Too Much

Queenie Update:

Went out to ride tonight and examined her ears. She was fine with me gently handling them, but any pressure made her panic. I shined a light in and felt everywhere and didn't find anything - no ticks, plaques, bugs or anything else. I lunged her and she was fine except for being super head shy, so we worked on that for a bit then I tacked her up and lunged her again. She was perfect so I got on. I decided to treat any head shaking as a behavioral issue and we had only one instance. I kicked her forward when she started sucking back then made her stand still without throwing her head everywhere. Finished out our ride cantering both ways with absolutely no problems. She had a little bit of "airplane" ears going on like she was uncomfortable and thinking about bucking, but whenever I felt her make that move I shortened my reins and pushed her forward.

I feel like something happened with her head/ears and now she's just anticipating it. She kept acting like I was going to whack her on the poll while riding which I've NEVER done. She was pretty head shy on the ground so I wonder if something either happened with the barn owners or maybe she got spooked in her stall and whacked her head on the overhead beam of the stall front and is just sore from it. Regardless, by the end she was much better about having me play with her ears or run a rope around them, so hopefully it's nothing. And MB is not going to be buying Queenie, though she said the reasoning is because she and her husband decided it wasn't worth it since he probably wouldn't ride much anyways. Lame excuse, you would have thought about that prior to asking me to hold her for you for TWO WHOLE MONTHS because you were sure that you were going to buy her. Whatever though, I'm over it.

Anyways, I've been getting my entries together for stuff and there is just too much paperwork! We're entering the Inavale recognized Horse Trial, a recognized dressage show and the endurance ride. I sat down today with all of Jetta's info and got to work.

I am now an AERC (American Endurance Ride Council) member and Jetta is registered with them. Jetta is also registered with the USDF (United States Dressage Federation) and USEF (United States Equestrian Federation), not to mention her being (actually) registered with the Jockey Club. Since I'm only doing beginner novice at the horse trial we don't have to be USEA (United States Eventing Association) members, so I'm going to put off that membership fee for now. I'm a member of my state's dressage society which also gets me a group membership to USEF. I also got a TIP (Thoroughbred Incentive Program) number for Jetta. Then I still need to sign up for the PNER (Pacific Northwest Endurance Ride) membership. Geez, we've got too many registration/membership numbers now!

 I'm sooo excited for everything coming up. We have our first endurance ride on the 25th and everything's coming together. I finally got my saddle bags in and my new hoof boots are on their way. I bought a neoprene girth to use instead of the fleece one.

We are doing a one day horse trial on June 2nd then maybe another endurance ride on the 15th (we'll see). Then the Inavale HT starts the 28th! I'm super happy that my dressage club ended up with too much money this year since we couldn't do IDA so they're paying for part of Inavale and for the recognized dressage show. Yay! This means that I will still have money after Inavale to do a couple more shows over the summer, which is always a good thing.