I have worked 5 different jobs in the past 3 weeks...YES, FIVE in THREE WEEKS! But funny thing- I am still broke as can be. Okay so maybe one job is an unpaid internship and one job is to work off my board but that leaves 3 others! Oh, the life of a horse lover- work your butt off to consistently be poor...all for your horse to have the best life possible.
I picked up a job grooming for another trainer out of the Atlanta area (lets call her SF). She is awesome and so great to work for. I originally was supposed to just work one show for her but they loved me so much I was asked to go to Tryon with them AND now they have planned for me to go groom at Auburn in July and at Pony Finals... and the week before! So excited. Tryon was two weeks ago and I figured this was going to be one of my only chances to show Bryce. I was nervous because I didn't know how J would feel about me taking him with another trainer to a show but she was ALL for it! She was very encouraging and insisted that it would be good for him [SO thankful]. The show went great! We did the .85 training jumpers again and jumped clear so we got a blue ribbon. It was extremely helpful to get insight from a jumper trainer since J sticks with hunters. SF helped me realize, even though I have light hands, they tend to work as if they were heavy. I guess there is something in my hands but I tend to make horses frame up and back off a lot and the 3-ring I was using plus my hands backed off Bry way too much for the jumpers.
The Atlanta Summer Classic has been this week. J had 14 horses on the list so on Monday morning, she asked me if I could come up Weds-Friday to help out. WELL, next thing you know she added Bryce to the list and has let me work all this week and is letting me work next week so Bryce can show. BEST. THING. EVER. I am at the point where he needs to show as much as possible so on my budget, I am taking every opportunity I can to make that happen. We showed on Thursday in the .85 and .95 jumpers. They were the best trips we have ever had together. The .85 was flawless and unfortunately I made two rider errors in the .95 and rode Bryce to a nothing of a spot. I didn't see a distance and second guessed myself so Bryce ended up jumping from basically under the jumper but he jumped like a spider monkey so he wouldn't knock a rail. He is amazing. Two clear rounds= two blue ribbons. YESSS!!
We are at the point where I don't need to "carry" and "baby" B around the courses. We have opened his step so much where he can get the horse steps in the in-and-outs. It is now up to me to adjust my riding to him and let him just do his thing but still be there for him when/if he needs my help. There is still one issue- his left change. He just kind of forgot it. He always lands right and so his right change is perfection, so over a year he has just forgotten about his left change. We have tried many, many, many, many (I could keep going) times to try to remind him and he just can't get it. I talked to a couple of people, my vet, the farrier, and googled it...our solution- back shoes only. Since Bryce is barefoot and has wonderful feet, we don't feel like he needs any front shoes. We are hoping the back shoes will add that extra boost to get the change. I can tell you now- he springs off the ground when he jumps. So the shoes so far?? So good!
Still so much to come so I will definitely make sure I make time to update :]
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