The county fair is fast approaching and E. has been busy getting ready. She and Curly are together most days now, taking lessons and just generally bonding. Soon there will be two lessons per day (currently she does one every other day) to make sure they are in sync when it comes time to compete.
They will be participating in Western Pleasure, Western Equitation, Bareback, Showmanship, and Trail. This is all going to be quite a challenge for Curly as he has never been a 4-H project horse and has never competed in an arena. I'm sure E. will be quite frustrated by the end of fair since her last competition experience was on Pyro - a 27 year old Arabian who could compete in his sleep - and they took home a handful of blue ribbons!
We don't expect any blues this time around, but are preparing as much as possible to make the events come out as successfully as possible.
Having said all that, I must add that Curly and E. took yesterday and today off. He had his hooves trimmed on Wednesday and is pretty tender-footed at the moment. The farrier is very happy with the direction his feet are going, but it is still a somewhat painful process for the poor guy. And on top of that, E. has gotten some sort of stomach bug and was up all night vomiting. Poor girl!
We took one more step into the "horsey world" this week. Our family is now the proud owners of a truck. Never thought I would have one, to tell you the truth! Guess the city-girl in me is slowly fading away....