Shai Al Bey sings "I got the blue"

Starlog 092008

Today Rosey finished her 2008 show season at the Eddie MacMurdo Memorial Horse Show in Walla Walla, WA.

Rosey kind of got the short end of the stick this week as Kittee had a very busy court trial-trail schedule, having to use the I-84 corridor to go 100 miles to the west on Wednesday and 100 miles to the east on Thursday. Hectic! This played a bit of havoc on Rosey's pre-show training and all around show beauty treatment. Fortunately all of Kittee's trials came to a good conclusion for she and her clients this week, so Friday she got to stay at home with SHAI AL BEY, and do some show prep and herd petting. Turned out a bit too much herd petting.

Friday, was Rosey's first time in the ranch's horse wash station, in preparation for her outing/showing of today. She took the wash station relatively well with a small amount of grain (in a bucket), and only a few pullbacks against the wall hitch. Kittee and I first worked with her using a butt rope to enter the station, stroked her with a dry wash wand, then turned on the water to give her a full real deal horsey bath and show sheening. It still amazes us as to how much Rosey will allow us to get away with while handling her. She is such a beautiful, trusting little girl.

She is quite the joy to handle, from her very soft muzzle, ears, running our fingers through her very soft, plush baby's coat, and then Kittee will fluff her tail using Show Sheen to finish her after bath beauty treatment.

Back to today's show activities...

Kittee was up and running before the 5:20 a.m. alarm went off, asking if there was coffee made and ready to start brewing. Shortly thereafter she came in serving coffee in bed for the few minutes we had before daybreak and getting ready to Getty-up and get ready for show day. We grabbed a quick breakfast of coffee, fruit, granola and proceed about our day. I move the Double Duce out of the driveway, while Kittee went out and loaded Shaiela in the trailer. It had been raining most of the night, everyone in pasture was wet so I began to dry off Rosey's coat. We got her loaded and were on our way to Walla Walla by 7:00. Making good travel time, we were at the show arena by 7:30 and working on Rosey and doing a little touch up on Shaiela before the show start at 8:00 a.m.

Since this was an indoor arena show, I was unable to get any pictures of the show events with my digital camera (doesn't work well for taking indoor distance shots). There was a professional photographer there taking pictures of horses in the winner's circle, which we will get to see later as those pictures go online.

After we got into the arena building we ran into a number of horsey folks that we know from all our horse clubs/activities, and we then started to do a bit of horsey groundwork with Kittee handling Rosey and I handling Shaiela. Rosey and Shai stopped a few times during our pre-show workout for Rosey to have a quick milk snack, most everyone thought that was cute. Rosey was actually the only foal that we saw at the show, even though were a dozen or so minis around the arena.

To make a long story short, our show class was Arabian In Hand *Any Sex-Any Age*. Our ole friends Shana, and her eleven years old Sinwaan (a former pasture boarder) were in our show class along with two major show judges. Sinwaan and Shana took the lead in the show position, SHAI AL BEY and her Mom were second in the show lineup, with more full grown Arabians following us. The judges and show steward were very good to tell us what they wanted us to do and what they wanted to see from the horses. Rosey did a good job at showing today.
Again to make a long story short, after all the Arabians had done their halter class showing, the winning horse show number 309 was called out on the PA system - it was our SHAI AL BEY that will be found on the internet in the very near future with her picture in the winner's ring. Yep, we are happy that our baby came home with her/our first BLUE Ribbon and a crystal platter from this show.

After the show today, for the first time she was eating grain out of my hand, a sweet little girl, and happy. When we got back to the ranch we found everyone, and I mean every horse doing a song and a dance around the pastures. There was running, hucking and bucking going on everywhere when Rosey and Shaiela came through the ranch entrance gate. I watched Auntie Misty who really has an attachment to Rosey leave the ground twice with leaps of joy upon her return, or it may have been something to do with the cool first day of Fall weather we had. It was a joyous sight seeing everyone happy.

We are now looking forward for the 2009 schooling show/show season to begin next spring. We are going to try to follow SHAI AL BEY's Grand sire's -*SIMEON SHAI+- footsteps... as far as they may take us. It is allot of fun working this game.
After Kittee and I met, we talked about our individual time in France (I have always wanted to go back to Europe, retrace some steps of years gone by)... who knows maybe, just maybe SHAI AL BEY may just someday take the three of us to Paris for the horse show of our lives.

This past week I have been able to put together a web page for our baby... Rosey's web page.

Are we having fun with our 5 months old baby?
Youbetcha, even though while petting and swatting bot flies yesterday, Rosey ended up kicking Kittee in the right forearm, created a small hematoma which put Kittee's arm on ice last night.

Happy Trails to you until we meet again...

a day in the life around the ranch --- Dale