The Fanciness that is Tryon International Equestrian Center

I'm really having difficulty starting this post- I keep flip flopping back and forth with my sentences- they go from HOLY HANDGRANADS BATMAN! LET ME TELL YOU.... to In my hometown, boring sounding sentence to follow.... because I can't find a nice happy medium to tell you about the new Tryon International Equestrian Center that is basically in my BACKYARD!

Grand Prix at TIEC

The same people that brought you the Wellington and WEF that you know today have come together to build TIEC. So needless to say it is TOP CLASS. It has been a huge deal in this area, lots of people are for it, and just as many are against it. So naturally when a facility creates so much buzz the entire town shows up for the inaugural Grand Prix held at the new show grounds.

So many people in the background :)

For the first 3 weeks in July, Tryon was filled with strangers from Florida, Aiken, and various other places.  Even though it is still under construction, the barns, 4 arenas, walkways, horse paths, golf cart paths, vendor area, REAL bathrooms with flushable toilets (!!!!) wash stalls, etc were in place for what looked like a successful outing for a "not quite open but still having a show" facility. I don't know how the numbers paired out, and truthfully I only saw the Grand Prix, but it created enough buzz that it was standing room only. And the best part was FREE BEER!!!! Usually you have to pay a flat fee for an open bar but this time (probably to win over the public) there was an open bar and ice cream social- so everyone could stay cool and get drunk hahaha!

I truly can not describe the facility in all it's glory- it is something that must be seen and experienced for yourself! Their website does a great job of giving you a taste of what is to come and there is a short video too. I hope that the new facility only brings good people, more jobs, and benefits Polk County instead of turning it into another Wellington where only the super wealthy can afford to live there. The future is unknown, but until then I'll continue to enjoy my cozy little house and the place that I love and call home.

Waiting for his ribbon

The Mountains

Some Pretty Pictures of Horse Country

I am so lucky to live in one of the most gorgeous pockets of Horse Country. I know there are different areas spread throughout the States that can claim to be Horse Country- but few have the scenery to go with the horses! The ones that come to mind (at least in my general area) are Southern Pines, Fla, Aiken, and VA. All of those are located in flat boring places. I hope you love pine trees if you're in SP or Aiken. I do agree that they have pretty spots within those communities, but I can't help but love the views I see every day while driving around Tryon Horse Country. So here are a few non professional pictures taken of the area. These pictures were taken with my iPhone so the quality and sharpness isn't near what a skilled photographer could catch with a really nice camera.

I hope you enjoy just scrolling through a couple of these pictures- I have more but have had difficulty with remembering to load them onto my computer. I also hope to write a separate post about the NEW very sexy Tryon International Equestrian Center that has just been built!!!! I took pictures from the 1st Grand Prix and plan to take pictures of the 3rd Grand Prix and hopefully more of the facility on Sunday. It is a gorgeous facility and I hope it is successful but doesn't take away the Tryon Charm with to many fancy rich people that buy up all the land and turn this area into another Wellington. I love what the facility could do for our community but I also worry what it could take away. Only time will tell! And back to the purpose of this post... pretty (ish) pictures!!!

Here we go....

This is the view from my parent's house. I randomly found it when searching through my pictures and thought it was quite a fun shot. I can't help but love the mountain views that are a part of my every day life. I don't have a mountain view from my house but every time I leave my neighborhood I get to enjoy a panoramic view of the mountains. What could be better than living in Horse Country with pretty scenery????

Continuing on the sun setting and picture taken looking at the sun theme... I snapped this one with my phone while waiting for jog outs at Eventing Rally in May. 31 and 32 in the picture were 2 of my girls that I was "chaperoning" for rally- aka they wrote my name on their stall card and I if I was needed I had to be on the grounds. It was such a fun shot and the girls were walking their ponies around before heading into the covered arena to jog for the vet.

This is a pretty sunrise taken as I was driving down the road I live on. I can't remember when I took this picture exactly- but it obviously was a day I was doing something with horses b/c that's about the only reason I'll get up super early and see a sunrise. Ok there might be other reasons but they're so few and far between that they don't count- horses are the main reason I see sunrises!!!

An ear photo of the big guy Chimi. Fun fact- during this picture taking session (b/c I tend to take 1million photos and then delete the bad ones) I was bitten/stung by a flying ant and my finger swelled to most annoying proportions! Also this was the trail ride with quite a lot of wildlife viewings- we saw a hawk on the way to this field, a turkey in the field, a flying ant that bit me (grrr) probably some deer (it's normal to see 20-60 deer at sunset in my neighborhood) and then a white creature lurking in the woods. This white creature turned out to be none other than my dog Jello who had wiggled her way through the dog proof fence and followed our scent (I guess?) and met us on the trail. I'm sure she would like you to believe she was worried about us but I guarantee she was out hunting and then tried to look all innocent when we found her! Bad dog :)

Another Ear photo of Chimi. Here we took a stroll down to the river and had a nice hack. There are mowed paths through the tall grass that criss cross back on each other- you can easily create figure 8's and have a nice trot and canter on soft, flat ground. It's also fun b/c if you go at the right time of day (dusk to be more specific) you can work on despooking your horse! The last time I took Chimi down to the river we saw 10ish deer jumping out of the tall grass as we approached. The grass is so tall right now (not when this picture was taken) that you don't see there deer until they leap up in the air and take off. As state before- great lessons in despooking!!!!

That is it for now- until the next post!!!!

From Bay to Grey

Last year I was making plans with my little bay Connemara/TB cross. I was going to event him beginner novice, try to qualify for the Eventing Championships, and generally have fun with my cute little guy. But since change is inevitable, and plans don't always go accordingly, I find myself a year later with a exuberant grey OTTB mare that I'm trying to keep inside a dressage arena and not go advance speed around a BN cross country course!

schooling Gus through the water- April 2013

The grey ghost herself, Miss Marley- May 2013

I competed Gus at the FENCE HT in April, and we finished 4th overall. We would of been 2nd had Gus not been so in love with his friend Finn and looking everywhere but at the first jump on course, plus I wasn't riding him the way I needed to towards that jump, especially with him being an air head about his buddy. Even if the rail had stayed up and we did finish 2nd, I knew in my heart that Gus just wasn't all that jazzed up about jumping. He can jump, and is a cute little jumper, but his heart just isn't in it, and when the jumps get bigger it could become pretty dangerous. I've taken my share of falls from Gus because he wouldn't pick his feet up going over the jump. As my coach Annie says, he just doesn't have any self preservation and that can be very dangerous over bigger jumps. So I put some feelers out for Gus and ended up finding the perfect home for him. He is now trail riding and fox hunting with my mom's good friend Cyndi. She is a great rider who just wants to have fun and puts up with Gus's silly moments. Plus I get to see him every time I head to my parents' because he's boarding at their place! 

Gus is a cute jumper when he wants to be!!!

 With Gus now enjoying his life as a fat, happy, trail/fox hunting pony, the grey mare that I've been riding on and off for a while had a chance to step into the lime light and become my main focus. Previously I wrote a post about taking her XC schooling for her first time last fall, and then I took her to a Ralph Hill clinic back in January. She's such a cool OTTB with so much heart, but trying to keep her relaxed while riding her is like holding a ticking time bomb. If you "cut" the wrong wire you've got pieces flying everywhere, but there is very little difference between the right and wrong wire. To be fair to her, she's only been in consistent work for 3 months, and even that is a bit questionable b/c we've had sooooo much rain this summer!!!! Either way, Marley has been getting a lot of work and really is progressing, even if at times it feels like at a snail's pace.

This past weekend I decided to take her to her first event. We headed off to the Tryon Riding and Hunt Club Sizzling Summer Schooling Horse Trails (non recognized) for our first outing at Beginner Novice. Last year I won the event with Gus, but this year my goal was to stay in the dressage arena (no joke- this was real goal, not just a laugh!) and to stay in a controlled trot/canter in stadium and XC. I wasn't worried about time or jumping faults, or even what the final Dressage score would be. I just wanted to complete and not scare the living daylights out of the jump judges!

The end result- SUCCESS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We stayed in the dressage ring, had a terrible score, but again considering I was worried about elimination, I could care less about the score.

Marley being calm...

submission- what?

ok, back to being good...ish

 Had a very green rail in stadium (not listening to a half halt to the 3rd jump on course which was a vertical with a downhill approach will do that to ya). We started to find our rhythm towards the end of the course, but we need to work on keeping a steady pace and not letting the momentum keep building jump after jump- gymnastics are going to be our life for a while!

weeeee!!!!! 

And to seal the deal, we had an amazing, mostly controlled, cross country round! She calmly cantered most of the jumps, and we came in closer to the optimum time instead of the speed time!

making the warmup jump look like a piece of cake

Overall we ended up in 6th place, I think out of 10 or 12, and I couldn't of been prouder! Technically we were last of everyone that completed, but that is not something I cared about at this event. Marley is still quite green, and is still learning the basics. We were nailed on submission and impulsion in the dressage which showed up in our stadium. But this horse has so much heart that I know I must take my time and do it right with her. There are no short cuts with this girl!!!!

Marley in her new pasture

she's such a pretty girl

Marley and her "gang"- Finn, Arrow, and Chimi