When it Rains it Pours

Of course, everything always has to happen at once. As soon as I signed up for a show, Jetta started being AWFUL. Like, we hadn't had that bad of rides for many years. We completely lost all semblance of a half-halt and she literally couldn't do anything.

"How does one horse?" At least she's looking good!

After blundering around for 3 days, I realized that our half-halt was the main reason we were being a complete train-wreck in every aspect, so we reinstalled that. You'd think she'd have a solid half-halt after 8 years of being under saddle, but apparently not...

We're still working on it, but at least we're not completely awful anymore. Just slightly awful. So maybe we won't be a complete embarrassment at the show this weekend? Just a little embarrassing probably.

I tried to have a stirrup-less ride before it all went downhill. Do not recommend

At least our matching is on point!

We finally got our new vienna reins (more on that in another post) so we've been doing a fair bit of lunging. Even on the lunge line she just wants to go go go, so we're working on slowing down and stretching, hoping that will translate to under saddle.

Love this place

The most stretching we're getting right now

I'm bummed that of course this happened once I sent several non-refundable checks for the show and clinic, especially since I am SO EXCITED about them, but oh well.

Horses. So frustrating, it seems like we're always taking two steps forward then three steps back!


And then of course Maisie had to make sure she got enough attention too. She got her vaccine boosted on Sunday and then Tuesday night I tried to feed her grain and she wasn't interested. She's the pickiest, least food-motivated horse I've ever interacted with, but usually she tries to eat a little grain, plus she just looked out of it. So I took her temperature and found it to be a whopping 104F. Just peachy. I talked to one of the doctors at school and came to the conclusion that it was probably a vaccine reaction and gave her some banamine. An hour later she was still uncomfortable, but her temp was dropping, so that made me feel better.

She is now back to normal termperature, but still not interested in food, so I'm not sure what's with that. We did just recently switch grain to something better suited for a growing baby (per my recent nutrition class, which was AWESOME! I may need to do a post about it), so I'm not sure if she just doesn't like the grain or if there are lingering GI effects. She got a dose of probiotics, so we'll see how it goes from here.

And to top it all off, my BF and I decided to drive 8 hours to get a puppy last weekend. I fell in love with an Akita a few years ago and found a litter up for adoption. I loved one of the girls and they agreed to put her on hold and now we have little baby Kaida. So of course, who needs sleep around here?

She slept and cuddled the whole ride home

Loves rolling in the gras

Champion at walks

Puppy + sick baby horse + awful acting adult horse + majorly awful midterm + life in general = no sleep, lots of stress.

Rose Gold Obsession

I have always been a "silver person". I don't like gold. I hate brass fittings. I had a hard time with Jetta's show halter having a brass nameplate (yuk). I want silver everything. I've always thought that rose gold was pretty, but more of in a way like "that's a shame I only like silver" because it's a fairly nice color.

I follow an eventer on instagram that has the cutest eventing buckskin and a while back she posted a picture of her horse in a rose gold browband. It looked good. Really good. And you know... I have a buckskin now.

And thus the rose gold obsession began.

For whatever reason I have now decided that rose gold will be Maisie's color. Most of the horse's I've owned have had "a color". Grady was red, Jazz was blue, Patches was dark green, Katy was purple. But Jetta's never really had a color. She gets purple and aqua and navy and gray and plum, etc. So who knows why I've decided to revive my assignment of colors to a horse but I love the look of rose gold on a buckskin.

So far the only thing I've splurged on is a rose gold and grey halter by Eskadron. This was definitely a splurge - I've never spent this much on a halter ($60). Halters are made to be worn lots, get dirty, and occasionally broken so I've never wanted to spend much on them because it doesn't make sense. Eskadron's rose gold collection is from last year, so they're slowly selling out, so I bought the last rose gold and gray full sized halter that was available to be shipped to the US.

*swoon*

Here's what else is on my rose gold wish list:

The first thing I actually put on my wish list is this stunning Equiture rose gold browband. I LOVE it. When they first debuted it I was sad that I didn't need or want a rose gold browband. But now I do! I think it will look amazing on Maisie once she wears a bridle. I will definitely be purchasing this one next time they have a good sale!

Rose gold stirrup irons. This is kind of a silly want item. I have stirrup irons. I have no need of other stirrup irons, especially ones that cost over $90. But they're beautiful.

Maisie of course needs dressage boots. And what better boots then a pair of rose gold ones from HKM?

And a matching saddle pad of course. The only problem is that these things are spendy and while I have spent $$$ on pretty saddle pads before, it's still hard to stomach $80+ on one. Eskadron is going to be the death of me because they just released a navy/aqua floral line that I love and Jetta would look amazing in. I have a problem.

Option #1

Option #2

And this gorgeous Kask helmet with rose gold. I'm obsessed. This is a problem. I don't have enough money for all of these things...

 Please send help.

The Many Reasons I Love my Farrier

• ·       She does what’s best for the horse

She’s not concerned with what’s pretty or trying to make the hoof conform to an “ideal”. She’s more than happy to change what she’s doing depending on feedback from the horse. Her goal is a comfortable horse, regardless of what that looks like for that specific horse. Jetta is one of those weird horses – she gets sore every time her bars are trimmed. So we don’t trim her bars and she’s happy and sound. She has a slight medial flare on her hind feet. But she needs that or she would have very unbalanced feet with all the weight-bearing falling laterally. She travels well and is comfortable with what AC does.

• ·       She drives an hour+ to come do my horses.

She says she’s semi-retired and just trimming part time now. “Only the people I like”.  She has a kid and lots of her own animals to take care of at home, but she makes the time to make a long drive up to see my girls. I had a moment of panic when she said her plan is to retire in three years, though I doubt I’ll be living in the same area once I get out of vet school. I’ll miss her!

• ·       She is just a plain good person, the kind that gives you faith in humanity

She doesn’t charge me for trimming baby. She says that because baby horses can change so rapidly, she trims them for free for their first year of life because she never wants someone not to call her to trim due to money. Some babies can need trims every 4 weeks to help prevent or reduce angular limb deformities.

When I got Jetta as a 2-year old she used to come out 2 or 3 times a week and just trim one hoof at a time and helped me work through her many hoof- and behavior-related issues. Jetta used to try to kick her in the head or lay down while trimming and since she considered her a rescue horse, she didn’t charge me those first couple months and she was always good with handling Jetta.

When I was looking for a farrier before AC I had a lady out and she smacked my horse Jazz (the NICEST most polite horse ever) with her rasp and I definitely didn’t have her out again. AC also rescues animals and retires horses to her little farm just to give them a good life.

Adorable little baby feet

• ·       She’s just so dang nice

There was another farrier at my barn doing shoes while she was trimming Jetta. He was REALLY rude but she just took it in stride. He stopped what he was doing to come watch her trim and kept asking her questions about “why wasn’t she doing this” or “what about that, are you just leaving that”. Then he ridiculed her for how little she charges for trimming. But AC was just her normal polite self. Jetta has always been happy barefoot and I have no complaints about how she does her feet. She grows them like she does for a reason and we’ve fixed a lot of problems barefoot – she had ridiculous quarter cracks on her hind feet, recurring abscesses, etc. I make no secret of the fact that I believe horses will have less problems and have healthier feet long term staying barefoot. I won’t ridicule people for choosing the convenience of shoes, but it’s insane the amount of ridicule I receive for having a happy barefoot horse.

AC also brought me fresh eggs “because I know you’re a college student and you need healthy food”. Have I mentioned I love this woman?

Run Away!

I went to buy Jetta her birthday carrots and for whatever reason they only had baby carrots, no big bags of full sized carrots. So I decided to treat her and bought her some organic carrots that still had the tops attached. I thought she'd love them! She's never gotten carrots like these, but I couldn't see why she wouldn't be excited about them.

 

This was the funniest thing I'd ever seen. Jetta was straight up scared of the carrots. The first carrot she ate, she had the tops hanging out of her mouth and she was spooking at them, but she wouldn't let go of them. I was dying, I almost slipped and fell in the mud I was laughing so hard.

I just thought this was too funny not to share on multiple platforms. My horse is such a dork...

12 Years

I am a bad pony mom and I missed Jetta's birthday! For some reason I thought it was on the 15th, but it's actually the 5th of April. Based on last year's post this seems to be a running theme for me. Oops, sorry Jetta!

I did this last year, sharing my 12 favorite pictures of Jetta (last year was 11). Unfortunately, I don't have a whole lot of new pictures that are really that good! I think I really need to get some new ones asap.

My two loves

This one will always be my favorite - I will repost it forever!

Our happy place

One of my favorite memories - our first recognized HT

She's just adorable

Those whiskers <3

I obviously just really love that cute little schnozz

I need to print and frame this one!

We ended up celebrating her birthday on the 6th and she got a big bag of carrots and lots of extra cookies. Here's to many more years of my monster pony!