Clover Ledge Farm

Thanks to Amanda for starting a fun little bloghop!

Favorite Show Picture
This is from our first dressage show ever, in May at our lesson barn.  It is a crappy screenshot from a video, but I love how Ellie looks like a proper little dressage pony!  Sadly, there were no photographers at any of the shows we did this year, so I was unable to purchase professional photos.


Favorite Non-Show Picture
This is such a sweet photo of my three year old son and Ellie.  She is so kind and this photo exemplifies her personality.




Favorite Thing You Bought
I don't know if I have a favorite thing, but for this blog post it would be my pretty blue AA Platinum MotionLite show coat.  The coat is such a great color and just different enough to stand out in a good way.  Also, it is so super comfortable and breathable, it is the best show coat I have ever worn.  I splurged and bought the hunter green as well.  



Favorite Moment on Horseback
This would probably be our XC clinic with Daryl, because it was so much d…

To be honest, this was my first not-my-own-horse riding lesson in a looooong while!  I rode my former instructor's Second level horse a couple times back in 2009 and 2010, and I regularly rode school horses when in college from 1997-2001.  So to ride a horse that is not my own in a lesson situation was definitely strange...and good!

No media from the lesson, but I will share a few pics so this isn't a hugely boring post haha.
Beth had been mentioning all summer how she wanted to stick me on her daughter's twenty two year old Grand Prix horse and we decided we would wait for winter to do so.  Well, mostly I decided that because I wanted to lesson on Ellie all year haha.  I knew once winter hit and my driveway became unsafe for moving a trailer, I would be happy to ride the GP schoolmaster.  My last Ellie lesson was back at the end of November with the Ashley Madison clinic.  The first weekend of December I was supposed to take a jumping lesson instead of going to Beth's (…

This is the third year I have participated in the Equestrian Blogger Gift Exchange, hosted by Tracy at Printable Pony.  I love everything about Christmas (well, except the whole sn*w part...) especially choosing and wrapping a thoughtful gift for another.  Don't get me wrong, it is also fun to receive something fun from a blogger in the mail, too!  ;-)  I know how excited I feel when the box shows up on my doorstep, so I also love giving that feeling to a fellow horse lover!

I came home from my lesson barn's Christmas party on Saturday to a box at the door.  As I am waiting for a few last Christmas gifts to arrive, I didn't think much of it at first.  Then I realized WAIT, this is for ME! and happily tore into the box like a child haha.  

Sarah at Three Chestnuts blog did a great job choosing some fun gifts!  Somehow I was not officially following her blog, so now I am!


I love the treats, both the bag of Meadow Mints and her own handmade pumpkin molasses treats she uses for h…

2018 was quite the year for Ellie!  I remember being so excited and nervous in May for our first ever dressage tests and having NO real clue how this year might pan out.  I had so many plans and ideas, but I took my cues from Ellie and what she needed and was ready for.

The following goals are what I outlined back on the first day of January 2018.  Let's see how it all worked out, shall we?  


Start dressage/jumping lessons
The eventing instructor I alluded to in my above post never really panned out.  I reached out to her initially in November 2017 to see if she was taking new students and she seemed excited to help me, but when I contacted her in April to actually begin lessons, she was a bit noncommittal.  She said weekends were too hard for her to schedule anything and weekdays were all over the place.  I was like uhhhh, alright (insert confused and sad face).  At that point, I had already started dressage lessons with Beth, so I kind of took the response as a sign that maybe she …

Oh, Smartpak.  What is happening?  :-(

Let me start by saying I have loved Smartpak forever and have been a loyal customer since they started.  I have bought supplements through Smartpak for over ten years at least.  I know there are varying opinions about Smartpak out there, however I have always had great luck with them and I really have had no complaints until now.  Generally, I check Smartpak first when I am looking for a horse related item, mostly because I get free shipping with the standing supplement order (let's be real, paying for shipping is dumb if you can help it!) and because they ship from MA, I generally get orders within two days.

Well, it seems they have been having issues with their warehouse system for a while now.  I never really noticed the problems on my end, because my Smartpak supplements always arrived faithfully every 28 days and general items I ordered were still showing up within a few days, too.

Then I had the big idea to switch Ellie over to Gro 'N …