Doin' Dressage

Hello from Orange, VA. I would like to commend the local Mexican food establishment for having some of the friendliest staff and best margaritas (for $4.50 each!) I've experienced in a long time. So, I'll be writing tonight for as long as it takes me to finish the very large bottle of Deer Park water sitting next to me, on my Holiday Inn Express nightstand. My excuse? I don't have to ride until 4:00 tomorrow, and I did a heck of a lot of dressage this weekend!!

Also a quick report on my eye - looking awesome! Aside from my very stylish apparent choice of yellow and purple eyeshadow on one eye, it's looking almost okay! Kerry and I will be playing operating room in the Holiday Inn Express tomorrow night to remove the stitches. But everyone's an expert in a Holiday Inn Express, right?! I'm really thrilled with how quickly it's healing, and I definitely don't feel too damaged any more.

But - back to that dressage thing! Spent the weekend at Morven Park at the VADA/NoVa Dressage show. Katchi made a clean sweep of yellow ribbons, and I was thrilled! He scored higher in each test we rode, ending with his final test earning a 67 something!!! WOW - that's like almost a 70!!! Best of all, he finished off the last score he needed to earn our USDF Performance Award at First Level - considering we only do 1-2 dressage shows a year, every test counts!

Katchi was a bit of a jerk today (hollering for his friend and threatening to have a tantrum, but I was especially pleased with my ability to stay cool and ride through it - to good scores! It's a great feeling!

Perhaps the most stressful part of my day was reading a second level test for my old friend, Dee! It's such a strange thing, this test reading! Not allowed in eventing, but everyone's "doing it" it dressage! I have to admit I found it kind of annoying in rings next to each other when someone is screaming out to do a "change of lead" or "travers right" when I'm just trying to remember whether to turn left or right at C! Anyhow, I'm quite proud of myself for keeping Dee on track and giving her the correct commands at the correct time! It was perhaps my biggest accomplishment of the day!

And a huge thank you to Kerry's mom who bought me the cd of photos from the weekend! Unfortunately, Kerry left her photo cd in the trailer tonight, so you're stuck with photos of just me and Katchi for now! Kerry put a lot of dressage mileage under her this weekend - and came away with several pretty ribbons including a well deserved first place!!! Not too bad for her first recognized dressage show ever!

Day 1 of the Lucinda Green clinic is tomorrow - stay tuned (hopefully!) for videos tomorrow!