Friday 27 November 2015

I hear sleigh bells!

It's that wonderful time of year where people put up their Christmas decoration and the shops start playing our favourite Christmas tunes in the middle of November. We both love it and hate it.

In between buying presents for birthdays and, of course, Christmas, I received word that the annual Christmas show jumping competition is happening next month. This is a small event my stables throws. It's just a bit of fun for its clients. There's the actual jumping of the course as well as the dressing up element, so it's usually pretty good.

This year I made the brave (or stupid, we'll see!) decision to sign myself up for the upper class. I've normally always stuck with the lower due to inexperience with courses, and also I tend to have a run out or two. My steering gets a little off, especially when the horse/pony I'm riding gets a tad excited and doesn't seem to be able to turn any more so we just keep going sideways - yes Duke, I'm talking about you!

I decided to sign myself up for the upper class for a couple of reasons though. Firstly, it could well be my last competition at the stables, for Christmas at least. Next year I'll still be at University and won't be back in time to do the competition, and the same will apply for the two years after that. Depending on where I go to university, I may end up moving away. I'm sure I'll find another stables, but it really isn't the same.

The other reason is that sometimes the horses concentrate more on bigger jumps. Bailey is a great example of this because on many occasion I have ridden him over jumps and he has let his back legs kick the pole for the simple reason he doesn't put the effort in if he doesn't consider the jumps worth his while. If the jumps get bigger he starts picking his hooves up and really thinking about it.

I would really like to place this year, but I'm not sure how much practice I'll be able to put in. I'm going to miss Pony Club this weekend, so I'll only have half an hour on Sunday. Depending on how much money I have in my bank account affects whether I'll make the next session of Pony Club, and then it's the show on the 13th!

Nevertheless, I'm really looking forward to it. Hopefully this year none of the costumes will prevent the rider from getting on the horse - last year someone's antler-hat had to be replaced with a plain, normal hat or else she would not have got on her horse!

Have you got any competitions coming up?

Until next time :)

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