Happy Halloween!!

Ich lebe noch! Halbwegs!! Bin seit gestern krank...komischer Magen-Darm Virus, aber definitiv schon auf dem Wege der Besserung!
Ist natuerlich keine Entschuldigung, mit meinem Blog hier ewig nichts mehr zu machen. War irgendwie super busy die letzten Wochen, dass ich zum Update keine Lust hatte.

Chris sieht sich nach einer neuen Arbeitsstelle um, und wenn das mit dem Job klappt, ziehen wir definitiv in den Sueden Denvers um. Ich koennte dann auch bei IKEA arbeiten, wenn der Laden endlich Herbst naechsten Jahres aufmacht. Wir wuerden dann auch naeher bei seinen Eltern wohnen und es waere fantastisch, wenn Linda sich um die Zwerge kuemmern koennte, waehrend ich Vollzeit arbeite...daher habe ich hier im Haus ausgemistet und viele Kindersachen auf Craigslist gestellt und sie auch verkaufen koennen. Und wenn ich grade mal im Aufraeumwahn bin, dann ist kein Stoppen. Dazu muss ich halt auch Lust haben und wir hatten so schoene zwei Wochen, morgens kalt, aber noch kein Frost, nachmittags ueber 20 Grad und Sonne....und in der Zeit, in der Jonah schlaeft, kann ich ja eh nicht raus, daher halt organisieren und verkaufen, was das Zeug haelt.

Die Woche vor Halloween sind wir durch die Strassen gefahren und haben Ausschau nach Haeusern gehalten, die schoen dekoriert waren. Ein Mann in Broomfield faehrt immer rum und in unserem Lokalblaettchen wurden seine Favoritenhaeuser genannt. Daher wusste ich, wo ich hinfahren musste.

Hier ein Haus aeusserst klasse dekoriert!

Friedhof

Den Samstag vor Halloween waren wir bei Matthew zu einer Halloweenparty eingeladen. Es hat viel Spass gemacht, selbst Chris hat sich mit den Eltern der anderen Kindern amuesiert!

Halloween startete fuer uns schon um 4 Uhr nachmittags, weil unsere Nachbarschaft 'Red Leaf' zur Halloweenparade um den Tunnelpark eingeladen hat. Bei wunderschoenem Wetter machten sich die Kinder auf...

Erst waren wir die ersten, aber innerhalb kuerzester Zeit war eine Menschenmenge zugegen!

Ein anderer Incredible! Jonah konnte es kaum glauben!

Von dort aus sind die Kinder dann Trick or Treaten gegangen und kamen ungelogen mit 2 kg Suessigkeiten wieder nach Hause....die Suessigkeiten halten sich sicherlich bis naechstes Jahr!

This time of year again - Pumpkin Farm!

Gorgeous weather leads to gorgeous pictures!!

Some videos of Clinton Anderson's horsemanship

Clinton Anderson is using the same techniques like Pat Parelli (who is more famous) but when Parelli was doing all his stuff I still was in Germany and did my English riding. So I am not really familiar with all of Parelli's horsemanship methods and really can't compare Clinton to Parelli.

Here some videos I took at the clinic last week. I am still thrilled and thankful that I could attend the shows!

Here is Clinton teaching Maverick to come into Clinton's space, that he did not allow to be walked in earlier (first gaining respect, than to allow the horse into the space - like after a day). Clinton is really witty and funny, I love that!

Clinton on top of his horse Jillaroo. His top mare Mindy got retired on this tour at the Las Vegas stop in the summer, and his other top horse Diaz was kept at the World Equestrian Games in Kentucky for demonstration. So he showed us the next good horse Jillaroo, who is an offspring of his favorite Mindy.

I got the stick, halter and leadline off of ebay and train my Vanna since this week. I can't believe that it actually works with a stubborn old Fjord mare! LOL! I rode her this week for an entire of 30 minutes because it makes so much sense working off the ground first and I really enjoy it!

Clinton Anderson's Walk About Tour (Horse Clinic)

On the weekend I went with two ladies from the barn to Clinton Anderson's Walk About Tour at the National Western Complex in Denver. The clinic was just GREAT!!

Actually, I just found out that Clinton Anderson is existing! I saw a video posted on Facebook of a girl (Stacy Westfall), who rides bareback and bridleless and does spins and sliding stops (of course without falling down). I was really impressed by this and tried to learn something more about 'Natural Horsemanship' that we as English (Dressage) riders don't know.

Anyway, I googled this and came across a Clinton Anderson. I got on his webpage www.downunderhorsemanship.com and there are videos of him training horses. Just amazing! On this webpage I found out that he's coming to Denver for a horse show!

On Craigslist I tried to get cheaper tickets than stated on the webpage ($45 for Sat and Sun combined) and I looked on Ebay. I won on Ebay 4 tickets (2 pairs of Sat and Sun each) for $30! So I got a ticket for myself for just $15!!!! I was so happy!!

I could not wait for the weekend to arrive and on Saturday morning, I entered the Show Complex at 9 a.m. sharp.

And there he was, Australian's Clinton Anderson, who resides now in the US, in Stephenville, Texas!

First he talked about his training method and demonstrated this method on a 5 year old bratty horse in the roundpen. After lunch, he demonstrated the method on a halter and leadline for the horse folks who are not blessed with a round pen.

His method is really close to the Dog Whisperer's Cesar Millan one: Gain respect!!! Everything is about the horse respecting the human! Cesar uses a firm touch after several 'Shhh!' warnings, Clinton uses a carrot stick and smacks the horse on whatever body part he wants the horse to move after several warnings as well.

This dark brown 11 year old gelding, Maverick, was disrespectful and running almost constantly over the owner when the owner presented the horse, when Clinton worked with him for about 40 minutes, the horse already transformed tremendeously!

In the first picture Clinton wants his own space and backs up the horse out of his personal space, inthe second picture Clinton wants the horse to move his hindquarters around the front legs. Body language is everything!

The next day he rode Maverick and to get his neck softened, he flexes (bends) the horse's neck several times towards his leg. Maverick is blessed with an enormous muscular neck on the underside (Unterhals), because he was just disrespectful behaving and carried his nose high up into the air all the time. A horse that surrenders keeps in low, not higher than its withers. Maverick has a lot of learning to do!

Here's Clinton signing autographs during breaks. Of course I got one, too!

My friend who took this picture did not push far enough on the button of the camera so after 2 unsuccessful pictures I wanted to tell her that she needs to push harder on the button. Of course now she did it and this is the outcome of it...Grrr! LOL Second pic is me talking to Clinton about a behaviour problem of the mare I ride.

Of course Clinton is marketing his own line of horse tack. Pretty overprized for my taste but probably worth the money!

Anyway, I had a blast at these two full days, my wonderful husband took care of the kids and I learned a lot! In fact so much, that I fell asleep with the kids at 7:45 pm on Saturday!

Sigh / Seuftz!

WEG Television Coverage on NBC

NBC has the exclusive for airing WEG, at least here in the States. They’ve been making a big deal about how it’s more television coverage than WEG has ever gotten in years past! Yes, folks, we are getting a total of 6.5 hours of television coverage on NBC.

Here’s the official schedule:

Sunday, September 26 at 12-1:30pm EST (opening ceremonies, team reining)
Sunday, October 2 at 1-6pm EST (eventing cross country and jumping phases)
Sunday, October 10 at 4-6pm (show jumping, closing ceremony)

On the first Sunday, the reining team competition will be aired live with commentator Aaron Ralston, a reiner who happened to be on the gold-medal winning team and the individual bronze medalist at the 2006 WEG. America’s Horse Daily has the full scoop on the reining coverage. Reining will be included in all three broadcasts. I would expect we’ll also see some eventing and show jumping highlights, as they are the more popular spectator sports. Especially since the popularity of NBC’s Rolex 3Day coverage is a big part of the reason they agreed to devote so much air time to WEG.
And note, too, that while NBC is airing the Games, they are not producing or covering it themselves. The WEG Foundation had to buy the air time and do the producing themselves. However, that does allow them to get the advertising dollars for the commercials aired during the broadcast.

Weltmeisterschaften im Reiten...

...werden dieses Jahr in Lexington, Kentucky, USA ausgetragen. Aber denkt ihr, ich sehe davon etwas am Fernsehen? Alles, was uebertragen wird - so ca. 20 Stunden insgesamt von 16 Tagen (!!) GRRRRR - wird ueber einen pay sender uebertragen!! Ich muesste einmalig $30 zur Aufnahme dieses Senders bezahlen und dann pro Tag, den ich sehen moechte, nochmal $13 zahlen. Ist ja wohl die unverschaemteste Frechheit sondergleichen!!

Ich wuerde echt mehr von den Reiterspielen mitbekommen, wuerden sie in Europa stattfinden!

Vielen Dank, USA! Mal wieder kraeftig ins Klo gegriffen!!