I'm Alive!

I have officially survived the crazy show season!! There are only a couple more shows left, but not until Canadian Nationals in August (I am not going to Canadian Nationals) and U.S. Nationals in October. Can you believe it? I might actually get some time to spend with my own horses? And maybe spend some time with my OH? Play with my crazy Aussie's? Do some house work and yard work? Go trail riding? Is any of that possible now? I sure hope so!

The last regional show of the year was pretty crazy. We ended up having a total of 34 horses at the show. That is a lot of horses. Plus summer decided to make it's first real appearance of the year and the temps hit 95+ degrees! Oh how I hate the humidity in this state! I have never sweated so much in my life, and my back and shoulders hadn't quite healed from that nasty sunburn, so I had a nasty heat rash on my shoulders and upper back. I have never had problems with the sun or heat. I do not have sensitive skin! But apparently my body couldn't handle the sun and heat this time.

We had a really good show. Almost all of our horses made Top 5's and tons of Grands and Reserves.

Here I am leading a horse back to the barn after a class. Photo courtesy of Pony Girl.



My sister was able to stop in one day. She hung out and watched classes one afternoon and evening. She also went and bought me lunch/dinner, I think that was the day I didn't get to eat until 5:00 p.m. It was so busy.

I also got to meet Mikael from Rising Rainbow Arabians. She stopped in to say hi on Saturday. I wish I could have talked to her more, but we were just starting to pack up what we wouldn't need that night, then we had around 10 more horses showing. It was great getting to meet her, and I am sure we will meet again and hopefully we will get a chance to talk a lot more!




I was supposed to go to the show grounds on Sunday to finish packing, but we had so much packed on Saturday evening, that I was told to just stay home. On Saturday night, we did haul all the horses home that were left at the show grounds. So we hauled them home at 11:30 p.m. I think I got home around 12:30 in the morning. I went to bed after I ate something and I must have turned my alarm off, because I didn't wake up until 12:30 in the afternoon. I guess that is what happens when you only get 12 hours of sleep in 4 days and work 16-18 hours a day. Wow. I was one tired girl!

My OH had went to pick up a huge load of local grass hay on Saturday evening, so we went to get more on Sunday afternoon. It is really nice hay, the bales are huge for local grass and we couldn't be happier. We have 200 bales sitting in storage right now. That is a huge relief! We have been paying $14.00 a bale for grass hay that is hauled in from across the state. We paid $7.00 a bale for the local hay over the weekend. This local hay is equivalent to the $14.00 hay. But a much better price. I just wish we had more hay storage, because we would buy more right now if we could. But we will continue to buy it throughout the summer, so hopefully we will have enough to get us through the winter.

I don't have to go back to work until Friday. It will be nice having a few days off. I haven't had many of those, so I kinda forgot what they are like. I am hoping to get a trail ride in this week too! I also have some exciting news, well, it is very exciting to me anyways!! My arena has been in place for around 3 years now, and I have never been able to afford to get any footing in it. What I have in there now is just very hard, compact dirt. I hate it. I am always so worried that one of my horses will injure themselves. Even dragging it doesn't loosen it at all. It is just too compact. So my OH called around to check on sand prices, and WOW! Sand is so expensive!! There was no way that I was going to get footing in my arena at the price of $24.00 a yard. It would have cost me over $1600.00 to put sand in my arena! Then the next day, my OH called me to say he found a deal on sand. He could get it to me delivered for the entire arena for only $580.00. Now that is what I call a screaming deal! So I can afford to get footing in my whole arena, finally! They are delivering it first thing tomorrow morning! Our neighbor is going to bring his tractor over and spread it for us. I should be riding in my new footing this weekend! Yeah!

I feel like I am so behind on everything since I haven't been home much in the last month and a half. It will feel really good to catch up on what needs to be done around here and hopefully I can get some "me" time too!