Birthday Ride

My birthday was on Wednesday and since I was still off of school this week, everyone else was either working, traveling or in clinics. So I loaded up my pony by myself and headed to the trails. I finally got a new hoof boot to replace the one that broke so we were back in action!

Pretty leaves

I decided to go to Chip Ross, it's a park that's pretty close to me but for some reason I haven't been there in years. I really have no idea why, it's been almost 3 or 4 years since I've been there but the trails are really lovely and I used to ride there a bunch!

Cool fallen tree

Jetta was on her best behavior though we mostly just walked, which was good because we rounded a corner and came upon a gaggle of children sitting in a circle directly on the trail. I'm really glad we weren't going any faster or we would have crashed through them like a bowling ball. Jetta loves little kids though and obligingly lowered her head after they all came running over to pet her.

Overall, it was just what I needed! I've been really stressed this week as I prepare to go back to rotations (I will be on small animal surgery for the next two weeks) and also trying to study for the board exam which is in just over a month. Scary!

A lady at my barn offered to take a "birthday picture because you both look nice". Jetta was unenthusiastic

Also, my birthday is October 3rd, which is also a Wednesday so I had to wear my pink(ish) shirt

Birthday Girl

I can't believe that one year ago (on the 27th officially) I got to welcome my sweet bouncing baby buckskin girl into the world! I had been wanting to breed FOREVER and still somewhat regret not breeding my amazing appendix QH mare years ago (I recently saw a 4 year old with almost the same cross - same stallion that I wanted at the time with the same breed of mare - and I swooned!)

I could not be happier with my little mini Jetta filly - she is the prettiest little thing with a great brain and I can't wait to see where the future takes us! Of course I had to give my baby a ridiculous birthday party. I made her a cake by putting water in her normal grain, dicing up a couple apples into it and then squishing it into the shape of a cake. I drizzled a tiny bit of molasses on it and then stuck some more apples on it. Maisie LOVES apples but hasn't quite figured out carrots yet so it was just apple-flavored this year and she thought the cake was delicious! (she can be really picky)

It was cute but also looked like a pile of dirt

<3

Marge the sheep is a party crasher

She didn't even care about the party hat!

Sparkles the goat was polite about sharing the cake

I have the most tolerant boyfriend!

Our new roommate even participated! (Hopefully she didn't judge me too much lol)

This girl is the best

Can't believe I already have a yearling on my hands!

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.

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!

Bad Horse Mom

Oops, I missed Jetta's birthday. For some reason I thought her birthday was today, the 7th instead of the 5th. I don't have her birthday memorized, even though I still have both Grady and Jazz's birth dates memorized... (Jazz's birthday is in 10 days, she would have been 28 this year).

Always a good excuse to share baby pictures!

2 year old baby Jetta when I bought her

More recent confo pic

At least I did go to the barn and gave her a good grooming. She's been so itchy lately with all the shedding. She will adjust her body to the exact spot she wants curried. It took me a bit to figure out why she kept backing up every time I worked my way backwards. Duh. Her favorite scritchy spots are over her last ribs so of course she was wanting me to work on those spots.

But I can't believe my baby is 11 years old! I have now owned her for almost 9 years now. Crazy. In honor of 11 years, here are my 11 favorite pictures of my monster pony!

Our first recognized HT, conquering the scary trakehner

Don't know why but I love this dorky angle with her

 

The first show where I felt like I had a trained horse, showing at first level and winning both our classes

First 3' jumper course we competed in

First 25 mile LD race!

Bad pony still does well at dressage... but this is the horse that once upon a time ran through the show grounds when a ribbon was placed on her bridle