Wow, what a weekend! A great, successful weekend but a long one. Although the highlight of the weekend ended on Sunday with our very successful schooling show, it began for me on Thursday.
Thursday is the day the Krista and I spend a lot of time schooling horses/ponies over the course to prepare them for their riders on Friday. It's quite a lot of horses to jump if you add them up. The unique thing about this Thursday is we had all our newly painted brush boxes (with brush) and new bright colored flower boxes added in. The first few horses were good with not a lot of drama (I expected drama). But then I got on a handsome burly dark brown gelding who I won't name but his name starts with a G. Now I knew that this particular guy had a little issue with the girly pink flowers a couple days prior. So I was prepared for a potential confrontation but was going to give him the opportunity to prove me wrong. Well, he was totally fine about the pink flowers...... but...... he had a big problem with the outside line that had the brown brush boxes. Now of course I took it slow and let him take his time to walk by it both ways and go up close to sniff it out. But he was a little too persistent about making a big deal out of this line and started to hop up and down. Now all this was about not wanting to walk up to the jump and take a closer look. As he continued to hop up and down I decided I better let him know who's boss. Let's just say I don't respond to small threats very well so I proceeded to take him in a tight spin to the left and then to the right and the whole time I'm thinking of Angelina Jolie in the movie "Mr & Mrs. Smith" (I'm Mrs. Smith in this scenario :) saying out loud "who's your daddy Now!" Well he got the point. He may be the cool kid in Junior High but he sure does not know how to handle a confrontation especially when it's a girl. Turns out he jumped around the course after that just beautifully and was glad to hear a good report about his Friday Lesson.
So Saturday was the next day of preparation for the Schooling show. When I headed down to the barn mid-morning it was absolute chaos in the wash racks as all the riders were waiting for the opportunity to give their horse/pony a bath.
Later in the day was spent going to Costco to buy food for our concession stand "The Archway Cafe". After delivering that to the clubhouse and doing the necessary set up in the kitchen it was time for a break. Then Clare and I went back down to the barn to set a course for Sunday. We wrapped that up at about 8pm. Big thanks to Brandan for helping with the concession set-up and the course set. I slept real good that night!!
Sunday my alarm went off at 5am. Felt so wrong for a Sunday, especially in January, but up I rose. First thing first was to do the Starbucks run. Thank goodness for Starbucks!! Then down I went to polish my boots and check in on everything. Then I went in to start up the Archway Cafe.
It was wonderful to see our students out hacking their horses before sunrise to prepare for their classes. A few students braided their horses as well. Let's not forget the Dad's who brought their daughter's for their early arrival.
The show was a great success and our horses and rider's all did fabulous.
Words of wisdom: "Eyes up and heels down"
PS I slept great on Sunday night too!!
~Corey