The Ultimate Update

I feel like all I ever do anymore is write update posts. Also, I'm pretty sure that this is the longest I've ever gone without blogging. I just simply got too overwhelmed/busy to write about anything. The horses have definitely taken a back burner unfortunately, which was pretty unavoidable, but still a bummer.

I basically went through my phone's camera roll to see what happened in the several months since I last posted, so here goes:

Jetta got new matchy bell boots that were on clearance. I love how ridiculously fluffy everything is:

 Maisie also got some new boots - some incredibly shiny rose gold dressage boots:

Jetta officially turned 13 on April 5th so I got her some fun colored carrots with the very scary tops on them, but unfortunately didn't get as good a reaction as the first time I gifted her with whole carrots:

I also bought Jetta a pretty black Mattes pad to complete our all-black outfit:

Jetta also got the present of a grazing muzzle this year...

She is not amused... also I put this on wrong, but I fixed it eventually

This pasture is amazing... just a little too much

My chunky hippo horse

Jetta got to go to school with me for our equine dental course. I also got to weigh her on the real scale and she weighed in at a perfectly round 1200 pounds. Oof. I really do enjoy doing dentals and after an intensive week of doing dentals all day, every day I feel more than prepared to do them on actual client horses!

She had a bit of a wave mouth - I definitely need to work on my photo skills!

So cute and drunk

Patch, my first ever project horse, came up for sale again.  This probably deserves its own post, but who knows if I'll ever get around to that. Basically, after training Patch and selling her, I lost contact with her owners and they ended up abandoning her at a boarding barn. She was sold to recoup board cost and I was contacted by her new owner. This lady was in love with Patch and said she'd never sell her - I even went and visited her. She was now called Scribbles. Years pass and then I randomly saw her for sale on Facebook from a new owner so I messaged him, provided all my old pictures of her, and asked to be given the contact info for whoever bought her. I have no idea what happened between the last lady that owned her and the current owners who had owned her for several years and seemed to have done a wonderful job exposing her to literally everything. Long story short, they told me someone in Utah was purchasing her and they gave the new owners my contact info. A few weeks later, I get a facebook message from a local lady who used to work in the lab at the vet school and she had purchased Scribbles (Patch) and was hoping to give her a forever home. What a rollercoaster ride. I really hope this poor horse has her forever home because she has changed hands so many times and she really is a great horse that deserves a forever home. I really wanted to buy her back as a babysitter/friend horse but I just didn't have the funds.

She's very adorable

 One of my favorite local shows happened, but I hadn't really been riding Jetta all that much so I decided not to enter. I did trailer my friend's horse over and decided it would be a great field trip for Maisie - she was pretty good! I was very proud of her hauling skills - she loaded and unloaded 4 times in the course of one day since Dundee is so big and needed to be in the first slant spot, but he had to get dropped off first.

Acting like a big girl!

Trailer manners 100% installed

Leading manners were however not fully installed. I made the mistake of putting her big girl halter on her because I thought it fit finally (it doesn't) instead of her rope halter and she apparently did not remember our discussions about personal space and proceeded to run me over. Twice. Luckily my friend had a stud chain so she was introduced to that and we had no more incidences.

She does however stand fairly well for bathing now (grudgingly)

Yes, you should bite the tree when you're mad about life

And lastly, I got to see Trask at a recognized show! He was ridden by a trainer in first level and he did so well! He's matured a lot in the last couple years and I thought his test was very nice. Still some baby bobbles outside of the show ring, but I'm so proud of him! Kinda makes me miss the little guy.

 It's been a busy few months! Especially with vet school, graduation, new job, etc. More to come (hopefully soon-ish) on that!

Update Overload

I'm not even sure where to begin, it's been a while.

First off, most importantly... I passed my boards!!! In less than 5 short months I will actually be a DVM. It's crazy that it's finally almost here - exciting, but mostly terrifying. But that's another post. It's been a really long 4 years!

Lots of things have happened the last couple months:

Jetta did this. Because she's an idiot. Apparently her neck cover came off partially and when the BO called the horses in for dinner, she started running with the other horses, then obviously her neck cover was flapping around and "chasing" her. So the logical thing to do would be to run through the fence, right?

Such a dumb dumb

Luckily she ended up with no serious injuries, just a few superficial scrapes. The next day her legs were swollen, but she's a delicate flower and was never actually lame. A couple doses of bute and she was back to normal!

We went on a frosty New Years day ride which was lovely. But very very cold.

 I've been working with Maisie on groundwork and she's occasionally looking like a real horse a times. An awkward moose calf at other times.

Maisie got to go on another field trip to the barn. She got to hang out in the cross ties, where she's mostly trustworthy. And she got her first full bath! She was MAD about it, or as mad as a little baby horse can get. Lots of pinned ears and tail swishing, but that was it.

Finally getting almost trustworthy in the crossties

My two favorite nicknames for her: my baby string bean or baby noodle

Wearing Jetta's cooler

And then I had a bad day where I euthanized several horses in a row at school, so we did this:

And I didn't die. I never thought I would ride Jetta tackless simply because she's the kind of horse that likes to go-go-go and getting her to slow down is not her favorite. She's been a tough horse to train so while she's very responsive, she also doesn't have the most eager-to-please personality so I just resigned myself to not trusting her without tack, despite the fact that I love liberty work.

Speaking of liberty work, I do a lot of that on the ground with Jetta when I'm too lazy to ride and I've been having a ton of fun with it lately - Jetta is learning how to collect her trot and canter, in addition to changing the size of her circles while free lunging. I'm hopeful it'll translate to better transitions in the saddle!

How's that for a disjointed, overwhelming update post?!

Decisions Decisions

So many decisions lately. A bunch of people have already been clipping their horses and I'm trying to decide when I should do Jetta. It's a little early for me to clip, but then again I have time this week before my schedule gets crazy... so that leaves the decision for what design do I want to do?

I miss her tail!

My favorite

I'm probably going to do something similar to the year before last (my favorite one). She didn't get done last year because of baby, but even if I don't ride her a whole lot this winter she just has too much hair. She's been getting pretty sweaty during our rides lately. She has a super dense winter coat, but there's not a whole lot of length. Still too much hair!

Baby horse hasn't been doing too many exciting things, though she did finally get some boots of her own! I had a pair of medium Veredus splint boots that are a hair too small for Jetta and I haven't been able to get anyone to buy them off me. They're the perfect size for Maisie so I decided to keep them. Then at WEG I looked at a bunch of different boots and decided I liked the Horseware Amigo Air Flow boots. I would've liked some Majyk Equipe boots but I needed to stay under $50 a pair and these were half that price. I'm trying really hard not to buy lots of things for her, especially ones that she will grow out of. I think at this point she has a handful of halters, a cob sized bridle that I used for Trask, a baby blanket, and now boots (one pair of which was a hand-me-down).

Ugly but free!

A friend that used to breed warmbloods gave me a blanket for her this spring. I measured her at around a 62-64" (I was being lazy and trying to measure a moving target). Luckily the blanket fits perfectly, unluckily it fits perfectly so she's going to grow out of it shortly. So now I need to hunt for a cheap blanket that will last the winter! I was thinking maybe a 68" or 70".

She could have cared less about the boots and took a couple funny steps before getting over it and walking a few laps around the round pen. Such a good baby!

Best baby

I made the decision not to go to the dressage show this weekend which is a bummer, especially since I am so ready to start showing at second level and this was going to be out debut. But, we need some more time to polish everything and I have other plans this weekend, so we'll have to wait until spring. The good news is that I really like the new second level tests for next year, so I'm excited to start riding them!

It's Always Something

I had some really great rides on Jetta in the past week, including a lovely fall-feeling trail ride. Of course, I've been excited to start schooling second level and hopefully squeeze in a schooling show before the end of the year, but as always, horses have better plans.

Here's our recap since I'm a bad blogger:

We had a fun day with the pup

She's becoming a great little barn dog!

Nice trail ride day

Even though we busted a boot :(

Cooling off with a walk around the field

Pretty girl

She's looking really cute over fences

 



Jetta felt a little off on Thursday and she didn't work out of it under saddle. She didn't feel terrible, just NQR. She had Friday off and when I went to get her out of the pasture on Saturday she was definitely a little off on her right front, but everything in her leg palpated normally - no heat, swellings or thickening of any tendons - so I'm thinking it's an abscess. She got a hoof soak and a really good grooming, so we'll see how it goes from here.

Of course I don't have hoof testers which would be super helpful, but with how hard the ground has been and her inability to get any sole depth this year, I would not be surprised. It's been so many years since I've had a horse with an abscess, I think 6 years?! So I guess I was overdue. It isn't the worst timing because I'm heading to WEG on Thursday!! Is anyone else going to be there the 13th-18th that would like to meet up? I haven't heard of any blogger meet-ups so I assume everyone's just doing their own thing, but on the off-chance I would love to meet up!

So for now Maisie gets to be my focus! She hasn't been doing a whole lot, mostly just being a baby and growing up. She gets groomed almost daily and messed with a little bit. She recently learned how to trot in hand which was cute. The first couple of times it was like I was flying a little baby horse kite but by the third time she figured it out. We still really need to work on clipping, bathing and ponying, but otherwise I'm really happy with where she's at right now!

This mane is ridiculous

I measured her again and she just hit 14.3 hands at 13 months, she string tests to 16.2 hands which is PERFECT. I was worried she was going to get huge, but fingers crossed it's accurate! Our current project is pulling her mane - it is SUPER thick so I've been working on it bit by bit because Maisie hates it, so we've got a quarter of it done so far. She's definitely going to get a mohawk like her mother at some point because this is ridiculous. I thought it was funny today as I was scrolling instagram and someone made the comment that Warmbloods and Thoroughbreds can have their mane pulled easily since they don't grow thick hair... Um. I wish. Maisie's mane can rival that of any hairy breed!

Gorgeous day at the barn

So that's our life in a nutshell!

My Horse is Obese and Other News

Guys. I'm officially a fourth year vet student. How did I get here already? I can't believe I'm actually getting to treat patients for real!

I know I don't post a whole lot, but for those who do continue to read my blog, I have a few questions.

First off, I'm going to be working a lot of long hours. Medicine and surgery rotations are notorious for super long hours (and I have 3 months total of those rotations). It's fairly common to have shifts longer than 12 hours, and not unheard of to have shifts that are 24+ hours. You don't get breaks to eat or sleep, so I need to figure out some sort of system with food that I can stick in my pockets that doesn't need to be heated. I don't like Cliff bars (they taste like dirt to me), so does anyone know of something that can be eaten as a meal replacement bar that tastes somewhat palatable? I feel like a lot of bloggers would know things like this. Also, I'm willing to make things too if anyone can point me in the direction of a recipe.

And secondly, I'm not sure what to do with this blog. I enjoy blogging, especially when people take the time to comment, but I just don't have a whole lot of time. What do people want to see?

• Posts about vet school? Things like advice for people wanting to go to vet school, what the daily vet student life is like, or "educational" posts about interesting things that I learn?
• Baby horse updates?
• Details of training, clinic, and show rides with Jetta?
• Product reviews? I have a lot of things I could review at the moment, just haven't gotten around to it yet?
• A mix of all of the above?

I'd really love some feedback! Please and thank you :)

In the pony world, both girls have been slightly neglected. I've had finals, orientation, and getting the house in order for me to go into clinics plus a new roommate moving in. It's been a little hectic!

Jetta and I got to go on a fun trail ride with PR after finals that was MUCH needed. Unfortunately we got over half way around the loop... and the trail was closed for logging. So we had to turn around, resulting in a 10 hour trail ride, definitely longer than intended!

I love my long-legged hippo mare <3

Jetta got a fairly good cut to her hind leg that I discovered when we went cross country schooling. I kept it wrapped for a few days with some corticosteroid cream to try and keep it from developing proud flesh. It was healing nicely so I let it go naked and it looks fine, just refuses to heal completely, which is a bummer. Jetta's not lame per se, but she's definitely a little sore. But holy smokes guys, my horse is OBESE. This is not something I ever thought I would say about my thoroughbred that takes forever to put weight on. She has gotten a little chunky in the past, but never like this. She's seriously a 7 out of 9. She's typically between a 4 and a 5 which is perfect. She's getting very little grain right now, but her weight just took off when the spring grass finally came in. She may be getting a grazing muzzle very soon...

It looks so much worse all wrapped lol

SO FAT

Other than that, I have a glove review to do here soon! I won a pair of Roeckl's from Hillary's contest which was awesome! I've never owned a pair since they are just too expensive for me, but I can't wait to ride in them a few more times.

PS. I got to do a photoshoot for PR and her horse Bailey and I LOVED it. I'm always trying to convince my horse friends to let me take fun pictures for them and they were such good models. My favorite gift to give people is pictures of their four-legged babies. This is my favorite picture because she looks like a fairytale princess <3




Thank you in advance for any and all comments!