Equine Affaire to Remember!

The Equine Affaire was in town! On Saturday Brandon and I excitedly drove to West Springfield to get a piece of the action! It's 4 days long and I was able to go on Saturday, but my friend Karen P (and her hubs) spent all 4 days there. Lucky ducks! On Saturday as soon as we arrived, we met up with her and her husband Paul. It was so fun to see them and be surrounded by horses and horse people! Karen took this picture of these horse bums.

This is another one of Karen's snaps of the ending of the versatile horse competition. It's something I love to watch every year. But this year they didn't show any of the qualifying runs on Saturday at all so I didn't get to see any. Such a bummer! Luckily, Karen took some great pictures while she attended and shared them with me. Each year seeing each competitor go through the course is so inspiring and inspiriting, we go back to the ring at Bill's and set something up ourselves! I personally feel that the horses love our trail courses in the ring. It's much more fun for them. It also great fun to watch at the Equine Affaire.


This is me in the Aussie booth right after Brandon bought me this hat. Isn't this hat the best? The Aussie booth is one I never miss! I saw lots of scabbards there and wanted them, but in the end Brandon bought me a tiny pruning saw with a saddle pouch. So maybe it's not a machete, but I do know I could use a little saw out on the trail. I'd probably inadvertedly stab myself or Lilly if I had a big sword. I guess I am not a natural born swashbuckler. I am however, a natural born hat-wearer.


Here are Karen and Paul!! What fun it was to hang with them! They had saved us seats at the Sylvia Zerbini presentation. Sylvia can "control" and direct her horses without anything but her voice commands. She was terrific. Both Karen and I loved her. As Sylvia was performing, we saw Guy McLean, Bill's new horse inspiration, watching. I would have liked to see him work with horses too, but he only had demos on Thursday and Friday.


We wandered from building to building for hours! Here is a very cool mechanical horse that people were trying saddles on and then "riding." I wonder if it has a bucking bronco setting. Brandon said he would have loved to see a person get catapulted off the mechanical horse. This is what husbands who do not any real interest of their own in horses say at these kinds of events.


The next day I headed over to the farm with visions of sugarplum equine fairies still dancing in my head. I am still working on ring work with Lilly. I will see her through her tarp phobia if it is the last thing I do!


Oh look, is that my new hat? Yes, it is! That is right after I mounted Lilly bareback with no real assistance--except for that block you see by her feet. It was the messiest, sloppiest, most ridiculous unassisted mount you will ever see.


QTee took the afternoon off.