Quick update

Well I haven't posted for a wee while and thought I would give a bit of an update. It's the middle of winter here, we've just passed the shortest day and I have planted my garlic. It's been really dry, which is unusual, and the temperature is dropping. We have had a few mornings with hard frosts and the mercury below zero. I wasn't too happy to pull out my winter wool riding apron to discover the mice have been snacking on it all summer long! grrr... they have even chewed all the wool off the covered buttons. It's a lovely wool/cashmere blend that I bought off eBay and it is so warm on the frosty mornings. I'm going to have to cover it in patches and I will look like I am schooling with a patch work quilt as a knee blanket...

I managed to talk a local saddle fitter into repacking my sidesaddle. He is originally from the UK and has done a fair bit of work on sidesaddles but hasn't touched them for years, mainly because of the crap that people find here and then expect him to make it work. So I traded outrageously on my neighbour's good standing in the local equestrian community and he said he would look at it, as a favour to her. It also helped that it is a new saddle and only needed a repack. Although he did tell me that I was responsible if he developed night terrors from having to look at a sidesaddle again! lol

So that is done and it has made a huge difference BUT it is still twisting to the left at the front. I suspect Molly is like Leila's Hattie and her shape just isn't compatible with the billet placement, so there's probably nothing I can do about it. I also suspect I am unconsciously putting too much weight into the stirrup and pulling the saddle over myself. I need to have an experiment and ride without a stirrup to see if it still happens, but I do think Molly's round shape is the larger portion of the problem.

I am seriously thinking about starting to put some money aside for a decent sidesaddle for my youngster. Honey will be 3 this Christmas and I will send her away to be broken in. I figure I will start her under sidesaddle when she is about 6, so that gives me 3 years to save my pennies. I *really* want a Laura Dempsey sidesaddle, they look devine. But by the time I factor in the exchange rate, shipping, insurance and the local taxes I will get hit with here (another 25%) it could cost me nearly $10,000 NZD. That's a serious amount of money just for a sidesaddle :(

I am going to wait and see what Honey is like undersaddle and also decide how serious I want to be about this dressage thing. If I really want to have a crack at the NZ para-dressage squad with Honey then I definately need to spend the money and get her a custom sidesaddle, as I will need to be competitive at about level 4/5 to have a chance. Anyway those are the long term goals that I toss around in my head at night.

I have decided to carry on pottering around with Molly. So many people have told me to sell her, that she's a dog and not worth my time (because she is tense, highly reactive and anxious) and there have been many tearful days here contemplating her sale. I did advertise her and pulled her ad after just 10 minutes, I couldn't do it. She is my sidesaddle pony, she's fantastic to handle and very respectful of my damaged joints, and so darn smart aside that she keeps me on my toes. Riding is my physical therapy (which most people don't realise) and she keeps me moving and active. That is worth far more to me than a few ribbons.

So that is all that is happening. The next dressage competition is 16 July and I need to decide in the next week whether I am going to enter or not :)

More earthquakes

We had a magnitude 5.5 at lunch time and then a magnitude 6.0 at 2.20pm. There is more damage in town and buildings down, 50,000 houses have lost power and liquifaction is back again. The kids' school closed early, they were all out on the playing field when I got there at 2.30pm. So many of the wee kids were in tears, they were so scared, its so heart breaking. The cracks in the house get wider with each quake, but at least the stables are fine!

And to top it off Rob can't even come home, as we have the ash cloud from the South American volcano over us as well and all flights are grounded. When will Mother Nature leave us alone?  :(

Big Bertha

I can't believe I actually forgot to mention that I *cough* acquired another sidesaddle! I now have two, I guess that is how collections start? lol

It is incredibly hard to find sidesaddles in New Zealand, there just isn't the number of saddles down here. I had toyed with buying myself a western sidesaddle for trail riding, but then I spotted this one for sale up in the North Island. It has been recently refurbished (so didn't require any work) which was a bit of a deciding factor.

It has been christened Big Bertha as it is just enormous, I feel like a child in it, but she is ohhhh so comfy :) Its not a sidesaddle that I would do dressage in, I can't "feel" Molly like I can in my Tidbold sidesaddle, but its a great second sidesaddle (and did I mention how comfortable it is?), and I like that I now have a sidesaddle I can lend out to interested people who want to have a go, since nobody else down here will do that.

The girth is too short unfortunately, it was a struggle to get it in the last hole on each side. I have a saddle fitter coming shortly and hopefully he will be able to extend it on one side, to give us some extra length to play with.

I would be interested in any opinions as to age. It has a cut back head and a fairly level seat. It has an ordinary roller stirrup bar, but a two position leaping head, which I thought was a fairly "modern" invention? And I've not seen it on an old sidesaddle that wasn't a O.N.E.S before. The leaping head also collapses, and has an intriguing square ring on the end. What was the purpose of the collapsible head and what could the wee ring be for?

Collapsible leaping head and a small square ring on the end

The saddle is quite long, 22" from in front of the upright pommel. And the pommels themselves are huge, I can only imagine what sort of imposing figure it was made for!

Of chickens and vegetables...

Winter is nearly upon us, and my sidesaddle desperately needs a repack - and I'm still trying to talk somebody into doing it for me! So I'm going to digress today, as I have been putting the veggie patch to bed. Plus I lust after the set-up over at Too Many Tomatoes :)

I have 6 beds that are 1 metre by 5 meters. 4 are laid out radiating off the central statue (making a big X) and then 2 on each side. I also have two large beds either side of the shed. One is my asparagus bed (to the right of the shed) and the other (to the left of the shed) is going to have globe artichokes.

On the other side of the hedge is the chicken run, the pond and it will also be the orchard and has the larger veggie beds and my berry house. I decided to let the chickens free range as their run gets so muddy in winter. This is how they repaid me... this USED to be the winter veggies - silverbeet, cauliflower, kale, cabbages, broccoli and pumpkin...

The culprits!

We will eventually put a chicken proof fence around the outside of the bed to stop them getting in. Since they have trashed it anyway I am letting them scratch everything up, as they do a fantastic job of turning the soil over. They are like little rotary hoes.

Hubby built me a berry house last summer, so at least they can't get in there. 

The fruit trees are coming in July and I am planning on planting them into large 4WD tyres. It gets quite wet out here because of the pond, and I want to raise the trees up a bit. Plus we can run the irrigation on top of the tyres, and hopefully hubby won't run it over when he mows... :)

Show Report

Well I will admit to my reservations at 6.30am, wandering out to the paddock in the dark (and freezing cold!) trying to distinguish Molly from Jasmine with no torch when they are both the same size with the same blaze. I ended up counting white socks in the muted moonlight to make sure I had the right horse! lol

And dispite the apprehension I had, that there might be a bit of a fuss, the show organisers, judges and competitors were lovely. I had heaps of hands to hold Molly while I got my apron organised and people were just so supportive and interested. Not at all what I expected from the serious DQs and the registered judges (who can be terribly harsh in their judging).

I didn't warm in for long, my saddle is seriously sliding to the left now, the panel looks quite deflated, and I didn't want to risk going too far over. So we did about 15 mins w/t/c and then chilled out waiting our turn. 

Molly put in an average performance, probably much the same as how we go at home. However she was obedient and is actually starting to listen to me now, so I was thrilled with both tests and finished up with a big smile on my face. It just "feels" so much better sidesaddle!

We came away middle of the field in both classes (6th & 7th out of 15) and scored 60% and 62%.

Her trot is still tense & rushy and our canter departs were muddled and need to be a lot snappier. So we have heaps to work on at home through winter and there is scope for us to make some big improvements.

Can I call myself a SSDQ now? :)

I did it.

I stuck my entry into the mailbox :)

We will be doing level 1, tests 2 and 5.

The good news is that neither test has that horrid 20m stretchy posting trot circle. The bad news is the weather has completely packed up here, it is wet and miserable, and I can't ride. So I'm not sure how we will go with no work! I can't use my neighbour's arena when it is wet and the grass in the paddock is too slippery. I'm going to have a go at lunging Molly in the driveway...

Do I or don't I...?

Coming up at the end of the month is a local dressage day. I have spoken to the organiser and she is happy for me to ride sidesaddle based on my para-classification. So IF I enter it would be our "official" level 1 sidesaddle debut.

But I don't know if I want to do it now... I have a major case of cold feet. I know people will stare at us and I just don't feel good enough. On the other hand winter is fast approaching and this could be our last show of the season. Plus numbers at this time of the year are much lower, so it would be a much quieter/less pressure debut than if I wait until Spring.

Hmmm.... I have to send off my entry this week if I am going... so do I or don't I...?