8/20/03 Liz rode Manhattan to finish 10th in the OP with a super cross country run and also had a wonderful run cross country on Matchbox in OT. Matchbox moves up to OP next weekend! Poppy rode her Mercury Rising in their first ever JYOP and finished 8th! Congrats! Christine rode both Hocus Pocus and Gliding Dragon in the OT as well. Both were great! She had an interesting show jump on Dragon though - he jumped huge into the triple and popped her out of the saddle and went on the jump the rest of the triple by himself - and clean! He then went though the finish flags and pulled out like a good little boy! What a great horse!! Lenore rode Bacall in the OT with a good go as well and one of the only clean SJ of the whole day! Both Bacall and Dragon go OP next weekend! I spent the past two days driving to Indiana to take Poppy home for college and pick up two new horses from my friend, and co-owner of a lot of my horses, Virginia Benz. We are sad to see Poppy go, but wish her the best of luck at Indiana University and hope she will be back soon!! She went from BN to OP in 8 months with her horse and learned a lot! Hopefully she will be back next summer and be ready to go run her first 3-day and for a move up to OI!! With Poppy gone, we are welcoming a new working student from Washington state, Laura. Along with Laura, we have Jen and Jessie doing work study so they will get out of school early to help out at the barn. And of course, Amy and Christine are here full time - with Lesley and Kerri helping out too!! We are lucky to have such a great crew. We have a packed fall event season so check back soon to see how everyone did! 7/28/03 7/15/03 We also took a group of "new to eventing students and horses" to try the Elementary division. Sierra Lindsey rode Lillian (who she leases from Christine) and had a great go! Both Dianne McNally on McKeldin and Jeannie Borger on Hot Topic (former WEF horses too!) rode in their first event ever and had tons of fun. Neither can wait to try it again! Amy Knapp took 2 of her mom's young horses - Red Velvet and Beez in my Bonnet - for educational first outings. On the whole, a lot of fun was had be everyone - and - NO RAIN!!! We are taking advantage of the summer and continuing to event most weekends. Next weekend we take Novice and Training horses to Radnor Hunt HT and then I am off the following week for the CIC** with Jessica Price's Big Bad Voodoo Magic. Check back to see how those go! Also congrats to Elizabeth Guss on her purchase on North Forty Model! 7/8/03 I also had the opportunity last week to ride in the ICP testing at the O'Connor's home base of Stonehall Farm. This testing was for level 3 to 5 instructors so I was able to bring a Prelim horse (Tommy), an Intermediate horse (Norman), and an Advanced horse (Magic) to ride in lessons while the instructors were tested on how well they taught. This was very educational for me as a rider, and also helpful for the future as I am planning to do my testing for levels 1 and 2 in the fall. I had a flat lesson on Magic with David O'Connor and a flat lesson on Norman with Cathy Wieschoff that were both very helpful!! Also - we want to congratulate Dale Price on his purchase of Regal Sky and Katherine Hammer on her purchase of Impress Me - both are very talented horses who should take their riders far! Check back soon for more news from WEF! Natalie 6/8/03 Another muddy, wet weekend of eventing in Area II!!! We went to Elysian Hills Horse Trials Saturday (although if I had been smart, I would have stayed home and stayed dry!) and it poured all day long. Christine rode her horse, Gliding Dragon, and Amy rode her horse, Charlie Can, at the Preliminary level in the biggest studs they own!! Both girls had good dressage tests, slow but good cross country rounds, and clean show jumping to finish 5th and 3rd respectively. Congrats to both on their first time at this level! The rains continue and next weekend's event at Menfelt has already been made into a combined test for Novice to Advanced. This is so unfortunate but understandable! I was so looking forward to running my 5 Novice to Intermediate! But that is the luck of this spring! Check back soon for results for Menfelt and our next run at Seneca! Hopefully it will go on as planned!! PS - Sirius is now in foal to Aberjack!!! Natalie 6/03/03 Liz rode Toast of Manhattan around the Prelim and he was wonderful! They finished 9th with some time faults due to some long routes taken because it was this horses' second outing at this level. He never glanced at anything!! Liz also rode our horse, Juliet, in BNH to finish 6th on her dressage score! What a nice little horse she has become! Several working students brought their horses to the event. We actually had 5 horses in the Training level division D! Amy Knapp was 6th with Charlie Can, Christine Eigenbrode was 8th with Gliding Dragon, and Kerri Long was first with Bacall! Kerri is riding this horse for another student, Lenore Oliphant, while she is healing from a broken leg. Poppy Coulter and Mercury Rising completed their first Training level event this weekend and were in good form! It was also nice to see several of our former horses out and going and doing well. Peg Nara of Infinity Farm rode The Boss to win in the Training. This pair has consistently been in the ribbons since forming their partnership! Susan Farris also had her horse, Lt. Benz, ridden by a friend from Bascule Farm, to 2nd place in BN. 5/25/03 Liz Patrick rode American Idol (aka Welded) in his first event in BNH and won an impressive 2nd place! This team will have a talented future ahead and should be going Training by fall. Working student Amy Knapp also had 2 rides. She rode WEF's Juliet to tie for first place in NH with an incredible 29 in dressage! This is this horses 2nd event and 2nd ribbon! Amy also rode her own North Forty Model to 5th place in NH. Other students also attended and had a successful go! Sierria Lindsey rode Lillian in her very first event and was 4th place in Elementary Rider. Jessie Poole rode Honest John to 3rd place in BNR - which is the 2nd event for both horse and rider! Chrissy Davidson rode Casey Jones to 6th place in BNR as well! Debra Kohan rode Sierria in her first event in BNH and would have gotten a ribbon if not for an unfortunate wrong turn on cross country! She did an outstanding dressage test and had an otherwise foot perfect cross country round! They will definitely ribbon next time and be ready for more soon!! Congrats to everyone!! Several of these fine young event horses are for sale - so check them out! We'd also like to congratulate Elizabeth Hattenburg on completing her first BN this season! Next week we take several horses to Waredaca HT here in Laytonsville for BN to OI. Check back in and see how it goes! We are hoping for some drier weather! PS - the drought is over!! 5/19/03 Norman was 9th after dressage with a great score of 52.6. I was very proud of him - and the great news is that he can do an even better test! Endurance day was wet and cold! Norman wasn't too sure what to think of steeplechase at first - he thought I had lost my mind to be running at the fences. He wanted to show jump them! By the third fence he had it all figured out though, and I could hardly pull him up at the end! He was great on phase C and came into the vet box very cooled out, leaving my team without much to do in those "10 minutes". Soon I was back in the saddle and on the cross country course. He performed wonderfully with a clean course. The conditions had gotten wet and slick so I did incur some time penalties by taking a couple long routes to take advantage of the better footing. We finished endurance day in 18th place. On Sunday, Norman jogged up perfectly and was jumping really good in warm up for show jumping. The indoor coliseum impressed him a little with the extra atmosphere and he had a couple rails - which is not his norm as he is very, very careful. We finished in 20th place and I am very pleased with his performance. Can't wait to do Morven CCI*, our next planned three day, in the meantime, we will try a couple of Intermediate horse trials. Norman is still quite young and has proved that he has a great future ahead of him! Big thanks to all our helpers (who stuck it out even though it rained every day) at Virginia - we needed it! I had a great team in the vet box, consisting of Shane (my husband), Christine (my groom and assistant trainer at WEF), Phyllis (my trainer from Windchase), and Carol (my student and boarder). Congrats as well to Carol Federighi and her new horse for a great go in the Novice - 32.5 dressage and clean cross country and show jump rounds! While we were away Lesley Long and Poppy Coutler went to the starter event at Menfelt. Lesley took Leggs (High-Tech) in their first Training and were 5th. Poppy also took her horse Freddie (Mercury Rising) in his first Training and were 3rd! Congrats to both! After a long week, I took a relaxing day today and unpacked and rested my tired muscles, but plan to get back into the schedule tomorrow as I have 3 horses entered in Novice for next weekend and have many, many students competing as well. Check back in and see how our weekend went! 5/5/03 Liz Patrick rode Matchbox in the Training to score fourth with a 31.5! He was quiet exceptional and proved that this is going to be a great partnership! Liz also moved Manhattan up to Preliminary this weekend. He performed wonderfully and had a great go cross country. Liz had a little "whoops" when she jumped too boldly into a combination, circled back to part B of the jump and received a technical refusal. Hopefully, Manhattan will be ready to do a one star this fall! Kerri Long had a wonderful weekend with her horse, Impress Me. She rode him in the Training level to be 5th with a 35.5! Her mom, Lesley Long, rode Kim Davidson's No Way Jose in his first event to be 7th in the BNH. Working students Poppy Coulter and Christine Eigenbrode rode in the Novice on their horses. Christine rode Hocus Pocus to 3rd place with a 31! Poppy just missed the ribbons with a rail in show jumping, but still had an excellent performance. Several of these horses are offered for sale so check the website if you want a great horse to compete this spring! We all go again next weekend to Rubicon so join us again on this page to see how that goes! 4/28/03 I rode Jessica Price's Big Bad Voodoo Magic in the OI and he was awesome! The best Dressage test we have ever done, a great Show Jumping round, and a perfect Cross Country go! Jessica will be taking over his ride now for the rest of the season. Best of luck to them! I also rode my Prelim horse, Ready to Rock. I only did Dressage and Show Jumping with him - which he was wonderful for - and decided to withdraw from cross country as he is headed to the CCI* very soon and I didn't want to risk it!! Cruise Control (Tommy) was my entry in the OT. He went around Cross Country like it was nothing and will be soon ready for Prelim. This talented horse is offered for sale for someone looking for a serious upper level prospect! Liz Patrick rode her new horse, Matchbox, in the OT along with her other horse, Toast of Manhattan. Both horses went well in all three phases. Liz moves Manhattan up to Prelim next week at Difficult Run. Matchbox will have a few more goes at Training to form a stronger partnership before moving on. She has only ridden him for a week! Working student Amy Knapp rode her horse, Charlie Can, in the OT as well. She had a great Dressage test and Show Jump round, followed by a clean and fast Cross Country go! Congrats! Amy plans to move this horse up in June if all goes well. Alex Gilman had her two horses, Keltic Druid and Bo, in the OT as well. Bo performed all three phases wonderfully. He is also offered for sale! Keltic Druid and Alex had a great day on Saturday, but unfortunately they had a misstep and slipped on a turn on Cross Country and both went down! Luckily no jump was involved and no one was hurt! Better luck next time! Both of Alex's horses will compete again at Rubicon. We start all the young horses out next weekend at Difficult Run. It should be an exciting weekend as we have several other entries in addition to the babies. Check back to see the results! 4/16/03 Despite plans to compete this weekend with Liz, I ended up going by myself as Liz' horse, Blue Yonder, had an injury show up after FHI last weekend. Yonder will be bred this spring while she is recuperating and will produce a lovely baby to play and grow up with Sirius' baby!! What fun 2 will be! Some other exciting news - with Yonder out for the year to have a foal, Liz has purchased a talented young NZ TB from Phyllis Dawson! Matchbox will be one to watch this year! He's an incredible mover and super jumper and this pair will quickly move up to prelim and should do very well! While we were away at Plantation, some students did a local event at Redlands HT. Poppy Coulter was 8th with her horse Freddie in their first Novice event together! Congrats! Kerri Long rode Impress Me to a 4th place finish in the Novice as well. Kerri will move up to Training at the next event! Chrissy Davidson rode Casey Jones in their first BN event - a superb team of a 9 year old girl on a 6 year old 14 hand Quarter Horse! They will be future stars - look out YR! Amy Knapp moved up Charlie Can to do their first official Training level event and also rode North Forty Model in his first BN. This talented young horse is offered for sale and would be a super PC mount for the lower levels! That's about all for now. Check in again soon to see how the next few events go. We are home this weekend after doing a pipe opener with the youngsters on Friday and then go compete again at Loudoun on April 26-27. 4/8/03 While Liz and I were away at Fair Hill, several of my students went out to the local event at Weave a Dream HT. Alex Gilman and Keltic Druid had a super run to finish third in OT. Working students Amy Knapp and Poppy Coulter also attended the event. Amy and Charlie Can were 8th in the ON. Poppy and Freddie were fifth in the BN. Both girls will move up a level next weekend at Redlands! The mother/daughter team of Kim and Chrissy Davidson had good rounds as well in the BN and will be out again next weekend!
Full Moon Farm had a cross country pipe opener that another WEF mother/daughter duo, Lesley and Kerri Long, attended to get a good cross country school in for the start of the season. Kerri will be moving up her horse, Impress Me, to Training after one spring Novice run at Redlands. Lesley Long will be doing her first Training at Menfelt on my ex-Advanced horse, High-Tech. Both riders had very successful seasons last year at Novice with these horses. Impress Me is also for sale - check him out on our for sale page if you want a great horse that's easy going, competitive, and has a lot of potential! Check back for more news soon! 4/01/03 Event season is here! We have done 2 events now and have had good runs! Middletown was 2 weeks ago and I took Jessica Price's Big Bad Voodoo Magic in the OP, Cruise Control in the OT, and working student Amy Knapp rode Alex Gilman's Keltic Druid in OT as Alex is recovering from knee surgery. Magic won the dressage (nice start for the season) and had a great show jump! Unfortunately, he had serious issues with the start box so we went out on course (very) late and racked up penalties which knocked us out of first. I will have a new plan of attack next time! Tommy (aka Cruise Control) was very ready to get going after the long winter! He settled nicely and put in a good dressage test, was excellent cross country, and we only dropped one rail in show jumping to finish 6th. He will soon be ready to go Prelim and is one to watch for the future! Frankie (aka Keltic Druid) gave Amy a partial good dressage test... after having an excellent lengthening (which got an 8), he didn't want to come back and collect! He was super show jumping and cross country. The weather was perfect - the warmest Middletown Horse Trials I have every been to - which helped in making the weekend a great first outing! Last weekend was Morven Park. Magic and I put in a good dressage test to be in the 30's in the OI. We ran cross country wonderfully - Magic went around the course like a horse ready to move up to Advanced adding to my excitement over this talented horse! We finished the trials with a good show jump - except Magic slipped a bit before one fence and I fell off. I quickly got back on and finished the course. No rails, but the fall moved us out of the ribbons. Better luck next time! The Morven staff decided fairly late to move show jumping to Sunday and it turned out to be a very good move! Sunday was very snowy and the conditions were horrible. It was snowing so hard that the visibility was bad enough that the jumping was moved indoors half way through the day - something we could not have accomplished had we been running cross country! Announcer Brian O'Connor joked that Dianne Roffe was going to have a down hill skiing demo at the leaf pit after show jumping was over! Thankfully, the snow didn't last (although we did end up with 4 inches of accumulation!) it didn't last and today it is 80 degrees - a good sign as we leave Friday to go to Fair Hill International. Liz will be riding Blue Yonder in the OP and I will have Ready to Rock in the OP. This is the first outing for these horses on their path to the Virginia CCI* in May. Both are already qualified and ready to go so a couple good runs is all they need! While we are away at Fair Hill, several students and working students will be going to Weave a Dream HT to run BN through T. Check in next week for the results from both outings! 3/13/03 It is warming and thawing out so it looks like the spring season will get started on time after all! We are entered at Middletown March 22-23 where I will be riding Jessica Price's horse, Magic, in the OP and WEF's Cruise Control in the OT. Amy will be riding Keltic Druid in the OT for rider/owner Alex Gilman while she is recuperating from knee surgery. Everything else is back on track and running smoothly and all of the horses are coming along nice for the spring season. I am looking forward to competing every weekend again as I always get bored with the winter - and countless circles in the indoor arena!! You can now see our outdoor footing at least, so maybe we will get to ride in it again soon as well, and put winter firmly behind us! 2-22-03 To make matters worse, Christine's dog, Tela, and two of my dogs, Dolamite and Harpua, got sick during this time and so we had to make a lot of vet trips. Tela had to go in for fluids and Dolamite spent 2 days in the vet hospital. Harpua, the six month old puppy who I got from Phyllis Dawson's litter of lurchers, spent a week in the hospital before finally being diagnosed with 'hepatitis from an unknown source'. My other dog, Sage, and Liz' dogs never showed a symptom, so these three must have gotten into something together. Fortunately, everyone is home and doing much better now! Natalie 2-9-03 The first event for us is Middletown and I have 2 horses entered in the prelim and one in the training. Several students will be coming along as well. We are hoping to get out of the indoor at least once before the first event - it has been very cold this winter and we have had a lot of snow! More exciting news is that I have a wonderful horse to compete at the Intermediate level this spring for one of my boarders. Watch for me on Jessica Price's Big Bad Voodoo Magic at the competitions! This is a talented horse who has done very well and I am very excited to have this opportunity!! I am also breeding Sirius to Aberjack this year and expect an exceptional foal out of this combo! Both horses have outstanding breeding for upper level eventing and I hope to produce something as nice as they are! Well that's about all the news around here for now. Keep checking for more updates!
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