Author: Amanda

book review · giveaways

Giveaway: Stablekeeping by Cherry Hill

Amanda9 Comments

If you’re not familiar with Cherry Hill’s work, you really ought to be. She and her husband, Richard Klimesh, have co-authored some of the most useful and informative books out there for horse owners. I own probably 10 or 12 of their books, and each one has terrific information, well-organized, well-illustrated, and sensible.

There’s a school of horsekeeping thought that is all about the Ideal and the Perfect and then there’s a school that has well-thought out reasons for everything, takes workarounds into consideration, and gives you things to consider you never realized would factor in. Cherry Hill’s books are in that latter category. I have learned something every time I’ve picked up one of her books.

In unpacking my books into the new house, I discovered that I own two copies of one of her best books, Stablekeeping. Here’s the book summary:

Learn to design and maintain a high-quality barn with this complete stablekeeping reference. Expert Cherry Hill draws on decades of horsekeeping experience to help you provide a safe, efficient, healthy living environment for your horse. Instructive text and more than 250 photographs cover topics such as stalls, tack rooms, work and storage areas, sanitation and pest control, feeding practices, safety, emergencies, and more.

Even if you just board your horse, there’s something here for you to help your horse. And who hasn’t spent hours and hours designing their dream farm? Get more imagination fodder here.

SO! I’m going to give away my extra copy of the book to a blog reader. You can enter via the Rafflecopter below. The giveaway will end on Friday, November 20. There are a bunch of ways you can enter the giveaway; pick just one or all of them. The easiest is to leave a comment on this blog sharing your best organizing tip for around the barn, in the spirit of the book. Good luck!

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[Probably] Last Ride Outside

Amanda2 Comments

Vermont – and most of New England – is in a bit of a heat wave for early November, by which I mean it’s in the low 60s for the high. So earlier this week I got to the barn while it was still light out, and thought, hey, I could go outside and get some work done!

Tris was sore from a hard school we’d done the day before so I was focused on getting him moving and stretching. He was not thrilled with that plan, especially when it involves some long & low work over trot poles. For Tristan, being in the outdoor is an time to flail around, run through his shoulders, and generally work on freight train management.
Because there were jumps set up, we also had some steering issues: he wanted to bolt toward them and jump all the things, which would not have ended well for either of us. So I mostly tried to re-route that energy.

You may or may not be able to see in this photo, but he has a fair amount of blue paint on his front left hoof from knocking into poles. So, mixed success on re-routing.
He was sweaty and puffing after even that very short ride – both from the work he put in avoiding what I was asking him to do and from the temperature. So he got walked out for a while and then clipped.
It’s possible we will get one or two more schooling rides outdoors, but between the time change and the impending change of season, I doubt it.
clipping · winter

Clipmageddon 2015

Amanda4 Comments

Last year, I angsted almost endlessly about clipping my horse. I asked for opinions, got a ton of awesome thoughts, and then still waffled and flopped around. When I finally got around to it, I was relieved and happy and wondered why I hadn’t done it sooner.

So: I knew without question that I was going to clip Tristan for this season. Then I dragged my heels, shockingly enough.

Then, on Monday, it was warm. Tristan was huffing and puffing and sweaty after just 30 minutes of relatively light work. (Granted, some of that was because he insisted on flailing around, crowhopping, and trying to pull me toward the jumps in the ring at a dead gallop, so it was kind of his fault. 20 years old, huh?)

It was time. So I pulled out the clippers.

Let me just state at the outset that I am like your model of What Not To Do. I had no intention of bathing my horse – it’s November in Vermont, you have got to be kidding me. I own clippers that are a good example of what they are, but are classified as “ear and nose trimmers” so yeah not exactly your fancy $400 body clippers.

I was also too lazy to get an extension cord so I, um, stood on his lead rope to keep him in one place. DON’T BE LIKE ME, INTERNET. Your caveat here is that I know this horse intimately, he is solid for clipping (he was antsy last night because it was dinnertime) and I did actually position myself so I could duck into an empty area off the aisle if he decided to snark about it.

I aimed for a very light trace clip, and used the 0 blade cover. I think I have some more to do, but I will live with this for a week and then update it next week.

…wow I didn’t realize how bad those lines were until just now. sigh.

So there you have it. First clip of the season is out of the way.
I am very seriously considering some kind of My Little Pony style clip on his butt when I expand his current clip. It would need to be some kind of geeky symbol. Suggestions welcome, keeping in mind that I possess exactly zero artistic talent and would need to use a stencil.
vermont

5 Reasons Why Vermont Is the Best Equestrian State

Amanda5 Comments

Oh yeah. I’m going there.

I have long held the conviction that Vermont is simply the Best State (TM), and despite the neverending winter, I’m going to make an argument why it is also the best horse state.

1. Four Letters: G.M.H.A

GMHA Sleigh Rally
The Green Mountain Horse Association, founded in 1926, is one of the best equestrian facilities in the country. It may not have pagodas or million dollar indoors or water fountains, but what it does have is pristine natural beauty, the most competent and kind staff you will ever meet, and an extraordinary schedule of events. Endurance, driving, eventing, dressage, hunter/jumpers, trail riding, even off-season out of saddle educational events: if you can’t find something to get excited about on their schedule, you’re not trying hard enough.
I’ve been there as a groom for friends, as a volunteer, and as a spectator. I have never ridden a horse on the property, which is a deep personal regret of mine. Someday!

2. That Hillwork Though, or, Let the Green Mountains Condition for You

The view from one of our road routes

True story: a former eventing trainer of mine grew up on a horse farm in Vermont, and moved out of state to pursue his riding goals. He took his horses out to their first few events and their conditioning was terrible and he was flummoxed. And then he realized: he had been doing the exact same fitness work he’d grown up doing in Vermont, but there were no mountains in other places like there are in Vermont.

The trouble here is in fact finding level ground. All of our pastures are on hills and even when I boarded and lived in Addison County, part of the Lake Champlain basin and the flattest part of the state, it still wasn’t what you’d call flat. It rolled quite a bit, just not as dramatically as most of the state. So even just going out on a hack on the roads works those glutes. And with 70% of the state’s roads still dirt, you’ve got a lot of territory to explore.

3. We Have Our Own Breed of Horse: Justin Morgan’s Figure and the American Dream

Weathermount Ethan, Morgan stallion and all-around hunk
Figure, the first Morgan Horse, was not born in Vermont but he made his mark on the state indelibly, leaving a breed of horses that matched the needs of the American frontier. Today, you can find Morgans in every corner of Vermont and even in the world. The National Museum of the Morgan Horse is here, as is the UVM Morgan Horse Farm. They’re both interesting places to visit, but the real value is in the horses themselves.
There’s a lot of back and forth about how and why and when exactly all of this got going, and I think the story of the Morgan horse’s second generation might be at least as interesting as Figure’s (and someday I wil pick up my research project on that again), but the end result is a truly American breed of horse, and it all got started in Vermont.

4. Olympic Density

Tad Coffin riding Bally Cor at the 1976 Montreal Olympics
Someday I’d love to actually run numbers on this, but: the sheer number of Olympians and other high-level riders who have come out of Vermont is amazing.
Vermonters include Tad Coffin, Denny Emerson, Jane Savoie, Carol Lavell, Stephen and Dinah Rojek, and last but not least, Laura Graves. Yes, she of Verdades taking-the-world-by-storm fame. She grew up riding about 6 miles from where I am typing out this blog post.  (We also produce the sixth-highest number of winter Olympians, but they are all in non-horse sports, obviously!)
I’m sure I’m missing a few, but those are just the really really famous ones. And keep in mind how tiny Vermont is, with a population of just over 500,000 in the entire state. The density of quality riders is astounding. You simply can’t go wrong with finding a good trainer here.

5. It’s a Way of Life, or, When Your Local Ice Cream Shop Is Ben & Jerry’s

You guys, this is 20 minutes from my house. It’s literally on the way to and from work for my husband. I can call him and he can come home with any flavor of Ben & Jerry’s in the whole world.
On top of that, all of the other food is amazing. There is a better variety and quality of food here than anywhere else I have ever lived, and I have lived in France, ok? And everyone knows that ice cream and beer/hard cider are key components to equestrian life, especially for recovery after your inevitable fall.


house post

House Post: Epic Attic Insulation Project

Amanda4 Comments

Really, this story should start with the energy audit. Vermont is Very Serious about energy efficiency, green building, etc., and there is a statewide agency called Efficiency Vermont that sponsors rebates, tax breaks, and all sorts of programs to promote energy savings.

So, soon after we bought our house, in May, we scheduled an energy audit. Which was…by turns interesting and depressing. We learned that our house leaks air like a sieve and has no insulation. None. ZERO. When they did thermal readings of our walls, the studs showed up as “insulating.” We had a hunch that was the case but did not know for sure.

The company we worked with to do the energy audit had a series of proposals to address all of the energy concerns which totaled $35,000 in costs. Yep. They also recommended basically rendering our walk-up attic unusable by blowing in cellulose to a remarkable depth in order to insulate it. We were very firmly against that, and back and forth and back and forth to get a workable plan finally landed us with the outline of tearing up the attic floor, then spray foaming, then adding 2″ of rigid foam above that, then putting down a new attic floor. Which would be a PITA, but would satisfy state requirements for energy renovations (which require fire safety + certain R-values depending on where the project is in the house).

Then when we did the electrical we discovered how unbelievably difficult the attic floor is to pull up, and we started thinking that if we insulated at the floor, we would basically discount the idea of ever finishing the attic. Which was not in our plans, but we felt was an important part of the resale value. I started shopping around for a different contractor to insulate the roofdeck, aka the attic ceiling and walls. I was primarily looking for more creative flexibility and a better price. I found both and in August, we scheduled the work to start October 5.

before

At 10pm on October 4, I got an email saying they were delayed and would not be there that day, maybe the next day? Then they weren’t there. Then the next day, and the next, and then I had to go out of town and wouldn’t be there to get the dog to daycare & lock up the cat & let the contractors in, and then there were more delays. Most of them without any advance warning: so I’d take the dog to daycare and wait, and wait, and wait. Progressively getting more pissed off.

Then, the owner of the company showed up, after I had left a work meeting to wait for him for 2 hours, and told me that we needed to do more prep work. I had specifically asked him about whether these pieces of wood needed to be removed three weeks previously, and he had dodged the question. So here he was, telling me unless these wooden soffit blocks were removed they would not start the next day. I was at the height of my recent plague, possibly feverish, definitely miserable, but I went out, bought a sawsall, and removed every last damn one in a very long two hour project.

prepped

The next day, they started. They got two and a half days of work in, and then did not show up the fourth day. I called. They said oh, we’ll be there at 10 am. I went to work. I left work. I waited. I called. They said oh, we’re not coming today, can we come tomorrow, Saturday? We were expecting 10 people for the weekend, but I wanted the work to keep going. So I said yes and we danced around it and it sucked, especially the last hour when everyone had to stay in our living room to be out of the way of the contractor, especially the dogs, who I did not want snuffling or tracking around the 8 million teensy pieces of foam flecks that get everywhere during the process.

Then Monday, they were supposed to come by to finish, cutting the foam away from the joists of the attic. They showed up at 1:50 pm and thank God finished that day. I sent an email to Efficiency Vermont as well as the company listing my grievances and their bullshitting ways, got a sleazy and only vaguely apologetic response from the owner of the company. In particular, I pointed out that we had spent over $100 sending the dog to daycare on days when they had not shown up, and they had failed repeatedly to communicate in a professional fashion. I’m still trying for some overall reduction on the bill, because they were a freaking nightmare to work with. I really, really regret not going with the original company who did the audit; they may have been a little pedantic but they were highly communicative and professional throughout. Live and learn, I guess.

So, now we have an insulated attic. Part One of the project is done; part two will happen soon-ish, in which we need to put 5/8″ sheetrock over the exposed insulation and tape and mud the seams in order to seal off the insulation as a possible fire hazard. I’m working on finding someone to do that right now. Originally we were going to do it, but I am 110% done, so, hiring someone.

All that feels like a very short way to sum up what has been the most frustrating and most expensive project we’ve done on the house to date. That said – I’m really glad we did it, and the house is holding heat noticeably better now. I have become an obsessive checker of our Nest thermostat via my phone, and there is a clear and easily noticeable difference of several degrees in how the house heats up and then how slowly that heat fades.

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Incorporating Work at Liberty

Amanda1 Comment

Last night, I headed to the barn with the intent to longe. I wanted to see how Tris was feeling; I am still (still) not breathing without mucus, at least not exercising. So riding was out.

I put the longe line on and then saw that someone had closed the indoor up tight and even organized it a bit: all the doors were closed and latched and some of the usual chairs, etc., that were often out were tucked away.

So I did not bother with the longe line. We spent about 20 minutes working at liberty.

Our indoor, with doors open in the back.

Now, I don’t buy into the natural horsemanship join up sparkly hearts kind of working at liberty. I’ve never done any of the Parelli levels. I’ve never bought any specialized equipment or followed any schools of thought or anything like that.

I have worked Tristan at liberty on and off in the years I’ve owned him. More in the beginning, in a round pen that allowed him some space but didn’t mean he went too far.

My philosophy is as such: work at liberty should be used as a tool to fine-tune our communications. Tristan should not simply use it as an excuse to sprint off bucking and then investigate all the corners.

He is allowed more leeway, sure. If he wants to take off bucking that’s ok, but he should then re-focus on me.

So our rules last night were simple: we both had to keep moving at all times, and Tristan had to stay focused on me and listen to what I told him to do.

I feel like any kind of in-hand session progresses best when Tristan gets sharper and sharper off my commands. Last night, we definitely accomplished that. I walked or jogged alongside him around the edge of the ring, because I am in terrible shape and also needed to move.

the actual cutest.

So he did a lot of bucking and farting around, occasionally in sass to what I was asking him to do. He opted to start off cantering quite a bit, which was fine by me. I think liberty work can be a useful tool for helping see how your horse prefers to move. He’s been telling me under saddle that he would rather canter for a while first, so I let him do what he wanted, figuring I would observe and see more of what I was feeling from the saddle. After several turns at the canter, he settled back to the trot when I asked, and it was not all that pretty: propped, short-strided. So I brought him back to the walk, then asked him to go forward, and let him canter again for a bit. After that, his trot was much more fluid, and after 10 minutes or so he started to stretch down his neck and come up through his back.

He also very much preferred to track right, though I asked him to turn from time to time. So that told me more, as well, which was also not a surprise – he prefers to move to the right. I also worked on getting him to halt, back up, and walk and trot bigger or smaller based on body language. I carried a longe whip but mostly left it trailing on the ground behind me.

He clearly had a lot of fun, which was nice. He gave me some lovely big ear-pricked trots around the outside of the ring, and was W-T-C and back from voice commands from a fair distance. I was really, really pleased with him, and he was clearly becoming more comfortable and happier in his body. Liberty work also gives me the chance to really just watch him, to focus on one leg or one muscle grouping, the way he used different parts of his body.

We finished with a long walk, and while he was a teensy bit warm he was definitely not hot. (It was in the mid-40s, so not overly cold or hot.)

In all, it was a good night, which I sorely needed after a very stressful couple of weeks. (Though, I’m starting to wonder what weeks won’t be stressful right now…)

blog hop · product review · shopping

Favorite Products Blog Hop

Amanda4 Comments
Jumping on the bandwagon for this fun blog hop from Breeches & Boat Shoes.

What is your favorite equestrian-specific product that you use when you’re at the barn?

I think it might have to be my Oster Mane & Tail brush. I confess, I don’t clean out Tristan’s mane and tail as often as I should, but every time I do I LOVE using this brush. It’s just one of the best-designed tools I’ve ever used around horses.

I actually own a full set of the Oster brushes – they lived in my trailer as my second, traveling kit – but I find the brushes so-so. The mane & tail brush is a thing of glory and a joy forever.

What is your favorite non equestrian-specific product to use when you’re at the barn?

Probably something medical. I’d say a toss-up between vinegar (for White Lightning & other hoof soaks), saline (for some idiot pony’s eyes), and molasses, though the smell makes me gag.

In actual happy things to use – I wouldn’t necessarily say that I’m in a good mood when I have to use any of those things – I’d have to go with my iPhone + headphones. I’ve only recently come around to listening to podcasts while riding and it’s such a great way to kill all that walking warmup time that Tristan needs.

What is your horse’s favorite equestrian-specific product to wear or use?

Cripes. None of them? No, wait, never mind.

I have this tiny little face brush. It’s maybe 4″ long, and it has the most flexible, softest bristles you can imagine. Tristan loves his face brushed, and I bought this for him almost eight years ago now. It was during his first, awful colic – which maybe I should blog about someday, but it was as bad as it gets – and I was on a rare break from the barn, at the tack store, buying extra medical supplies mostly. And there was this brush at the register in a box with others of its kind, and I was so strung out and tired and worried and sad and all I could think was how much he loves having his face brushed and how soft it would be.
So while I often brush his face with my regular body brush, on special occasions I take out this small wonderful brush and spend a long time just brushing his face. He leans into it and tips his head for me  and sighs happily.

What was the best equestrian-related gift you were ever given, and why does it mean so much to you?

It’s not a great picture, but can you see the small horse statue in the photo? It’s a raku horse made by Lindsey Epstein, who is an incredibly talented artist and was the barn manager for a previous barn Tris and I were at. (She appears on this blog incognito as both a teacher and occasional rider of Tristan a few years back.) Lindsey makes these gorgeous horses, and due to the quirks of the glaze they often come out in all sorts of different and unexpected patterns. This one came out looking like Tristan: all roany. It was a Christmas gift several years ago from a very dear friend, and it has occupied this spot on my desk in three different offices now. It’s the combination of unique, thoughtful gift and the much-beloved people involved that makes this so special.

If you had the ability to create any product or anything to make your time at the barn better, what would that be?

Try as I might to devise a winter riding apparel plan every year, there is literally nothing on earth that makes going to the barn in 12 degree weather better. Nothing. So, if I could wave a magic wand and make that happen, that would be nice.