Nas is still intermittently lame he’s more not than is, but it’s still an ongoing issue after having more vet visits we’re convinced it’s arthritis in his shoulder which we can manage, that is until he kicks the gate with his other foreleg. Paris is well overdue to start her training, have to say I was not prepared for having a mare at all, the youngster I had as a teenager was very easy to work with. We’ve also got a new member to the heard another piebald no less, an. 11.2hh gelding called Jiggy. He’s an old boy at 20 but is an absolute darling I loved him from the second we got him. Unfortunately just before christmas he was diagnosed with cushings and had a bout of laminitis to boot. 

Last winter the horses lived out, which was horrendous we did have a large field shelter but the horses preferred to stand in the mud for most the day. There was just no let up from the mud being on clay soil it didn’t hold up to two large cobs, one of whom likes to piss a round a lot. To be fair poor Nas was pretty sedentary he had an abscess at the beginning of last winter and then he was lame pretty much for the rest of it. 

He’s not 100% now but is a lot better than he has been, he is due a chiropractor visit which usually helps to release his hamstrings which then makes him lighter on the front. We have had a problem with feather mites on all of the horses, my next plan of action is to try deosect. 

I currently have three very filthy equines out in the field, I will try and get some up to date pictures later today to prove just how bad they are. 

So here it is Welcome back to my blog, you might noticed it has a new name which I will try to elaborate on in my next post. 

Jennie 

Counta Canta is coming soon so watch this space!

I will continue to put effort and focus into losing the weight and bringing Nas back into work. I’ve also got Paris who needs her ground work training to start. As well as a puppy who needs to learn a trick or two.

I would like to thank you all for reading.

Jennie

We didn’t have dinner last night not in the conventional sense anyhow. Shadow the new puppy we have acquired managed to get himself trodden on by Nas (totally wasn’t Nas’s fault) and to make it worse he got pushed along underneath as poor Nas tried not to hurt him anymore while getting out of the way.  Thank god he was unharmed we did think he had broken his paw but despite being shaken he was soon up and running again -after a couple of sweet biscuits- looking at him now if you hadn’t of seen it you wouldn’t believe it had happened.

Needless to say I needed something sweet after that, what I did have though was a bucket of soup with some tear and share bread. This helped to a point but my nerves were still synapsing most the day. In the end I couldn’t bare it anymore and munched my way through deal or no deal (yep a guilty pleasure of mine. It just so happens to come on at 5pm which is when I am in the house with the boy). I then proceeded to have prawn crackers and large dairy milk for dinner once I picked Steve up. Not quite the spaghetti carbonara ready meal I had planned lol.

Hence why I woke up hungry this morning and thought sod it I will have some porridge with the boy. I also think the advert I saw yesterday about porridge lowering cholesterol might have helped in my decision. Not that I have any idea about my cholesterol levels or have any intention of finding out. Like I said the other day all I’m interested in is my weight and whether I can ride Nas or not. It was pretty tasty but it feels a long time ago now and lunch feels even longer away!

It might not also be helped by the fact I’ve come in from the rain, I got soaked just putting the horses out and I only had a long sleeved top on with my gilet. I wasn’t happy hence why I am in before really doing anything on the yard. The forecast says it should clear up later so I figured I was better off waiting and doing it then.  This however is not helping my need to not be sitting around thinking about food -as I reach for a mint- I’ve already had 4 coffees this morning and I now feel so hungry I don’t think it would make a difference if I had another one anyhow.

So the big question of today will be can I hold out until lunchtime:-s

I’m really not sure where last year went if I’m honest; the daily runs to take hubby to a station 30miles away haven’t helped or the pick-ups. And then there was a lameness issue going on, as well as my usual battle of the bulge and a very sedentary year was had by all. If I’m honest I’m still not sure Nas is completely sound, it’s hard to tell when he is so unfit. And I mean really unfit he has had almost a year off. He’s never looked this bad, sure we’ve had or lulls in the past but nothing to the extent of this.

I think I spun him a few times on the lunge last year nothing that amounted to much more than a head collar though, or to be any help in gauging his level of lameness. I do believe his fitness now plays an important part in anything that is going on; the new farrier has been brilliant in helping to get his feet back to how they were. So hopefully in the long run this rest will have done him some good. However we can’t go on like this, it’s time to bring him back into work.

In fact it started today I was on the yard most of the morning firstly grooming Nas and then Paris. Then I had a good clean up and swept out the hay barn. Once I get him in later I’m washing his legs off so hopefully we can get them clipped off tomorrow. His feathers really don’t help the farrier and they also get those scabby sores. Which I’ve yet to try the stuff I got from the vet last year for him. Hmm wonder if it’s still in date.

Diet is also a go, two meals and trying to avoid sweet temptations. I finally got the Wi-Fi scales I was after, they took some setting up but now it’s done they send the info to my phone or the pc and then I can forward it to twitter or Facebook if I want.  Not that I want them for that it’s mainly so I have a set record each day. Everyone has weighed  on them and I think the general consensus is we all need to lose a bit of weight (even the boy), well in their case they just need to move about a bit more but it’s good to have it saved so we can all see.

I’m also going to ask you to forgive me for the amount of  s#!t I do spout on here sometimes, please believe me when I write a post that it is truly what I am thinking at that given time, whether it’s right or wrong at that moment I have faith in what I am typing. I would like to point out even though I back track go around in circles and often say the same thing more than once, there is always a little bit of truth in what I am typing.

And as much as I believed two days ago that I would not get on the scales for 2014 or stay away from sweet treats and that I was going to stick to three meals etc. etc. today I believe the complete opposite. The same goes for thinking I would have had some proper horsey time by now, I thought I would get out there as soon as the boy went back to school. What I didn’t bank on was the abysmal weather and then the break down f a washing machine a house in chaos and the sudden impact the school/work routine has had on us.

So yeah I will admit it sometimes I can say a lot of nonsense. In my defence though I don’t give up if I think something isn’t working I go back to the drawing board and start afresh with a new perspective and a greater determination (for that day at least).  I have been thinking though maybe I should stop telling you what I am going to do but actually wait until I’m doing it and then share that in a post. Thinking deeper into it I have started using this blog like one of those diet magazines/clubs where I get myself hyped up about what I’m going to do and no matter how much I talk it up I still don’t actually achieve anything.

So yeah sod it I will weigh I will eat chocolate and I probably won’t have breakfast. Who knows! I have to get myself organised this year I can’t keep this living from moment to moment, one thing I have really got to do is make sure I do a food shop once a week either online or a specified trip. I’ve got to stop the dashing out for the odd item; there is nothing more disruptive to my day than when I have to pop to the shops for something menial. It also makes the whole being good harder seeing as not only do I have the lure of costa coffee now I’ve also got the sweet counter to contend with.

So I took a couple of pictures of myself yesterday when I was still on the no weigh thing. I thought it would be good to do a selfie of the outfit I aiming to be in before I ride Nas again. If I post a pic of when I last wore the jods it will give you a comparison. Also I don’t actually know my weight at the moment still because the scales are in the barn I’ve been using them to weigh Nas’s haylage out.

And those that are still confused my new year’s resolution is to not weigh myself anymore, well at least not for 2014. I just don’t want to know anymore, all I am interested in is getting fitter and getting smaller.  It’s no longer just about being an acceptable weight to ride, it’s about being fit enough to ride and it’s about taking the focus of what those scales say away.

At end of the day I have weighed myself in the past to see if I am losing which is effectively getting smaller. We’ve all been there though when we have been in a really good place and then we get on the scales only to find they don’t reflect our thoughts or jeans for that matter. It’s then all downhill into a spiral of misery and eating. Ok sure there are the odd few who will get on the scales and be surprised that they have actually lost.

Unfortunately I am not one of them. I have never EVER lost weight through misery or stress or any other emotion on occasion when I am happy I have been able to keep my eating in check a tad but then I get really happy and the eating kicks up a notch. And then I’m not so happy anymore. So for this year my focus is on getting us all fitter and hoping that will lead to smaller. Of course I will be dieting there really is no avoiding it, no matter what exercise I do I do need to cut my eating down somewhere.

So I have decided on a plan which I am determined to stick to, regardless of how quick or slow my results are. There was a point somewhere between Christmas and New Year where I was attracted by the sparkly but dark side of doing a shake diet. I somehow managed to convince myself it was my only hope –ok it might have had something to do with all the posts on Facebook of people who were wanting to share their success’s- and as much as I scoffed at them I was suckered in to thinking it’s a path I wanted to take.

I’m pleased to report I quickly came to my senses and went back to scoffing at them (but don’t tell them that!) I swore off diets a long time ago and sure you could say where  has it got me I lost 3stone and put most of it back on. The truth is though diet or no diet I would have still done that. I had spent almost 20yrs prior to my ‘doing it my way’ where I was always on some kind of “diet” p.s from now on when I say “diet” I mean where someone else is trying to tell me what I should and shouldn’t be eating, whereas plain old diet just means what I am choosing to eat or rather what not to eat in order to lose weight.

So I guess you want to know what I’m doing its simple really and you have heard it all before. But this time around I’m going with the 3 meals a day. I’m not going to say ‘small’ because darn it some days I just need to eat more. Where I will be cutting back initially is I am not having any sweet treats whatsoever. In fact the sweetest thing I will be having is my cereal. I will then have a lunch and a dinner both consisting f what is on offer or available. I’m not going to try and supplement my diet with additional fruit or probiotic yogurts etc. I wouldn’t eat these if I wasn’t trying to lose weight so why pretend to like them when I am trying.

It’s hard enough cutting down as it is without replacing what you like with foods you don’t like. Ok I don’t 100% hate fruit but it’s not something that factor regularly into my life at the moment I much prefer my veggies. Of course if I get a sudden craving for some as my body adjusts I’m not saying I will never have it. but at least for the time being I am going to stay away from anything that might trigger me into thinking I can control my sweet tooth, which is something else I want to talk more on at some point. I had another one of my little epiphany’s over Christmas that I want to share with you.

So there you have it no great surprises other than fact I’ve already started both cutting back and doing more I haven’t stopped pushing myself over Christmas I have walked around the field everyday (ok again there is good reason for that and I shall introduce him when I have time to add pictures).  It has been an excellent but exhausting Christmas which has left me with little energy to think about horsey goals.  The boy is back at school tomorrow and I have spent last few days blitzing the house. I think tomorrow will finally be the day I get to do more than muck out!

About 5 weeks ago I was all hyped and excited about getting my arse back in the saddle by New Year, that hasn’t happened. Then at about 4 weeks I was all ready to start a plan that would involve more meals but smaller ones, that didn’t happen. Then I decided I would just go with the flow get everything sorted and get on top of everything before I started any more talk of plans or goals. And where has that left me….

Three weeks until Christmas, and if we want to get really technical this time in three weeks it will all be over! Of course most of my plans involve the New Year so it’s technically just under four weeks. And although I had some whimsical notion that I would see the New Year in by riding. Like most New Year’s resolutions I know that just isn’t going to happen. It’s not because I don’t want it too or haven’t in the past tried. But no matter how you look at it new year’s day is a bank holiday and not just any bank holiday it’s the first one of the year and I like to make the most of those little extra down time days by taking it easy with my family.

To be fair in the past we have usually been entertaining the family members we didn’t get to see at Christmas. It’s almost like another Christmas day just without the presents. This year I do believe we will be on our own. We were having a quiet Christmas up until about 2 weeks ago when everything changed and we now have a plethora of guests arriving from the 21^st until the 28^th of December. It’s going to be hectic to say the least… luckily I love it. Family at Christmas is what it’s all about to me. What I don’t love is that we have two more weeks at school. Which would be ok just? If it wasn’t for the nativity, the school disco, the drop in session, the cake sale and an end of school assembly. Yep all that in the next two weeks and I’m sure I’ve missed something out.

So with all the will in the world I just know I won’t be in any state to start thinking about exercising the horses for at least another four weeks. Which I do find frustrating but equally I know on some days it’s enough just to have to muck them out. Esp. Christmas morning in the past 6 yrs. I have realised there really is no good time to go out and do them. I hate that feeling of leaving my family inside. On the flip side though there are times when I am outside with the horses and I hate leaving them to join my family. It really does feel as though my heart is in two places at times. (Not that I would have it any other way) I love them all.

So my new kind of plan is to keep doing what I am doing with the horses and at least try to flick them over so they don’t look like abandoned wild beasts. And in the New Year I will bring them back into work (whilst praying the bad weather we are meant to get doesn’t materialise). I am sticking to three meals a day. I wouldn’t say they are particularly small or big really, I’m just having what I fancy within those time frames with a definite no to snacks. I found if I messed around too much it leaves me open to failure so even if I’m not particularly feeling breakfast I still have a small bowl of cereal. Lunch can be anything from a takeaway to a sandwich and piece of cake. As for dinner that is when unless I am out I try not to have a dessert.

Still we made it to the coach pick up point, which after reading on FB I was confused as to whether they were having the coaches this year. Have to admit I was rather worried about this we walked it once a few years ago and I really didn’t think I would make it. However the coaches were there and all was good. Upon arrival we went straight into see Lucinda Frederick’s demo; I really enjoyed this she showed us some of her pole work. What I particularly enjoyed was the fun element she put into it. Her ethos is a ‘fun fair training system’ which really struck a chord with me.  Which I’m hoping to elaborate on in a future post.

We then shopped… this wasn’t so fun both me and my friend were a bit off the planet for some reason, that is until we visited the Equine touch stand where we had a little of their human touch demonstrated on us both. It instantly took the nagging knot out of my shoulder and my friend said it had cleared her back as well. Again this is another post in the making I did my level one equine touch about six years ago and have been toying with the idea of going back and completing it to become a practitioner.

After another peruse of the stands we headed back to watch the Eilberg demo. This had a very different feel to Lucinda’s. Over the course of the weekend I ended up watching three Eilberg demos and I feel I have a little more understanding of where they start with the pirouette training, as well as with passage and what  Ferdi Eilberg called the half step. The athleticism of the horses always amazes me. It is always a pleasure to watch such quality horses being worked, made me want to come home and update my subscription to horse hero, oh and to ride of course.

I ended up buying a few bits on day one, but the bulk of my shopping was done on day Two. Day two was with another friend who is also plus sized, this time we concentrated more on the shopping she had a few bits on her list so we headed straight out to the stands outside. This plan worked well it was a lot quieter out there and we were able to actually see in each stall and have a bit of a forage. Of course that is actually lethal for the old bank account I am happy with what I got though. We had a little bit of a hunt to find the Maxavita stall she wanted. Still it wasn’t that late in the day and they were all out of goodie bags supposedly! Which I think is bad form considering she spends a lot with them.

We then checked out the two plus size stands… yep you heard me right there were TWO plus sized stands both catering for people sized 16-24. There was 16plus rider and Fuller Fillies both were well stocked (except neither had coats that were suitable for my friend, which was one of the main reasons she wanted to go). Fuller Fillies has a problem with their order and 16plus rider had run out. between the two of us and the two stalls though we managed to buy three pairs of jodhpurs , two pairs of gloves, a top and a pair of half chaps.

I would have bought more but if I’m being honest I am over a size 24 at the moment and really couldn’t justify buying more stuff that doesn’t fit. Still it was a good haul and I hope they both return next year. I will also admit to having had some gripes with Fuller Fillies in the past and it was nice to meet them and I got a totally different feel from it compared to their online presence.

Overall it was a great weekend, my only gripes with Your Horse Live itself is still the palaver over seating. In the past we were able to just walk in and get a seat as we pleased. To a point I understand that hoards of people heading to their seats mid demo is not always the best thing. But then these horses are meant to be professional and should be able to deal with it, if not the riders certainly should. Still I do kind of understand. And although I don’t know what the answer is I don’t believe it is their present solution.

I was already annoyed with the whole VIP system. This whole ‘we managed to find 200 extra VIP seats’ and then saying it won’t affect the Joe blogs who has standard tickets is nonsense. Would also like to say I am so glad I didn’t have a VIP ticket other than Oliver Townsend and Geoff billington I saw most of the demos. And there were still plenty of seats. And once we were seated we were left alone. The VIPs however were constantly being asked to show their wristband, the poor couple in front of us got asked at least four times.

Of course the VIPs got to walk straight in practically, and we mere mortals had to walk half a mile (no exaggeration) through a barricade up and down like sheep. This I feel was a piss take fair enough if the queue was long and that’s where you started but really there was no need for it on at least three of my four demos. We walked straight in, a long walk mind. Oh hang on the second day someone had the bright idea to move the blockade and we bypassed three long rows. Much nicer when you are carrying a day’s worth of shopping and a hot chocolate with melting cream –not mine- so yeah there was my one main gripe of the weekend.

Over all I had a great weekend and can’t wait to do it all again next year. Hopefully my shopping list will be longer and I will be at the stage of looking for new tack and riding gear for me and Nas oh and don’t forget Paris I’m sure by then she will need some new stuff. So far this year all she has got is a new purple head collar.

I Can’t Wait.

This is the only photo I took all weekend! it was of a pony rug with matching lead rope. too cute.