Bdays. bulls. and xc schooling.

This week has been one full of planning and adventures. Sam started camp valerie, and well I did too! The ponies have been super this week. Charm has been learning to jump and she is super cute over fences. (check out http://www.blueclovereventing.com for more details!) Freddie Mac has been taking some field trips out and about and hes going to be a cross country star. I took some awesome video (if I do say so myself) but must admit to not being able to decide to watch through the screen or above it, and my filming might be all over the place as a result! whoops! Tori has been learning that the less dirty she is the less scrubbing there is... or maybe thats just wishful thinking on my part. Morris went to KOCs and has been working hard getting ready for Millbrook!!! Sam has been practicing his circles and we have tweaked my position to help keep Sam in better balance. were hoping to show off at DRPC... Since we have sams next outing picked out, we decided to sharper our jumping skills as well..

Sam jumped around the indoor at FCF like a pro on thursday as a bit of a refresher course before xc schooling at morven. Morris Freddie Mac and Sam all had a romp around Morven Park on friday and wow!!! They were all perfect! but I will only brag about Sam. he acted like a seasoned pro. We jumped around did some mini courses, and just worked on keeping him soft and straight. sounds easy, right? Sam made me a super proud mom. Which reminds me.....

So today's my birthday and Valerie and Richard took me out to dinner last night. since today had a pretty packed sched. Anyways. I digress... I ordered my drink first and got IDed.. (shocking I know) The waitress looked at my ID for all of 5 seconds before declaring that she had never seen one like that before (its from ga not another country) and that I wouldnt use a fake because I was out to eat with my RENTS.... Yikes... well I was beside myself with shock and could only muster. They aren't my parents... I did feel quite bad as she spent the rest of the night apologizing. We went to Cadillac Ranch for some drinks and live music. Valerie and Rachel convinced me to ride the bull.... (vids on facebook)... Its actually alot of fun... and certainly harder than it looks... not to say that I have skills but most people were falling off in about 10 seconds or less. I was pretty content with my 45ish seconds. enough with my shenanigans...its back to the pool for now.

HOT HOT HOT...

So the temps have been hitting record highs. and well my car which just crossed the 200K line decided it would be a great time to let the ac die. I am not totally disheartened by the whole situation as when I do finally get in the AC, I get a bit chilled. What can you do? A new car is a bit low on the priority list at the moment.

However I got to go pick up Sam on Thursday and he is certainly enjoying all the green grass he can eat and a stall with a fan where he sleeps away the hot afternoons! He is however not enjoying being put back into work. He is going to start at Camp Valerie on monday (hes excited about that... secretly!). He has been very good and is enjoying some long hacks and light trot sets. This week was filled with some exciting happenings at Blue Clover. Valerie Fred and I went to his first cross country schooling, and he was such a super star! He is coming right along and I can't wait to watch this horse at his first event! Valerie and Richard took a mini Vacay this week, so I spent some quality time with all the ponies. The super star was certainly Charm, but the others were stars as well! Morris and I have been bonding and he is certainly a character. He is very easy to love on, and I have been known to sneak him a few carrots here and there. I also got to spend some quality time with gunsmoke (the BCE mascot!) who is adorable! and hysterical. He has quite a few toys, his favorite being skunky, and he gets very into playing (perhaps a video of this in the future) it is quite funny as sometimes he does a bit of a sliding stop and takes out various rugs and what not with him, he also plays some mean tug of war!

Sam has some big decisions coming up! He needs one more placing to qualify for the AECs and we are hoping to run him at the end of August to get it. This however totally depends on him, he needs to be a bit more confident at the jumps as I have been slacking on my piloting skills recently and while he makes up for them I can't expect him to forever! So we are going to do some boot camp to hopefully work out these issues and come out on the other side as a better team!

a vacation and a change.

So I should start this out by saying its been a long time! I got a bit caught up with everything that life has been throwing my way and forgot about this! but I promise to be better with the updates....

So as the spring season came to a close I chalked up some awesome dressage scores, some ribbons and another TE on sam. Through no fault of his own... (I missed a jump in the SJ... whooopps) Overall I am so pleased with him. I am really starting to enjoy doing circles... I am not 100% sure what the fall has in store for us! (more on that later). After sams season ended I headed up to Bromont with Jenn for the CCI***. It was a bittersweet weekend as it was my last weekend with Jenn. Both of her horses were amazing!! and I enjoyed every minute of being there. I would like to say thanks to Jenn for the amazing experiences I had while being there. She is such an amazing horse person and taught me and Sam so much. I had to make a big decision because of school, that silly piece of paper! I have discovered I am much more of an in class person, and less of an on line person. So had to make a small change of plans, and will be the first to admit that I did get a bit teared up on tuesday morning after I got up, and must admit to have been a bit lost, but my family came straight to the rescue and asked me to join them for 10 days in Yosemite... I had a great time stacking rounds, cooking smores, rafting, and seeing old friends! My family is always supportive of the choices I make, and I am so thankful!!! So the great debate was on cooking or horses and how to juggle school! Decisions decisions. WELL to make a long story short I am doing a bit of everything. groom by day. waitstaff by select nights and weekends and student on mondays and wednesdays.... Yikes... busy busy busy.... I just started at Blue clover eventing owned by Valerie Vizcarrondo. Sam will be arriving later this week and I can not wait to get back on him... he got a bit of a break between bromont and vacation. I will keep everyone update on all the behind the scenes happening here at Blue clover eventing, my crazy experiences, and the adventures of sam.