Better A Late Post Than Never!

Dazzle was a shining star for Karol and her friends! We took pictures and Melissa rode her in the arena at Red Barn to show them what she could do Dressage-wise and then they loaded her into a shiny trailer and headed off! They made it home safe to Northern WA the next day.

Everyone keeps asking me if I'm sad, which of course I am because she's an AWESOME horse, but I can't begrudge her the new wonderful home she's won herself. Karol is going to spoil her completely! Turn out in a pasture, all new blankets and equipment; she's going to be in horsey heaven with her.

So, Dazzle has gone to a better place (really!) and Spotless should be home from training in a week or so and then Melissa will be riding him till he sells.

In baby-news, Desmond hadn't budged and wasn't a good candidate to manually turn him into a good birthing position so yesterday I went in for a c-section. In the pre-op room my Dr. did a last ultrasound and he had turned himself around! So I got to come home! So no baby yet, but I am starting to have little painless contractions and they haven't quit, so hopefully within the next few days I'll have a baby!

I've decided the best way to encourage a baby to come is to ignore him, so Melissa and I are going to look at a Paint gelding for me tonight at the fair-grounds. Should be fun, he sounds perfect, so hopefully he's as nice as he looks in his pictures. If we love him tonight we might get to bring him home on trial for a few days which would be really nice.

If the Paint gelding doesn't work out and Spotless sells, a friend I ran into Wednesday night offered to half-lease a gelding she has to me to share. So it looks like I won't have to be horse-less long, whether I own one or lease one I'll get to be riding somehow.

Dazzle Visits Red Barn

I braved driving the stupid-truck-I-hate and took Dazzle to Red Barn so Melissa could ride her in between classes. She hasn't been there in about 3 months and it was really windy. She wanted to jig at first and just stare at the horses in the pastures, but after 2 or 3 minutes she settled right down and got to work. Melissa was giggling with joy at her reachy trot and quite pleased with her canter work which was probably the best we've ever gotten from her. She actually called it "uphill"!!! It was lovely to watch. Not rushy, not on the forehand, controlled, it was awesome. In a 20 meter circle her head popped up about 3 times, meaning, she was starting to get consistent! She was on the bit most the time, listening to Melissa's leg and letting her keep her in or out as the circle needed. She got the correct lead both directions with no extra effort on Melissa's part. AND she wasn't even sweating by the end of it. She looked relaxed, thoughtful; not annoyed, no grimacing or swishy tail. Not spooky, even in the wind. I wish I'd taken video! I plan to take her back tomorrow, so I'll take my camera if that works out. Melissa hadn't ridden her since my last post, so it'd been a while.

She's also shed out most the way, no more wooly-mammoth hair. She's gained weight in the last couple weeks; before her girth went to 3 holes each side and today it was nice and snug on 2! So, she's looking good and seems to feel good. I'm so glad! She should show off nicely on Saturday.

1st Ride Back and Sales News

Melissa finally had a chance to put a ride on Dazzle. Her class schedule is crazy this quarter; really heavy classes with literally 5 or 6 hours of homework some evenings. So, Dazzle ended up with 3 weeks off other than a couple lungings from me that were short the first week Melissa was gone. We spent about 15 minutes grooming because she is shedding like CRAZY! I have a fly sheet on her as they help them shed out but it also makes it so they can't rub the hair off on the ground, so she had hair just sitting on her. It's sure fun to pull piles of hair off of them, see the clouds of white fluff. She LOVED it, it must have been itchy. She looks kind of purple now with her winter coat almost gone. It really makes her red mane and tail stand out.

Melissa lunged her and she was awesome! She didn't even have a bounce into the canter transition to show she'd been off work for 3 weeks. She got right down to business and was her lazy self. haha. Melisa had to push her to canter at first, even though she'd been in her paddock for 3 weeks. I love this horse.

She got on and did walk/trot only because they were sprinkling the field and flooding half my arena so she had to lunge and ride in the small section with rocks in it and didn't want to canter her in that. She did great under-saddle too, no silliness, just happy to be working and getting attention.

On the lunge-line she was even starting to LIFT her BACK through transitions! That is something we've been working towards for months. It's starting to click I think! She's much more forward now, so now they're focusing on getting more reach from behind. That's the trickiest because you don't want more speed, just more push.

In other news, the lady that is coming to see Dazzle on the 17th plans to bring her trailer and take Daz home with her! I'm excited about this home because it sounds like exactly what I wanted for her; she'd get to continue in her Dressage and finish her COA and she'd get to continue trail-riding and finish her Distance ROM. It sounds like a potential forever home with someone that would be a good match for Dazzle. So, I'm praying nothing changes in the next two weeks because horse-selling is so traumatic. It's hard to put a life you're worked so hard for and are attached to in someone else's hands!