Eventing tack and a pony saddle.

Whilst watching the BBC's coverage of Badminton Horse Trials yesterday afternoon, I did a spot of tack-making. (Everything's new except for the over-girth, browband and reins)



Not that he needed MORE tack; Harper probably has more stuff than any of my Julips but Jenny wants to try him out over fences this year so he kinda needed it.
That's my excuse anyway. :P

He's got a simple snaffle bridle with flash noseband and colour co-ordinated bit guards...



...a five point breastplate with running martingale attachment...



...and a brand new jumping saddle,(which now looks MASSIVELY too big for him :( ) complete with suede covered neoprene knee rolls and thigh blocks, stud girth and a 'sheepskin' saddlepad.





With all this new gear on, I don't think Jenny could resist taking him for a spin on the XC course. Although it doesn't look it here, - the grass hides most of his legs lol - he's actually going pretty fast. (hence Jenny's awkward leg position - she's pulling on him to try to slow him down. at least that's my excuse anyway...)







His jumping style is err...



...interesting but he's got some potential at least!



I tried to make Kestral a saddle the other day too but Rhu nicked it before she had a chance to claim it and well, his old one was terrible so he may as well have it seeing as it fits! I definitely need to make some better saddlepads though. >.<




Oh and before I forget...


DOCTOR WHO'S BACK!

*flails*

New tack and a couple of hairy coblets.

;D

I didn't come back from the show empty handed and afer a whole afternoon (which resulted in my black (!) jeans being completely covered in mohair) spent hairing them, I can now proudly present Simba and Pirate. :D

Simba.








Pirate.







I also made them up some tack today. Pirate found himself with a nice plain snaffle bridle (actually a bit of a cheat as I only needed to make the browband as the rest of it was found lost in the tack drawer! lol)





Simba however got something a little more interesting. Since he'll be broken to ride this year I thought he might need lungeing at times to take the edge off...



So no prizes for guessing what I made this evening!







The sidereins are elasticated, as is the girth.

Richmond Julip Live

A little late I know, but I had a wonderful time at the Julip show in Richmond the week before last. I managed to get two fourth places in the championships (for Scene and Fun respectively) which although not quite as good as I'd done at the last live, was still something to be proud of - especially considering what my lot were up against! :D

True to form I took LOADS of photos, all of which can be viewed here.

As it would take up this entire post, here's a link to the thread I made about the show which might be interesting to some of you. :)

-click me-

I'll post a couple of my favourite entries here though.

The sign outside the venue - painted by the host, Tania.



'At the Local Gymkhana' scene class.





'An historic scene or scene from a movie or literature' scene class.





'Beasts of Burden' class.



My little Lyra-donkey did rather well in this class, getting a second place. :D Not bad for a harness that I managed to adjust to fit her the day before I left for the show! XD (it was made to fit Maisie the very rotund Cob Mare...)









'Fresh From the Field Pony'











My two big winners -

'EAE Maigheach of Dúneachann'



and 'EAE Jazz Hands and EAE Archipelago'

Pipecleaner Animal Tutorial!

Made, filmed and edited yesterday, but uploaded to youtube today. :D I had a really nice selection of songs as the background music but youtube muted it. ¬¬ It's now some random Jazz number I found on the audioswap thing but it's just not the same! >:(

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Dxpws51a8E

The result from this is this lovely little Australian Shepherd type dog. Name suggestions appreciated as she just won't tell me!









I also made this little dog earlier on in the week. She's definitely a Collie cross of some kind but I can't think of a name for her. She reminds me of the dog my old riding instructor had - black and white with a big bushy tail and always getting covered in hay and bits of muck. XD



Here they both are with Max from earlier on. :D