Florence, Mabel’s daughter, is currently furthering her education whilst Michelle is busy with training her point-to-pointers. I would say Florence has gone to boot camp, but the photos and videos we receive show her clearly enjoying herself and being pampered.
I decided to buy her a nice new cosy rug to take with her. Unfortunately for Florence, I checked out the January sales and found the exact make and size of the rug I wanted, reduced by 65 per cent. What a bargain! The catch? It has a Christmas design with trees and elves and snowflakes. Sorry Florence let’s hope it soon gets dirty on the outside.
The lockdowns prevented Florence from going out and about as much as we would have liked, so going to Miles-Taylor Eventing is doing her the world of good. Florence has only ever lived with me or Michelle so going to a new yard could have been a challenge, but she settled in straight away. The freezing conditions meant that she was taken to an indoor school on a couple of occasions for her schooling sessions. Although when she was being shown in hand as a youngster, Florence had competed indoors, this was the first time she had been ridden in one. She didn’t put a foot wrong and did some lovely pole work under saddle. The yard has lovely, safe hacking and so she has been out round the lanes in the days between school work.
Florence also enjoyed a ‘spa day’. After being worked she enjoyed a hot bath and being dried off under the solarium. At this rate she won’t want to come home!
One trip she certainly had fun on was a visit to the beach on a lovely sunny, although very cold day. The light was fantastic and the photos of her cantering along alone and in company are beautiful. I think she will have slept well that night and her ears must have ached as they were so tightly pricked forward the whole time.
We look forward to the daily updates and hope we will have her out competing later in the year.
Once again I threw Arlo in at the deep end, affiliating him purely for the Arena UK second round show, and once again he pulled it out the bag. How lucky am I to have such a wonderful little horse? We haven’t really competed this year. I don’t really compete over the winter, and also my horsebox was away for repairs up until the beginning of June, so I had no transport even if I’d wanted to.
With the dry ground we don’t seem to be having much luck with shoes, as little madam managed to pull both her front shoes off within 12 hours the other day! We entered the arena with two shoes on for a schooling session and left it with one missing (took about an hour to find it). Then that afternoon, as I went to put some hoof ointment on, I looked down and had to double take, thinking I was looking at the wrong hoof. But, no, the other shoe was missing too.
After having a long wait and some lunch at the onsite café, it was time to get ready for the Joan Wolfe Overall Supreme Shetland Pony Championship. I got changed out of my usual showing outfit into black trousers and a maroon top with white spots, as you are expected to be a bit more “bling” in the evening.
We were all set to go for our next outing, and were super excited. That was until I heard the dreaded clunk of a loose shoe! I checked it over, praying it wasn’t too loose, but, nope, it was going to need a refit.