Equestrian Blog

It is a bitter sweet moment when a horse has to leave Judson, especially a horse that has been in our program for awhile. We love our horses and they all have a special place in our barn and our hearts. Unfortunately, for some of them, there comes a time when they no longer fit the needs of our program.  Often we wish that they could stay anyways, but in order for us to have room for new horses the ones that are no longer working have to find a new home.

Not just any home will do though. Just because a horse is no longer working in our program does not mean that we no long love and care about them. For one of our horse to go to a new home, it has to be the right new home. For some horses that is with a member of our program who has a place for them, other times it is with someone who used to be a part of the program, it could be with a friend of the program, or just with someone who came to look at the horse. In any situation though, it has to be someone we feel will be good for the horse and that the horse good for them. It is sad for them to go, but we know that they will be happy.

It is also a good thing; it means that we have an opening for a new horse. We have an amazing program and great support from our school, but we still have limited space. This often means that we don't have room for new horses. When a horse leaves, it means that we can accept a new horse that will work well in our program and benefit our program and riders.  

Another semester is coming to a close and that means that it is time for riding finals. Like every semester, each student enrolled in a riding class has to perform a mounted routine in costume that corresponds to a song that they have choreographed the routine to. I always find this one of the best parts of the semester. Maybe it is because it gives me the chance to show off what I have learned in the semester, or maybe it is just because it is fun to get to choreograph my own routine. I think the biggest reason that I find our finals so fun is that I love to design my costume to go with my music and routine.

Everyone comes up with a costume, but I come up with a routine for it's costume potential. I don't choose my song unless I can come up with an extravagant costume idea to go with it. Most of my friends think I am crazy for being so obsessed with coming up with a unique costume. In the past, I have been a pirate, with music from the Pirate's of the Caribbean sound track. I have been princess Lea with music from Star Wars. I have been an angel and used the Song Just Like A Prayer performed by the cast of Glee. This semester, I choreographed my routine to The Grid and C.L.U. from the Tron Legacy sound track. My costume resembles the outfit that Cora wore in Tron Legacy.

It was tons of fun and I really enjoyed it. I rode one of our new horses and the two of us worked together really well. The routine fit well with my music, my horse, and me.  Now that this final is over, I will have to start thinking about next semesters. I want to make sure I will have time to get my costume made. Since I barely had time to finish sewing this one together, I don't want to run in to that again.  

(picture to come, I am trying to get it on my computer) 

 At the beginning of this year, the Judson College Equine Studies Department got to move into their new facility. The facility includes a 30- stall barn complete with 2 tack rooms, an office, a restroom and laundry facility, feedroom and wash rack.The barn is conveniently attached to our covered arena and there is an outdoor dressage ring and round pen also on site. 

 I know this is a little late coming, but I have finally gotten some pictures, so if you will, please join me on the first part of the Equine Studies Facility Photo Tour. 

 Our horses enjoy the weekends off and can often be found relaxing in pasture. Don't be alarmed if you see one or two of them lying down flat on their side, they are fine. They just like to sleep in the warm sun. 

This is one of the two hallways in our new barn , the other is almost identical and is located on the other side of the stalls on the left of the photo.

This is a a view of the outside of our barn. 

Our outdoor dressage ring - it is also used by the hunt seat team to practice going over fences. 

The gating system to our pasture.When the double gates are open it provides a closed-off walk way for the horses to get from the pasture to the barn. 

 This is an example of one of our stalls. They are large and roomy, a comfortable place for our horses to spend the day when they are not being ridden. 

That concludes the first part of our tour. I thank you for joining me and I hope you will return for the second portion, during which we will look at the tack room, office and other features of this fantastic  facility. 

I cannot believe that this  semester is already over! I only have two more days of classes before exams. 

I think that this has been my busiest semester yet, and although I feel like it has been forever since the beginning of the semester, it does not feel like it is time for the semester to end.  This may just be because I still have so much work to do that I am wishing I had two more weeks instead of two days. The list of uncompleted work contains two papers, three websites, one test, and then exams. When this is all going to get done I am not really sure; but I think I find myself in a similar situation most every semester and it has all worked out up until this point. So I have no doubt that it will all work out. It is just going to take some serious focusing and praying that God will help me through the next week with very little sleep. 

On a more positive note, my statistics group project is almost finished. Actually my group is finishing it up as I am typing this blog. ( I am playing supervisor on this one.) Really they are just finishing typing the paper to go with it and most of the work for it was already done.  They have been amazing. 

 I have also already done my Equine final, so that is one less thing that I have to worry about for next week. We actually do all of our Equine finals the week before "finals" so that we can have more time to study for our other classes. For our riding classes, the finals are a riding routine that we choreograph to music. This semester mine was to the song "Just Like a Prayer" Glee version and I dressed up like an angel.  And to stick with the tradition of me incorporating things I have never done before into my routine, I rode barefooted. It wasn't part of the original plan, but my boots looked really tacky with my costume, You should all check out the riding final videos on the Judson Equestrians Facebook page. (http://www.facebook.com/judson.equestrians )