What a whirlwind of activities! We left for Lansing on Wednesday, packing up the trailers in the rain. We arrived early afternoon, and it wasno longer raining. We had beautiful weather for the entire weekend! We spent the rest of Wednesday setting up our stall decorations, getting the horses settled, and tack put in the tack stalls. We also had the responsibility of getting all the Futurity papers in order and getting some things set up for that event Friday morning. Included in this was setting up the Stallion Row--of those stallions who donated a stud service to be auctioned of Saturday morning. It seems like there was so much to attend to! We got up bright and early Thursday--actually, it was still quite dark! The Show started at 10 am, and we had all of our single pleasure cart classes right away--reinsmanship, turnout, men's, ladies, adult novice, youth, and so on. Jenni, our daughter, got 1st in novice and our granddaughter Megan got 1st place in youth. The day finished with the English riding classes, which Jim rode Mel, daughter Holly rode Atta Boy, and Jenni rode Sunny. Jim and Jenni also rode the Barrel races--in their English attire! Each lost a stirrup or two going around the barrels! Jim beat Jenni's time, mostly because Sunny stopped a few feet short of the finish line when Jenni lost her stirrup and couldn't be convinced to go faster than a walk!
Later, Jim and Jenni rode in the beginner Dressage class. They waited for 2 hours for their turn! Each rider rides alone in the arena, the arena is set up in a certain way, and the judge sits at the end of the arena watching. There is a particular pattern that each rider must follow, and walk and trot accordingly. Neither Jim or Jenni had done this before, and Jenni just decided that morning to look at the pattern and give it a go. She'd never even practiced! Plus, she just started riding English a month ago, a first for both her and Sunny--having a combined total of 4 lessons before the show! Jim scored 50% (Mel spooked at the corner of the arena) and Jenni scored 54.5%. The average score is in the 60s.
Friday's show included the pleasure pair driving, which Jim and Billie got 1st place! Also, the ride and drive, novice/youth walk/trot which Megan and our young friend Jacque rode, and the lead line class which granddaughters Stephanie, Hannah, and Makenna rode. They were so cute! Our show concluded with the Western riding, which Jim, Jenni and Holly rode again. Jenni got a 4th place, Holly got a 5th place, and Jim got a 3rd and a 4th place.
Saturday was the the tack sale and the horse sale. We've been worried about the horse sale, since the number of horses were low and the nobody seems to be looking for a horse to buy. We were putting Mel and Stateside News in the sale, but with a reserve on the price. We ended up not selling them since the bidding was way under. Many horses returned home with the owner because of this. If one had $1000 at the sale, he could've went home with 6 decent horses--some even well trained!
Stay tuned for pictures from the show!
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