January 21, 2014

Show Me Your Barn Blog Hop

I finally got to the barn during daylight hours and was able to take photos to join in on the blog hop!  I know it said 5 photos, but this is a really difficult facility to photograph with 5 photos, so have a photo smorgasboard.

It's time for a blog hop of barn tours! Ever wonder where your horsey Blogger friends spend most of their day?  Want to show off the amazing place you get to keep your fur child? Now is your chance to share and get to know your friends just a little bit more!
Here's how it's going to work; its simple and fun!
Share with us the following 5 photos:


1. View of the Barn (and indoor)

Our facility was once just a family farm centered around the old antique barn.  The BO's daughter got into eventing, met my trainer, and the facility has slowly taken shape around that partnership.  It's rough around the edges in a way that I truly love, and beautiful in the way it's meticulously maintained and improved by the BO.

One side of the main barn, 5 stalls, feed/tack, one set of crossties and gator/tractor storage.

They make impressive use of the space they have, and everything is designed for maximum operational efficiency and horse happiness.  It looks like a maze of stalls on top of stalls if you're only used to seeing a center aisle planned-from-the-beginning barn. Austen says it freaks her out that there's no obvious main entrance to the barn, but nobody minds that.



Hay loft

The "other side" of the main barn.  Wash rack and one stall on the right, paddock entrance straight ahead, new stall, stairs to the bathroom/shower and storage loft, and Connor's stall on the left (not pictured here).

2. My horse's living space

Connor's stall is the one with the fan.

That's my blue tack trunk and my hooks hanging there.  None of the horses are ever in during the day, but Connor likes being in the center of the action by the crossties and wash rack when things are going on at night.  He's also allowed to just run into his stall when they bring them in if the night person is comfortable with that, since this area is totally enclosed and he runs straight into his stall anyway.

And a view of his stall from the second loft (storage loft).
3. View of the tack room

There are two tack rooms in the main barn, one in the little barn, and one in my trainer's barn.  Like I said, making use of all available space!  Plus we're eventers, we all have a lot of tack.

Here's the main tack room:

I spilled water right before taking this picture.  Oops.
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And here's my tack room, which is also a feed room:

Everyone gets two saddle racks, because this is an eventing barn.  Mine are top and bottom, second from left.


I also keep a blanket liner/saddle pad box in the storage loft (white lid).  And my small show trunk is under the stairs.  There's so much storage space that I have no need to keep anything at my house, which is awesome.


4. A view of where we ride

Welp, normally that's here:

Outdoor arena built in 2011 with the same footing the KHP has (but not the same base).  There are four stalls, a center aisle and a tack/feed room in the little barn you see there.
But you can see that's sort of out of commission at the moment.  So that's here:

Indoor, and half of Connor's turnout field
Like all indoors, it's smaller than you'd like but a really nice place to ride.  Not heated.

We also ride here, in the open field we use for grass stadium jumping:

Miss you, summer.

Barn #3 is at the end of that treeline, too.  Mostly retirees and laid up horses are down there.

Those pictures are so bleak.  How about a green shot of the stadium field from last summer?


And here, the PVC Dressage ring that they move around so the grass doesn't get too beat up:

Currently buried in snow, but you can still kinda see it.
5. My Favorite Feature
I actually forgot to take a picture of this, but if it has to be facility-related, then I'm going to say the baby XC jumps the BO has built.  Baby corner, baby ditch, baby banks and drops, etc.  I think we have XC fences up to novice height on the property if I'm not mistaken.  It's really nice low-pressure way to school some XC for free at home, or during a private lesson, instead of the organized chaos of a group XC school.

Thanks for riding along!  I love this barn so much, it's fun to share it!

12 comments:

  1. Very pretty barn! It definitely looks like they use space well!:)

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  2. Your facility is beautiful! I love the inside of the barn.

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  3. What a wonderful place! It's so nice to be in a barn where so many people are in the same discipline.

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  4. Love your barn. It's so pretty and functional.

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  5. So pretty! Our new barn has some little XC jumps too and I am SO excited to go explore them this summer! ;)

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  6. So lovely, snow makes for great pictures if not great riding:)

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  7. Your barn has a lot of character, I like it!

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  8. I like that they give you two saddle racks...very nice!

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