Beautiful, crazy life

Today was such an absolutely gorgeous fall day but also a hectic day in the craziest week ever.

The sun was shining and it was 65 degrees which made it feel sooo good to be outside - I'm glad the weather was nice because it made my mood 100% better so I was able to just soak up the sunlight in the middle of my crazy day!

Why so crazy? Well, first thing was that I had the weirdest morning. I have an 8 am class on Wednesdays so I need to get up at 6:40 which my phone alarm is set for. I ended up waking up four times this morning thinking that it was time for class. Oy vey. First my watch alarm went off at 5 am. I jumped out of bed ready to start the day before realizing that it was only 5 am. I have no idea how my watch alarm got set or how to make it stop. I hope this isn't going to be a regular occurance! I go back to sleep and then at 5:40 my phone alarm goes off. I turn on my bedside lamp and close my eyes thinking "just a few more minutes..." I was thinking that it was my 6:40 am alarm. Anyways, I snooze for way too long and nearly have a heart attack realizing that I had fallen asleep again and frantically look at my phone. It's 6:30 am. I still had 10 more minutes until I had to go to sleep. My phone did not have any alarm set for 5:40 am. I don't know if it was some kind of glitch or a dream or what, but that was totally the weirdest morning ever and I was completely drained of energy all day.

Starting a morning like that isn't the best indication for a good day, but at least I only had three classes today and they went well. I go back home and immediately conk out on the couch, thinking that a roommate will be home around 1:00 so I could sleep for 20 or 30 minutes and when they get home I'll leave for the barn. Yeah... an hour later I wake up and realize that I need to get my butt to the barn if I want to ride before a 4:00 meeting.

The barn was super busy today, there were four other riders in the arena with me. Jetta was really good, especially since I didn't ride her Monday or Tuesday, though she did get ridden on Monday by ML. I just haven't had the time to ride! Sad :(

I got Jetta all tacked up in her new tack. I bought myself the Antares breastplate as a kind of b-day present to self kinda thing and then I also got a pair of thinline reins for my jumping bridle. Love! Jetta looks so awesome in the breastcollar. It matches my saddle perfectly and it just goes with her dark bay color perfectly.

Purdy blue elastic...

Fancy stitching...

Gorgeous!!

 The Thinline reins are fantastic as well! So glad I got them. They're thicker than normal reins but not as wide (if that makes sense) so they fit perfect in your hand and are uber-soft. The problem I have with laced reins is that they sometimes rub and I can get blisters if I ride for a long time. This definitely won't be a problem with these reins! The only problems I have with them are that I wish I had gotten buckle ends instead of hook studs, but these were on sale and so it's not a "problem" at all. And the thinline material is a magnet for dust. I don't know if that's just because they're new or what, but the great thing is a damp cloth along the reins = voila! Brand new clean looking. So they really have no problems at all and are perfect :)

After riding for a bit we went on a nice trail ride. I rode without a coat (whoo!) and the sun was warm and the fall leaves were so pretty! Here's a little bit of what I was seeing today:



Don't worry, there's a stop sign there that you can't see ;)



Blue sky!

The rest of the week doesn't look like it's going to be any less busy, which is a pity because I'm supposed to be riding Jetta in a schooling dressage show this weekend and I don't want to embarrass ourselves! This show is the one that my dressage team is putting on and since I'm president and show manager it's giving me such a headache. Since we are a campus club, we get some money from the university and they extend their "protections" over us and we get some other little bonuses like help with event planning, extra money for trips, motor pool vehicles for traveling, free printing, etc. but in the overall scheme of things, they are a pain in the butt! (random side note - we are a "club" and not a team because you know that horse activities aren't actually sports... Yeahh) I know they're trying to help but the paperwork is horrendous. This week they just contacted me saying that we need to submit our contract with the judge and with the facilities we're using. Uhhh, contract with judge is ok, we've got that, but contract with facilities?? We've never had a contract with them for all of our shows this year and they hadn't said one word about it and now they're requiring that we get one and submit it for review. Yikes. Luckily the barn owners were super great about whipping up a contract and getting it to me so I could submit it, I'm super thankful that they were totally fine with it, now we're just waiting for it to be "approved"... I'll just be glad when this is all over. I'm really hoping this show goes smoothly. It's going to be a small show - we only have between 30 to 40 rides but that's ok with me. Please let the weather hold! It's going to be in the outside ring so if it's rainy it's going to be pretty miserable.

The show is Sunday and I also desperately need to have a spa day for Jetta. Her mane is ridiculously long so it has to be pulled and I'll probably give her a bath too. On Saturday I have to work in the evening and then I really want to head up to a giant bi-annual tack sale that is held an hour and a half away before work so I'm going to try and cram it all in.

Sigh... such a crazy life but it's wonderful anyways.