Monday 21 September 2009

We have progress......

William has been a little star lately. As I mentioned previously, I changed his bit over because of all the 'issues' we were having with life in general. He is now being schooled in a rubber pelham with double reins. Well what a change in pony, he is loving this bit and has completly changed his attitude to work. I dont even have to touch the second rein, he is light and responsive and making my life just a little bit easier.

Before I owned Will, he was on a show jumping yard and ridden in a double bridle. When I bought him, we went back to basics and we found a happy medium on the flat with a Myler Comfort Snaffle and a Myler Combination for jumping. Obviously we have progressed through the years and I now feel ready to try him again in the double. His attitude and abilty have progressed so this week I have begged, stealed and borrowed a double bridle from a friend of mine and I shall be trying this out and I will update as we go along.





Friday saw us doing our first bit of pole work, only trotting poles but this is William we are talking about, however he didnt even flick an ear and happily mooched over them without a care in the world. This is great for me as I have an event planned for mid October and was wondering how long I would need to spend in orbit before we could get on with some decent pole work and jumps. The weekend saw me doing some happy hacking and this week, apart from the bridle change, sees me doing some lunge jumping and more ground work.


I clipped him yesterday so I had all of about 12 hours of a gorgeously clean grey. This morning, I was greated with a lovely poo stain all down his neck and rubbed nicely in his mane. Oh the joys.................

New range of Tottie clothing now in!

And I love it. We have Polo Shirts , Hoodies , Gilets and various other items of clothing in now. I am into Grey and Pink at the moment. These are my 'in' colours for the season so I am loving the Charcoal colour that is out in Tottie at the moment. I think it is exceptionally smart with your Jodhpurs (and having a grey, the hair blends in nicely) and also teamed up with jeans, they look great around the town as well.



As you can imagine my pay packet doesn't last long working here, by the time I have bought all my rugs that I dont need, and then bought all the new clothing it doesn't leave a lot for the important things like bills. Thank god for husbands! But as we say, you can never have enough Jods and fleeces..........or is that just me?................



Tuesday 8 September 2009

I'm exhausted...........

Wow, what a busy bee I have been. I have been working my flying grey that goes by the name of William quite hard to get some extra buzz out of him. I am having a breakthrough! After my last post, his erractic behaviour continued and my patience was slowly wearing thin, but with a bit of hard work (and a bit change, which was desperately needed by the end) we have started to come through to the other side. Saturday saw some of the nicest canter work I have had out of him in a long time, so light and controlled, it was gorgeous and sunday morning I took him for an early morning hack which was nice and the sun was out and not to many people about and again he was a very good boy........ so I love him again now.

Saturday saw all of the family take a road trip to Burghley Horse Trials. My son Oliver, who is 4, enjoyed it the most, cheering on the riders and racing up and down the hills, I dont know where he gets the energy from, but this is the first time he has really showed an interest in the horses. Bikes and cars take preference to the horses with the males in my household so I took great enjoyment at the look of horror on the husbands face as his son proudly said how much fun the horses were....priceless.
Shoved down in the footwell of the car was Ashka, who just adores these days out, and we met so many other Weinaramers who all had a little play together and got on superb. I never thought they were so common but there really were a good few there at the weekend. If you ever want to look at different breeds of dogs, go to a horse trial as they are everywhere, in every breed, in every colour, and I have to say, hand on heart, I did not meet one that was not on a lead or not in control, although to the man who let his dog poop in front of us and then promptly walk away leaving it there for people to tred in....you have pockets, stick a bag in them and pick it up!!!
As I have read a lot of articles about people wanting dogs banned from horse trials recently, For me personally, my horse and my dog go together, I keep her on the lead when I need to and I have her under control. If you cant control your dog, do not take it to these events, if you dont have recall, do not let it off the lead and I am all up for these events to give a fine for people that do not have control over there animals but don't let everyone lose out on the enjoyment of a great day that can be shared with their dogs in the countryside with great exercise. Rant over......