Meghan and I met for dinner at this great little bar in town, lord knows after the drive I had heading there I definitely needed a drink! The burger was good but the fries were amazing!! I will have to go back if I go next year. We stayed at this relly nice AirB&B, which was awesome. It was a little bit of a drive to the show hall but we had the basement to all to ourselves. There was a ping pong table, pool table, electronic slot machine and a huge TV. We didn't do a whole lot while we were there, mostly just catching up and talking about show stuff.
The venue for the show was amazingly beautiful!! It was in a new place this year, a little off the beaten path but well worth it. It was help in a refurbished barn, it was so warm and cozy, they did a great job getting all of the tables in that space. It could have felt very small with the number of tables but they planned it out very well.
Halter/Workmanship was a bust. I had some placings but nothing that I was really pleased with. I had a few models get some 3rd placings but it was mostly last place in the class or no placings at all. The more I think back on it the more I feel like it was just one of those shows. The judge didn't like small scales and the placings reflected that. I would have been madder about the whole thing if I hadn't done so well in performance.
I had decided shortly after deciding to go that I was going to do performance. I have had very mixed results with performance in the past. I had several shows that went well, then I had a show that didn't go well. After that show I decided to upgrade and work harder on all of my set ups. I put a lot of work into my entries and for the next 3 shows had nothing come out of it. I just about gave up performance showing all together. I did end up judging performance at one show, which I really like. I still get to be a part of it, but I don't have to worry about actually showing in it. So going into this show I decided that this was going to be the "make or break" show. Depending on things went I would stop showing performance all together or I would try again.
I knew that this show was going to be competitive, there are some big names that come to this show for performance. I felt that any placing not at the bottom of the class or even 1 NAN card would be worth the effort. I spent months making brand new props and set ups for every class. There are a few things that I know I want to change for the next show, but I couldn't be happier with how it went.
I made 2 horses specifically for performance. I was working on these horses until 2 days before I left for the show. From the start, I said that if one or both of the horses wasn't finished then I would skip performance and just do halter. The repositioned Moxie that I started almost a year ago was the first horse that came to mind. I knew he was closer to being done that for the last show so I decided to finish him and see how it turned out. It took me months to finally settle on a mane that I liked for him. He ended up with a nice simple hunter type braid with a loose tail. I would have loved to do a loose following mane on him but it just wasn't working. I did try to make a removable mane for him so that he would have one for western and the braids for english but it didn't work. I got one made but I broke it so I decided the shelf that idea for now. He was suppose to be a chestnut with a really loud overo pattern but he said no thanks and ended up a bay roan with a less dramatic overo pattern. I really love how he turned out, I'm curious to see how he does in halter classes. The other horse that I did was one of the Chronos 3D Printed horses. I loved his pose from the moment I saw him. He has this really nice forward, yet collected canter that just screamed performance horse. His mane was causing me problems too but in the end he got some nice button type braids that suit that him nicely. I had his color picked out from the day I got him and it fits him really well. He's a nice medium bay with 3 socks and a nice blaze.
I am really happy with how both of them did. There were a few classes that I have to change or fix some thing on but overall its good. Osiris (bay Warmblood) was a prop horse in Other Performance, but his first real class was Jumping. I was really excited about this class, I made a new beach themed jumper jump for him and it turned out really cool. But the bit came unstuck on the one side that faces that judge so it cost him, but he still placed in a big place. After that he brought home a card in the next 3 classes. My plan for the next show is to change his Other English to a Fox Hunting scene now that I have the pewter hounds I have been waiting for.
Bar Liar is the Paint (Cm Moxie) He had a stellar day! Placed in ever single class and brought home a card in 9 of his 14 classes. As if that wasn't enough, with the cards from this show he is half way to his Performance Versatility Award from NAMHSA!! He needs 2 more Other performance cards to meet the required numbers in each division, then he will only need 7 more to get the total number needed. I have never had a horse do that well in the performance ring before. There are 2 more shows this year that are having performance classes. If I can get to both of them there is a chance he could get the award in one year, how crazy would that be!!
I put together a slide show of the performance classes. I did miss a few classes just because of how things were moving along, I added the missing classes below.
Bad Liar
Costume - 1st & NAN
English Pleasure Stock - 1st & NAN
Other English - 1st & NAN
Osiris
Other English - 2nd & NAN