Scary! I'm glad things ended up being fine. A similar thing has happened to us before, except we were home and it was the neighbour that called at 5am because on his way to work he thought it was odd that he didn't see any of the horses. There was a blizzard that night and the wind combined with the heavy snow had broken one of the gates and all of the horses, except for my old guy who thought it was a much better idea to sleep in the shelter, were gone. We called the RCMP and had everyone

As you all probably know, Eric Lamaze's Hickstead collapsed and died while at a competition in Verona, Italy. What a huge loss to not only the show jumping world, but the horse world in general. I wrote a tribute post for Horse Junkies United that can be found here: http://horsejunkiesunited.com/2011/11/hickstead-the-little-stallion-who-became-canadas-champion/ I've been a wreck over it all day, it's just so tragic, my heart goes out to Lamaze and everyone else who was involved in his

The Mane Event comes to AB every year as well and I've always wanted to go but it seems like something always comes up! I looove trade show shopping-- I have always found them to be full of good deals, you just have to know your product/prices. I'll have to try to make it next year, I believe it comes in April....maybe it will make up for the disappointing EquiFair at Spruce this year.

Hmm, that's good to know- I'll have to look into it and keep it in mind. Thanks for the info!

Whew, I can't believe summer is over already! I actually put my jumps away last weekend because with a full course load and shortening days I just can't keep him in jumping condition :( Anyways, the rest of our season went really well! I didn't do a whole lot more showing ($$ and I had HJU commitments--did you guys read my Spruce reports?) but he kept advancing really nicely at home and we schooled xc a few times just for the heck of it. We slowly made our way back to about 3'3--I

Thanks! I haven't found any melanomas, yet, but I know they are pretty much inevitable. What kind of herbal supplement is it? Jayne, ugh, you can have our fall anytime! Saying that, it has been really nice so far- we reached 30C last weekend and, as a 'fall bonus', it cools down at night! But the wind certainly has some chill to it, and as you can probably see in the pictures, he is sporting quite the winter coat already.

Thanks! I've added more pictures to the album since then as well...some of xc schooling and others of another show I went to just this last Sunday. We did the 2'6 to warm-up and then the 2'9s like last time. It was a larger show and although he was a little silly in the big grass ring, he jumped well and mostly/kinda listened (I need to look into different bit options!).

Alrighty, so I survived and I'm actually really happy with him! We had some rails and one refusal, but he was very forward and honest and jumped well. The refusal was jumping off of the tabletop for the second time (yep, haha) and I think it was because there was a patch of dirt instead of grass that he looked down at and I failed to react with my leg before he stepped back. After that he was fine over it the rest of the day (at least twice each class)-- it was surprising though because this

Alright, he has been thoroughly warned! ;)

Woohoo! I just sent in my first entry form in just about 3 years for a little schooling show next weekend! He has been doing really well lately and seems to be back to 100% and is jumping well at the 3-3'3 range. I only entered the 2'9s so then I won't have to worry about height-- I foresee him being an excited monster. The barn is only about a 5 minute trailer ride down the road, so that's nice for once too....it should be pretty low key. Unfortunately the only help I have been able