Category Archives: Horses

2014 US National Arabian and Half Arabian Championship Horse Show

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My sister Ellen and niece Jillian were in Tulsa this weekend to attend to the U.S. National Arabian Horse Show held this weekend. I don’t know a thing about horses but I sure do love to attend the show. It is quite an event.

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There is lots of money involved in Arabian horses. Jut look at this horse trailer.

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The various horse farms that participate decorate up the their stalls very nicely. Televisions, bars, comfy furniture. It is really quite remarkable.

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But the real attraction are the horses. They are incredibly beautiful and graceful and they have attitude. The best of them have the air that they are not quite under control.

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The final event Saturday night is quite elegant. Green sawdust and the judges are all dressed up.

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You can tell that the horses and their handlers have spent a lot of time training together.

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I’ll repeat myself, the horses are incredibly beautiful. I tried to get good photographs of them during the riding events but they are all very blurry.

I did take a 12 second video that is not too bad. The horses are incredibly graceful.

I’ll keep going to this event as long as they have it in Tulsa is what I think. And you know something. The event is free for spectators. You just walk in and sit down in the general seating area like you owned the joint.

Have you ever been to a horse show? Tell us about it.

Linking with Camera Critters

First Ride of the Season

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Saturday was a glorious day. Sunny, cool, breezy, and dry. At All-Star Therapy Group,  Logan got to ride out across the pasture and through the woods for the first time this year. Of course I came along to document the event.

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The new green of Spring is great. Everything is very lush right now right now in northeastern  Oklahoma. As one heads west it dries out quickly and there have been several big grass fires not too far away.

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But on Saturday we were just enjoying the riding and walking through the pasture and woods.

When was the last time you went on a walk through the woods?

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Scavenger Hunt Sunday – Where I Stand Edition

Where I Stood

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Hey everybody meet Seven. He is the horse my son rides at his Thereapeutic Horseback Riding lesson every Saturday morning. Seven was donated to the center by a ranch here in Oklahoma. He is a trained cow horse but he has a trot that will “scramble your brains” which is not good for cowboys in the saddle all day. 

Silver

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I captured this at the Nelson Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City during our Fall break trip in October. Notice I got myself along with Heather and Logan to the left.

Tiny

Teeny-tiny #geocache like a needle in a haystack #tulsa #oklahoma #geocaching

I’m a geocacher, an internet based game (check out geocaching.com) where people hide containers or “caches” out and about in the world and then other people go find them using handheld GPS receivers (“GPSr”). The biggest cache I found was a footlocker in the eleavator penthouse of a New Orleans high rise office building (the owner of the building is a geocacher. He has a security guard take you up to the penthouse so you can go find it). This pictured is the smallest I’ve ever found. Talk about a needle in a haystack especially consider that the accuracy of a GPSr is only about 12 feet under ideal conditions. So if the hider’s GPSr is off by 12 feet and the finder’s is off by the same amount then you have a radius of 24 feet to check. Fun, fun, fun. I have found about 1300 of them over the years and hidden 27.

In the Cupboard

Prepared Pantry

Well instead of Cupboard, how about Pantry. Above is my wife Heather at my cousin’s store in Rigby, Idaho. It is  The Prepared Pantry. They have all sorts of baking mixes that are great. They often have free cooking demonstrations on Saturday where they give out generous samples of the food.

Shadow

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I found this shadow at Powell Gardens near Kansas City Missouri back in October. 

Scavenger Hunt Sunday

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Our World – Arabian and Half Arabian Championship Horse Show 2013

A couple weeks ago the Arabian Horse Association held their Arabian and Half Arabian Championship here in Tulsa. As a bonus my sister Ellen and her daughter, niece Jillian came from Colorado to see the Championship and visit with us. 

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Of course you have to fly the flag before you do anything right and play the Star Spangled Banner.

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And in a nice gesture the Canadian flag was paraded and their national anthem played.

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Then the big guy in the red jacket sounded the bugle and we were off.

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I don’t know a thing about Arabian horses but I can tell you now that they are beautiful and have lots of attitude.

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They are well trained and so are the riders. It was fun to watch as the judges put them through the various paces.

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I stole this picture while the horse and trainer were posing for a real photographer.

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Another segment of the Championship was the horses posing. Don’t worry, I did not see any horses hit with the whip, or whatever it is. It seemed to be used to get the horse to pose correctly. The horses had lots of attitude. Kind of like teenagers when posing for family pics. You know what I mean.

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The horses had a classic looking trot. The riders were almost perfectly still. It was rather elegant to watch.

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There were all sorts of events and all sorts of championships. This lady was the Reserve Champion. Which I think is second place in her event. She wowed the crowd with her standing on the horse. Not as part of the competition of course but part of her celebration afterward.

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The winner got a big check. Makes winning that much better right.

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I like the behind the scenes in the staging area. All sorts of stuff going on.

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The stable areas were luxurious. This is part of the stable area. It looks like a nice living room to me. Lots of money at these shows.

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And they display their trophys.

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And the expo, everybody has an expo these days. I bet you that they have expos at spelling bees. These saddles are beautiful.

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Decorative clothing.

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And cowboy boots. Why have boots if you nobody can see them is what I say.

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Jillian brought a 4H team from Colorado who participated in the horse judging events. You can see that the students did very well. Jillian is at far right.

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One of the more spectacular events involved the riders and horses wearing costumes.

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I loved it. It was like Lawrence of Arabia. You know except for the violence and all that.

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Again, the riders were elegant and the horses were beautiful, and full attitude. I think I might become a fan of Arabian horses. 

If you want to see a post by somebody that knew what was going on check out my Sister’s post on the event. She knows about horses. So does Jillian. Me, I can tell a horse from a cow at least 80% of the time.

Our World Tuesday

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Connected Again

I’ve been off the air lately. A few nights ago our internet crashed. I am not sure what caused it but it may be the Obamacare website thrashing around in its death throes did our access in. Stuff like this never happened with Bush is what I say. Of course most Republicans these days don’t even know who Bush is. They seem to think that we didn’t really have a President in the eight years before Obama. And you know they may be right! But I’m digressing The point is that I lost my internet but that’s okay cuz I was out gathering material.

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My sister and her youngest daughter came to town for a horse show. (A little bit about that later.) We got to visit a little bit. It would have been rude to be writing a post during a visit don’t you think? For those of you who don’t think that I ever smile, this picture is proof that I do! Sister Ellen is also a fellow blogger. Go check out at News From The “Pole” Yard.

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On Saturday I ran the Tulsa Run 15K. It kind of hurt. I had a sinus infection going on and had missed three days of work. Of course my boss is a runner also and asked me Saturday morning, “Oh, so you feel okay to run, huh?” To make matters worse I came in ahead of him, and his wife. Oh well, all in good fun is what I say. I’ll have more about the race in a later post.

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Ellen and Jillian are both really involved with 4H and horses and horse judging. They were in town for the U.S. National Arabian and Half-Arabian Championship Horse Show. On Saturday night we met them at the show.  I had never been to such a thing and it was just amazing. I have not seen anything like this horse show ever, not on television or anywhere. Those Arabian Horses are very spirited, high strung and beautiful and the owners, breeders, and fans are passionate about the breed. I’ll also be posting more about this later. The National Championship is coming back to Tulsa each year for the next five years. I’ll be there!! Getting high on that green sawdust.

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Jillian (at the far right) was the coach of a high school 4H horse judging team from Colorado. Jillian competed extensively in high school and then later at Colorado State University before she graduated. She stays active in the sport. She took vacation from her job to come down with the kids and help them compete.

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And then of course we went to the Pumpkin Patch. Gotta have pumpkins this time of year. Of course, Logan can carry the pumpkins now. We started bringing him out here when he was about the size of the one he is holding.

So, anyway, that’s my whirlwind post. I’ve missed everybody! But it was a nice break also. We had a lot going on.

Our World – The Fricking Frackers, Bison, and Longhorns of Woolaroc

Son and I went on another road trip Saturday.

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First, SuperPizzaBoy does his weekly session with All Star Therapy Group. Here he riding the barrel racing pattern with Seven. Then it was off to Frank Phillip’s Woolaroc (Frank is the guy who started Phillips Petroleum way back when. He has been gone since 1950 or so but his company goes on. Woolaroc is his old ranch and museum. It is a heck of a place.)

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When we got to the entrance it was a zoo. I’d never seen so many people. They told us at the gate that Phillips Petroleum was having their annual employee picnic. So we paid our admission and joined the fricking frackers of Phillips Petroleum at Woolaroc. (Note, I’m a big fan of fricking frackers.)

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It was stop and go from the highway to the parking lot. The bison were wondering what the heck is going on.

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Well at least some of them were. The rest were like ho hum.

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This guy is all depressed looking for some reason.

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There were some Texas Longhorns at the ranch.

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I mean if you were a Texas Longhorn confined deep in Oklahoma Sooner country you’d be depressed also.

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In the barn, the llama was bemused. He had never seen so many fricking frackers and fricking fracker family members.

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The deer were on point also. If the bambi’s are not afraid of fricking frackers why should you be?

Later, I’ll post some pics from inside the museum. If you love western art, you’ll love Woolaroc.

Our World Tuesday

Our World – Family Trail Ride

We had a family reunion on a ranch near Island Park, Idaho last week. While there we signed up for a trail ride.

Uncle Bob and Shiloh

As we gathered brother Bob and nephew Shiloh honed their roping rope untangling skills.

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Sister Ellen, (left), Dad, and Sweetie chattted.

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The smirking stars of the day were trying to figure out who of the dudes they were going throw off during the ride.

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The lead wrangler was showing us how to get on the horse. I didn’t catch his next move where standing where he is, he jumped and swung his right leg over the horse and into the saddle as smooth as silk. Without breaking his serious face he asked if we had any questions. I love smart alecky wranglers.

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So after everybody was on their horse (using platforms) we were ready to go.

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Off we went across the sagebrush and up a hill against a beautiful blue sky.

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Alongside a small lake.

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Across lush green meadows.

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And through the woods.

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We stopped and the wranger took photographs with our cameras. Left to right is brother-in-law Irv, brother Bob, sister Ellen, SuperPizzaBoy, nephew Mr. Beans, Sweetie, and Me!

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Irv documented the return trek.

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Here is my horsecam view of yet another small lake close to the stable. 

All of our butts were a little sore but we were happpy.

Our World Tuesday

Skywatch Friday

Under a big blue beautiful Oklahoma Sky in Pioneer Woman country north of Tulsa.

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SuperPizzaBoy takes his weekly therapeutic horseback riding lesson. Bob, the guy that runs the place decides to make a few changes.

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SPB is riding Frisco instead of Sally. Frisco has better brakes than Sally.

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Which means that son doesn’t have to worry so much about keeping his balance on the horse. Which means that he can relax and lower the reins.

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Which means that the horse can lower his head.

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And that makes for a better ride.

I don’t understand it all, but I have confidence in Bob, and I can see that son is getting more and more relaxed in the saddle but is also more and more in control of the horse.

It is all about observation and making changes and seeing what happens.

Under a big blue beautiful Oklahoma Sky.

Camera Critters – Sally

SuperPizzaBoy is turning into quite the rider. Here he is with Sally.

Therapeutic Riding Update

He is riding weekly at All Star Therapy in Ramona and they have him riding independently more and more. He is going from being a passenger on the horse to actively controlling and working with the animal. Sally, the name of the horse, takes a lot of working with. She gets irritated by the other horses and likes to bite them so SPB has to take charge and prevent her from doing that. 

It is really fun watching him ride these days.

Camera Critters