Improvements

This weekend was Jetta's first recognized horse trials! While things have been super crazy in the past week with trying to move houses (I hate, hate, hate moving) I felt like we were able to prepare adequately well. I rode her Monday-Thursday and had some better dressage schools. We're still not back to where I want her to be in terms of lightness, but she's better than at the last couple of shows. We had a good jump school too in there, though we didn't make it to a cross country course to practice like I had been hoping.

Unfortunately the weather has not been wanting to cooperate. It has been about 70 and pouring down rain for the better part of the week. Then, come Thursday it was instantly hot, in the upper 80's and planning on just getting hotter. Lovely.

Thursday I moved Jetta and everything else out to the show grounds. After bickering with Jetta for a good 5 minutes, I finally got her in the temporary stall. She was not impressed with them, but at least there was some knee high grass to munch on.

My brother came up to help me move so after getting Jetta all settled I spend the rest of the day moving furniture. In the evening I went back to check on Jetta and took her for a walk around the grounds. She could care less about all the other horses and dressage rings, she just wanted the grass :) I walked the xc course and it seemed to me to be pretty easy to remember (keep in mind that I almost always get lost).

Friday morning I was up bright and too early to go get ready. Our dressage was at 8:20. I got to the show a little later than I had been planning due to forgetting things and having to run back to the house. My mom came out to help me luckily. I got Jetta all tacked up, her braids looked awful after being in overnight, but oh well.

I got on a little after 8 so we had the shortest warm up in history and just went for it. Our test was not what I had been hoping for. Nothing too bad but I was just wanting Jetta to be rounder and softer in some areas. Our free walk was not as stellar as it could have been in my opinion, but we still scored an 8 on it. And I couldn't believe how crooked Jetta decided to halt at the end, though the judge only commented that it was "unbalanced". Overall, not ecstatic about the test. Somehow we still tied for third with a 33. There was a tie for first place as well. I guess that still counts as achieving my goal of placing in the top three for dressage?

Oh dear, what on earth is my leg doing??

Up the centerline

I had a while to chill before xc. It was getting super hot, into the 90s. I got on Jetta probably a little earlier than necessary to warm up but I wanted to be able to watch people go before me to make sure I was going the right way through things. Between fence 4 and 5 there's a tree line that you have to cross with two different gaps and I didn't know which one you were supposed to go through, but it seemed 50/50 which one people were going through. Jetta started out quite indignant in warm up "I MUST GALLOP!" and I was getting nervous that I might get run away with... Luckily she settled down a bit and when it was our turn, we trotted over the first jump. Here's your blow-by-blow :)

Fence One: Roll Top

This fence looked pretty big on the course walk to me so I was a little leary of it, but Jetta jumped it just fine!

Launch!

Fence Two: Hazelnut Table

This fence for some reason is a troublesome fence. It's not that scary looking at all, but a few riders had stops at it and I knew Jetta would look hard at it because even though she's jumped it before we've had a refusal at it in the past. And of course she did refuse it. I gave her a big spur and smack with the crop and we hopped over it the second time. 

The dreaded fence - look how tiny it is!

Fence Three: Red Barn

This fence was no problem, Jetta really likes it and I don't think we've ever had a refusal at it.



Fence Four: Quarter Round

Jetta was a little wiggly to this fence but other than that no problems.



Fence Five: Jump Down

This I was a little worried about. Jetta loves jumping off banks, but for some reason at the little one-day trial she refused this so I made sure to have my leg on to get her over it and she went!

The back side of the step down

Fence Six: Log on Hill

This fence I was a little worried about too. It was a tiny log set on a small mound. Or so I thought. The backside of the hill was a lot steeper than I thought it would be so I wasn't sure what Jetta would think when she got to it since we've never schooled it before. She could have cared less, in fact she ignored my request to trot it and cantered right over it!

Fence Seven: Log

I wasn't worried about this fence, the only thing I knew I had to do was keep Jetta to the left where the trees were so she couldn't run out to the right. Turns out Jetta thought it was quite scary and stopped. Bummer. Took it again the second time and galloped through the forest. The gallop stretches are seriously the best part!



Fence Eight: Log

Another log in the forest. This time I kept my leg on really tight, gave her a cluck and a tap with my crop and we cantered right over it and onto the next gallop stretch. Love galloping!



Fence Nine: Ditch

I wasn't too worried about this jump, Jetta seems to find ditches inviting and we even cantered it!

Little baby ditch

Fence Ten: Log

This fence was about three strides after the ditch so I kept Jetta straight and over we went.



Fence Eleven: Log Combination

Jetta gave this fence a hard look and really wanted to wiggle away from both of the fences but I was able to keep her from running out to the left.

Fence Twelve: Flower Hut

We've schooled this jump but even so she refused it at the one-day trial. I kept my leg on and she jumped it.



Fence Thirteen: Water

While in schooling Jetta has no problem cantering/jumping into the water, at the one-day she refused the water too so I was worried she wouldn't go in. I needn't have worried though. I lined her up with it so she could see the water from a couple strides away and wrestled her down to a trot. She kind of started at it once she noticed it but then power trotted through it and cantered away. So proud!

Showing off her power trot - this is what she does when we do endurance rides...

Cantering! This may be my favorite shot once I erase the people in the background.

Fence Fourteen: Coop

Over the coop she was a little sucked back but I kept my leg on.



Fence Fifteen: Ditch with Log

I hate this trakehner. I was none too pleased to see it on course again, but I was hoping that since she jumped it last time we wouldn't have a problem. I lined her up properly and brought her down to a trot and she jumped it perfectly.

Hey, we almost look like we know how to jump!

Fence Sixteen: Brush Fence

I was a little worried about this fence. It looked a little big and since we don't have any brush fences to work with at home Jetta often refuses them. I brought her back to a tiny little canter, really kept my leg on and tried to get her straight (she tried to run right) and over we went to the finish line!



It was a whopping 93 degrees during our run, but even so we both managed not to keel over from the heat. Got her back to the stall, hosed her down, wrapped her legs and stuffed my awesome pony with treats. Recap of day two is yet to come...

Post-xc high. I was SO happy

Overall I was so, so proud of my girl. Yes, we had two refusals, but that is a huge improvement over the last show where we had four. Best of all, it meant we weren't eliminated! Cue huge grin :] And I didn't get lost either! I seriously almost always get lost but we didn't have a single problem with where to go, thanks to walking it twice this year instead of once (or not at all). We got 11 time penalties plus the 40 for refusals, dropping us from third to ninth. But the fact that we hadn't been eliminated meant so much to me - Jetta is still at the point in her training where she requires you to ride her perfectly. If you don't set her up just right for something, you only have a 25% chance that she'll do it anyways, which is a lot different for me coming off Jazz who would do something 75% of the time even if you set her up awfully for it.

I was getting so discouraged before this event - here I have a talented horse and I was thinking "We're never going to move beyond Beginner Novice!" I was wishing I had an easy little draft cross to push around cross country just because they're so easy, just point and shoot (in my experience, even though conditioning them sucks). This show was a huge boost to our confidence.

So Much

I have so much to write about! I'm officially moved into my new place and today was the first day of the horse trials, completing 2/3 phases! I had a blast, it was so fun and I can't wait to write all about it. There will be some (verrrry long) posts coming up now that I have internet again :)

And Then There Were Two

Sorry for not posting that often! I'm in the middle of moving (which sucks) and preparing for Inavale so there hasn't been a whole lot of time, or energy, to sit down and write.

The title refers to the fact that Queenie finally sold. I hadn't mentioned it because I didn't want to jinx it, but she went on trial over a week ago and last Thursday, it was final! Her new owner, GK, came down and rode her a couple weeks ago. Queenie was ok with her, but got a little rushy. GK was a little nervous around her because she was so big, though she is an experienced horseperson. GK wanted to take her on trial so she could take her on the trails around her house since that's what she wanted her for. I think a major selling point is that she had her 11 year old daughter handle Queenie and it was adorable. Queenie put her head down and let the little girl lead her around. So cute!

I dropped Queenie off at her new digs and GK had already bought her a nice new "Queenie-sized" leather halter, even though nothing was final yet. But after spending a week with her, how could you not fall in love??

I stressed about it all week, I even had a nightmare, but when Thursday rolled around (the deadline for deciding whether or not to return Queenie) and I got the sweetest text: " We absolutely LOVE Queenie! She has become a member of our family and is loved by all of us. I've only ridden her twice but I already know we're a fit. We will own and cherish her forever as one of our own. Feel free to cash the check and rest assured that she is cherished. We beyond love her! She will live a pampered life. She has had 1000 kisses and 100 carrots in a week and many more to come for the next 20 years. Thank you"

Aww, I'm so happy! Nothing better than finding her the perfect home :)

Liebster Blog Award

I LOVE blog awards :) I was nominated four times, by Monica at Panic and the Pony, Niamh at Life of Riley, Ruffles at Just a Girl and her horse, and Carrot Top at Little Bay Horse. Thank you!!! For some reason this post took me forever to get together, so here it finally is. I decided that I'm going to answer all 4 sets of 11 questions, but I will do two sets in another post so this doesn't get too overwhelming :)

How to accept the award: The Liebster Blog Award is a way to recognize blogs who have less than 200 followers.  Liebster is a German word that means beloved and valued.  Here are the rules for accepting the award:

1. Thank the person who nominated you and include a link back to their blog.
2. List 11 random facts about yourself.
3. Answer the 11 questions given to you.
4. Create 11 questions for the bloggers you nominate.
5. Choose 11 bloggers with 200 or fewer followers to nominate and include links to their blogs.
6. Go to each blogger's page and let them know you have nominated them. 

11 Facts about me:

1. I hate giving facts about me; I feel like I'm not that interesting of a person. 
2. I love traveling, it's my goal to visit every continent someday. So far I've been to Costa Rica, India, France, Spain, England and Bhutan. The next places on my list are Italy and Ireland, hopefully with a stop in France again. 
3. If I could pick any job in the world and not worry about money, then I'd probably be a horse trainer. Or rather, anything that would allow me to spend all my time with horses - training, rescue, rehab, breeding, competing, etc. 
4. My dream is to one day be able to build my dream barn/house. It's literally just that: a barn with living space on top! I pretty much have the entire thing planned out, down to a floor plan and decorating scheme, lol. 
5. I love to read and I will pretty much read anything, though fantasy is my favorite genre. Plus, I read really fast so usually during the summer I go through about a book a day.
6. I love bling! Sadly it's not as accepted in dressage, which is my main discipline, but I still have a sparkly browband and my ear net that I can use in eventing dressage has crystals. I would love to be mainly in western disciplines where you can bedazzle everything, but I like my english disciplines just a little bit better :)
7. Hot pink and sky blue/turquoise are my two favorite colors, with purple coming in a close third. I have a strong desire to make all of my tack come in those colors and be matching. 
8. I love, love, love seeing horses of non-traditional breeds succeeding in different disciplines. Such as drafts in eventing, quarter horses in dressage, etc. 
9. My least favorite foods are raw tomatoes, shell fish, mushrooms and olives.
10. I'm addicted to Netflix and will totally binge-watch TV shows. The latest was Desperate Housewives (with my roommates) and Doctor Who. 
11. I raised rabbits and showed them competitively in 4-H and ARBA (breed shows) for 10 years. I had Dutch and Champagne D'Argents rabbits. I am quite knowledgeable about them and love helping people at the vet clinic with their rabbits since the vets don't have a ton of experience with them! I miss having rabbits and hope to get one as a pet soon.

Questions for me: (I got nominated four times, therefore you get 22 answers to questions this time and more to come later!)

1. What's the last book you read cover-to-cover?
I (re)read The Book Thief by Markus Zusak (one of my favorite books!) and am currently starting on the Game of Thrones series...

2. Have you ever broken a bone, and if so how?
Nope, amazingly I have not.

3. If you could chose any super-power, what would it be?
The ability to speak and understand any language, animal ones included :)

4. What would you change about the horse world that doesn't have to do with animal abuse or money?
I guess I would encourage people to be more open to new ideas and new people. Obviously what works for one horse/rider might not work for another, but I find a lot of people immediately discredit some ideas, simply because it's just not what they are used to doing. And being open to new people too is important I think. A lot of horse people are really open and friendly (obviously! Just look at the horse blogger world) but there's quite a lot of horse people at the other end of the spectrum that come across as snobbish.

5. What are those 'Baby on Board' signs for cars really for? Nobody have ever been able to give me a satisfying answer.
I really have no idea... I think some people use it as an excuse to be a rude driver, like you can't be mad at them when they have a baby in the car.

6. What are your three favorite words?
Serendipity, juxtaposition, dilapidated.

7. What's the most 'out there' thing you believe in?
I have to say that I'm rather boring... I don't really believe in anything that "out there". I don't believe in aliens or ghosts, or being able to know the future or travel in time. I'm definitely open to the possibility of some "out there" things, but don't explicitly believe them to be true.

8. Describe the last time you laughed out loud.
The last time would have been last night, hanging out with my 4 roommates. They are all hilarious and ridiculous, so any time we're all together we are bound to have a good time.

9. Mares, geldings or stallions?
Well, I don't typically have a preference, I've worked with all three. But, I've owned way more mares than geldings and I get along well with them.

10. Who would you most like to go on a trail ride with?
Not sure if this is supposed to be a person or a horse, but I'd love to have one more ride on Grady and pony Jazz on him. That was my favorite thing to do...

11. What's the most ridiculous thing you've bought for riding or horses?
Ha, a pink sparkly crop.

12. Were horses is your childhood?
Yes, I got my first horse when I was nine (Grady) after moving to the country where we had a barn and a pasture. I begged my parents for riding lessons and after riding the neighbor's very ornery horse, Ruby, for a while, they finally caved and found a trainer who found me my first horse!

13. What's the weirdest lesson/clinic you've ever had on horseback
That's a tough one... there hasn't been anything too crazy, I'm usually pretty good at picking up strange ideas and figuring out how to apply them, but the weirdest has to have been with this local trainer through the dressage team. He's a nice guy and I have several friends who board and train with him full time, but he's just strange. The weirdest part of my lesson would have to be when he kept telling me to relax my forearms and wrists. I just didn't understand how to and finally he came over to me and started shaking my arms to get them to relax. Something must have worked because he stopped bugging me about them, but I don't think I actually changed anything?

14. What one thing would you change about your horse?
I would change her (Jetta's) argumentative-ness. She always has to have something to argue about which results in so many evasions. She's getting better as she gets older, but a lot of times she will refuse to do something just for the sake of it and after bickering for 20 minutes she gives in and pretends it never happened and it isn't a big deal. 

15. What one thing would you change about yourself?
I would change my laziness. It's my biggest bad habit and it affects my riding too. I'll go to the barn and decide that I'd rather not jump just because it means dragging out the jumps. Or it means skimping on grooming or not practicing riding without stirrups.

16. Do you board or keep your horse at home?
I usually board during the school year and take my horses home during the summer time, but I'm still not sure what the plan is for this summer.

17. What is your favorite thing about boarding or keeping your horse at home?
My favorite thing about boarding is having nice facilities: an arena to ride in, nice stalls, a wash rack, etc. My favorite thing about having the horses at home is being able to walk out the door down to the barn. The horses have a big pasture, big stalls with runs, I can feed them however I like, I can go riding down the street, there are trails behind us. I don't have an arena but I do have a roundpen and I can use the neighbor's outdoor arena.

18. What is your least favorite thing about boarding or keeping your horses at home?
Least favorite about boarding is having to pay... But also the drama that comes with keeping your horse at someone else's barn - you have to abide by their rules and deal with other people. And the fact that sometimes you can't get the exact care you'd like. Keeping my horses at home, I dislike not having certain facilities, but mostly just the fact that I have to be out there two or three times a day, every day and if I want to take a day off that's not usually an option.

19. What nicknames do you have for your horse?
For Jetta it's dork or brat. Misty is Misty-moo. 

20. What scares you the most about riding/horses?
There's not a whole lot about horses and riding that scares me. I've always been that fearless little girl. But now that I'm getting older I'm getting a little more cautious. Jetta's rearing scares me since she has flipped over on me before and I got hurt pretty badly. Cross country jumping scares me a little bit since Jetta dumped me over a jump.

21. What is your best skill around horses?
I would say my best skill is not being afraid. I have no problem dealing with naughty horses, I don't get nervous if I get on a horse that's a little flighty or spooky. I don't have issues dealing with bratty horses on the ground either, for instance the barn owner's stallion who strikes and likes to turn his rump to me. I have no patience for naughty horses and am very much the "alpha mare".

22. What is your dream pony vacation?
I think my dream horse vacation would be some intense, upper-level sort of training trip in either dressage or eventing or jumping. Something where I'd get to ride other horses and learn to improve my skills. Get multiple lessons a day then go for fun rides on the beach or through the countryside. Not sure where though...

11 questions for nominees:

1. What equestrian sport that you've never done before would you like to try? 
2. If you could ride any horse (living or not), who would it be?
3. If you could buy one tack item, no matter the expense, what would it be?
   
4. Why did you start blogging and who in real life knows that you blog?
5. Besides horses, what is your favorite hobby?
6. Second favorite animal? (horses are obviously your first :)
7. Favorite color?
8. Least favorite equestrian fashion fad?
9. Black or brown tack?
10. What is your favorite place to go besides the barn? (can be a travel destination or someplace close to you)
11. Favorite food that you couldn't live without?

11 bloggers: I have no idea who has or has not been nominated at this point, so sorry if this is your second (or third!) nomination. I gave up trying to keep track.

1. Hillary at Equestrian at Hart
2. Karly at All In
3. Matt the Cowpony
4. Kristen at Sweet Horse's Breath
5. in2paints at R Lil Bit of Cash
6. Karen at Contact
7. Lauren at She Moved to Texas
8. Jen at Wyvern Oaks
9. Gingham at Pia's (and Praire!) Parade
10. Checkmark115 at Chasing the Dream
11. Amy at Slow and Steady

League Championship Day 2

Well, today didn't go as well as I had hoped but it wasn't awful either.

I got up super early to clean stall before hand (I don't think I've slept more than 6 hours per night for the past week... I'm exhausted). Luckily Jetta's braids stayed in overnight and I only had to redo one braid. We got to the show and had time to chill for a bit and make sure I had my first test - Training Test 3 - memorized.

Jetta warmed up really well actually. I didn't put on my spurs, just carried my whip for the warm up. She was still not quite carrying herself as lightly as I'd like, but she was a lot better than the day before, she was bending nicely and listening to my leg.

We headed to the competition ring and the test went ok. Jetta was really heavy in my hand and I didn't do a very good job of getting her off the forehand. We ended up scoring a 64% - our last two shows were about a 65.8% just to put that in perspective, so we didn't do as well as we had been doing in the past. Our final comment was "Attractive pair. Rider sits right and must stretch up. Horse must stretch out to hand." Bummer.

Just waitin' around

We had a loooong break in between the two classes. Jetta finished up her hay and I took my chair out in a grassy area and sat and let her graze. In the continuing theme of a lack of preparation, we had never looked or schooled the First Level Test 3 and it was full of surprises... I knew the leg yields so that wasn't an issue. The 10 meter trot circles were fine (it's the half circles that we have issues with!) but then there was a change of lead through the trot at X. Huh, hopefully that goes well... Then there were the "counter canter" loops. Oh, yeah, we used to do those. Haven't done those in a while.

Put my spurs on, warmed up ok. It was a little hectic feeling but we can do all the movements just fine. The problem is putting them all together into a fluid test. The hectic feeling went into the test and it basically just sucked. Jetta was so, so heavy in my hands and no matter how many half halts I gave her she would not stop pulling. There was basically no redeeming elements to the test. I didn't like any of our movements, though maybe the stretchy trot was ok. I didn't let her stretch as much in order to maintain some semblance of control of our tempo, so it was a sacrifice between stretch vs steady tempo and we actually scored better doing that sacrifice.

I was fully expecting a 50% score. I was going to be really embarrassed since I haven't gotten a 50 in FOREVER, not since I was first starting out with Jazz. Amazingly, we got a 62.419%. Well that was surprising... I felt like we were definitely not ready to do First 3. First 2 was ok and I'd like to start showing that for the rest of the summer, but we're not quite there yet for the third test.

The show office was pretty disorganized today so I never saw the class scores overall, but we must have placed quite well, at least second because after placing fourth the day before, we ended up with a 3rd place in First Level out of five, and a 3rd place in Training Level out of 6.

Not too shabby for such little preparation, if we had actually prepared we might have done a lot better. We have a lot of work to do before our next show. I have decided not to enter the big recognized show that I've been looking forward to for years... That will have to wait until next year. I just don't think we'll be ready by the end of July to do well at a recognized show. There's a smaller one in August that I think we'll try to shoot for instead or just put the whole goal off for another year.

I did get videos and they took pictures with our GIANT ribbons (they're super, super long!) so I'm hoping that they'll send those out possibly? I will upload at least the Training 3 test for your viewing (dis)pleasure but I might not upload the First Level tests... they're bad. Well, maybe the First 2 isn't that bad. We'll see :)

League Championship Day 1

Today was the first day of the league championship. In true "queen of least preparedness" (I think that should be my new title) I rode Jetta a grand total of three times in the week before the show due to the craziness that was finals.

Anyways, I got out to the barn and groomed Jetta within an inch of her life. Luckily she was super clean so I didn't have to bathe her, since being my normal lazy self I didn't do it the night before. Got her braided, tack cleaned and trailer loaded and we were off.

Jetta's ready to go!

This show was at the state fairgrounds. I've been there once before with Jazz but that was a long time ago. The arena footing was ok, but it seems like the norm for fairgrounds in general is "hard and full of rocks". Of course I got there early so I sat around for a while so that I wouldn't get on too early like usual. Luckily I brought plenty of hay for Jetta so she was happy.

I didn't realize this before the show, but the first day of the show you ride Test 2 of your level and then the next day you ride Test 3. So I entered Training and First Level thinking I was going to do Training 3 and First 2 but they changed it around on me. I have never ridden the second test before of either level. Good preparation, right?

Jetta warmed up fairly well. Ever since she had that week off when she hurt her knee we've taken a big step back in our training. I had finally gotten her to carry herself lightly on the forehand and not pull on the reins or rely on me to hold her up, but that has sort of disappeared recently. The last dressage show I was super happy with how she did, even though our scores didn't reflect that. Anyways, she wasn't too much of a freight train and actually was a little lazy off my leg.

The first test up was Training 2. We rode in the outdoor arena and I was happy to find that the footing was at least a little less rocky than warm up. We didn't even get a full circuit of the arena before the bell rang so Jetta was still a little looky when we started our test, especially since she wanted to watch all these people who were next door at a big convention.

The test went fairly well. She was a little braced in areas and popped her head up a couple times when she got disctracted, but I felt rather good about the effort which was good because I didn't feel so hot going into it.

Cute stuff chilling at the trailer

Jetta got a little bit of a break in between the classes, I went and found the videographer and signed up so we didn't have our first ride taped but the rest of them would be. I got our test back - a 65% and third out of six. I was pretty happy with the scoring, I thought the judge was accurate in all the movements. It's my first time riding under an "R" judge and she was quite nice I thought. I expected a lot harsher judging. Her final comment was "Nice horse with a bright future - get more impulsion for more expression." Which kind of made my day. Always nice when your horse gets such a nice compliment.

In the warm up for the next test I carried my dressage whip just to help with the leg yields and get her transitions a little crisper. Unfortunately I forgot my spurs (go figure) and whips weren't allowed in the championship class.  Definitely bringing the spurs for tomorrow.

Of course when I first looked at the First 2 test, my first thought was "Oh #@$%^. I don't know if we're ready for this..." But luckily I was able to remember the whole test, even though half way through I had a blank spot and almost had a panic attack before I remembered that we were supposed to do our stretchy trot (which sucked, but oh well). The test went quite well for doing it the first time ever at a show and adding in the leg yields. Surprisingly, while our right leg yield sucks at home and the left leg yield is good, at the show, the right leg yield went quite well, but the left leg yield sucked. She inverted throughout the whole movement and would not unlock her jaw and give to the bit. Bad pony.

I was quite happy with how she did overall and we scored a 62.027%. I thought it was pretty fair, though I had hoped to do better. We got fourth out of 5.  I need lessons SO BAD. I need to figure out how we get a better score on our lengthenings because I just do them too fast apparently and we need to show more length and less speed, so I'll try to be more reserved tomorrow. The comment for this test was "Need to be overall rounder to make scores go up. Horse has talent!" I really did like this judge! She was so nice and gave good comments on the movements which is always helpful.

I really do like how the First Level Test 2 flows though so I'm going to add it to our show "repetoire" for the rest of the summer. I like how you do the leg yields right before the canter transition, then the 15m canter circle before the lengthening it all sets up each movement nicely.

Overall, a pretty good day. Started off feeling rather lackluster but finished off well. Hopefully we can improve upon our scores tomorrow!

Ice Boots

I have decided that I'm tired of cold hosing legs. I want ice boots.

Jetta's leg is looking better. It was quite swollen two days in a row but she wasn't lame on it (I rode her on Saturday with no problem). Yesterday it was much less swollen which made me feel better because I was getting worried about it - horse legs should not look like elephant legs! I lunged her and she still looked fine on it so I'm hoping that it's really nothing. She doesn't mind me pressing hard on it and she's not off at all. Regardless, there's been too much cold hosing recently and it's so tedious, I've decided I'd rather just spend some money on some ice boots instead, plus I went to a talk on tendons by a veterinarian recently who was very adamant about how "worthless" cold hosing legs was and that we should ice legs instead...

Anyone have any experience with ice boots? I don't want to spend over a $100 on a boot (I really do just need one) even though some of the boots look quite neat, like the IceVibe boots and the Equifit compression cold boots. Here are a couple of the options that Smartpak and Dover carry in my price range that look like they might work for me.

Cool Cold Super Boot

Flexible Ice Cells

Cool Boots

Ice Horse Tendon Wraps

I think for now I'm going to order the ice cells since they are cheap and I have a pair of SMB boots at home that I can use, or if they don't work I'm sure that I can just wrap the ice cells just fine. Oh horses, please stop hurting yourselves and making me worry. I don't think I can handle it much longer!