Daffodil All Arabian Spring Show - Wrangler Jeans

Before I resume with the Daffodil story, I just want to remind everyone that I am hosting the Carnival of Horses on June 1. Submit your entry for the next one by May 30! The Carnival after that will be hosted by Halt Near X Those interested in hosting future Carnivals please contact Lynda Polk at Hoofbeats


The next one to ride an Arabian horse into the ring at the Daffodil All Arabian Spring Show was baby boomer grandma. Sometimes I feel like I'm coasting along just fine, keeping up with the show scene. While other times I feel all sixty-one years of my age. Showing two horses at the same show seems to do more of the later.

I did manage to get my horse schooled in the ring at the break. He was better than he had been the day before but still nowhere near where he needed to be to be competitive. Despite his concerns about going forward in the curb bit, the horse was doing better maneuvering in traffic. I felt like we were making progress.

Getting ready for the class is always the biggest part of the stress involved in showing horses for me. I feel totally comfortable riding in a class but always have this nagging fear that something might happen to stop me from getting there in the first place. I guess looking at the way things have gone over the past 15 years or so of showing that I have done, I have good reason to feel that way.

I have far more time that I've ended up home than I've been in the show ring despite my best efforts to do things differently. It's always my plan to show each year. To get qualified for regionals and nationals but many times I don't even make the A system shows because something always seems to complicate my life that prevents the showing from Dandy's fall last year at Daffodil . to when the twins were born.

When I do finally get to a show, I can get pretty anal about getting ready for a class. So the big story for me sometimes can come behind the scenes as I try to get ready to show my horse in the first place.

This particular horse show was not exception as I tried to get myself together and into the ring. I neglected to mention in my post about my first class, that I had a "slight" problem with the fit of my black wrangler jeans.

Thanks to a particularly wonderful confection from Dove's Ice Cream known as Irresistibly Raspberry, I've put on a few pounds over the last couple of years. I'm not really a big fan of ice cream but for some reason this Dove's flavor in their ice cream in tubs line really grabbed me. I was eating two of those suckers a day.

I might as well have just slapped those things right onto my hips, thighs, and butt because that's exactly where it all headed. In the course of about 18 months, I'd gained about 18 pounds. Thanks heavens that Dove's seems to have discontinued the flavor and the gaining has stopped. Now if I can only figure out a way to shed the weight is so blissfully added.

What does this have to do with showing you say? Well, that's easy enough. My show clothes don't fit! I'm not much of a clothes horse to start with. Clothes just aren't that important to me. Granted, I prefer to be fully clothed........and actually I'm a big fan of multiple layers........but fashion......not so much. I'd much prefer spending my money on my herd of horses.

So I have a couple of outfits...........a couple of sizes.........my fat chaps........my skinny chaps.......you now the drill. I have skinny jeans and fat jeans as well. As close as I came to checking that my jeans fit before the show was checking the label to see what size it read.

It was good. The same size as the blue jeans I was wearing........but that's were the problem began. The label may have said the black jeans were exactly the same size as the blue ones but saying they were close to the same size might be a lot more accurate. Close..........but not close enough!

So when it was time to put those black jeans on, I could hardly get my foot into the small hole my ankle was supposed to slide through. That should have been my first clue. But then I really had no choice........no back up plan.......these jeans were supposed to fit. Once I did manage to get my foot through the openings, I could hardly pull those things up over my newly endowed raspberry chocolate posterior. I got the things zipped up ok BUT I could hardly move..........and I don't even want to talk about all the stuff that couldn't fit that got pushed up over the top of said wrangler jeans.

I would definitely say that the term being "poured into" my jeans is the most accurate picture I can paint. I was going to need these jeans to stretch and stretch fast. I had to climb up on a bench to mount my horse. The climbing part was difficult with knees that wouldn't bend because my jeans were so tight! Seriously.........I looked like one of those cartoons puff boys walking stiff legged and swinging their limbs around because they'd lost all flexibility. It was NOT pretty! (funny...........maybe...........but definitely cartoonish!)

When I did get in the saddle, my jeans were so tight that my stirrups were too long. I had to move them up a hole on each side so I could even reach the bottoms of my stirrups. I must have been suspended by the tight fitting crotch of my jeans over the saddle seat.

Moving my leg to cue my horse was next to impossible..........nope, I take that back...........it was impossible! I tried to move my leg but those tight jeans acted like a corset designed to keep me into some predetermined form. Not only could I not reach my horse............I could barely breath!

To be continued...............


I am back from the Salem horse show...........glad to see that my pre- scheduled posts all made it up when they were supposed to! I'll be trying to get through and answer comments tomorrow.



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