Wellington wrap up and Aiken update

The past few weeks have gone by pretty quickly! We have managed to fit quite a bit in such a short amount of time. The two weeks spent in Wellington were incredibly beneficial for myself and the horses!! A huge thank you to Phillip for setting all of that up for us!

I was fortunate enough to ride with Katie Prudent while in Florida. Let me just say, wow! Learned so much in every lesson, and I felt all of the horses did too! Especially Striker. He is still a bit green in comparison to his stablemates that were with him down there. Being only 7 coming 8, he had a lot to learn and rose to the occasion. I had a different horse after the first week of lessons! It was an eye opener for him and I feel that I came away knowing much more about him and how to continue on with his training. Striker is an Irish horse ( by Maltstriker kwpn) that we imported as an un-broke, untouched 3 year old. He is very talented, and super athletic, but has been a little slow to mature, so I have taken my time with him. Striker is for sale and probably will progress as a show jumper with his incredible jump! I was very lucky to have him with me in FL! Katie worked me hard on my position as well, which I needed. This has made a huge improvement in the horses' jump, particularly Joey.

At the end of the 2 weeks I took each Joey, Rox and Striker into a class at WEF under the watchful eye of Katie. Let me just emphasize how helpful it was to have Katie warm us up, watch our ride and critique! All 3 horses jumped lovely clear rounds, not bad for their first time showing this winter!

We also were very lucky to continue our flat lessons with Betsy Steiner!! So much fun!! Betsy was very kind to fit us in for quite a few lessons. She has a wonderful way of teaching and I find that not only do I learn so much each lesson, but my horses truly enjoy every ride with her! I find myself getting very excited about the dressage work we have been doing, and the best part is that my horses (especially Joey), are really into it!! Joey seems to find a place in this more intense flatwork that makes him relax and really buckle down and work VERY hard! He has always had a great work ethic, but there is something that has changed in him since working with Betsy. He is truly enjoying his dressage work and at times I think is having fun with it! For anyone that knows Joey......this is pretty cool!!! (I'm having a blast too!!)

It was very sad to leave the 80 degree weather, sunny skies and palm trees to head north on Sunday last week, but I can't complain because we only had to go as far as Aiken......NJ is a mess with the horrid winter weather! Back to reality :)

It took a few days to settle, unpack and well....crash for a day after FL! But it was quickly back to work and prepping for the training sessions that start tomorrow. It's been a few years since I have been fortunate to ride with Mark, I'm looking forward to getting started!

Thanks for reading :) I will keep everyone updated on how the lessons are going!!

Kristin