Diamond Jubilee & Meeting Bloggers

The Carl Hester clinic didn’t happen for me this weekend, which I was kind of bummed about (serious frowny face). I got the hefty vet bill from Valeria’s illness after foaling and couldn’t in good faith spend more money. I did hit up the Diamond Jubilee Horse Show with L from Viva Carlos and Alex from thehorsedream. It was fun to meet up with local bloggers and chat about horses. They were both really cool (no lies) and I enjoyed the steady stream of conversation that went on the whole day. There wasn’t a single Iberian horse at the show (all the Iberian classes were canceled) which was a shame. I should have entered Aria. We could have been swimming in blue satin. Haha.

Morning yoga.

We did spend a lot of time towards the second half of the show picking the line-up and without boasting too much, the 3 of us should get paid to judge Morgan/Saddlebred shows. Our track record for correctly picking 1^st and 2^nd place means we’re basically experts now.

After seeing all the really cool show clothing I kind of regret how boring my dressage outfit is going to be. I was also really surprised by how many American Saddlebred Horse farms San Diego had. I mean, I knew about Scripps Miramar Saddlebreds but I had no clue we had such a booming ASB community. When I think of San Diego and horses I think of thoroughbreds. Who knew?

Smooch.

I definitely foresee more hangouts in the future with L and Alex. Maybe even a harebrained trail ride with two baby horses and Scarlett. Not sure I’m feeling that lucky…maybe just some arena jaunts first. 🙂

I’m sure you probably want an update on Catalina! She’s turning into more of a moose every day. For comparison, here is a picture taken the morning after she was born.

And here is a picture of her at 3.5 weeks.

And another picture I took on Sunday at a month old.

For real, eating is the only time I can get these shots.

I’ve installed a couple feeders to help her eat since she doesn’t reach the ground well. She doesn’t like bending down and was dropping to her knees to graze but lately she’s found a new system that works way better.

She’s much surer on her feet now but I’m still awaiting the elusive trot that she never seems to want to perform. She has, however, perfected whatever this gait is.

We’re still working on not chewing on humans. She thinks a fun game is seeing if she can sneak in a quick bite and get out before I can react to correct her. Working with her on leading goes well on occasion but often devolves into hold-on-to-the-rope-while-baby-frolics-on-the-end-of-the-lead. She also gets really, really mad if I don’t let her chew on the lead rope. I would really like to attach a lead rope to her and leave it on her for a few days to wear off the novelty but Valeria will sit and chew on the rope until she destroys it. Basically, I need to find a baby boot camp or something because she’s smarter than I am!