Great to turn 30!

Saturday I had a great time with my family. We were eating nearly all day: breakfast, brunch, cake & coffee and my favourite dish in the evening. Between cake/coffee and supper my sister and me went shopping in Hannover and had some ice-cream later. It was a very funny time as we started to take photos of every garment we tried at P&C. Now after checking the photos I know that I have to go again and buy everything I tried :o))))

On Sunday we drove to Baga to do a walk with her. We met Simone who asked me suddenly "Baga is very coloured, isn't she?" And I was wondering, "Huh? Baga is bleikvindótt (red silver dapple dun), she is always special coloured." but then I saw what she meant:



All my tack was also decorated with balloons and paper streamer and I had no chance just to go pick up my horse and ride like she and my tack was. But of course I did :o)

Baga was a little bit unhappy with the balloon on her head so I removed it soon. The next days I will try to get the colour out of her coat. Luckily the summer comes and she is losing her winter coat but maybe I will take water for help :o) Now I have to go to work. We'll see if anything's happening there... anyhow it was a wonderful birthday and I have not one bad feeling about getting 30. Quite the opposite: I feel better than ever before!

SSSól Revival Playday

Isländischen Aschewolken zum Trotz feierten wir am Sonntag den 2. SSSól Revival Playday. Knapp 20 Teilnehmer hatten sich eingefunden, um sich im Trail, Fahnenrennen und Best of Dreigang zu messen. Bei der Parcours-Begehung gab es zwar noch großes Staunen, vor allem das Besenpolo mit Gymnastikball erfreute die Gemüter, aber in der Durchführung zeigten sich teils wahre Perfektion und Einfallsreichtum. Mit einer Mischung aus Gehorsamkeits-Prüfungen und Geschicklichkeit gab es für jedes Pferd-und-Reiter-Paar positive Ergebnisse zu verzeichnen. Das Reiterstübchen war gefüllt mit unzähligen Köstlichkeiten und sogar Gäste aus Island (Menschen) und ein echter Cowboy hatten sich als Zuschauer eingefunden.
Auch das Fahnenrennen fand schnell Anklang in der Startergemeinde und plötzlich folgten jede Menge spontane Nachnennungen. Siegreich waren am Ende Kira und Bjalla, die im Rennpass und Tölt ohne Sattel durch die Bahn flogen. Und während die Kohlen im Grill schon glühten, machten sich neun mutige Reiterinnen auf den Weg zur Ovalbahn, um dort die drei besten Gänge ihrer Pferde zu präsentieren.
Mit vollem Bauch, gebräunter Haut und einem alkoholischen Kaltgetränk in der Hand ließ man langsam den Abend ausklingen. Zum Abschluss hatten wir sogar noch das Glück, Zeugen eines mittlerweile selten gewordenen Phänomens zu werden. Wie gebannt starrten wir in den Himmel, unsicher ob den Augen noch zu trauen sei. Doch tatsächlich...ein fliegendes Flugzeug!

Hier der Link zu den Fotos:
http://skinfaxa.net/gallery/main.php?g2_itemId=29141

Baga confused - too much ash in the air?

Hey my friends,
today is the Playday-day and I am hopefully ready with all arrangements! I wrote a time-schedule and starting-list, created notes for the judges Bettina & Petra and painted a plan for the trail-parcours. Actually Baga and me would be a hot favourite for the trail but anything happened with my little horse what makes her confused. It started with the day as the ash from Eyjafjallajökull came into our country. Maybe Baga is smelling her home? Actually she is acting like a horse on the right side of the brain (parelli language = RBI). She is having fear about everything. On Tuesday she was rather normal but some kind of stubborn, on Wednesday I was wondering why she was not putting her feets on the pallet (pedestal). One of our favourite tricks at normal days. But this day she was acting rather fearful. But on Thursday everything was over and I could hardly touch her head, she was in fear about EVERYTHING including me. On Friday we had a riding-lesson with Teresa and I learned that best is to give continuity to the horse, so I put more self-confidence and leadership in myself and let her feel that there is no reason to be fearful. She was still freaky but it was getting better after she used her head to listen to me. At the end of the riding-lesson she seemed to have forgotten that she was fearful before :o) It was similar yesterday as I was riding at the oval-ground the first time this year (after the snow-season). She had fear about the tie of the new fence which was laying on the ground. But after some rounds the bad feelings were nearly gone. Now I would say we are no hot favourite for today but of course will we take part at the SSSól Revival Playday! It's just a new chance to show her that there is nothing to have fear about.
I am very excited if the flight situation in Germany will change soon because actually I have to fly to Vienna tommorrow. We'll see?!
Have a great, sunny day my friends! Now I have to rush...

Für Hara

Stjarna gestern

No time to blog, just new pictures

Dimma, 05.04.2010

Baga, 07.04.2010

Two weeks later

They sales-show in Hestagard and Hestabakki was great and it fell not one rain drop down on me. The weather forecast is always only as real as you think it is ;o) My favourite horses at the show were Svala vom Lordsee - 5 years old red dun mare (V: Hjalti vom Blitzberg, M: Bitta frá Hliðarbergi) and of the unridden horses it was definetely Tibrá v. d. Prignitz - 5 years old red dun pinto mare (V: Tindur von Adlerhoop, M: Rósa frá Stokkseyri). Luckily I had enough time on Sunday to look through all the pictures and uploading them immediately. That's much more than I have yet done with my pictures from Iceland but I hope that this will happen in the next days.
After the sales-show I drove to Baga immediately because I received my brand-new "Quittpad" and could not wait to use it! Baga seemed to like it and I found some tölt-scenes in the video. Often I am filming my riding or play-sessions because it helps me a lot to see my faults but sometimes it also useful to see improvements (or finding tölt steps ;o) The days after we had a mixed program of jogging together, playing at liberty or online, riding "naked" (I had my clothes on!), climbing on a pedestal, pushing a ball or eating grass!
After a great week with Baga and early finishing times at work I decided to take photos on Circle-L-Ranch in Wenden (27.+28.3.). I came home with ~ 4000 photos which I am uploading now in every free minute (not this very minute but the next again - I promise ;o) The competitions were fine and the weather much better than the weather forecast announced. There were many beautiful horses and nice people to meet. In spite of all my photo-work I could spend some minutes with Baga this week and went on with my training about collection. At the moment I could swear that Baga is tölting every day few steps. ANYTHING seems to work :o)

My trip to Iceland

The drive to Frankfurt and the flight were very easy and Ransý came to the airport of Keflavík to pick me up. Then we drove to Mánagrund to have a look at Skinfaxa (which is for sale like I have been told) and checked the riding-hall. Silla picked me up at Ransý's home and after having some coffee and "hestaspjall" we went home to Reykjavík. I met Silla's family and we had a great dinner and some more "hestaspjall" before going to bed. The next day we went to a farm near Borgarnesi to take photos of Sokkadís new home. Fortunately it is the same place where Sæla-Dís - her daughter from 2008 - lives. It was a nice place for getting some photos on my camera. Later at the same day we went to the horse stable to see the stallions of Silla's parents. Glófaxi and Völusteinn frá Kópavogi. The pictures weren't bad but Silla and her horse-trainer Árni decided to try it again the next day.
On Tuesday Silla and me went riding and it was very exciting to ride tölt again after so many years of trot. My performance was rather bad and I am sure my horse was lucky to get rid of me after the riding-tour. Now my plan is to study more about riding icelandic horses in future ;o) After the riding Silla had to work a little, so she throw me out of the car at the 66° North Shop. What a great idea! First I could not decide what I like, short time later I wanted to buy everything in the shop :o)
In the afternoon we went to Árni again to have a look at the stallions. I got some good shots and we were especially excited about 4 years old Völusteinn who showed incredible movements and a lot of will to run!
The same words could describe another stallion we met the next day in Hárlaugsstöðum. His name is Lindi and he is born in 2007. It was a rainy day and the stallions were more curious then anything else but as we let them run you could see all the talent in them. We also looked at the herd of young or pregnant mares and there were also many beautiful ones. After taking some photos and getting totally wet we were invited to some skýr and coffee and we gladly accepted the invitation. Of course we had some hestaspjall but after few hours we had to say goodbye and drove to Ásmundarstöðum to meet Hekla. It went on raining so I had no fun taking more pictures so we just talked a little, looked at the horses (for example Loki - another son of Sokkadís) and later took a drink of mare's milk. It was a funny experience ;o) Further we also went to Selfoss and said hello to Mona but still being wet we wasn't relaxed enough to stay and went home rather early. As all pictures were taken suddenly the sun came out... It was still rather bright so Silla and me stopped at some places to take photos of icelandic landscape. You can say I have seen a lot of things and people in only three days so I am glad that I made this trip but maybe next time there should be more time. I'm sorry for everybody who have not been visited. Next time you'll be the first ;o)
I had a very good view over West Germany on the return flight. Nearly 30 minutes I could observe the earth from above. After a stopover at my friend and sister-in-law Annette I arrived my home around six o'clock in the afternoon. The next day I could not await to see Baga after sooooooooooo long time and she was obviously surprised to see me. To make an easy start from break to work I used the icelandic saddle and a briddle from anybody else. What a strange feeling to sit in this saddle again - but it was comfortable ;o) Unfortunately Teresa is in holidays and I would love to get some riding lessons. Hm, no solution available at the moment. Now I have to quit to wrap up somebody's birthday gift and to carry it to the post office immediately. Later I will be in Buchholz to take photos at the sales-show there. It should be rainy the whole day but I'm thinking positive and give the weather a chance to be great for photos. After it I want to see Baga again and ride a small pattern. Have a nice day and keep on smiling! I do :o)

Dimma - the working cow foal :o)

Febrúar

Hard to say what happened the days since my last blog. It happened a lot, that's a fact. My computer-time is short so I will only use few words, photos, videos or links to describe what's going on ;o)

Photo session at Hestagard, 06.02.2010


Monday the 15.2. we had carnival and I painted Baga for fun :o)

Later we were playing in the snow:

Walking at sunset on 18.3.


Yesterday we were fighting against claustrophobia:


Next weekend I'm having a wellness-weekend and the weekend after (6.-7.3.) we will hopefully work with cows and visit Dimma. On 14.3. I'll fly to Iceland and come back on 18.3. Any more news? Can you never get enough? Ok, on 20.3. I'm on Hestagard again to take photos of a sales-show. The weekend after I'm possibly at Circle-L to take photos of the competitions.
Addition: After my trip to Iceland I will spend some days in Switzerland working.

Snow pictures online

http://skinfaxa.net/gallery/main.php?g2_itemId=27541