Magic Mare - and 10lbs of scheduling in a 5 lb sack..

Prairie has been spectaculamazing.  The entire week she has been a soft, light, forward ball of loveliness.  Our magical ride on Tuesday was followed by a fabulous trainer ride on Wed (counter canter down long side, flying change to true canter for short side, change back to counter for long side.. repeat) another fabulous lesson for me (course work, soft, steady and joy inducing) and a couple of hacks (all productive.

Saturday S asked if I wanted to head out to one of the AA shows nearby and watch the Derby in the evening and obviously I said yes.  Of course I said yes without asking The Boy (or my totally non-horsey friend who was visiting) if they wanted to go but no matter.  We all pig piled into the truck and headed out to be spectators. 

Honestly I expected to be blown away by the level of competition, but I.... wasn't.

There were a few gorgeous horses and some lovely rounds to be sure, but I was shocked at how many refusals there were (especially at the hay bales... Hunter babies have gots to be getting out on XC more often..) late changes, crappy rides, etc.

Mostly it was reassuring that while I don't entirely want to cough up the funds for an A show at the moment, Prair and I wouldn't embarrass ourselves too much running around.  Also fun, a (big gorgeous KWPN) gelding that Prair beat out for her Pre-Green Champion was the Reserve Pre-Green at this show... which means that in theory Prair could have held her own as well.

All in all very encouraging.  The entire time The Boy was like "can't Prair do this? Why didn't we bring Prair? she looks way better than some of these horses... when can we take Prair to a big show??"

(he also made the observation that Gus looks less lame than some of the horses being shown but that's another issue..)

Of course all the fun show action led to a night of S filling out entries for our next couple outings including.... DERBIES. 

A 2'6-3' one for me and a 3'-3'6" one for S to ride in.  WOO. so fun.

Schedule-wise things are a bit bonkers this week.  The second week of the AA show is starting and our plan was to haul Prairie up for schooling day tomorrow to play in some big rings, be in the atmosphere and take a lesson from our favorite fancy trainer. 

This was a great plan except that schooling day is actually today and the jumps are set to "our" height around 1pm.  Which conflicts directly with both my weekly exec meetings, the dog's 2pm hydrotherapy (don't get me started) session, and Gus' poorly scheduled 2pm pedicure.

Argh.

I had a mild panic before I shuffled meetings, arranged to haul Prairie today, rescheduled hydrotherapy and Gus all to get done and accomplished before we head to Cali on Wednesday.

Busy, busy week but it's all good, fun, information stuff.  Really excited to see how the big mare handles today!

Also... I'm a little skerred that all our success last week was due to a change in saddles.  I've been borrowing S's Mom's saddle and while it fits Prair the same as mine, it puts me in a much better position which I think is totally facilitating our rides...

It might just be the equivalent of Dumbo's Magic feather.. but even he needed it to fly for a while so we'll see.  Lord knows I need another saddle like a hole in my head..