Merry Christmas!

The c-ville airport is a lot smaller than I imagined... I'm currently sitting at gate 5 out of a total of 5 gates waiting for my flight. I'm Hilton Head bound for Christmas and I'm super excited!
For once I have Internet access somewhere other than an obscure location in town- and much has happend since baby Wesman came to Virginia!
Little Wes has taken to Will's methods well. He's getting much better on the flat and its been so cold we haven't had to chance to do much jumping. The ring freezes and its terrible! BUT we did get some jumping in last weekend!!!
So every few weeks Will and his dad take a trailer full of horses up to Middleburg to ride with Joe Fargis and after Fair Hill Will said he would pay for me to have a lesson with him as a thank you for all the efforts that weekend. I've been waiting a while for this to actually happen and lucky for me, Wesman got here just in time for the lesson! Saturday I woke up extra early to get everything in the barn perfect before leaving for the majority of the day.
I had been up to Joe's barn once before and it is gorgeous!
Will rode first with his Dad and then I got Wesman and Obo ready for the second lesson... Wes and Obo certainly were playful! The two of them thought it was really funny to go around jumps instead of over them this particular day... But in hindsight I think it was a good thing Wesman was bad... It really helped us make some progress with our issues together. It was awesome! I hope I get a chance to go back before I have to go to school.

Wesman's here!!!

Well, plans to sell Wesman are put on hold for now because he pulled into the farm here in Virginia around 3am! It's so exciting seeing him, I thought for sure when I left Mass. I was saying goodbye forever.

Nothing against the crew back home, and by crew I mean Mom and Dad, but little Wesman was a hot mess when he pulled in! At 3 in the morning, however, I opted to put him in a small turnout for the night and deal with him at a normal hour.

After a bath and an full body clip of epic proportions Wesman started to blend in with the other horses... sort of. We went for a hack to show off the new look, though no one really knew it was a new look. He was being particularly adorable, which was great. For now, everyone seems to like him...

I missed the little guy.

FAIR HILL!!

Friday after we finished everything at the two barns I met up with Ali and her friend to make the voyage up to Maryland for Fair Hill! (Up to Maryland still feels weird!) We got in really late so we spent the night at Ali's parents house. King size bed = awesome. The next morning we woke up super early, of course, and drove over to the show grounds.
Once we parked we found Andrea, who gave us our super awesome wrist bands that let us go ANYWHERE, and we were off to the barns!
I spent most of the day in the barns. I iced many legs and went for many hand walks. The MOST exciting part, at least for me, was being a part of the crew in the box after cross country. It was pure organized chaos and it was awesome! Then of course, it was back to icing legs. My hands were very cold most of the day.
When my hands were near normal temperature it was time for dinner. My first ever competitor party! Also very exciting! I'm sure no one else thought it was half as awesome as I did, but the fact that I was sitting in a cramped, over heated tent without nearly enough food was overwhelming-- one of the highlights to my weekend. Strange.
A few last minute things in the barn and then off to the van for some sleep.
We were the first in the barns Sunday morning, the lady who checks for your wristband wasn't even at the gate yet... I took the boys out for some early morning grazing before returning to my life calling: icing!
True to the lifestyle we are apparently living here we spent the majority of our time in the warm-up ring with the best company. We chatted for some time with Boyd Martin and Phillip Dutton. David came by for a bit before Marcia Kulak took over the warm-up ring coaching anyone who would listen...which was pretty much everyone!
My amazing zooming abilities while video taping the rounds at Maryland made this my job again come Sunday... However, I missed the last jump... and they pulled a rail... so I don't think I will be taping anytime soon.
But, overall the weekend was awesome! All three horses were in the top ten, everyone was happy.
And just like the way up to Maryland, I slept the whole way home...

Virginia is a very interesting place... at least when you roll with Will Coleman.
I'm all settled into my new residence... though I do not have television, Internet... and my cell phone works in very few locations. I'm getting much better at driving the car too! I can almost not stall out on flat ground!
But seriously, its CRAZY here! One of the first days I was here we went to the movies... Bonnie Mosser just happened to be there too. Needless to say I freaked out. It was awesome.

Maryland H.T. is this weekend and I hope I get to tag along! Heidi White stopped by one day and dropped off a horse, Noodle, for Will to try. He's hoping to take him to Fair Hill for the CCI**... This place is crazy awesome!

In other news, after the epic fail weekend in September, we decided to we should sell Wesman. He stayed home when I left for Will's hoping he would sell... Reports from home are saying that we may have movement on his sale!

AHHH!!!

I did finally get the courage up to call Will Coleman...and apparently a phone call from David O'Connor is all you need to be hired.
I'M LEAVING TOMORROW?!?!!!?!??!?!!!
I have nothing packed. I have no arrangements to get Wes down to Virginia....
I'm freaking out to say the least.

Billy and Hou Ride again...

William had one of his best days ever since his field trip up to Mhyre Equine Clinic in NH over the winter...

We've been working at Billy's own pace to get back to riding- which is super slow! Usually its just walking around the yard, a super epic day involves a bit of trotting.

BUT today Billy and Hou went out together... GREAT SUCCESS!

EPIC WEEKEND...epic fail.

Back in June David had mentioned that he was coming to UMASS in September to do an ICP level 3 and 4 workshop and he expected me to be a demo rider for it.

September is here, and so is ICP! Apparently when David said I should be a demo rider he meant that I should be his demo rider... No pressure.

Wes and I headed up to UMASS the week before for a final dressage lesson with Jerry before riding with David on Friday. We put in some of our best trot work to date and everything from the previous weeks seemed to be falling in place and finally making sense.

Feeling super confident we pulled into UMASS Friday morning

David was still briefing everyone on the weekend ahead so I headed into the ring to warm-up some before the crowd came in. 10:00AM on the dot everyone was seated and David was ready to begin. Making a point to not violate specific pet peeves of David's we performed our official warm-up. He spoke with poise with a smirk that lead me to believe things were going well.

David then moved into the center of the ring and asked me to do some simple lateral movement as an extension of my warm-up.... and all hell broke loose.

Wesman simply said NO THANK YOU! Which in Wesman's world is usually along the lines of bucking, backing, and kicking. Awesome.

So the perfect opportunity to prove to David that Wesman is actually a very pleasant horse who has come a very long way since he last saw him in June failed epically.

Saturday Wes and I were suppose to ride with David again for Show Jumping and a little Cross Country but we decided based on Friday's antics to take the day off and just watch. We went for a hack around the property at home and that was more than enough for the day.

Oh right, did I mention we had an Event sandwiched into this weekend too? King Oak? Sunday?

Thursday, I was super excited about the event. With the school with Stephie up in New Hampshire and the Dressage lesson with Jerry everything was going to be perfect Sunday! Until of course Friday...

I didn't ride until the afternoon so I much of the preparation was to take place in the morning leaving Saturday for relaxing.

So Sunday we loaded up and headed over to King Oak- as a final attempt to salvage the weekend...and yet another perfect opportunity to prove to David that Wesman does have it in him.

I was thankful that we were to ride in the far Dressage ring that is almost completely surrounded by woods and there are always fewer people schooling around it. In theory the lack of activity around the ring would enable little Wesman to focus and pull out a better test. False. This ring proved to be the most distracting ring ever and well, the test was very forward... But our test at Apple Knoll wasn't too great and we ended up finishing 6th!

Show Jumping was next and for whatever reason it was up in the sand ring. We met up with Stephie shortly after Dressage and she was waiting to help me warm-up when I got to the ring. He warmed up perfect! We went over to the ring and cantered on in...

Well we made it over the first 4 jumps before we got eliminated... Ugh.

Since we only did four jumps I didn't feel too bad for Wesman when we went back up to UMASS Monday afternoon for a jump lesson with David before he went back to his Presidential duties.

Well, it was better than Friday...and I suppose better than Sunday.

So Sunday ended with David displeased with Wesman overall. David seems to think Wes won't be able to pull it together and perhaps its time to move on to another horse...

However, David did help me out before he left. Apparently he and Jerry were discussing the fact that I would not be off to college until February and the two of them decided I should concentrate on riding and find a working student position somewhere. So they called up Will Coleman... I'm sitting here now looking at the piece of paper with Will Coleman's phone number scribbled on it trying to get up the courage to make the call he's apparently anticipating.

Wes and I are suppose to be off to Bruce Davidson's this week with Stephie but based on this weekend I don't think thats such a good idea...