Make It or Buy It?

Here are pictures of Junior modeling what he got me for my birthday!

It's usually a jerk move to get someone a gift that YOU are actually going to use... "Happy birthday Wifey! I got you season tickets to the Vikings!" but I appreciate his gift all the same. I think he chose this because black has become his color. When you have this flashy of a horse I think too much color starts to look like kindergarten finger painting.... and he prefers it over the baby pink pad I've been using. Not sure why....

I can sew and make my own patterns. It's what I went to grad school for so making things comes pretty easy to me, I know how to source materias and I can look at something and usually figure out how it was made. It is not always what I want to do when I get home after a work day of.... sewing, though. The bottom line is unless it's a custom item like a show shirt or a particular printed fabric you just have to have as a pad, it's not worth it financially. Now if you simply ENJOY the work then that's another thing. I mostly enjoy it, but unlike people who sew and design and play with fabric as a hobby, it's also my work and it's not always relaxing. I find that during times of the year when I'm doing much more classroom teaching and much less designing and sewing I will pick up projects at home.

I had plans to make some pads, but I have learned that making things is rarely cost effective if you can find the same thing off the rack. This is due to the inflation of fabric and notion prices. Once upon a time only the poor people made their own clothes (just like the period of time when only poor people still owned horses) because it was more economical. But now the DIY market has created a surge in prices of materials and a downward spiral of availability. Even JoAnn Fabrics is only about 30% fabric. They sell patio furniture for heaven's sake, and not just the kind you would decorate!

I had a coupon for EquusNow and I went in to look at jointed stirrups but decided I should ride in a pair before I spend the $50. Then I wandered over to the pads and found a black one with grey piping, the same as our monogram patches. Sold. Done.

The pad cost $27 with tax. It would have taken probably 2 yards of fabric at maybe $7/yard, $3 of piping, $7 of batting, and probably $10 of lining, $4 of webbing for the keepers, and $3 velcro. I'm not good at math but throw in the time of me taking a pattern off of an existing pad (or $ for purchasing one from Suitability), laying out the fabric, cutting all 3 layers, cutting the bias for the edge, figuring out how to do the spine correctly, wrestling it through the quilting process (these things don't seem big until you try to maneuver them through the arm of a domestic sewing machine!), adding the piping, binding the edges, sewing the velcro to the webbing, sewing on the webbing.... and you've got an expensive and labor intensive project.

I did make a pad/blanket carrying bag over the weekend and I'm sure that was not cost effective, but I couldn't find one with dimensions big enough to carry both my English and Western pads so I just made my own. It's not pretty, but it will do.

Speaking of Show Shirts, I'll do a post soon of the shirt I made for my horsey friend for her graduation present.

Oh, and I posted my saddle for sale last night and got a bite already that wants to look at it at the show. That would be SOOOO awesome to get it sold this weekend!!! Here's the link to the ad.

Easy Bake Oven

When I started this blog, the tagline was "How an almost thirty-year-old perceives her world as a first time horse owner..." Of course when I turned 30 I had to change that tagline. Tomorrow I have another birthday. If you've done your math and paid attention to my posts about Banee and I being the same age... and that she turned 31 in April.... yeah.

This week I'm getting ready for a show. Now that classes are done I am not teaching or in meetings, but I do have a play opening on the 24th so I'm still working, just not as much and more flexible hours than during the school terms. This means I can get out to the barn every day until the show and hopefully get some good work in. It has been so wet here that the outdoor is a lake, the fields are muddy messes. All of the standing water has created a mosquito population that is grotesque. We have also been experiencing humidity more native to late July. On top of that we have the least ventilated arena in the history of riding. There is NO ceiling vent and the only doors are on the North and South ends completely eliminating any chance of a cross-wind. No windows. So the only place I have to ride right now is in a sauna.

Tonight I noticed some dried blood on Junior's left hind leg that was not there yesterday. Not a ton, but enough that I investigated by hosing the leg until I could see the would, felt for heat and sensitivity, and watched him walk and jog to make sure he wasn't showing an lameness. It was not deep or large or swollen and it did not bleed after I hosed it off so I put on some Tri-Care.

The heat in the arena and his leg gave me an excuse to take it easy. We practiced a little showmanship and I was absolutely dripping. Junior didn't break a sweat, but I made sure he had fresh water and turned up his fan.

The best news of the day is that my friend who was my show mom at the show last fall is coming to the show on saturday to help me out! I am SOOOO relieved to have her there. She is AWESOME help and knows how to do everything to prep a horse. This will help me out so much I won't have any excuse for forgetting patterns! Oh I probably shouldn't have said that out loud....

And Then There Was Grace...

I have a dread of taking green horses to shows. I was VERY nervous about taking Junebug to his first one and he really didn't do anything crazy and gets better every time. Before Junior I had taken three different horses to their first (or first in a LOOOONG time) shows and all three acted like crazy idiots. Lots of factors are involved in this, but the biggest factors can be classified as 1) mileage (lack of) on the horse and 2) the fear or anxiety (in abundance) of the rider/handler. The first was Gigi who tried to beat me up at the county fair in halter class so I didn't show her in anything else and have only ridden her a few times since. I've spoken of Sonny before. The third was Grace. She was a gorgeous arab filly and sweet as pie. She became my lesson horse during the short time I was at an Arab barn in MN before moving to Ohio. The boss asked if I'd take her to a small open show and I was thrilled. She was fine to load, fine to unload, fine to warm up, fine to braid, fine fine fine. As soon as I remounted to head to our class she started gettin' uppity. We even needed the boss to lead us through the in gate... and then....

Here is the link if you'd rather watch it directly from YouTube.

I still get a little twitchy when I watch that video. She did have some lovely moments but I edited them out for time and because the crazy stuff is much more interesting. Did you notice all those nice paints and QHs we keep passing at warp speed? Yeah... and you wonder why I went and got myself one of those nice calm stock horses?

Grace went on that same summer to win something big at the MN 4-H horse show with a 16 year old kid and is now owned by a kid who takes lessons and shows. She really was a nice mare, we just had a bad, bad ride.

No longer AWOL.

Though I wouldn't want to flatter myself by suggesting anyone actually noticed I had a lapse of more than 10 days since my last post, but just incase you were anxiously awaiting something: I'm sorry. I was without a home computer for a whole week for the first time in many many years. My new MacBook Pro is here and I'm back online. I also have a video camera on my screen so I might even attempt some vlog posts, but don't hold your breath!

In horsey news, Junior is being used for far fewer lessons than he had been and though I still hear that he is a bit uncooperative during grooming and tacking, he hasn't done anything major that I know of. It seems we're both counting the days (18) until we move to the new place. I'm heading out there on Wednesday evening for a pot luck, hopefully I'll get to meet some of the other boarders.

My post-surgery toe is getting much better. I have been riding without pain (only Western so far) and can wear my old Ariat lacers, my Sketchers and any sandals. Haven't tried my show boots yet, but they weren't painful before so I doubt they'll be painful now. Still not into my Converse shoes yet which is a bit of a downer.

My lower back is not doing great. I took too much time off of riding right after the surgery so my muscles got weak. It's not debilitating, just annoying, and if I didn't have a vet bill on the way for my clumsy horse's eye I'd get myself a massage! Darn pony.

Right now I'm trying to get us back into work. We have a show in less than two weeks and it might be our last one of the season so I'm going to try to make it count. Still trying to secure a show-mom for the day. That'll really help. I might be able to show later in the summer but I'll have to wait and see about scheduling and trailering.