Monday and pic catch up

Yesterday I shared the plan for preparing for my 50 this weekend. My plan is to go through each item this week so everyone can see how I plan for a 50 in the prior week. If there's a reason I do something on a certain day before the ride, I try to share it.

So how did did Monday go?

Boots - fit and replace straps

• I pulled all my competition worthy boots out and decided to use my burgandy fronts and black hinds. I was able to put all new toe straps on those 4, AND have barely used/new toe straps on 6 spares. I don't usually replace pastern straps, but I made a point of doing so on the boots that saw 20MT as the wet sand wrecked havoc on them. I cannabilized various spares and was able to put good pastern straps on the 4 primaries AND still have good pastern straps on the 6 spares. I'm golden! (3 boots of the 10 saw action at 20 MT)


• I put the fronts on the Farley (I know the hinds are adjusted). They look good! But......Her right front is *almost* a size 2!!!! That may change after the farrier visit on Thursday, but for now, I can barely squeeze a size 1 on her. This is both good and bad news.....oh well. The left front is still definatly a size 1 (this is the clubbed foot), but even that one is filling out the boot better.

Discontinue Oil

• Yep - this was the one thing on the list that was super easy and convient. I discontinue adding oil to her diet one week prior to races based on the advice of Dr. Susan Garlinghouse. I don't understand all the technical details, but her website/articles are google-able and I would encourage people to check it out.

School in the Arena

• Had a really good schooling session. Good thing because it's POURING today and we are probably not going to ride. Approximately 30 minutes of mostly walk and trot with a little cantering.
  
• I picked up a project horse for a friend at the stable. I think it's going to work out well. Once I get to Farley, I'm more mellow, less demanding, and more likely to "let things be".
  

Test out saddle bags

• Didn't happen. Not sure if it is going to happen period. Maybe Thursday? I'm not too worried - I'll have a crew and if I hate them, I'll switch out the new ones at the first vet check. They are so similar to my other saddle bag (instead now I'll have one on each side instead of just on one side) I'm not anticipating any problems....

So, as of yesterday, I'm on track.

Since I can now post posts using blogger, I can post pictures again!

First, some eye candy from this weekend, courtesy of my mom (and commentor, and blogger) Carolyn:

This pretty girl is "Gringo", one of the CHAS horses. We decided to bring a cart to this event and it was FUN. Dennis (on the seat next to me) and I have much more experience driving 2 horses than 1 and our conversations centered around "so just how fast can you turn this little thing?", "how fast can you go down hill?"

We had so much fun in it, we are going to try and bring it to every event. It's so useful for carrying water and people. Often the various reenactment camps at an event are scattered and it's a pain to walk everywhere, or saddle up a horse.

Here's a shot of me in my ambulance driver garb. I still need to put green stripes on my sack coat. I have no idea what I was doing or looking at. Ignore the uniform. It puts on 20 pounds at least. I swear....

For those of you that were asking for pics of the packs I made - here's a few, including one that shows the size difference of my pack versus a hoof boot bag from easy care:

A half finished water bottle holder from the water bottle holder I cut off the side of the pack. The yellow strip is a piece of fabric I sewed.

pack and water bottle underflap. You can see the tie and clip on the water bottle holder that holds it in place and keeps it from bouncing. The fanny pack strap of the pack holds the pack in place to the billets and keep it from bouncing.

Here's a pic of the pack off the saddle. This particular pack has a space in the back of the pack that the strap tucks into. The buckle for the fanny strap is actually hidden in this padded compartment.

Not so great picture showing the compartment that the strap tucks into.

Pack set up on horse. I may need a compression strap on the middle of that water bottle that hooks to the billets....

By request of Heather, here's a pack size comparision. Then because the angle of the camera doesn't give justice to the fact that these two packs are really the same size....

...Here's another angle.