no show :(

Well, it's pouring down rain here- the show was canceled. On the bright side, they are considering rescheduling, and it would be AFTER I come back from Peru, so hopefully I can still get him to it.
Looking forward to some sunshine!

whats been goin' on

I did go out for that test ride, and it was super great! Sunny was awesome. I was having some trouble with his canter (which is hopefully slowing down some to a nice easy lope!) but other than that he was perfect. We were out on our neighbors lane and I saw a small shape coming out of the bean field on the right. It was tan and small, and it just stopped and looked at us for a few minutes, then started coming towards us. I kept Sunny moving forward at a walk, but was a little nervous about this because of the light, I couldn't see exactly what it was. I knew it wasn't another cougar (at least the reasonable side of my head did, lol!) but I sure didn't want to meet up with a strange, possibly feral dog. Fortunately it turned, and I could see its ears. It was a fawn, which had been precisely what I was hoping it would be. We got within about 20 feet of it, which was really cool. (What a time not to have a camera along! grrrr.) THEN, when we were riding along the road, we came to the crossroads, and I looked down to the left, and there, standing right in the middle of the road, was what must have been the mom. She didn't stay nearly as long as the baby, but a lot longer than I would have expected. I think she was confused about a human smell coming from an animal! I was REALLY pleased with how well Sunny behaved with the new animals.
The rest of the week comprised of short bareback rides. Thursday through Friday I was busy baking for the 4-H foods show, which was Friday afternoon. (that went well, btw) Then Saturday I had a cousin's wedding. Then Sunday (today) was church and then a 50th wedding anniversary party. I am really tired. I did go for a nice ride this evening, just bareback with a halter again, and (oops) no helmet- it was so hot I barely could force myself to put on a pair of jeans, let alone a helmet. Good thing he was his normal awesome self. I went up and down the drive several times at a foxtrot, and around the house. Almost all the way back down the drive (which we walked, since the last time coming towards the house I always walk him) I just had the lead rope on his neck and both arms up in the air in a V sign. I was totally thrilled to be back on him again!! It felt T-E-R-R-I-F-I-C !!!
I have a show on Thursday, so I'll try to write about that this week if I have time.
OH... and the blog will be pretty quiet the weeks of July 2-15, 'cause I'll be in PERU!!! I am going with Focus on the Family on their Brio missions trip and so... yeah. I'll miss Sunny of course, but I know he's in capable hands, and I can't WAIT to soak in all the new experiences. It's not a sightseeing trip or anything, we won't see Micchu Picchu (sp.?) or anything like that, but I'm sure the whole experience is going to be awesome. Mom is happy about it too, for a different reason (NOT the fact that she gets all my chores since Dad is too busy!) She seems to think that I am going to want less fancy horse stuff after this. She's probably right (sigh). Our group will be spending time in Lima, basically in the slum sections a lot. We are sponsoring a child through Compassion International, so- I get to meet her, since she's from Lima!
Please pray for this trip ( and my parent's sanity as they worry about their 'baby' )
happy trails to all!!!!!!

it came!

Yay, the saddle came today! I am so excited, it looks like it will fit perfectly. I'm going out for a "test ride" this afternoon to see how it feels.

new saddle- on it's way, club tour

I ended up ordering the gaited saddle (OK, so mom did- for some reason she doesn't trust me with a credit card, LOL) Hopefully it will be here in time for the 4-H horse show, which is the 28. The people at Country Supply said it would be. I guess I will find out if they were being truthful.
Yesterday we had the 4-H club tour- where everyone goes around to everyone elses houses and looks at projects too big to bring to the meetings. So I gave a demo with Sunny ( "how a saddle should fit" by viewing the one that doesn't!) and showed everyone my mini lop ( a kind of rabbit) We were the first stop, so I got to go in and clean up a bit before heading to the next person's place. I am wondering whose dumb idea it was to have the tour on a freaking 90 degree day at 3 in the afternoon!! I am the secretary, but my brain was obviously somewhere else when we decided date and time.
I rode Sunny a total of 3 times the last 7 days. It has been SO HOT. Poor Sunny is out in the real heat (even though we don't have air conditioning, our house is at least 20 degrees cooler) but he seems to be handling it much better than me. I whine; he just stands in the shade and swhishes his tail. He doesn't even fuss when I get the insane idea to put a saddle on him at 3 in the afternoon! I didn't put the girth on though, and I didn't get up there. I did however reluctantly don jeans and go (not so reluctantly) on a short bareback ride. That was fun, but I was quite glad to change back into my lightweight shorts for the rest of the tour.
stay cool!

new saddle??

I've been poking around, looking for a new saddle for Sunny. I think I might get him one specifically for gaited horses, but I' m not sure yet. I don't want to rush into making the wrong purchase, but I DO want to have it before our next show.
I havn't ridden the past few days, so it's high time I get back on him. Hopefully this evening.

re- parade!

Sunny was SO awesome. Believe it or not, he was the only horse in the parade! He had a lot of new things to look at, and there were TONS of distracting noises. He was perfect. No one could guess that it was his first parade. He walked calmly along while the band played ahead, streamers waved, engines revved, and kids were running all around him. We were with my 4-H group, and the theme of the parade was "back to the farm". So... we had a calf, a sheep, and a chicken besides him! It was hilarious, while the pictures were being taken of our group, Sunny was trying to take a bite out of the calf and possibly the sheep too, and it was a good thing he couldn't reach the chicken! I think he was fascinated by the texture of their hair.
I was using the borrowed saddle, and it came with a blue fleece pad and blue breastplate. I had a flag stuck through the saddle, and I wore faded jeans, my old boots, and my Curly contest T-shirt (of course!) He looked great. I would have loved to wear my cowboy hat instead of my helmet (small town parade, it was only three blocks for heavens sake!) Oh well.
Then we took him to a friends house to stay overnight in their round pen. I went to church with them the next day and gave a mini presentation on my upcoming missions trip to Peru.
Then, it was a rush to the show (that I didn't show in :( and after that we went on a trail ride and rode around the show grounds for quite awhile. I realized that day that I had left my bridle in the truck that Dad drove back to town, so I made do with the extra lead that I HAD remebered and fastened reins to his halter. It was pretty cool how well behaved he was with just the halter and lead ropes. He normally is, but I didn't know exactly what to expect with him being with strange horses and going to a busy showgrounds. Perfect, perfect!
happy trails, shows, parades, whatever!

parade (2)

It looks like I will be able to get there {the parade} as of this afternoon, (Friday!) nothing like last minute changes!!
I borrowed a better fitting Arabian sized saddle for it, and I am defenitely loving it- its pretty old, probably one of the "new" synthetic saddles, but it is SO AWESOME. I didn't ride yesterday (high winds) but I did try it on him Wednesday, and took about a 3 hour ride, which was really nice. OK, back to the saddle! It is an Abetta Cordura, and it probably weighs about a third of my present ill-fitting saddle. Which I'm sure Sunny appreciated as much as I did.
I am VERY happy I got to borrow it, since otherwise- no parade! (M+D nixed my idea of riding bareback - "it's on asphalt!" even though the parade is really short) As if I don't ride him bareback on asphalt NOW, but I didn't feel the need to bring that up to them...

parade

Stay tuned, I might be able to get Sunny to his first ever parade on Saturday. I'm thinking about printing up little fact sheets about Curlies and handing them out. I'll see. Another possibility is that I could take him to a show Sunday afternoon the day after the parade, but I'm not sure I can make the necessary arrangements. Besides that, I have to get back in the saddle and work with him this week!! Hopefully the weather is improving so I can do that.

last 10 days or so

Wow, I have really been ignoring this blog!!! Unfortunately, it wasn't because I couldn't tear myself away from all kinds of outstanding adventures with Sunny. Nope, nada, zip. (pouting) The weather and my schedule have conspired against me for the last week, and I have had very little riding time. Yesterday I rode Sunny for awhile bareback, even though the wind was almost 30 mph, and it felt SO GOOD to be back on him. Another day I might have been disappointed that we didn't get much accomplished- yesterday I thought it was a great accomplishment to be on him at all! He had been enjoying his little bit of time off from work ;-). I spent lots of time on the non riding days just being with him in the pasture and grooming him. So it wasn't a total loss, especially from his point of view ("I get attention AND I get to eat at the SAME time!!! This is heaven!") HOPEFULLY the weather will be improving. It's getting really near to my trip time, I leave for Miami July 2 and from there head to Peru for 2 weeks- so riding time is a precious comodity right now.
Happy trails!!!