Let's play catch-up + millions of redundant photos + bonus!

Riley got his shoes back on (since the beginning of December) a few days ago and homeboy was feeling REALLY good about himself. Our new farm is VERY rocky and I was pretty nervous about how he'd cope with the turnout fields (mostly just near the gates). To my surprise, he's held up pretty well for the last two months, at least until the mud arrived. He got a bit sore and popped an abscess, so I switched his turnout schedule so he's in half the time and I think he's appreciating the relief. Temperatures are warming up quite a bit and all of the horses seem to have spring fever! The ring was still sloppy, so i thought I'd hop on him and ride around inside to see how he was feeling... well, that ended quickly as he got all sorts of frazzled and I hopped off and decided we'd do some free lunging -- as a rule, I NEVER lunge or free jump for this sort of purpose, but I had little choice in crappy footing and less than ideal circumstances!

Buzzzzz, buzzzz, buzzzz... that's the sound of inviting winter in.

We've had an unseasonably warm winter here in Philadelphia, as in... a few years ago we had several feet of snow and ice everywhere to deal with. This year, I haven't put more than a sheet on Riley (and he's being going without one on most days)!

With (another) move under our belts and new and exciting facilities awaiting us, I knew we'd be legging up much earlier than I was originally planning. I had his shoes pulled a few weeks ago, so I took his shoe allowance and spoiled myself by having him professionally clipped! Woo hoo!

Let just say, Riley was not super stoked about being removed from his best friend in the WHOLE world to get a bath.

Opinions, he has them.

I actually enjoy the process of clipping (though the hair everywhere sucks) but I don't have my own clippers and Riley's pelt (yes, it can only be referred to as such) is really weird and destroys blades no matter how sharp they are or how clean he is!!! Out of fairness to the groom, I bathed him within an inch of his life and prayed that he'd dry in time! As a thank you for my painstaking work, Riley decided to bite the ever loving shit out of me while I was checking his belly for dampness. Through my quilted vest he very nearly broke my skin (and I'm sporting a huge bruise/welt combo) -- to which I responded with a little reality check on ground manners thankyouverymuch. Needless to say, when the groom arrived he asked me if Riley behaves for clipping and I assured him that he'd be on his best behavior. As a general rule, he's great for clipping and really enjoys it, but you never know.

Look at his sheepish expression. That's what a naughty (clean) horse looks like.

I decided on a hunter clip but I had his whole face done too just for fun (and to see if anything creepy was lurking underneath).

I am so pleased with how his skin looks clipped. In previous years, he's dealt with all sorts of gross rain rot/fungus issues and once clipped he looked a bit sad. This year he's only got a few little spots of funk and the coat underneath was shiny! I think it's partially due to the mild weather, but also because I've been treating his funk with Listerine/water and grooming all his yucky spots feverishly (*honorary mention for Head and Shoulders here too).

So much hair!

But GUYS, I took out his tail braid and combed it out and WHOSE TAIL IS THIS???

It was well worth every penny, and I didn't mind helping to hold Riley when he got fidgety about his face. He looks incredible! I can't believe this is a horse who isn't in proper work yet!

What a handsome beast! Also, he looks wayyy better with a few less lbs. He's usually looking a bit rotund by now.

Best of all, I adore how his face looks clipped! He grows insane goat hair all over his chin and I think it makes him look pretty unremarkable in the winter. I think he has a very cute face when you can actually see it!

Almost palomino for the day! ps. still fuzzy inside those ears:)

I guess I should dig out his quarter sheet as winter decided to show up the DAY AFTER I CLIPPED HIM!!!!!! We haven't had consistent cold weather at all and of course now he has to go in two rugs!

Ah, well, at least cool down time will be a minimum!

Weekend recap -- progress made?

Muddy Mudskipper (click for weird hairiness)

Phew! A bit of a whirlwind weekend there! I have to go out of town this upcoming weekend to take care of my Mom while she undergoes neck surgery (in Florida), so I wanted to get the most out of this weekend as possible. The forecast promised two beautiful spring days and with 4 new horses showing up in the last week, I was needed as an extra hand around the farm to help get the sales horses ready for clients! We were up early Saturday morning, as my trainer was taking a sales horse over to Philly Dutton's for a client. I was attending to the farm chores and putting a couple of our guys on the Equiciser to warm them up. Though it was a beautiful day with temps nearing 60, the wind was HOWLING. We are essentially out in the countryside/woods and when the wind picks up it can be downright daunting (think haunted woods). Gusts of 40 mph meant that our scheduled hack to the indoor was going to be interesting.

Brooklawn Double, Brody.

 Through a series of serendipitous connections, my trainer was going to be showing two of her sales horses to Suzanne of Confessions of an AA Rider, I was secretly more excited about meeting a fellow blogger in person, but also happy to help get the horses ready and hack them over to the indoor. I would be riding Brody who is a 6 year old, 16.2+ TB. it's amazing how those few inches can make a huge difference to someone my size. Riley is a big bodied 16 hh horse, but he's a very smooth, fluid mover and is truly, just the right size for me. Anything bigger and I feel like I'm a little kid! Brody is not only tall, but he's also a really big mover, it's pretty amazing. The effort needed to post his trot is exponentially higher than riding my pony! But, in the crazy wind and the 2 mile hack over, we mostly trotted (to escape the wind) and I was actually able to keep up with his movement! The two boys were both so great in the decidedly spooky weather... it's easy to forget you are riding thoroughbreds when they are just so level-headed.

Spring forward -- and a lengthy update!

Finally!

The clocks have gone forward, the days are longer and dare I say it, the weather is warming up. Which can only mean one thing...

Spring Mud Season

Yep, all the snow and ice we've had lying around is quickly melting into little estuaries and streams around the farm. There are giant mud pits around the gates and water troughs, but I don't care... I'm completely over winter and I'll take a muddy mess over frozen hands and toes and constant wind burn on my face. The new farm appears to have decent drainage and thankfully the owners know exactly just how muddy the property gets so we're not freaking out that the horses are making a mess.

Storm Prep part IV OR How I spent a 40 degree Saturday.

Riley says, get away from my hay pile!

When did 40 degrees become balmy? What hell winter? At least it was mild and sunny and after three days of temps in the single digits, I'll take it. We have a predicted snow storm coming overnight Sunday and Emily and I planned to make a run to the hay guy so we could stock up the sheds with hay for the boys. There are 3 of them on a round bale which as you can see from the photo to the left, didn't last much more than a week. We don't have a good way to move round bales right now and we figured they'd be hanging out by the shed during the storm so it worked out. Just in case we can't reach them for a half a day they'll have plenty of hay to keep them warm and happy.

I decided that I should probably finish clipping Riley today after chores and our hay run so that I didn't have to start from scratch if I let it go another few weeks. We have him a little ace again and he really well behaved. He still wouldn't let me near his "business" on his belly (I need to get someone to hold a leg up while I finish that bit), but otherwise he was great! Even standing with the halter around his neck letting me clip his face! I have to say (for the millionth time) I love this horse.

LOVE.

Hopefully tomorrow will be nice enough to saddle up and go for a ride. I want to do some trot sets in our big field and I might work him in the pessoa before I hop on. I'd love to make a post with some goals but it's nearly impossible to do so with the unpredictable weather and the wheels coming off my personal life. Hopefully things will level out on all fronts soon and I'll be able to set some real goals for Spring! At least he looks the part and we can actually work now without him sweating to death. The only real downside is that he's super-dooper bundled up now.

Such a cutie.

So sleepy from the ace. Also, he's not cow-hocked, I don't know why he's standing like this!

All bundled up and ready to go back out. There was a face under all the hair!

I got his bridle back from Bartville today, I can't wait to see how it looks on his nice clean-shaven face tomorrow!

Oh yea, in case you forgot how cute he is in the last 5 seconds.

Riley making friends with my friend's little pup!

50 degrees and sunny

Lambies sunbathing, seriously too much.

Saturday promised to be sunny and mild so I raced out quickly to the barn to get started on my chores for the day so I would have time for everything else. Emily and I and another boarder decided we wanted to ride ALL THE HORSES, so I hustled the morning away so we could make that happen. I wanted to give Riley a much needed bath after our ride so I could clip him Sunday. We didn't end up getting on until 12:30 or maybe even later because our friend was having the worst luck with her horses. The plan was to get on at the barn and hack up to her field (remember our property is huge). One had pulled a shoe, one was ouchy from just having his shoes pulled and the other had blown an abscess! So we while she fooled around with them Emily and I rode through Riley's field (20 acres) to check on their round bale in the shed (they had eaten every scrap) and when I turned him around to head back up the hill, he planted his feet and refused to leave his "home"! Ha! He hasn't been living outside that long, jeepers. So we had a little discussion about whether or not he could stay in his shed, which involved a tiny spanking (he gets sooo offended at the whip), I insisted that we lead the way because I don't want him needing a buddy to get past mental issues like that! We helped our friend pony her abscessed horse back down to the barn and I opted to get off and go give Riley a bath so he'd have time to dry in the sun. The plan was for me to ride Emily's new horse Brody, but by the time they got back from the first set it was getting late and I still had to finish my barn chores. Slight fail, but at least I got my horse ridden and bathed.

New Irish knit! Looking crazy butt high, I swear he's not this downhill!

I also brought my dog Lucy with me on Saturday and while she was incredibly well behaved she was very, very whiny when we came back from the first round of rides and I needed to let her blow of some steam. I took her up to Riley's field (with no horses in it) and let her go crazy in the snow. Nothin better than deep snow to wear out a pup.

Weeeeee! Crazy dog.

Surveying the landscape.

Sunday I left Lucy at home and decided I would go on a nice long hack to try to wear Riley out and then clip him. We had a wonderful hack that included some really fun hill work in Riley's field. There's really good footing around the inside perimeter and the snow had melted enough that the horses could actually move so it was really perfect. I was riding with Emily and her chestnut mare Kiwi who is extremely forward and has an enormous stride. Riley was excellent at keeping up with her and his trot felt amazing in the snow. I was posting so much higher and longer because he was forced to take these lofty steps! That field is going to be terrific in the spring for fitness work (it's at least a full mile all the way around and the hill part that we used is about a half a mile total. We met up again with our fellow friend at the top of the field and headed along the beautiful path that leads through the property. I made a rudimentary map of our trip.

The star is the barn and we headed left from there. The first red loop was our fun trot set through Riley's field, where it ends is where we met our friend at her field, then headed through the woods from there. Her other horse lost his mind when we left because he was alone, but our guys didn't seem to mind. There was a huge tree that had fallen in the woods that too dangerous to jump and we had to scale a crazy embankment around it! Thankfully, all of our hunter paces have paid off and Riley is remarkably sure-footed and doesn't leap off of banks etc. Right after that was a water crossing that was filled with branches and he didn't bat an eye! Hooray! I think living in a field where his water source is a stream has quell his issue with water. When we got to the T intersection we made a right and headed up the road and went exploring a bit on a quieter road which you can sorta tell was a bit of a failure... we actually ended up in someone's driveway (oops) and came back down to the main road (which is also very quiet). Sadly I didn't bring my phone on this hack (because I took my vest off just before I got on) but we had to pass a couple of scary things along the way including a big mushroom facility that had lots of heavy machinery working out front just out of our sight line. I have to say that all three handled everything in stride and Riley only had a few baby moments of getting a little jiggy (like when a herd of horses came galloping up suddenly). We turned bac around after awhile and our friend went one way (back through the woods) and we went back up the road the direct route to the barn. Riley threw another little fit about having to leave his friend, but I pony kicked him out of it. We had another nice trot up the road* to avoid cars from not seeing us and all told we out for about 5 miles. Not a bad little hack for our first real ride back!

*Notice I said "trot up the road" -- yes, Riley can now trot beautifully on asphalt!

He was a bit sweaty when I got back so I toweled his girth area, let him chill for a bit and Emily gave him a tiny dose of ace. Her only experience of clipping him she recalled him acting like a brute so it was just a little bit of a security blanket. He was terrific for most of it, sadly I wasn't able to finish (I got about 85% done)... only his hind end was left and a little around his face but being that the temps are dropping AGAIN and more snow is on the way it's not the worst thing in the world. I gave him a hunter clip and left a saddle pad. I was so happy to shave off the areas where his rain rot has been awful. I'm sure it felt really good for him. Oh, also, he's a lightweight.

SOOOO relaxed.

He was pretty much over it by this stage.

The clippers started to dull, so I'll clean up all the details and finish his behind soon. But to be fair, I haven't clipped a horse since I was a teenager and he doesn't look that bad! I'm sure he'll be so much happier when we're working now, especially since he was sweaty after a mostly walking 5 mile hack.

That's all for now, I have come down with some horrible cold or something and spent the night coughing and sweating out a fever, so I'll check back later for spelling and grammar when I'm not loopy on dayquil.