Jersey Boy goes to the head of the class!

Happy New Year to everyone!

The new year hasn’t changed a whole lot at this end – to me it is a non-stop learning process – about how to manage horses, how to show them, deal with pre-purchase exams, saying Goodbye – saying Hello! and keep the routine as routine as possible!

Three lovely CANTER horses went to their forever homes in the past few weeks. Huge congratulations to Mari from Southern Pines, NC, Madeleine from Pinehurst, NC and Traci, from Yadkinsville, NC  who welcomed Sonrea, King Remda and Lord Greystoke into their lives respectively! So far – all reports are of stellar 4 year olds who are happy, quiet and calm and loving every minute of building new relationships with their new people.  It translates the BEST in their own words!

Traci’s update about Tarzan:

Hi Suzanne,

Merry Christmas! Wanted to give you the up date on Tarzan. So I got him home on Tuesday and he was very good. Decided to go ahead and ride him on Wed. The wind was howling and it was a bit cool. I hand walked him around the ring one time and then decided to get on. He was much more forward than when I tried him down there, but still a very good boy. There was one other horse in the ring with us. I thought the company might be good for him. We walked trotted and canter both directions. I never got the floppy ears, but that would have been asking for a lot on his first day. He was a very good boy and I am so proud of him. So today I got to ride again. The wind was blowing just to hard on Thursday to ride. I had company once again. We started out in the ring and did our walk trot and canter. Once again he was more forward but also more relaxed this time. We decided to head out into the field to walk out there. He was sooooooo good. He wanted to go first and was very brave. His head was up and he was looking around and sniffing the air alot. I have to say that he really feels like a big horse when he is out in the field and walking out. Wow what a stride! We walked all over and he didn’t mind our little pond. But when we got to the jumps in the field he was looking at them hard. So I told him we had to go and touch them. He was sooo good once again. Very brave but telling me he was unsure. I just tried to sit deep and wrap my legs around him to encourage him to go take a look at everything. He try’s so hard and has such a big heart. As we were walking back to the barn he was picking up the pace. I thought we were back at the races, at the walk. HA HA! Wow what a big stride he has. I can’t wait to see what it will be like when he has muscle and is strong. He is a very good boy and we are getting to know each other. I will have to get use to him being more forward. Oh, and he loves going over the poles on the ground in the ring. And he even tired to eat one of the flowers off the flower box. That was just to funny.

Thanks again for all your help and have a very Merry Christmas. I hope all the horses are well. Take care and I will send you more up dates soon.

Traci

And from Madeleine:

Had the BEST ride on Remda today !! Hate to be a bore…but ,I’m still happy….both of our light bulbs went off and we figured out how to get what we wanted !!! Its been a long time for me and brand new to him…. but now, I get an arena length of round, relaxed down, back up trot ( hard to post to on him) and he got me to stop asking with my hands. 🙂 He just prefers very little contact, so I get it now, and I will work with that. Then, we decided we would head straight into the woods for our first trail ride . We went out alone and no problems ! He marched right ahead and loved it ! What a good guy 🙂 I’m very lucky.

I can’t tell you how happy it makes me – and how rewarding it is – to read these words about our horses. Such lovely animals, such AWESOME new owners and partners for them. YAY!

Vida, the filly formerly known as Frita/Rita, is going awesome.  Not only is she a joy to work with, but has the brain we all dream of. Oh, did I mention she’s put together also like a dream? And moves awesome, too. She’s just hacking out now- and by that I mean w-t-c in the woods, through water and, um, in the dark! Hey, when you hack out at 4:30 in January it sometimes gets dark before you get home! She’s terrific, and we’re very excited for her future.

Tommy and Hurry – the two horses Allie brought down from Maryland a few weeks ago =are doing great! They weren’t the ones she planned on bringing – they were just a few weeks off the track – but the lifestyle of turnout and snow wasn’t agreeing with them. She decided to bring them down to our warmer climate – and to where we could keep a close eye on them.  First was to pull their racing plates, which made their feet WAY more comfortable. Then put blankets on so they didn’t have to work so hard to keep warm. In two weeks they both have light in their eyes and are happy and packing on the pounds. Both are 3 year old geldings, adorable boys, and in a month or two will be starting their retraining. Maybe sooner since they are getting fatter and happier by the day!

Since our inventory has been depleted in the past few weeks I’ve started working with Mazzie again- who, since she is a young 3 year old, we gave more time to to let her grow a bit more – she’s grown at least 2 inches since she arrived in the summer and is ready to start hacking out and having some fun!  I’ve been on her a few times and she has been  foot perfect.  At first we just walked and trotted a bit in the ring – and even trotted over a pole on the ground between jump standards which didn’t bother her in the least! Today she did more of the same with the same great results. She is very forward, sensitive and things jumping little crossrails is the coolest thing ever. She moves better by the day and is going to be a fancy little sportscar for some lucky person! Can’t wait to report more on how she progresses!

And now to the head of the class! Jersey is a changed man since the departure of his beloved Tarzan – He is way more serious about his work and even though I was gone for 5 days for Christmas – he went on a very quiet hack yesterday all by his lonesome -and even trotted and cantered out in an open field without batting an eye! Such a good boy – So looking forward to moving him to Aberdeen where the hacking is endless – that way he’ll have something to engage his active little brain!  He is a pretty lazy boy so I am looking for ways to make his feet move as fast as his mind!  I “made” Allie get on just to trot around so she would understand why I gush and go on and on about how nice he is to ride! Naturally she instantly got it and I got to drool over my adorable, fancy boy! All this aside, he is also a cheeky little monkey so he definitely keeps me on my toes for the sudden spook – he’s way more interested in things going on around him than in his work.   As he gets more broke and used to hacking out I think he’ll keep his eyes on his OWN paper and the silliness will dimish.. a little anyway. 🙂

More horses coming down to North Carolina on Wednesday! Yay!

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