Meet Cruise

Cruise had pretty much been abandoned since last autumn. through winter without a cover too. i finally got him -rescued him!-on Tuesday. he looks so horrible - Poor Pony.

So a small fact file...

- show name is Hailwin

- 16.1hh

- 11 years old

- hasn't done a lot, basic dressage and PT eventing.

I have cruise on free lease for this season and if hes going well probably the season after too.

hes a real mellow horse who I'm thinking will do well in dressage. but eventing is our plan. hoping to get to Pre-Novice at the end of the season.

But not looking like much of a show pony now!

hes..

- Hes skinny, Brought loads of feed for him the other day and really feeding him up, so hoping he gains weight soon.

- Possibly got worms, brought a drench asap, I've no idea when he was last done.

- He had rain scald all over his back! most of which has healed up but now hes left with bald patches everywhere. but I've been washing him every sunny day with a medicated wash.

- His mane was down do his shoulder and tail o the ground, washed all them and trimmed the tail, and nearly finished pulling his mane - Big job!!

here's some pictures of him yesterday and his current condition, already I've noticed his coat shinier, and hopefully he will fatten up soon.

Cruise saddled up for his 3rd ride. he looks a lot nicer with gear on!!

Saddest Day Ever - Twiggy Sold

Twiggy sold yesterday! =(

To a lovely home in Orewa. She has gone to a 14 year old girl called Shinaed, although she isn't as confident as we would have like. she is a nice rider - Smart too, shes going to take things slowly and get lots of lessons and do lots of flat work to get to know Twiggy. No trial wanted - they just wrote out the cheque and took her! Going to miss her heaps.

but I can now lease my friends horse Cruise, and bring him on and go eventing again! So my next blog will be about him =]

New Drawing

A Random drawing of no horse in particular. i just really liked the photo i found on www.deviantart.com.
Know idea how long the picture took. its done entirely with HB and 2B Mechanical pencils.

Twiggy gets Photoshopped

Twiggy's advertised on TradeMe right now - So as her main photo Ive photoshopped one very unbelievable picture to really grab viewers attention. Must be working her views have gone up heaps! Here is the Pictures so far i rotate between.

Twiggy takes "Jumps anythinng" to a whole new level!!

Twiggy back in work

Well Twiggy actually came back into work a while ago, I'm just slightly slow to update this blog, but nevertheless. Twiggy's been back in work about a month. Shes been doing lots of Dressage and long road walks. a little bit of jumping but the ground is still so muddy so i avoid jumping at the moment - And Twiggy is barefoot still.

Twiggy tried hard but i don't think she will ever be a top dressage horse! she will never master the essential "calmness" needed for dressage!

But she is being very soft, and often takes the rein and works long and low, you can see in the above photo shes on a loose rein, a year or so ago Twiggy would never trot nicely on a loose rein. so she has improved. slowly. but its still progress for Twiggy

Yes i am doing Dressage in a Jumping saddle too - with jumping length stirrups...

So Twiggy's jumping is pretty good for being muddy and barefoot. Theses photos are taken from her first day jumping since being back in work. so keeping keeping it low in the winter conditions. I'm happy with how shes going. I've also noticed shes become snappier with her front end too. Wearing Open fronts on her I've found shes a little more careful when she jumps. i think she got used to having closed XC boots all the time and wasn't bothered when she knocked a rail as it would never hurt her. now that she can feel the rails i think shes being more careful.

I have set up a down hill jump which leads into a small dip with water (from rain and flooding) I've had this set up a while and shes become very confident jumping big heights into water. Even though she often over-jumps it and launches herself into it. its better than timidly "climbing" down it how she used too.

Twiggy also made a huge improvement when it comes to combinations. She has never been the most confident horse jumping over on strides and other related distance combinations. and bounces she has always seemed to fail at hugely. preferring to go "through" them rather than concentrate and go "over". so setting a a small bounce a few days ago i wasn't expecting much of Twiggy. But to my surprise she went over the small 50cm Bounce perfectly. to make sure it wasn't a fluke that she left the poles up. i did it a couple More times, fro the other direction too. and again, she did it faultlessly. so up wen the poles to 70cm - and again shes jumped them with perfection, not tipping the rails once. So i put them up to nearly 1m - and popped through it once again without hesitation. I Stopped while i was ahead and ended on a happy note. Twiggy is getting much better and focus on more than one jump.

Twiggy impresses me sometimes.