A Totally Crazy Show!

This year at Scottsdale we had taken more horses then our farm has ever taken to this show before. We hauled down 18, and a client of ours took her own 2 horses down, so that was a total of 20 horses. The first week is for setting up our barn display and working horses. Since we didn't have a truck, we had to borrow D's uncle's truck to get us from the house to the show grounds. Eventually we got 2 rental cars and us girls had our very own, which we usually get the truck to drive but since it was sitting at the Ford dealer, that wasn't going to happen.

The first weekend of the show wasn't too crazy. We had quite a few horses showing, but when they are spread out throughout the day, that makes a big difference. The first really crazy day was on Monday. We had a lot of horses going, and since it had rained the day before, there wasn't anywhere to warm up. The Wendell arena was closed due to sloppy footing, so all classes that show in the Wendell, ended up being held in the outdoor warm up. They also had to use the covered warm up for some classes too. This made it really hard to get the horses worked and ready for their classes. We were literally running from the barn to the arena, to the barn and back to the arena.

During all the craziness and the highlight of my day was when Mikey, at the blog Postcards From Arizona, texted me to say she was there. We had emailed each other before I left for Scottsdale and she said that she would be going to check out the horse show. Once I knew she was there, I would text her to let her know where I was, and by the time she got to the barn, I would be back down at the arena and so forth. I was starting to wonder if I would ever see her! I was down at the covered warm up, and I was keeping an eye out by the temporary Wendell arena, when I saw Mikey. I hightailed it over there, and got to meet Mikey, Mercy and Grandma! Unfortunately I only had a couple minutes before I had to run back to the covered warm up and get back to work. But Grandma did take a picture of us. I just wish I had more time to hang out and chat. If it was the day before or the day after I would have been able to watch a couple classes and get something to eat with them. Mikey~ it was so great getting to meet your and your family!! You are awesome! And Mercy is such a doll! Next year we will have to make sure we get more time, on my end anyways!! Crazy horse shows!



After Monday it quieted down just a little, until Friday came. We had 8 horses showing within 6 classes of each other, which meant that we had 2 horses going in the same classes one right after the other. We literally were running from 7:00 a.m. until 8:00 p.m. But the 8 horses that were showing were all in the afternoon classes and we had horses showing in the Wendell, as well as in the Equidome. Which meant that our trainer D, was showing a horse so then he couldn't warm up his horse that he would be showing in the next class, so our assistant trainer M, would warm up that horse and D would get out of his class, jump on and go straight into another class and that meant that he couldn't coach our clients that were going into classes either. It was absolutely crazy. We had to get all these horses ready for their classes way in advance and we had our clients helping to lead horses down to the arena's. A trainer from another barn sent someone over to us to help with whatever. We had to have numerous gate holds just so we could make it to a class. I didn't think we would make it through the day. But we did. And we got a couple Top Ten's and a Reserve Champion in the English Pleasure Futurity. So even though it was totally crazy and we thought we were going to miss classes, we made them all and did well too!

A snowy mountain on our way home

The last weekend of the show was pretty quiet. We had a couple horses showing on the last 2 days, so we were able to start tearing down the set up to get ready to pack up the horse trailers. Our new truck arrived the last Saturday of the show. D really wanted to be the first one to drive it, so A and I knew that we wouldn't be having our "girl" time on the way home. Once we finished showing on Sunday we worked really hard to get everything torn down and got as much done as we could before going out to dinner one last time. On Monday, we had to finish packing up and loading everything in the horse trailers. We got the horses loaded and pulled out of the show grounds at 4:30 Monday afternoon.

Another snowy mountain on our way home

The whole time we were in Arizona, the weather at home was just terrible. There was lots of rain, wind and tons of snow. We missed out on all the bad weather. Driving home was very uneventful, due to having a brand new truck and the weather was absolutely perfect for driving, again! Not a drop of rain. We did hit snow in the mountains, but the roads were bare. We ended up having D in our truck the whole way home.....we couldn't really get him out of the driver's seat! But don't worry, I did get about 10 hours of driving the new truck!

We arrived back at the farm at 11:30 Tuesday night, and by the time we unloaded horses, unloaded luggage into our cars, I got home at around 12:30 Wednesday morning. When I walked into the house, I let my crazy Aussie's jump all over me. They were so excited to see me and then I went straight to bed and didn't wake up until 11:30 in the morning. It took me the rest of the week to recover. We take the rest of the week off after we get back from the big horse shows. I actually think I am still trying to recover! It's such a long time to be away from home and since we work every day we are there, it really drains on your body physically, as well as mentally!