Back to the show ring we go, after a nice long break. Fortunately, six weeks wasn’t so long that we all forgot how to do what we do, and I had some very good rides.

The worst of the day was Ella, who led things off by being way too relaxed for her first Young Rider Grand Prix test. Just blah, and nothing about Ella should be blah. Everything was 6s and 7s except for an out-of-character bungle in the first extended trot (duh!), and the piaffe, which can’t happen out of big, open, swimmy passage, something I thought I was done with. Bollucks.

She just sort of didn’t show up today, and I tried to get her on fire with my Big Big Spurs, but to no avail. Dangit! A year ago at this horse show Ella and I were waterskiing around at fourth level. I’m amazed with how far we’ve come in 12 months, but can’t I have a little of the loopy back, please, just a little?

I know that if the nerve isn’t there (which is good! it shouldn’t be about tension), then I have to rely on her fitness, and that’s still growing. Hello, 9-year-old Grand Prix horse. Chill, dude. But I’m a type-A Dressage Perfectionist, and so even when it’s good enough (almost 64), it’s never good enough. She did, however, make all 15 ones, and her twos were particularly good, and the pirouettes weren’t her best, but they erred on the side of too big, instead of the usual too small, which I guess is something. Tomorrow is another day.

Fender was up next, for both of our Young Horse Test debuts. I was really looking forward to it, not because I was expecting to be brilliant, but because I’ve never ridden in that format before, and wanted to experience it. Fender, for his part, rose to the occasion by REALLY taking the bridle, for the first time, ever. He took the bridle so well that he took it out through my hands and into the abyss. Crap.

No, he was good. This is young horse riding—no guarantees you have the same horse for more than one ride in a row. He picked up his canter leads, stayed in the arena, was relatively steerable and didn’t cry. The canter was actually quite good, and the judges agreed—8.5. Wahoo! They got after me for his wobbly contact not in the trot (7.8, needs more organization, particularly in lengthenings), but in submission (7.3), which was exactly what they should have done. They also told me I need to make the walk take bigger, swingier steps, which I’ll get right on as soon as I figure out how. Overall impression was an 8—nice leggy, modern type, they say. I know! Yay!, I say. A 7.76 total, which I think is just swell. Let’s see if we can do it again tomorrow.

Midge’s first real Prix St. Georges rounded off my day with a bang. The canter is still a little tight and holdy in the back, and he filched one flying change from me, the weasel. But the trotwork was SO easy and lovely, super transitions out of medium and extended paces, rideable and organized and quiet and as long in the neck as I can make him. Made all his fours and threes, and he made two perfectly civilized pirouettes and was a GENIUS in the extended canter (8, baby, with the comment BOLD!), all for a 67 and a commanding win. Woohoo!

Tomorrow, I will try and get Ella to show up a little more in her warm-up for her Brentina Cup test, try and ride more suppling walk work before Fender’s 4-Year-Old qualifier, and keep the exact same plan for Midge’s Developing Horse test, and be done showing by 1 p.m., the best part of all.

And proper Mexican food for dinner tonight, followed by an early bedtime. Does it get any better than this?