♣Ambitious♣

Y'all still with me? Okay, so, ya know those images I've been posting from my March bareback ride? I'm talkin' about these bad boys. That ride was therapeutic in more ways than one. First, it was directly after my really difficult lesson on Blackjack. Second, it was maybe an after Satin and her owner took a hard tumble in the ring, and I had to call 911 for the first time. They were riding alone, and no one saw what happened, but the gist is that Satin lost her balance while trying to take a tight turn after a fence, hit the ground herself, and sent her owner flying. Luckily, nothing ended up broken. Satin walked away covered in dirt, and her owner fortunately did not have a concussion. I was super shaken up by everything, so the bareback ride basically became a necessity. Fast forward two weeks or so from then, Trainer G asked me if I would like to start riding Satin. We're more or less trying to figure out what caused the trip. Satin is known to trip when out of s...

  I am ridiculously behind on monthly vlogs, but here is February! Song: "Dreamin" by 53 Thieves. I've been loving this group lately :)

After reading a bit more on Figueras Polo Stable and seeing the overall positive reception that it gets even among traditional horse people, I wanted to keep highlighting stables that are different but also functional. As I said in the last post, horse barns are incredibly mundane in their fundamentals. There's no harm in having fun once you've established the basic layout. This brings me to this Chilean horse stable by 57STUDIO. As of late, I've been thinking deeply about what I want my future to look like with horses and decided that I wanted to go the route of actually owning a farm. In terms of overall aesthetics, this horse barn is nearly in line with what I would envision my future self building. In reality, this is an incredibly simple manifestation of the equally simple layout that is essential to horse barns. I think what makes this a hit for me is the material pallet. The wood for the stall fronts and the metal posts are both new, but the roof tiles were re-used ...

It should be clear by now that my relationship with Blackjack needs some R&R. On the one hand, we do seem to have a good time when we're just plodding around and not doing anything serious at all. On the other hand, I can't do a hunter derby wearing a halter and a leopard print bareback pad. Correction: a halter, a bareback pad, and a mohawk I went out with the intention to try a different approach to our rides. The biggest thing for me was taking the pressure off and keeping everything straightforward and simple. His schooling bit has also been swapped from a Kimberwick to a Pelham on just the curb ring, essentially creating a Tom Thumb. With that in mind, I wasn't really keen on touching his face much either. It kind of helps since that was also one of the issues I was dealing with during my last lesson. I decided on a whim to try a new warmup. Because of my own balance issues, I try not to start my ride by going endlessly in one direction then switching to the other ...

A couple years ago, I posted some drawings on here for a barn that I designed based off of some farms I saw while flying over Texas. I posted those knowing that they would likely make no sense to people who aren't in my field. Which was okay with me! Because ultimately, I just love talking about and designing equine facilities. Plus, at that point, I really wanted to post about it, but I didn't have the time to make the drawings extra pretty. Well, fast forward a couple of years, I had time to make the drawings extra pretty! And I modeled it! And rendered it! I decided to be a Big Girl Architect ™ and put an actual column grid. Although, in hindsight, those columns are probably waaaay too small. Good thing I'm in school for architecture and not engineering, lol. The arena here ended up being relatively small, 72' x 168' at its largest points. The grid though makes this easy to scale up (or down). I designed it as something that could be phased in how its built and ...

To recap, my goals this year have been focused entirely around building good, healthy habits. Next year, I'll certainly feel much better about jumping back into specific riding goals, but for now, as my life approaches major turning points, this seems to work much better. Workout Once Per Week Absolutely not. Two Point, Stretching, & No Stirrup Work Every Ride I definitely jumped in with both feet on this one for absolutely no reason. Warming up at the two-point has made a valiant return, but I could go a little harder with it. I noticed that I struggle with it more when I'm riding in my trainer's saddle. It has normal fillis irons while I've been riding in my own wide footbed irons for several years now. I'm doing my best to push through the foot pain and not be a spoiled brat about it. The no-stirrup work is kind of meh. It's one of those things that was easy to make myself do in the past, but now? My aged body is battling a young mind. I have been the mos...