End of an Era

So cute and so stained.
 It was also getting too small for all my stuff

Back when I moved into what I still consider my first "real" boarding situation I had a tack locker that was school sized. I actually sort of liked the set up at that barn with a large room for saddles and personal lockers just for the smaller stuff. Too bad the trainer who owned the place, J, was so awful.

Back when it was much less stained.
Also, I know I've mentioned it before but I still miss that pink lined bridle

At any rate at that point I knew that I needed something to hold my brushes that could fit in that space and when I went to the horse expo they had these containers and were able to personalize them. I've used this one ever since which has been about 4.5 years.

It's worked so well that I've never shopped for new ones but I realized that at my current barn where there is no heat I needed to figure out a different method. The problem is that I can't bring any liquids including first aid supplies since I don't want that stuff to sit in my car and freeze. I was carrying a "barn bag" back and forth with me which was basically a canvas tote bag but it was all just dumped in the bottom and it was tough to find what I wanted.

When the black Friday sales started I casually was looking for totes and organizers and found this!

Puppy for scale (she loves posing for pictures hehe)

See I hate the ones with the draw string bag type top. It's clumsy in my opinion and makes it really tough to find what you need. This one unzips at the top and has lots of separate compartments which makes it awesome. I have a tone of stuff in it including all of the first aid stuff I'm likely to need, polo wraps and bandages, brushes, and tack cleaning wipes. Along the outside I have all of my grooming spray and detangled as well as scissors and a few other odds and ends.

Because it has the handy shoulder strap it's easy to carry to work and then the barn each day that I plan to ride and that way I don't have to worry about any of it freezing. Since it zips closed it also keeps the majority of hair and barn smell contained. So far I really like this grooming bag and its working really well for me.

Thursday Lesson Day

So far my lessons have been on Thursdays, other than at the beginning of the month when I had three lessons in a row to try out a couple of different barns/trainer. Today was my third lesson with Julie and my first lesson with her off the lunge. It was great and I am enjoying her ability and training more and more. I was especially happy when she climbed on the horse today to show me something as people in this area seem to be either teachers or riders and not both. I am a very visual learner so when watching someone do something I learn a lot more than when being told how to do something.

I have some homework to work on, of course :-), which includes stabilizing my torso and changing where I hold my hands a bit. Mostly though I'm very excited to get Katai there because then I will have very different things to work on vs. riding a well trained school horse. I move her in just over one week!!!! I have just a few more things to get ready and one more lesson before the big move and I just can't wait.

In Katai land things have been great! After a few days completely off everything other than a little light groundwork and grooming I rode yesterday, without a bit of course to let her mouth heal, and she was really good! I got some nice forward, relaxed, back swinging moments from her despite her being extremely jumpy for some reason. Katai tends to be quite hot, my little redhead, but she's usually not spooky at all. However, yesterday she was freezing and jumping at everything. Luckily she has this tiny freezy-in-place-thing that really isn't hard to sit but it just. kept. happening. Ah well.

I also managed to get a bunch of mane pulling done which is good because with how thick he mane is she could easily sport a Fjord type Mohawk if I wanted her to. I did a lot of pampering and grooming with her as well. Unfortunately the current barn doesn't have running water anywhere that's easy to get to so trying to scrub her stains off will be tough but its something I feel I need to do before the move. I am certainly no grooming queen and she is a bit of a hairy mess right now but transferring her to a new barn covered in stains is not ok in my mind. Now I just have to figure how I'm going to get rid of them! People with bay horses have it so much easier...