The groom becomes the rider for the weekend

Well I'm sure you'll know from my post last weekend that I had a dressage test, so today was the day!

I got up at 6 to dress, and eat a quick breakfast and straight out to start grooming and plaiting.

Mum is great and had been out at 5 ish to let Beanie out to have his breakfast and go for a walk and stretch  before we got him in. So at 6.30 I went and got him in.. Well Beanie thought if he sticks his head in a bush and hides his face that I wouldn't see him.. 

Well sorry B, I can see you...your white socks give you away mate..!

We were first at Rosewood Stud, B was nice and chilled and was happy to walk about and have a quick munch of grass before getting tacked up.

I got dressed, and if I do say so myself, I'm looking alright for a rusty amateur! Plus I've lost a lot of weight since I wore that jacket last, so that's another plus!

Once tacked up I mounted up and went to warm up and let B see his sorroundings. He was a little spooky and eyes on stalks cause he's not been out much lately but he soon settled in and worked really well in the warm up arena

He was just such a good boy, he warmed up beautifully, and just was so sweet.

He was a bit jumpy in the test and a noise outside did make him spook but overall I'm pretty happy! 

For my first test in over 15 years I got 59.7% and got some really lovely comments from the judge.

And I came 6th!! Not bad really, could have been much worse!

I am so proud of B and how he tried for me! He made my return to stressage a positive one, and I even channeled my inner Dujardin and sat back and was not a sack of potatoes!

As soon as we got home and rugged Beanie up, it didn't take him long to undo all my hard sprucing this morning! Only a few steps into the field and he rolled and rolled! Covering himself in mud, but he deserves it so can't hold it against him!

I know I am going to be stiff in the morning, but no pain, no gain!!

Dressage, what's dressage?

Georgie has done a boo boo and entered a dressage competition only to realise that she's away on holiday!
I get a text today asking did I want to do it..
Hold up, i've not done a dressage test since I gave up pony club at about the age of 14 or so. I'm now 27.. 13 years!
So safe to say i'm just a bit nervous!
Beanie is beautiful and lovely and I trust him, but i've also never schooled him. I've ridden out and jumped him once but never actually schooled him and got him really listening to me...

So with that I've now got to memorise Intro A 2008 walk and trot test and try and not to cock it up. If worse comes to worse then Mum can call it for me and I can focus on riding, although it's not too difficult so hopefully I can engrain it in my brain!

He is a beautiful boy who can go really well so here's to making him go like this