A Horse Family Goes On Vacation...

The kids on their 2-wheeled vacation steeds

I've said it before and I'll say it again: You can leave the ponies, but the ponies never leave you.  Case in point: We took a family vacation to South Carolina this week, the first real "away' vacation we've taken in a while.  We were looking forward to some time away from our busy schedules, quality time together as a family, and truth be told, my husband was probably eagerly anticipation a week away from anything horse related.

He rolled his eyes when we told him how we hugged the horses goodbye and told them we'd miss them and not to forget us for the week.  James, angel baby that he is, raised his head and pretended to look like he cared that we were leaving. Sug never even looked up from her hay.  The poor man started to get a sense that the horses were not going to be completely left behind when we were at the airport during a changeover: We were getting on to one of those automated walkways and my son misjudged his approach, at which point he turned to me and ruefully said, "I chipped the distance on that one."

Here are some of the other ways we knew the horses had not left our minds:

1) You go on a bike ride with your son and when he passes people on the bike path he yells "inside" to them to let them know what side he is passing them on.  To his way of thinking, the road was the outside and the golf course was the inside.  made perfect sense to us, but I told him we were probably the only equestrians on vacation so we'd be better off sticking to "left" and "right."

2)  You realize that bikes, at least the big old cruisers, do NOT listen to half halts.  They respond to backward pressure on the pedals.  I was pointing out an alligator sunning himself in a lagoon to my son when I experienced this bit of learning, and damn near skidded into the lagoon before I figured out what I was doing wrong.

3)  You call your bike your "steed" and name it.  My husband's eyes darn near rolled back in his head when Sophie announced her bike was a stallion named "Julien" (pronounced Hool-eee- en) and Noah and I confessed to naming ours as well.

4)  You find yourself creating a horse-less horse show with your bike.  While waiting for everyone to get organized to bike home after we'd gone out to breakfast, I noticed Sophie riding her bike in circles around the parking lot, muttering to herself.  After listening more carefully, I could tell she was giving herself the same instructions she'd get in an under saddle class.  Of course I had to video that bit of cuteness!

 

5)  While walking on the beach Noah commented how much fun it would be to bring Sugar and James out there, and what a good work-out it would be for our tubby mare.  As we watched Soph run around a jump the tide pools, he turned to me and said, "Look, she's practicing the water jumps."  Some of the tide pools were too large for her to jump over, and she called over to us, "Look, I'm an event horse, and I'm going through the water hazard"  She'd make a very brave event horse.

6)  You take so many bike rides that your muscles are screaming at you.  Normal people would go to the local Piggly Wiggly and look for Ben Gay.  We Googled the nearest tack shop for some Sore No More.

We're only halfway through our vacation, so I'm pretty sure we're going to have a few more of these moments before we head home.

An Equestrian Goes On Vacation...

Rainbow over Hershey, PA.
It ends in a pot of chocolate.
Which I ate. Yummy!

It's summertime, and like countless other families around the world, our family took some time off to go on holiday.  As anyone who has ever watched National Lampoon's Vacation knows, family holidays are always interesting, to say the least. Finding a vacation that fits all family member's activity levels and interests is bloody challenging, if nigh upon impossible.  Mom may prefer to park her butt on a beach with the latest hot summer read, Dad might prefer to golf, one child might want to explore old battlefields while the other would rather boogeyboard in the surf. Needless to say, it's an exercise in compromise.

The first compromise in our vacation planning came at the outset.  The kids wanted to bring the horses.  I liked the idea, but knew my husband would rather pluck his eyeballs out with a spork.  "Hell no!" was his exact response when the kids broached the idea.  Okay, nix the horses. 

After some deliberation, we decided on Hershey Park.  Lots of rides for the kids and hubby, water park for all of us, outlets for back-to-school shopping, and most importantly, CHOCOLATE FOR MOMMY!  I did not pay as much attention to the planning details as I should have.  Hershey Park is mostly roller coasters.  I don't do roller coasters.  I don't mind admitting that I'm a big old wussy pants. 

The Skyrush.  Which I didn't go on.

As soon as we got to the park the rest of the family raced to get on the Skyrush.  I went on the swings. And promptly confirmed that since my concussion I can't ride on anything that goes in rapid circles. Took me 20 minutes and a bottle of water to finally calm my stomach.  Next the family went on the SooperDooperLooper.  I tried my luck at Skeeball.  They tried the Sidewinder.  I went on the railroad. So it went for the rest of the day as the family went on eleven of the park's twelve coasters.

One thing we noticed as time went on was you can take the horsey family away from the horses, but you can't take the horsey outta the family.  Or however that saying goes.  Doesn't matter.  Wherever we are, we are still thinking ponies. 


Yep.  This ride is my speed, AND it has horses.
WINNING!



A few examples: 

• We pull in to where we were staying at a friend's house, and the first thing my daughter says is, "Look at the size of this lawn!  We could put a 2 stall barn and a couple of paddocks back there." Yep, we pretty much assess every place we go to in terms of equine housing potential.
• Every field we see evokes a comment along the lines of, "I bet Sug would love to eat in that field."
• Whenever we pass a field with horses in it my husband preempts the inevitable requests with a "No, we are NOT stopping to pet the horses. We need to make time."  Now in my world, the estimated arrival time on the GPS is considered the Time To Beat, but really, what is the male mandate to Make Time??? 
• We bring apples as snacks for the drive.  This got a bit funky when we realized the kids were saving their cores for the horses.  This is normally okay, but not when you are not going home for several days and said apple cores will be marinating in a hot car...
• The kids want to stop and play every game that offers a stuffed horse/unicorn as a prize.  Vaguely reminiscent of the "It's so fluffy!" scene in Despicable Me.
• We need to ride the carousel.  Several times. And we need to find the horses that look the most like Sugar and Cookie and ride them at least once.

Yep, that's how we roll.  We're the Equestrian Griswalds.

So Much for Lofty Goals, and Happy New Year...

Don King?? Nope, it's Tonka,
First Edition Farm's miniature horse

Have you ever noticed that a week's vacation seems a heck of a lot longer at the front end than it does at the back end?  Really, I had all sorts of grand hopes and plans for this week, and all kinds of good intentions to GET THINGS DONE.   I was going to re-organize cabinets and closets, get to the Post Office to mail Christmas gifts we needed to return/exchange, change the look of the blog, and spend some time learning the @!#$!%$@# new CRM software my company has invested in.  I was also going to spend a good deal of quality time with my family and the horses. 
Good news!  I accomplished ONE of those goals.  Yep, that's me, the perennial overachiever.  Sigh. 

Let's just call this the Week of the Horse, shall we?  Not that I'm complaining, mind you.  I was pretty happy with how things turned out (my husband, probably less so).  The kids and I spent a ton of time at the barn, hanging with the girls and our barn buddies.  We had multiple lessons, which I will cover at a later date, and had the opportunity to get some additional saddle time in by riding some horses whose owners were away on vacation.  When we got home, we watched horse videos online, and the Boy and I even took my parents to see War Horse (was like taking a kindergarten class on a field trip -- more on this later as well).

James says, "Hello! Aren't you the nice lady
who brings me kids and carrots?"

The kids also had the opportunity to visit our friend and trainer/owner at First Edition Farm, Sarah Doehler, a couple of times to hack a pony she has.  This pony is basically The Supreme Deity in Pony Form, SDPF for short.  Seriously, James (aka Chesapeake) has been there, done that, and gotten the Championship cooler, thank you very much.  He's been living in semi- retirement and I'm not 100% sure it agrees with him.  I mean, he's older and probably okay with not having to work too very hard, but he certainly misses having a child and I think an easy-ish job would agree with him. 

Let me tell you, this amazing boy has personality coming out of his ears and was absolutely thrilled to bits to have my kids loving all over him.  It was also a privilege to watch a this professional pony teach my kids.  He was a complete gentleman and very clear with them, "You give me the right aids, I give you the desired response.  You give me garbage, you get garbage back."  The best part of the whole time was watching his face while he interacted with the kids -- he was just so thrilled to have a child paying attention to him that you could see the grin on his face.  Ponies need kids and kids need ponies. End of story.

So that leaves me on Sunday morning, New Year's day, the final day of our vacation.  The husband and the Child are off with friends snow tubing.  The Boy had a friend sleep over last night and was unable to rouse himself in time to go tubing, so thus I find myself at home, contemplating all kinds of things I might accomplish today.  There's a lot of vacuuming and cleaning that can be done, a ton of horse laundry, a dishwasher to be emptied, a treadmill that could be run on, and lots of food that could be made into dinners I could freeze for those nights when we need something quick yet nutritious before running off to soccer or the barn.  It's already 10:30, and I'm still on the couch. I've watched some videos of the recent show in Mechelen, caught up on some of my favorite blogs, and written this blog post.

Yup, there are about a zillion things I could and should be doing today.  Yet somehow I don't see myself getting very far away from this couch.  And you know what?  I'm not all that upset about that.