne Rumbough of MTICA farm. She is a well-known P.R.E. (Spanish horse) breeder and rider. She kindly took us on a tour of her facility and showed us how she works with her stallion. Her belief is that a stallion needs to have the same respect as a gelding this way when she is on her own and has to take, for example, two mares, a stallion, and a gelding to a show, they can all trailer together calmly. She didn't even have to touch or be near the stallion for him to behave. All that was necessary was a quick, "echem" in a stern voice and he would instantly stop moving. WOW! 

Wednesday everyone had private lessons with Lendon. What I love about Lendon's teaching style is how she makes you think more like a trainer. Some days, we go in to the arena, do our own warm-up and then discuss what we did and what worked and didn't work. From there, we decide what we want to work on and see happens in the lesson and then we can practice our plan. The topic of choice for that lesson was the quality of the 'canter pirouette canter.' The problem I was having was bringing Livingston back enough to get a quality pirouette. That was probably the most challenging ride I have had on him because I just couldn't get my feel right. Thankfully, I finally got it and called it a day.

Every now and then, Palm Beach International Equestrian Center (the hunter-jumper show grounds) hosts a lunch and lecture. The lecture was presented by Adequan about joint support. Adequan reaches peak therapeutic levels in joints 2 hours after an intramuscular injection and is detected in cartilage and subchondral bone up to 96 hours after a single injection. I have used Adequan i.m. (Polysulfated Glycosaminoglycan) in the past and have had good results so for me it was interesting to hear about how the product is made. Who would have thought that 50mg injection takes over 70 steps and 24 months to produce!

Before afternoon chores, the WITees got an awesome surprise... Reed Kessler came to visit! Reed was the youngest member on the US Equestrian Olympic Team. She qualified for the Olympics at age 17! Reed is truly inspirational and is very down to earth. Hearing her talk about her Olympic experience made me feel like I was there. It is crazy to think that she is only a few months older than some of us here! I couldn't wait to watch her ride in the Grand Prix Jumpers Saturday night!

What a Thursday! Lessons, total barn cleaning, and fire safety! Lessons went well, but I was still having trouble with keeping Livingston supple while in a super collected canter. Instead of getting frustrated, I decided to leave it for the day and work on my precision in the lateral work. Since the first recognized show of my season is the weekend of Feb. 15th, I thought it would be good to work on the fixing and polishing the parts of the Young Rider test. That plan seemed to work out well.

We keep the barn swept up and organized; however, it was time to really CLEAN everything: trunks, ledges, stall boards, blanket racks, etc. What a task! At least everything is back to its normal color and it forced me to organize the tote in my trunk I had been throwing papers and keeping random things like a hoarder.

So what was the best part of the day? FIRE SAFETY! One of the fire fighters from Wellington came and tested just how much we knew about fires. Here are a few things you may or may not have thought about:

1. Have a mutually agreed meeting spot that everyone at the barn or house should meet at if there is a fire.

2. Test your fire alarms every 6 months.

3. If you have a farm, give your local fire department a tour and a map of your property so they are familiar with where water sources, breaker boxes, ways out are.

4. If you have a gated property, give them they key code or a key to get in. They don't want to barge through your gates, but they will if they have to.

5. The number one cause of house fires is unattended cooking.

Talk about adventures... Friday, four of us went on an hour and half long hack. Where did we go? Well... We ended up on the far end of the hunter jumper show grounds. 

I am actually surprised how well this picture came out... the horses wouldn't stand still so we just kept walking! 

Start at the 'A' and follow the mango colored trail... we just wondered around Wellington haha

A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to scribe for the 'S' candidates at Jim Brandon. Saturday a few of those candidates were back to judge the Grand Prix, Grand Prix Special, and Intermediare 1 tests. While I wasn't a scribe, I got to help score all of the tests. While scoring, I could compare how the different judges scored each movement. In the Grand Prix test, there was one instance where the horse did not perform any piaffe. Because no piaffe was shown, that means the movement was not executed so the score should be a 0 out of 10. However, since the judges were sitting at different angles, each judge saw something different. This meant that one judge scored it a 2 commenting, "change not seen" referring to the change from passage to piaffe. 

In between the morning and afternoon classes, we headed back to the barn for lessons. Livingston loves doing lateral work, especially the Prix St. George canter tour. He is so good that he has figured out how to multi task; he starts his second half pass while doing a flying change! Too bad that is not what is supposed to happen. And to his surprise, I would half pass and do the flying change, but then BAM leg yield in the opposite direction. HA! Alexa-1 Livingston-0. Lendon said that the look on Livingston's face was priceless when I didn't let him half pass again! 

Saturday night we went to Palm Beach International Equestrian Center to cheer on Reed Kessler who was competing in the Grand Prix... and it just so happened the course was open for non competitors to walk! 

This weekend is our first national show competing Young Riders. So for Sunday's lesson, I practiced bits and pieces of the test this way Livingston would not anticipate anything. We touched on the size canter I need for the canter pirouettes and it seemed to click. FINALLY! While it is not perfect, it was a lot better than what I was working with in Thursday's lesson. 

Then, before afternoon chores, we took a test on the horse's anatomy. It was like my Pony Club HB Certification Testing all over again! These were our study guides...

Every Monday we have off of lessons and lectures, but not barn work. For the first time since December 31st, I got to sleep past 5:30am! Our house decided to take turns feeding, turning out, and changing water so that not everyone would have to get up so early. This idea took effect last week and Alex (my roommate) and I took care of the six horses. This week, we got to sleep in. The sad part is that even with my alarm off, I woke up at 5:30... I then forced myself back to sleep. Once I was up, it was to the barn to finish my chores. And after two hours of tutoring, it was back to the barn for afternoon chores... and night check!

Tuesday was another crazy day. For starters, Dani Martin and Juan Manuel, Spanish Olympians and PRE riders, came to Hampton Green Farm. Both men rode in the 2012 Olympics and Dani rode Kim Boyer's horse Grandioso III. It was soooooo cool to meet them both! Many WITies took lessons with Dani and Juan and boy did they come back whipped! I did not get to watch day one of lessons because Charles deKunffy was having a lecture and lessons at JJ Tate's farm and I could not pass up the offer to attend. Charles de Kunffy is well known for his lectures and seminars. He spent years training in classical dressage in Europe at top riding schools. His lecture was all about riding in an effective manner and amplifying the horse's gates. 

Back again for round two, Dani and Juan spent the day teaching. Both men have similar methods of training, but their teaching styles differ. It was so neat to see how they worked with the different horses... P.R.E. versus the warmbloods. Everyone was thrilled with their lesson and the horses looked amazing!
I rode with Lendon later in the day and boy was it hot out! I was super cautious about not over heating so I was sure to drink lots of water and gatorade. Since the show starts on Saturday, I kept things short, sweet, and to the point. What a ride! Livingston feels very ready for the weekend! 
Our evening was spent at Global at the US P.R.E. Party. It was an evening filled with delicious food, many laughs, and demonstrations by Rachel, Kerrigan, Janne Rumbough. Robert Dover, Nicholas Fyffe, Juan Manuel, and Dani Martin gave the later presentations which were treated like mini clinics. Each rider was coached a bit from the ground showing off their P.R.E. stallions and their natural elegance. 



Everyone always says how bipolar the weather is in Pennsylvania, but bipolar weather in Wellington is a whole other ball game... The weather changes by the minute some days and today was a prime example. Thursday morning was typical, no rain, humid, and dark. By the time barn chores were over and lessons begun, the rain started.... and from there it just snow balled and the rain came in buckets.. then the sun came out, it got extremely hot and humid, and then BAM thunder and lightening complete with pouring rain again. Thankfully I left my wind breaker in my trunk at the barn... unfortunately, it isn't water proof so I was soaked by the time I was done warming up. Oh well, I was very happy with my ride and we ironed out the canter half pass pattern! 

The name of this program includes the word intensive for a reason... because it is INTENSIVE! We are so busy, I don't always realize that I miss good old Berks County. That may be a good thing because the crazy schedule keeps me focused. One thing is for sure though, after a long day at the barn, it is so nice to come home to a surprise note or package. I have been spoiled with John Deere pjs, Oreos, an embroidered quarter sheet, Oreos, my mom-mom's chicken corn noodle soup, Oreos, pretzels, popcorn, thinking of you cards, valentine's day cards & special sweets, and even a "Good Job/Happy 1 Month/Great 1st Show" Oreo Cake from Livingston's owner! These little surprises have kept me grounded feeling like a piece of home is with me and I can not thank you enough for your support! 

DELICIOUS cake from Liv's real mom! 

Happy Valentine's Day from rainy Wellington <3  

Tomorrow is our first USEF/USDF recognized show of the season and it is right next door at Global. Literally... we can hack there! But the way the weather looks, we will be taking the horse van to stay on the safe side. Today, those of us showing are going to warm up at the show grounds and work in the arenas after the last class of the day. Then, it will be time for barn chores and even better, time to go to the airport to pick up Samantha, one of my best friends from home!  

Sam's infamous sunglasses ;)