Old Habits

/ Ashley Wingert / 2 Comments

Funny how some habits end up deeply ingrained.  Mimi and I have one of those, a carry-over from our show days.

When I was showing, I always wore spurs, for both English and Western.  Not because she was lazy, or because she needed “punishment,” but because it was one of those little things that differentiated “work time” from “play time.”  When the spurs were on, that meant “Buckle down and work.”  Rail work, schooling, things that required her to be “on” and performing.  No spurs meant we could both relax and enjoy: trail riding, gymkhana, casual play days.

Her responsiveness coupled with using spurs also meant I barely had to move my legs to ask for a gait change…always a plus when it came to equitation classes.

To this day, she still does her best arena work when I slip on a pair of spurs.  We can both work without them, but why make things that much more difficult?  Especially when it comes to arena work, something neither of us particularly love anymore.

Do-It-Yourself Photo Shoot

/ Ashley Wingert / 4 Comments

Can a girl ever have too many pairs of shoes boots?

Nope.

Especially when they’re the right pair.

This is just from the last few years, and doesn’t include the couple pairs currently in use down at the barn.   Some of my earlier pairs have since been salvaged for parts and pieces.  The above pairs range from “barely worn with less than 100 miles on them” to “use only as a last resport because the toes are looking well-ventilated.”

All boots are matched up (with a couple of random sparesies, like the errant green one) and they fit really neatly in one of these Rubbermaid boxes:

As the post title would suggest, I had a bit of fun with a Do-It-Yourself photo shoot.  I needed some shots of the boots, and didn’t really have any that hadn’t been taken for purposes of “this is how they should fit.”  You know, the kind of photo that involves hooves, horse legs, and barn floor.  Even if they are cute pony hooves. 

But I’ve got a great backyard for photo-taking, even if I can’t exactly fit a horse in it. 

Somehow, that didn’t slow me down much.

As seen on Facebook.
Where are your boots taking you this weekend?

Procrastinators R Us

/ Ashley Wingert / 11 Comments

It’s February, and I just got around to taking down the Christmas lights.  I mean, just, as in, ten minutes ago.

I tend to procrastinate.  A bit.

It sometimes carries over to my hoof trimming duties.  In a perfect world, I trim Mimi every 2-3 weeks.  That way, I don’t have to ever take off too much at one time.

But sometimes, it gets pushed out to four weeks.

And then I have to deal with this:

Ack…toes.  And Pony Heels.  Front hoof.

On the surface, they’re not too bad.  Underneath?  Ew.  Winter Feet.

Hind hooves.  More heels.  Not seen is the side flare.

Ever seen the movie, “The Neverending Story”?  Great movie if you like fairy tales.  Which I do.  But I digress.  The point of that is that keeping up on Mimi’s heels is my own personal Neverending Story.  Just when I get it under control, it starts all over again…

And she still has a weird growth line on the right side, just in front of her heel area, where she blew out that abscess.  Y’know, a year and half ago.

Deep frog clefts, made all the worse because it’s really difficult to get in there and trim down her bars, even with my handy little bonsai trimmers.  Part of me has become compulsive about wanting to get all that crap outta there, since I don’t want a repeat of the abscess incident, which I suspect was caused by something getting up under those bars.

White line.  We have separation.  Part of that is coming from the fact that she lives in a stall for part of the day and enjoys walking through her pee spots.

Bit I think a lot of what I’m seeing is the post-vaccine detritus that comes out in their hooves.  Shots given in late October…about three months later…yup, that’s probably the worst of the post-vaccine natural reaction finally growing out.  But that’s worthy of an entirely separate blog post and why I reluctantly given only the very necessary vaccines these days.

But after I got off my procrastinating duff, we got this:

Fronts.  Toes seriously dubbed back.  Heels lowered.  A bit too
low, since she was a little ouchy.  Impatience + procrastination
don’t make good trimming buddies.

Right front.  White line tighter.  Little less stuff crammed in there.
Ignore the weird chunks out of her frog.  My bonsai nippers are
like mini half-rounds and nip out little half-moon chunks.

Hinds.  Not as dramatic, unless you look from the front, where
it is Flare-B-Gone.

Only negative was, as I said, she did get a bit ouchy in the following days.  Which makes me feel bad, even if I know she’s a bit of a pain-wimp.  It is my first time making her ouchy in the two and half years I’ve been trimming her, so I guess that’s something.  And with our concrete-hard winter pasture right now, it’s understandable why she might be feeling all the little rocks and pebbles.

“The Princess and the Pea”, anyone???

Just when I’ve got things figured out…

/ Ashley Wingert / 3 Comments

You would think, after 15 years together, I’d have my pony figured out.

Except not.

I’ve written in the past about just how dead-set she is against bits.  Have yet to find one she really likes, blah-blah-blah, she goes best in her s-hack, so on and so forth.

Of course she had to prove me wrong yesterday.  I’ve made mention of my bit collection and how it is almost physically impossible for me to get rid of any bits I own, and so always have plenty of bits floating around for various experimental purposes and kicks.

Just for some of those kicks, yesterday I pulled out the Myler Full Cheek snaffle I own.  I used this bit on her quite a few years ago, when we were first starting out in NATRC.  I don’t remember if it was good or bad.  The couple of ride photos I have of her in it, she’s not tugging and fussing and pulling faces.  Always a good sign.

Exhibit A: (It’s hard to see, but trust me, it’s the full-cheek snaffle.  It’s a picture of a picture, since my computer ate my flash drive that had all of the images of my ride pics I had scanned and I wasn’t going to tear apart my ride scrapbook to rescan ’em all.)

Descanso Desperados NATRC
October 2002
Photo by Cheryl Erpelding

Especially when this is the alternative:

Chino Hills NATRC
April 2003
Photo by Ray Brezina

Safe to say she doesn’t like the loose-ring, French-link snaffle.  Especially since I have another several pics that look almost exactly like above.

So yesterday, out comes the Full Cheek again.  And she decided it was perfectly acceptable.

Of course.

She loves likes tolerates the one bit I don’t like to use.  (Something about those full cheek pieces getting hooked on things like belts, belt loops, bridle cheekstraps, water troughs…get the picture?)

What I’d like to know is if it’s the bit, or the mouthpiece.  It’s the Myler Comfort Snaffle with Twist.  The slightly rigid aspect of the comfort snaffle means it’s pretty solid in her mouth…not a lot of play or wiggle, so she fusses with it less. 

*shrug*

Apparently she likes to keep things interesting.

Innocence