Chatt: Starter pony!

So..... Funny is a starter pony!! :) 

We got up super early (although luckily not quite as early as it could have been) and hauled to Bouckart farms. I did get a stall but a day stall, so.. I just put in the shavings that were in the trailer in there. Which, she walked into oblivion. She was not a happy camper being left in the stall. Sorry girl! But, that's what horse show horses do!

I checked in and then it was pretty quickly time to tack up. It was COLD!! I got her tacked up and we headed to the arena. I had joked with Dawn that I might need help because I wasn't sure how she would do in warm up. She told me to yell "mayday" as I went whizzing by if I wanted help. Haha! But I didn't need it. Well, I needed help, but not the mayday kind of help. Funny was pretty darn good! Their warm up arena is huge and it wasn't incredibly busy. We warmed up and Dawn gave us some pointers.. basically she said we were a bit unorganized and that if I got her a bit more organized and kept my shoulders up and not let her pull me down, it was a much more polished picture. Oh yeah... when I'm not on my forehand, she isn't either. Thanks Dawn! We had some nice work, but it is what it is. It's where we are at right now, but it was pretty good. And very good considering it was cold, she was in a new place with a bunch of other horses. 

I got on a little too early probably... and then they were a little under-staffed volunteer wise, so... we sort of headed down to the arena's too early. They let us congregate in the field in front of the arenas, which..was sort of nice but also ... trotting in the grass was okay but I would have preferred to just stay up in the arena to be able to keep riding more effectively. But it was probably better to let Funny see things. Although I'm not sure she really cared. It might have been more helpful for Lyric. Anyways... we went in finally and did our test. It was okay. It was pretty much where we are right now. She did all the things and even with fairly good geometry. But she was a bit braced, counterbent and fussy. And we got nailed for it. So we didn't score great. A 38 I think. That put us 5th of 6. Doh. Ha ha. It's okay Funs... we'll get there. 

So then I untacked her and put her blanket back on while I went to walk stadium and pee. And then it was time to tack back up again. Jeepers. And poor Funny was literally steaming! She wasn't sweaty but when I pulled her blanket off she was steamy. Poor girl was just unhappy in her stall... pacing... I could hardly tack her back up and had to tie her in the corner. Argh. She also dumped my saddle on the ground before I could get the girth. But we got tacked up and headed to stadium warm up. We started out decently and quiet but as we were trotting by the rail... she spooked hard left... and went careening across the middle of the arena, basically right at the landing side of the jumps. Thank goodness no one was jumping yet. Ha ha. She had a good reason though. Dawns' dog, wearing two dog blankets, was sitting the golf cart next to the railing. And she suddenly stood up and knocked a coat off the golfcart right as Funny and I trotted by. Hee hee. Of course she spooked and went wide for the next 6 laps or so around. But we started to jump and she forgot. She was a bit unorganized and strung out so Dawn reminded me to organize the chaos and I managed to get a better more controlled canter and then a better jump. We had some really nice jumps and were ready. 

They had used the ENTIRE arena for show jumping. And it was a simple inside/outside/inside/outside type course. Okay.... We went in and started out at the trot. She was good in the sense that she jumped them all but she was SO green! She was spooking at anything and everything and zigging and zagging. I had to ride hard to get her to the fences but once there, she jumped them just fine. We had one rail because... wiggles! It was a very obvious green baby horse effort. But we survived. And even got some accolades with smiles. Hee hee. 

Yet again, I had just enough time to untack and put her in the stall (minus the blanket this time, although it was still cold but not quite as cold) and then I booked it on the ebike down to the XC field. They didn't allow bikes on course, so I had to walk. So I walked it enough to know where I was going but didn't actually walk the whole path because I was afraid I was going to be late. And the jumps were tiny! It was wholly unimpressive. There was no decor... no sparkle...no giant glittering and waving poinsettias (like for poor Lyric). It was just natural jump after natural jump... a coop, a log, a cabin, etc. There was one combo which was a bendy line, but it was swoopy and about 6 strides apart. They also had water, but no ditches or banks. We walked down to warm up and because I was early (because of course... despite panicking and not walking the course) and I noticed she had not eaten at all, nor drank... I let her graze. She did eat some grass, so that made me feel a little better. We snacked for about 10 minutes and then I warmed her up. She jumped the first jump a bit chaotic but then once Dawn reminded (yet again) to organize her... it was good. She told me that I was being very kind to her and not hindering her, but... I should probably help her out a bit. She's still young and green and despite her cocky attitude, she needed a little help. Good point! We jumped the stadium jump and then the one XC fence that was a hair big... maybe even bordering on BN but it was the smallest one out there. I contemplated jumping the legit BN blue cabin but decided against it. No sense in creating an issue when we wouldn't need to do anything of color or that size on course. And then it was our turn! We headed out at the trot and she jumped the first one bold and brave and landed in a canter and then we just cantered on! We took our time because I could see that the girl in front of me was circling at the combo fence but luckily she got through it before we got there. Funny was great and jumped everything nicely! We almost had to pass the girl ahead of us but I kept taking wide sweeping turns and Funny actually managed a nice normal canter so we did okay. And then we got to the water and when I walked it, I didn't see that it was numbered, so I thought it wasn't on course. But my plan was to do it anyways to school it, especially since Funny has a tendency to refuse the water (oddly as she loves to swim). So we did. But she tried to side skirt it and shimmied to a trot and squirted sideways. I did manage to get her in and then she was fine. And apparently it was flagged and numbered, so I'm glad I did. They didn't count it as a refusal either so yay! That bought the girl in front of me a bit more time so after that we didn't have to worry about overtaking her. Although it was probably nice becuase it still kept me cognizant of our pace and it was probably smarter to keep Funny somewhat contained. :) She cantered the whole rest of the course happily and we had a blast! She may have deer jumped one or two fences but most of them were pretty well done. YAY! Good pony!

 

I hacked her back to the barn and then she got untacked and a little rest. She finally managed to settle enough to eat a little bit of hay. I celebrated Dawn's birthday with them briefly with some tea and cake! And then I packed up and loaded up and on our way out, we picked up our ribbon! We ended up 3rd of 6!! Even with our rail and our 38.7 dressage score. Good pony!