All Is Quiet

Just a few little things to report from the world of Junior.

- I've been doing the morning feeding at the barn twice a week to help with board payments and to get my lazy butt out of bed and moving around without excuses.

- My back is annoyed today by the horrible humid rainy muck that is central Ohio this week, but otherwise seems to be working it's way in the direction of "getting better", but I probably shouldn't say that out loud.

-It took a good two weeks after my fall to feel physically recovered from it, and I was more mentally shaken than I thought.  I cantered today for the first time today and was a bit nervous.  Wuss.

- I haven't gotten the neck stretcher out again yet, but riding with it is on the list for this week.

- The barn tried Junior in some lessons but he's not been the most cooperative so he's won the right not to be a lesson pony... again.

- So instead of lessons, I'm trying out half-leasing Junior to the sweetest couple I have ever met.  If it works out it has the potential to be the best possible situation.  They take a lesson each week and do two more rides per week, leaving me 4 days with him and lately that is plenty.  The nice couple had been leasing another horse but their owner moved the horse and they want to stay at this barn.  They really like him so far, are very smart, eager to learn, and promised not to let him try to be the boss.  ;)

- I am more concerned about his stifle(s) than I have been before.  I'm hoping he's just going through that phase between totally out of shape and back into shape and will, with steady work, turn back into the cadenced horse I know he can be.  My last two rides I felt it stick too often. We've been here before so hopefully it will get better as he gets stronger.  Plus he snuck some fatty past me and is suddenly on the chubby side which can't help.  We cut his grain back a bit, hopefully that'll catch up.

In other news, my house-rabbit continues to entertain me.  She's not proving to be a cuddler, which is disappointing but not unexpected.  She might change her mind in time.  But for now I'm satisfied with feeding her kale and banana chips when she comes over to say Hi.

Show Shirt Update

My 2011 Show Shirt - - -

For some unexplainable reason, this post has remained in draft form for almost 18 months.  So here it is.  No idea why I didn't post it!

I'm sure you have all been waiting for a progress report on that show shirt. If you couldn't tell from the peek at the crystals, I moved in a slightly different direction than I had been going with the diagonal designs. I moved on with the same combination of colors, still mostly black, but with color up towards the face. It will be symmetrical so that I can use the shirt for horsemanship, too. I also decided to be a little brave and try some Ultrasuede appliques. I had attempted this with the purple shirt and found it was a lot harder to double-layer them than I thought so they ended up as just simple straight V pieces on that one. Last year I discovered how easily they will cut and position themselves if you first use Steam-a-Seam Lite2. I was still not brave enough for anything but straight lines.

It wasn't until I started playing around with different brushes on photoshop that I started to really want a curlier applique and think it might be worth it to try again. I tried to use stencils and paint and that looked.... like total crap. I have been paying a lot of attention any time I get close to a high-end show outfit with appliques trying to see how they're done. So I got out the Ultrasuede, made stencils from the same photoshop brushes using a trusty laminator, and went to town. This is where I'm at:

I first tried a bunch of combinations on photoshop and then I cut a bunch of Ultrasuede pieces and played with them on the fabric, starting with the center front piece, which is in the photo. It's going to have a back zipper, rather than the front. I may regret this at a summer show when I miss being able to just unzip my jacket to catch a breeze, but it'll look cleaner. I don't know how many different combinations I went through before committing.

The crystals aren't attached yet. I'm having a slight technical difficulty and I may need to do some woodging (yes, that IS a technical term) to fix it... not sure how yet: the black fabric I'm using for the base doesn't seem to like the iron... which becomes a problem when you are IRONING FUSIBLE SH*T TO IT!!! Ooops. It's probably not going to affect the fit, only the fact that the brocade and the black are stitched together and the brocade is not shrinking with the black, hence the wrinkles in the photo. If I don't have the iron hot enough the appliques/crystals won't adhere. If the iron is too hot the fabric shrinks up badly. So I have to be very very careful, which will require me to have to use my little crystal setting tool instead of the whole iron so I have to apply the crystals one by one by one instead of in large iron-sized areas. That's going to be a day where I work in front of the TV.

Here's what I think it'll look like when I'm done, just slightly different appliques.

WTFriday - The Wonkey Donkey

That settles it.  If I ever own a Donkey, his name will be Wonkey.  Not really the most shocking WTFriday, but oh well.




Full article from Time

So We're Tryin' This

After a discussion with my BM/former tack store diva about a plateau in our training, I tried a piece of training equipment and then went and bought my own.  I am hesitant to use "gadgets" I don't understand.  The only thing we've used has been a training fork back in the way long ago time.  Where I'm having difficulty - okay ONE of the places - is getting The Junebug to keep round during downward transitions and at the canter.  I had considered draw reins but I've seen too many horses in draw reins with their chins on their knees and that didn't seem like something I wanted to be doing.  FuglyBlog posted about that today in fact.

So this thing.  It's pretty basic. It's a big bungee cord on plastic clips.   The bungee goes over the poll, through the bit, and clips to either the saddle dees or to the girth dees.  Being of the stock horse persuasion we use the girth.  It's very forgiving, I can stretch it myself, unlike my elastic girth ends.  What it does is makes a posture for the horse that puts zero pressure on the poll/bit.  If the horse moves too far out of this posture the elastic tightens.

I found a nice article about the pros and cons of this gadget.  Read it here.

The first day was very amusing watching him try to figure it out.  He walked super slow on our way out to the arena and kept stopping every time he lifted his head and wanted to do a shuffle-jog instead of a real trot so I was having a hard time getting him to extend. I didn't want to push him too much on the first day. I lunged him for about 10 minutes in it and just let him figure out what was going on.  I could tell it was difficult for him to canter because he's not been using the right muscles.  This should help build those muscles without my weight on his back and without me having to think about correcting and releasing.  The elastic rewards automatically.

We did about 15 minutes today.  He was "getting it"more but was still doing a bit of a shuffle-jog.  He was better after the canter and seemed to trot as freely as he ever does on the lunge without leg aids from me.  The canter was better today but I can see it's much harder for him to go left than right.

I don't want to over do it, but he seems to accept it, even though it's making him work harder.  The article I linked to cautioned against horses learning to balance against it so I want to watch for that.

Here's our first 5 or so minutes today.