Cob Jockey

As you all know, a few months ago I gambled that Eva and Disco might be the same tree size and shape when I bought a saddle for Eva by way of a blogger. Drumroll please...

Wow, did THAT ever pay off. It sits beautifully on him. And in a stroke of perfect timing, the original panels just got back from my fitter, who I paid $145+shipping to add the missing feature to them to ensure that that didn't cause pressure points.

Mmmmm, the way the panel follows the shoulder is so delicious.

While I was trying that on him, I also tried a couple of Connor's other saddles on him, even though I knew they would be all wrong. I just had to know.

My beloved CWD looked like a tiny little hat on top of his withers. But it's getting lots of use on Connor these days between his part leaser and the two kids that ride him regularly, so it will be sticking around.

And the Patrick, as suspected, is also a big no. Connor and Disco are different back-to-front tree shapes, and even when the Patrick was built, when Connor was at his fittest, Connor was narrower and had more of a wither than Disco. Disco may yet sprout some wither, since he's only 3.5, but not enough where this saddle will ever fit, and I'm at peace with that.

 

I've known for a while I should sell it. It's still nearly new, since I all but retired Connor a few months after getting it, and Connor's retired dad bod won't be using it. Seeing it on Disco was the push I needed to sell it and then plow those funds into a Wow jump saddle for him.

 

SO, any short legged riders out there looking for a Dressage saddle, I would be willing to make you quite a "blogger special" deal on the Patrick, especially if you save me from dealing with listing it. I only want to get out of it what it will take to get Disco a jump saddle, which is nowhere near what I paid for it.

2022 Patrick Saddlery Liberty II

17" wide monoflap

Velcro pocket for knee blocks (comes with small blocks, can order other shapes)

Extra short flap

Wool-flocked serge panels

Would best fit a horse that is wide with some wither and a semi-curved front-to-back tree profile. Will not fit a flat back.

Hit me up via the contact form on the blog if you're interested or if you know of someone who might be interested!

Last weekend we had our first early taste of spring. And it was glorious.

It was warmer than it has any right to be in early March, going from wool socks to tanktops in the same week, but I'll take it! On Saturday, Mary, Annie and Jeffrey came down and helped me and Leah put up electric rope around Connor and Disco's turnout field. We used EasySnap insulators to do it, and I can't say enough good things about them. It went SO fast.

They just snap onto the vinyl fence and then you put the rope through and click it shut.

I left the boys in the field while we did it, and we all just kept an eye on them. Disco thought it was THE COOLEST THING THAT HAD EVER HAPPENED TO HIM!!!!! and alternated between checking out our supplies and running around like a maniac.

Connor looking oh so fit lately, if I do say so myself

After that, Annie rode Connor, then I rode Connor, then Jeffrey, Annie and Mary all rode Zippy, Disco's geriatric buddy.

This has to be one of my favorite pictures of the three of them ever. Look at Annie finally fitting into the breeches I bought her two Christmases ago! We used to have to roll the heck out of them.

Sunday was more of the same in terms of weather, and I was motivated to get my life in order.

Making a month's worth of supplement baggies for the boys:

Putting the first coat of polish on the Celeris stiff boots I can finally ride in now that it's not freezing cold:

These are going to age so beautifully. I cannot wait.

Cleaning my jump saddle:

And the Fairfax bridle got fully disassembled and cleaned:

It felt like the world took a deep breath last weekend, and even though they're projecting snow and a high of 33 this coming weekend, we're getting closer and closer to spring.

 July

My barn officially became a co-op using a hybrid plan I came up with, and I became the "ringleader." I sent Connor off for a two-week tuneup with CGP before National Dressage Pony Cup, and NDPC was a freaking blast with friends from all across the country coming to support me. We won my first ever neck ribbon!

Family, friends and framily!

August

I went trail riding with my new barnmate, Mary and I discovered my CWD's tree was compromised, and I showed at Lamplight for the first time ever!

One of my favorite photos of me and this horse ever.

 

September
I bought a bunch of Jump4Joy jumps from my Aunt Paula, Connor gave pony rides to my gym friend's autistic son, we freaking brought it to win the Second Level IDS Championship title for 2021, and my saddle finally arrived...but it was missing some features.

October

The fitter decided to completely re-make my saddle to fix her errors at no cost to me. I bought Annie a baby saddle, and Connor showed with all three of us, me, Mary and Annie at the Welsh North Central Regional. Disco won literally almost everything, and was Champion C/D Colt, C/D Grand Champion, and was Supreme Champion all ages/sections/sexes under one judge, and Reserve Supreme Champion under another. After that show, I sent Connor to CGP's for flying changes training.

I had no idea that I'd get not only my first, but also my second and third neck ribbons ever in 2021!

November

My CWD came back, repaired! I brought Disco home, and cleaned up at our GMO's year end awards. CGP made incredible progress with Connor.

December

I only posted five times this month as I struggled with a period of growth in not only horse ownership and riding, but also at work. Disco was a good baby for everyone at the co-op, and Connor made lots of progress with CGP but less with me as I struggled mightily with some imbalances in my body. Connor came home on December 26th.

Disco's geriatric best buddy

Back again.

Ten days after I shipped it to Florida, my CWD was back in my hands. How's that for customer service? If you'll remember, it was late August when we figured out there was a structural issue with the tree, and early September when I learned it only cost $500 to replace the tree and another $500 to replace the panels.

The parts were subsequently ordered (the panels have to be handmade in France) and arrived at the Florida shop about a month ago. I then shipped it on a Monday, and got it back Wednesday of the very next week.

All that is to say, it was a very short turnaround time for as much as they did. The way these saddles are constructed meant that the entire sweat flap and the rear block got replaced in addition to the panels, but they kept my old front block and sewed that onto the new flap.

The thing is straight as an arrow now, and the panels are SO squishy! My old panels were 7 years old, so it makes sense that it was time to replace them, (foam does degrade over time and from exposure to heat, after all) and at only $500, that was well worth it. Certainly that's less than I would've spent on reflocking over 7 years for a wool-flocked saddle, not that I'm trying to start that argument - I own one of each so clearly there's a place for both in my life.

It will be two-toned for a while until I condition the new components (oh who am I kidding, Mary is like addicted to conditioning and rolling new CWD saddles, that's a job for her, lol), but I couldn't care less about the aesthetics as long as my unicorn saddle lives to fight another day!

So the lesson where everything went sideways was last Wednesday, and I booked a lesson with CGP for last Sunday. Last Saturday, Mary came out and looked at my jump saddle. And she brought company!

Annie making friends with new boarder Leah's saint of a mare

She confirmed my gut feeling that something is very wrong. We think the tree is compromised, specifically on the right under where the rider sits. Maybe not totally cracked through, but it ain't right.

While it will seem to all of you like this came out of nowhere, I'm not surprised, for a few reasons.

1. I used to be VERY crooked to the right in this saddle, for a long time.
2. Other people that have ridden in that saddle have commented that they feel tipped to the right in it, but I always thought it was more Connor and me than the saddle.
   
3. Amazing saddle fitter Kate pointed out an invisible spot of atrophy on the right side of his long back muscle right underneath what we now know is the trouble spot in November of 2019 that, at the time, I chalked up to my saddle fitting adventures.
4. Even just from a still photo, blogland's favorite saddle fitter and Connor's former owner Tara saw it tipping and had me shim it there last winter.
   
5. That spot of atrophy is now very visible, beginning about 3 weeks ago.
   

Our working theory is that me sitting crooked for so long weakened and maybe twisted it, and then CGP riding in it for two weeks in June/July was the final straw, and that's what's made Connor finally rebel against it. 

To be clear, CGP didn't do anything wrong, and I'm not blaming this on her at all, but given that she's taller and therefore heavier than me and would have been sitting in a spot that put her against the saddle's natural balance point, it might have been the push it needed to finally fail. Plus I've been using it in a way it wasn't meant to be used myself for quite a while.

Once Mary started really cranking on it, you could see there was way too much play, especially laterally, for a wooden tree. It was moving like a 2GS carbon fiber tree, and that's not a good thing.

So that explains why Connor has been going like crap since Pony Cup. And left me without a saddle with a show coming up this week, since my only functional saddles at the moment are my western saddle and Annie's new baby saddle I bought her, both of which I fit in but neither of which are legal to show in!

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaadorable, but I have to buy a girth for it! Every girth in our barn is either too short or too long, go figure. Anyone selling a 34ish girth on the cheap?

After talking it through with Mary, we aren't going to try to repair the CWD. It likely would require a full tree replacement and a repanel, which would be probably ~$2300, and even as much as I love that saddle and could make the money work, it's just not worth it on something 7 years old that I won't be using much after I get my Dressage saddle. If I knew it would fit Disco, I might try it, but we won't know that for years.

So.

I think Mary and I are going to get drunk (well, I'm going to get drunk at least) and tear it apart on video sometime. It's going to be terrifying, cathartic and hopefully will make for some good blog content. A fitting send-off for my most beloved piece of tack.

Best jump-dressage saddle ever <3 PC: Leah

(But that said if anyone comes across a CWD deep seat model (SE02 or the carbon fiber equivalent model) in a 16.5" with a 1C flap and a 705 305 RT pro panel configuration for under $3k, I definitely won't be able to help myself so...keep your eyes out, lol)

Last week, my virtual lesson was a shitshow in almost every way possible.

It started out as a technical issue, when my Pivo would flash up GP trainer's face and then crash, despite no updates or changes being made to my phone or Pivo in the last week.

Okay, we can deal with that: a gracious barnmate showed up and willingly volunteered to video. This is the nature of virtual lessons after all, sometimes it just won't work and you roll with it.

But then Connor just did not want to play ball.

We have an official murder of four crows that lives in a very specific tree next to this pasture. I see them every day and want to make friends with them!

 

In the lesson, I was riding in my jump saddle for the first time in a week, since I have a show coming up this week, and they won't let me ride bareback (shame). I mentioned in my last post I've been wondering if it's not fitting as well lately, and I'm also wondering if he's lost a bit of topline. Or maybe I'm just paranoid (Spoiler alert: I am not paranoid).

He was sticking his underneck out and just not letting go. She had me work him at every gait, "threw the kitchen sink at him" and threatened to reach through the phone and get on him herself, lol. But he wasn't having it. 

CrossFit was extra weird and fun last week (I feel the need to clarify, I am not the pregnant one, lol)

We did finally get to an OKAY place at the end of the lesson, and with Lamplight 8 days away, I knew what she was going to say.

"You need to come see me this weekend," she said. I sighed. "I know." I really didn't want to since I'd just hauled there the previous weekend and had to haul to Chicago the following week. But I knew we couldn't go to a show - to Lamplight - after a lesson like that.

So we went.

It's been a while since the blog featured my main man, so I figured we could check in with him on a Friday.

I'm currently trying to claw my way back out of a self-perpetuating spiral of not riding and anxiety. It started with an extreme cold snap in February, then my truck being broken + snow, and then all this Aeres stuff. I will not subject my horse to being ridden when I'm so anxious I feel like I'm going to throw up 24/7. I didn't do CrossFit, Pilates or ride for most of late February and early March, which again creates more of a self-perpetuating anxiety spiral, not doing all of my self-care things.

I captioned this: "I'm a proud member of the "phoned it in today but still showed up club". Sometimes you just gotta get yourself to the gym to stay in the routine and see your friends, even if it means pushing a 25lb sled when the pregnant girl next to you is pushing 135lbs.

I'm just now starting to ride him somewhat regularly again, forcing myself to get into the routine even if I just putz around - which usually by the time I get him tacked up I'm ready to do some actual work. Unfortunately, there's very little media because Pivo is STILL not compatible with my new phone (Samsung's newest flagship, the S21 Ultra), which is making for very little blogging.

 

Not that I need another hobby (when have I said that before?) but I did sign Meatloaf up for an agility evaluation after seeing her do this in response to some raccoons fighting on the roof. She might be part cat.

I'm also contemplating what my next steps are with Connor. Part of me thinks, now that I know how much harder he is for me to ride than other horses even after some A+ training (thanks, Aeres), I should stop pushing so hard on the Dressage front and goof off with some CTs since he's so much more comfortable jumping now, or get serious about trail riding. 

Then every time I get serious about that idea, he gives me a ride like last night, where he gave me 5 beautiful C-Ws when I wasn't even asking for them, which is its own set of problems to be sure, but also shows me that this stuff is not impossible for us. He's just truly a tricky horse to ride, and I'm glad Aeres showed me that my riding is not 100% of the problem.

One thing I HAVE been doing - riding in my jump saddle 100% of the time. I'm not saying I've given up on Dressage saddles fitting him, but I am saying there's no point in riding in a saddle that makes him go worse, and I will totally show rated Dressage in this again if I have to.

In reality, we'll probably split the difference between the two: however far we get in Dressage doing it our way, we'll do it, but however far we don't get, I won't stress about it. At any rate, he's a lot easier for me to ride after his full training, which is making for many pleasant rides even if we're not lighting the world on fire.

I used Connor to teach Mary about collecting the canter. She was ridiculously sore the next day, lol.

 February always sucks. This one took the cake though.

Normal height barnmate next to Connor, in case anyone forgets how big I make him look

I can't write about most of it at this time, though I hope to someday. But all you need to know right now is that I went three weeks without riding due to the shit month that was February, the weather, not having a Dressage saddle, 10 straight days of absolutely crippling anxiety, and (STILL!!!!!!) being without a truck. Although at least the snow melted so I can get my husband's RWD sports car up the driveway now.

He is really going to miss her when she leaves

But you know what? This guy picked right up where he left off. In fact, he picked up better than he left off after I finally gave up on my Dressage saddle and went back to my jump saddle. He's so much more willing to lift his back in the jump saddle, to the point that it makes me wonder if the long tree points on Dressage saddles are just a problem for him in general, because I've never felt him go like that in any Dressage saddle.

I like this saddle and I cannot lie

Good riddance, worst month of the year!

Just in case anyone has some Christmas money burning a hole in their pocket later this week, I thought I'd write up a proper review on the least adult thing I bought in 2020.

Hi yes I'm a 33 year old adult with a successful professional career, why do you ask?

Mary may have started something when she bought me that Punk Ponies pad. I've never been a wild colors or sparkles on horses person before, but when I saw these new Majyk Equipe Estrella pads, my brain was like "Look man, it's been a long, hard year of being an extra adulty adult and doing lots of things you don't want to. Life's too short to take yourself too seriously. Buyyyyy the paddddd."

So, YOLO. And teal sparkles look amazing on both ponies.

Bonus color and size reference, here's the pad on my barnmate's 16hh geriatric palomino QH Zippy, who has been filling in on pony ride duties for baby Annie while Connor is at school <3

 

But let's step away from the obvious fabulousness of the color and glitter. How is it as a pad? Honestly - it's my new favorite jump pad. It has great structure, doesn't slide down and bind the withers, and is nice and thick but still seems breathable. This doesn't feel like a cheap pad at all; they took the word 'luxury' seriously when they named it that.

I mean, please keep in mind we mostly keep one foot on the ground at all times now so I don't have an extensive collection of jump pads. But it's the nicest one I own for sure.

Like most saddle pads, it would be nice if it came in a slightly smaller size for my slightly smaller equine, but honestly, even with my postage-stamp sized 16.5" CWD 1C flap SE02 on it, it doesn't look massively out of proportion.

My biggest question with the glitter pads was how do they hold up? I'm happy to report that so far, they seem to hold up pretty well. I rode that jump lesson with my Back on Track nylon quarter sheet over the pad the entire time, and a fairly minimal amount of glitter transfer occurred.

I've also washed it once, and couldn't tell any difference in sparkliness before and after. There's obviously some top-dressed glitter on there that came off, but I think it also incorporates sparkly thread maybe? Either way, I think it'll stay glittery for a long long time (FWIW, same goes for my Punk Ponies pad as well). If you buy into the idea that glitter is the herpes of craft supplies, you're going to come away with only a very mild case if you own this pad 😂

It matches my...four? year old? turquoise Majyk Equipe Dressage Sport Boots

My only complaint is that there's one place where the braiding has started fraying, but I'm hesitant to call that out because it's such a clean cut, I'm not sure if I accidentally sliced it on something or what. Overall, the braiding and binding are very high quality and solidly attached. I'll update this review later if the fraying starts to occur in more places.

(My other complaint is that these don't come in Dressage cut - hello, Dressage queens and sparkles are like peanut butter and jelly! Do it, Majyk Equipe!)

Bottom Line: If you're in the market for a great quality pad that makes you giggle like a little kid every time you see it, this pad is for you. And I might have also ordered a purple one...

 

What: Majyk Equipe Estrella Sparkle Luxury Close Contact Saddle Pad

Sizes: Full

Colors: Turquoise, purple, black and silver

Price: $74.99

Disclaimer: I bought this pad with my own hard-earned money, and opinions are my own.

Yesterday, after all that, I finally bought a Dressage saddle. I ended up with a 12 year old wool flocked CWD for 1/3 of my budget, from my pseudo-local tack shop. Which is, you could say, right where I started.

Get ready for some French saddle porn

I learned SO much from this experience, but I think my most important takeaway is that saddles should be seen as temporary residents in your tack room (thank you, JenJ).

Your position changes, you get fat, you get skinny, you start working out, you stop working out, you have a baby, your horse loses topline, gains topline, gets fat, gets EPM, and the saddle that works for you today likely isn't the saddle that works for you five years from now.  And I feel like that's especially true for Dressage saddles.

Getting its first deep condition in my workshop. It was clearly well-taken care of, but it still soaked every bit of it up.

Combine that with not really ever having a "wow!" moment with any of the trial saddles, (do not tell me how amazing it will be if we order mine with slightly different features, I need to feel it before I sign my life savings away), with how much new saddles depreciate as soon as you take delivery, with how expensive they are, and with how generally screwed you are if you don't like it/it doesn't fit, and I ultimately decided a custom saddle isn't for me, and truly, it isn't the holy grail of saddle shopping I thought it was. Maybe if custom saddle money was throwaway money for me I'd do it, but it's not.




It's entirely possible that two years from now I'm going to be moving this CWD along after one or both of us changes, but at this price point, I'll almost certainly be able to recoup most of my money, whereas I wouldn't with a custom saddle, which made signing away the money so much less painful!

After conditioning. It has a 13.5" flap measured from the bottom of the stirrup bar, tee hee.

Some of my other takeaways:

1. Searching for used saddles is time-consuming and frustrating, but ultimately less risky than going custom

2. It's impossible to know what a saddle will feel like just by looking at it, which makes used saddle shopping insanely difficult. Heck, just looking at the picture of the CWD I ended up with, it doesn't look like something I'd like. But I love it.

3. I still firmly believe the saddle industry is broken. I have no answers. I admire the people who are trying to do something about it.

4. Brown Dressage tack would have been awesome, but a saddle we both love matters SO much more than aesthetics.

5. Maybe Connor does have a type.

At any rate, I'm now the proud owner of two CWD saddles, so I guess I can keep wearing my jacket!  Now to sell my brown short girth...