Wednesday, May 2, 2018

What's Up Wednesday

There's not really a whole lot up this Wednesday. This weekend was cold and wet, and I spent the majority of it on a ladder braiding horses at a few different barns. I did manage to ride everyday but Friday though, so that was... nice? I guess? Jamp's been a total spookasaurus and it's definitely a #firstworldproblem but he's been zero fun to ride. Probably needless to say, but I didn't do any jumping and didn't get any media this week. On the bright side (literally!) the sun is out and the forecast is calling for temps in the 80's this week! So hopefully we're trending toward better days ahead.

Thursday after work, I boogied home to ride Jampy quick and hand walk Rio before heading out to braid my first horse of the weekend. There's a relatively new show barn that opened up about 7 miles from my house, so that's where I was headed. The owner's mom actually has a lesson barn right down the road from me. This horse was the sweetest and pretty much just napped while I worked on him.


I was home by midnight which wasn't too bad considering I had to work the next day. Friday was pouring rain and I was pretty happy I was working and not horse showing. It actually finally stopped by the time I got home from work, but the ring was a muddy mess, and I had three horses to braid at two different barns so I opted out of riding.
I had two manes at the first barn, both chestnuts! So funny to have so many chestnuts to start out. I think normally I braid mostly black manes. Anyway, both horses were good and was done there by around 10.

The next barn was about a half hour away. Normally this horse is one of my favorites to braid! But for some reason he was tossing his head the entire time. Not sure what his deal was. He came out ok though fortunately.
Not my best with him, but decent considering he was a moving target. I heard he was great at the show though, so I guess at least he got the head tossing out of his system?

I got home around 1 am but wasn't worried about it since I could sleep in a bit on Saturday. It was a relatively nice day, overcast, but not too cold. As you already know, I had a fun little shopping spree after I got up. Then rode Jampy who was lazy and spooky all at the same time. No one died though, so that's always good. Both boys got hosed off and enjoyed some hand grazing too since it was fairly nice out.

I had a bunch of horses to braid Saturday night, plus one very early on Sunday. Oye. Who needs sleep anyway?
Saturday I headed back to barn #1 from Friday night. They were having a pizza party when I arrived and was handed a glass of wine. My kind of job right there! I had like a horse and half to do there. (Seriously, the pony was so tiny! But so much mane...).

And then I headed back to the barn near my house. I had three manes and a tail to do there. Two of them had really thick manes which isn't my strength... They came out... well. They got braided.

The bay horse was so odd. He kept sticking his nose on my leg and just smelling me. So weird. I was telling the trainer about it the next day, that I was wondering if he was going to bite me. And she was like nope, he's just really weird! Probably deprived of oxygen when he was a baby. Lol, yeah, I could see that! He was fine though, other than being weird. The paint horse just had SO MUCH mane! It wasn't long enough for me to try and pull it to thin it out, so just did the best I could. He was a good boy at least.
And the last one was the one I had done on Thursday. He came out beautifully. I like his mane, and he's just the sweetest thing ever.

I was done around 1 am. I got home, let the dogs out, and went straight to bed. After a three hour nap, I was back up and heading to the same barn I had just left. They had a customer shipping in that morning that needed a mane braided. I got there at 5:30 and she was already on the cross ties waiting for me. What a good owner!
The mare was a little busy with some head tossing and what not, but not too bad. She didn't take very long, and I was happy to get home, feed the horses, and crawl back into bed for a few hours. It was raining again, so I didn't think the horses would mind a later turnout.
They didn't! I went out to the barn around 10 to let them out and clean stalls. It wasn't really raining any more just cloudy and cool. After barn chores I treated myself to a delicious sandwich from a deli in town before taking care of the boys.
Rio and Jampy both had their manes shortened. They really had gotten out of control. Then Rio enjoyed a snack outside before I rode Jampy. He got some grass after too. Not that he earned it. Eyeroll.
Monday was my birthday! I had the vet coming at 10, so I had decided last week to just take the day off. Silly to go in at like 2. Anyway, the vet didn't actually get to the barn until 10:45. Which was fine because it was absolutely freezing cold in the morning. It was cloudy, damp, and windy. And never got above 49 the entire day. What a disappointing day off! But I digress...
We pulled Rio out first. I figured he would probably be quick and we could stay indoors with him. As I've mentioned before, he's been pretty lame left front and eventually presented with a decent size lump in the tendon area. But I wasn't really sure which tendon/ligament was the issue. I'd been treating him as you would with any such injury: keeping it wrapped and only turning him out in a small medical sized paddock. The lump has been getting smaller, but he's still pretty unsound. I mostly just wanted a professional opinion. My vet says it's a bowed tendon and he sees it fairly often in horses his age. Prognosis is unknown, but likely he'll recover just fine. He said to stay the course for now and we'll see how things progress. I also asked him about his muscle loss. Doc thinks he's looking pretty good despite that, and suggested we put him back on the Winstrol. I probably should have kept up with it all year. Lesson learned. Winstrol is a steroid if you haven't heard of it. Helps with muscle gain/retention in my elderly, handicapped boy.
Jampy was next (obviously, I only have the two at home...). I got on and rode him a bit so doc could see him go and then we did a bunch of flexions. Jamp was all kinds of worked up from the drop in temp, wind, and who knows what else. I had warned my vet that Jamp had been pretty ridiculous lately, but Doc was surprised at how spooky he was. Especially the time he dropped, reared, and spun.
We decided after the flexions to do his hocks like we did last year. But he's actually looking pretty good this year, so we aren't going to do much else unless a problem arises.
sleepy pony, finally not spooking...
 We also talked about some possible things to help with the spookiness. We decided not to try the depo again as it hasn't really helped much in the past. He also did an eye exam. What he found is that there is an abnormality in the shape of his ocular disc. Unfortunately, since my vet isn't an eye specialist, we don't know what this means. Is it causing him trouble with eyesight? Maybe. Is it something that will get worse? Could be. Is it nothing at all? Could be that too! We don't know. So it's not any kind of emergency, but I'm trying to find an ophthalmologist that is ambulatory to come take a look. If I have to, I'll bring him to the clinic. But the closest one to me is over two hours, so I'd prefer to have someone come to us. In the meantime, we'll be spending more time than usual with Mr Lunge Line, and I'll be sure to keep my Gudersitz on hand!

It took awhile for Jampy to wake up from getting his hocks done. When he finally did, I headed out to find a couple more things for my nieces for their birthdays and had some lunch. A friend stopped over with cupcakes (seriously though, my friends are the best!) and then I hung with the Pugs until bed time.
 It wasn't the most exciting birthday, but it was nice to have the day off!

Last night, after cold hosing and hand walking Jampy,
 I celebrated with my mom and my brother/his family. We had pizza and cake, and my niece taught me all about LOL Surprise dolls. What a racket those are! She loves them though, and knows ALL their names.
And then tonight after work, (and after pony tending of course) I'm celebrating with my dad and stepmom. I could get used to these week long birthday celebrations!
Hopefully this weekend I'll get some riding media to share. And it would also be nice if said media involved a nice calm forward moving Jampy rather than one spinning and running away... But like, either is entertaining? We'll just have to see what we get!

How was your week? Do anything fun and exciting? Are you starting to horse show on the weekends? Tell me about it in the comments!

12 comments:

  1. My fingers are cramping just LOOKING at the pictures of all those braids, haha. Great job!

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    1. Thanks! Haha, it was more than I was expecting. They kept adding horses to the list!

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  2. Happy Birthday, also I love your braids, I seriously want to steal you to be my braider on the west coast lol

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    1. Thank you! Well if I'm ever out your way, I'll have to plan for a show weekend!

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  3. Happy Birthday. I love all the braids though I can't imagine doing that much. Or getting up in the morning to do so.

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    1. The morning one was the hardest. I'm much better at staying up late than getting up early. Especially when I had to do both!

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  4. Happy birthday! I feel like so many of the kids toys these days are a racket, but my niece loves all this stuff I've never heard of, too.

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    1. Marketing people these days are really good at what they do! These little dolls are pretty cute though.

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  5. Happy bday to you! And you will have arthritis one day from all that braiding. They are gorgeous braids though. All of them. So envious of your ability to do that. Whew.....

    That was a very very busy week. I need a nap after reading all that LOL! :)

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    1. Thank you!
      Probably carpal tunnel too. I don't do it that often though, so hopefully I'll be ok. Not sure how the pros manage it though!

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  6. I know I've said this butttttt I'm so impressed with your braiding!!! I need to get that good. Seriously, so impressed!

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    1. Awww... shucks... Thank you :)
      My parents never let me get my horses braided professionally, so I've been at it since I was 9!

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