Clover Ledge Farm

By mid September, Ellie and I had started to get ourselves together. It wasn't perfect, but it felt so much better to have put in the time, sweat, and tears to begin to move past our issues with stopping. I felt really discouraged for most of the summer, so moving through that was huge. Of course, my rides at Green Acres and Esprit in August had still contained stops, but our lessons were where we really showed improvement.  when you ask your small child to take a photo of you on your horse and he wants a selfie, too  I took Ellie down one day to the farm where Babette was based out of for years called Gathering Farm (she is now at a new barn because Gathering sold over the winter). It was an opportunity to take a lesson over fences in a new place, so while it wasn't totally like a show, it was nice to jump in that environment. And can I just say that Hamilton, MA is such beautiful horse country! It is home to Myopia Hunt as well as many other lovely barns like Ledyard Farm. B...

Phew, it has been a crazy few weeks with school starting and my entire daily schedule changing entirely!  There is so much to write and no time to just sit down and do so.   The biggest recent event is that after waiting on the saddle brand's rep/fitter since July , I finally gave up on that (she did schedule something for the end of August to only cancel on me late the night before....grrr!).  I contacted Nancy Sherick, who has fit saddles for me before years ago , and she came right out on September 4.  Now that is good customer service!  I will never bother to ask anyone else to fit my saddles from now on, that is for sure.  I figured Nancy would be too booked up or not come up here, but I was happily wrong! Before fitting - a decent fit but not perfect Also before fitting - just sitting every so slightly too low I had a feeling that the wide tree was OK but the saddle just needed flocking up in the front. I also wasn't convinced th...

So, earlier this year in June, I finally found a decent fitting dressage saddle for Snappy .  The joke is on me as I ended up having to put her down just two and a half months later.  *crying* I figured the saddle would easily work for Ellie, as that was one of the selling points of purchasing this super expensive saddle.  I bought it used, not brand new at $6000+, but still it was not cheap. I know many folks have opinions on this brand of saddle (see original post for brand - I am trying to be kind here), but honestly, I didn't mind it.  It wasn't my most favorite dressage saddle I have ever sat in, but I didn't hate it.  And mostly importantly, it fit Snappy quite well and she seemed to like it.   I was finally able to arrange to get the fitter out last Friday.  I figured this would be a fairly easy procedure to adjust the gullet width and air panels.  Ellie is a completely different horse than Snappy, so I assumed there would be changes. ...

Seven years ago, it took me forever to find the dressage right saddle for Dreamy.  I tried many different saddles and eventually settled on a Stubben Juventus which I adore!  I made it work well enough for Snappy last year with a Mattes pad and a lot of cringing, but she is built downhill and I knew the saddle really didn't work for her.  With Dreamy essentially retired, I knew it was time to get the Stubben looked at for Snappy.  Ashley Hutchinson of Whole Horse Works came out last week and evaluated the fit on both the dressage saddle and my other Juventus which is a jumping saddle. Because of her downhill build, the dressage saddle was sitting too low in front.  However, because of her wither shape and large shoulders, there was no way we could go with a smaller width tree (it is a 31 cm, medium wide) because then it wouldn't fit.  While the back gussets work well for her shape, she really could use front gussets.  Of course, the saddle is design...

So, as I wrote about here , I have a new dressage saddle.  I completely adore this saddle.  I love how it has shorted panels so I can actually get my leg down on my horse.  I was pretty confident that it fit Dreamy well and it truly fits me PERFECT.   I was able to get an appointment with my saddle fitter, Nancy Shedrick, for last Thursday.  I was so pleased when she took a look at my saddle and said it was a good fit for Dreamy!  YAY!  She complimented me, saying I had a good eye.  Well, SHE is the one to thank for that!  Nancy taught me well at our first fitting in April.   I had a few concerns though.  One was how low the saddle was to her withers.  I mean, there was three of my tiny fingers clearance and it cleared her spine with no problems, but it did seem low.  My instructor Judy echoed the same thing when she saw it.  Nancy agreed that while it was a tiny bit lower than she would like, it was f...

So I finally had a chance to get a saddle fitter out here for Dreamy. I knew that her saddle was not fitting her quite as nicely as it did two years ago when I got it. But I was pretty sure I needed help to fix it! Nancy was easy to contact and we set up a time for last Friday. Thankfully she was free when I was on school vacation, making my life easier. She lives in NH and works all over Northern New England. Click here for her info. She was nice enough to come out here (over 2 hours from her) on a Friday when she normally just works in her shop and does not do appointments! I realized before she came out that I would not be able to do too much to the saddle to make it only for Dreamy since I use it for Reva too! Uh oh...would we be able to fit it to both horses, seeing as they are built so differently? I was a bit worried. LOL ! I liked Nancy immediately. She seemed down-to-earth and very personable. She examined Dreamy all over and found some rough skin and bumps on each...

I have finally decided that my Bates Caprilli just does not fit Dreamy correctly. :( I sort of knew the panels were not right, but I think I was in denial. After all that work of selling the County and getting the Bates... UGGGG . There is plenty of wither clearance with the Bates so it looked like it should fit. But it is those damn CAIR panels, I just know it! Now that the muscles have actually started to atrophy, I am 100% sure the saddle is not right. If it were a wool stuffed saddle I could just get a fitter to fix it. But the CAIR panels are air filled foam, so no go. They are what they are. But my horse must be comfortable, so we start THE SADDLE SEARCH again. On Friday afternoon (8/1) I received two saddles from Trumbull Mountain in VT. One is a Duett Fidelio and the other a Thornhill Vienna 2. The Duett costs twice as much as the Thornhill and of course it is the one that I like best! LOL ! I rode in the Duett on Friday and LOVED it. I had sent wither tr...