Horses ... My FAV!!!

 There's nothing better than a sunshiny day in Arizona.  Except for the wind ... we could do without the wind.  It began with a lovely little video of this baby.  It looks like he's lost his squadron.  Yup, that's what they are called.  Maybe his navigation skills are a little off.

I set about quilting the last chunk of fabric I sewed together because I completely forgot about the horse competition at the fairgrounds.  I threw all that aside, pulled my boots on and was off with the Chance family to watch Laila ride.  

For those that haven't done this with their grandchildren, there's a lot of sitting around talking and waiting for a two minute ride.  This is dressage ... the English way of riding around an arena at different paces, following a specific pattern.  When done, you salute the judges who have been scoring you and ride out.  There were so many entrants in this class they had two arenas going at once.  People come from miles around to ride these competitions.  

Laila and Max did really well in the novice class until he had one tiny instance of balking, but completed the pattern perfectly.  I never did find out how she placed.

Next was the jumping competition.  This is really good for a horse bred for pulling carriages.  He didn't hesitate at all going over these jumps, even though he hasn't been doing it very long.

Let me just say that these competitions for novice riders are VERY stressful.  You get so nervous your adrenaline is running crazy.  Sadly, that's what happened this time and Laila's mind went blank, not knowing which jump to take next.  She turned the corner and exited the field.  

I'll bet you that won't happen again.  She gathered herself and went to the office requesting another ride today.  No points, but like the old proverb ... if you fall off, just get back on and do it again.

Back home I spent the rest of the day and well into the night trying to finish this quilt.  I looked for an easy snowflake pattern to complete quickly.  I guess that knowledge comes with practice.  This pattern took one whole hour just to do ONE ROW!!  

Besides that, it took rolls and rolls of bobbin thread.  I'm getting really good at restarting it when it runs out.  

At long last it was done and I was off to bed.  Today should be an easy restful day of packing!!!