Seeley's Bay D Rally

August 26-28, 2003

Pictures:


Hogan Fitzgerald (Land O'Lakes P.C.)
on Emma
Hogan Fitzgerald and Curtis Hall
(Land O'Lakes P.C.)

Curtis Hall (Land O'Lakes P.C.)
on Sophie
Curtis Hall (Land O'Lakes P.C.)
on Sophie

Carolyn Wight
(Prince Edward County P.C.)
on Jazz
Megan Snetsinger
(Kingston & Region P.C.)
on Zeke

Sondra Shantz
(Prince Edward County P.C.)
on Pyra
Sondra Shantz
(Prince Edward County P.C.)
on Pyra

Jessica Henderson
(Kingston & Region P.C.)
on Peko
Megan Snetsinger
(Kingston & Region P.C.)
on Zeke

Stable Management Results:

1st Place:
Kingston & Region I
2nd Place:
Village Creek
3rd Place:
Kingston & Region II
4th Place:
Prince Edward County/Land O'Lakes

The Pam Dillingham Award went to Hogan Fitzgerald (Land O'Lakes P.C.)

Write-Up:

D Rally 2003, what a success! Great food, great kids, great horses and, most of all, great fun. From the soccer game, the pony-club stud, turning into the pony-club mother, the trophy discussion, cat aids, my sweeping buddy Hogan, the independent pair, to the hot chocolate cake; this will be another rally I won't forget!

The best mini-rally I have ever been to in my whole life started on Tuesday the 26th of August and ran to Thursday the 28th. Oh boy, did it ever get off to a great start. I can honestly say I didn't want to go and when I got there late, I saw my team members were scrambling around to get everything labeled in time for the stable management check. That is always a good way to get your team to like you.

Any ways, I was introduced to my team: Hogan, Curtis, Sondra and Carolyn. I had no idea that I would have a sweeping buddy by the time the rally was over or the independant pair. We got everything under control for our first stable management check. After that we got to go and have some pizza. It tasted really good after being in the barn and having a marker in your mouth and having the taste of tape on your lips.

After supper we went back in the barn to clean up the horses, feed them and see how bad we did on our first stable management check. Correct me if I am wrong but when you walk into a barn you are usually greeted by the sweet scent of horse manure and a nicker or two. Not this time, we weren't. Instead it was a big green chart with our horrible stable management marks on them! Who wants to see 10 out of 20 on their first check? "Not us," said the first team. So as a team we sat down and had a small talk about what was wrong and how we could fix it.

Early on in the week I was told that this rally was more about horsemanship, team work, safety and fun than it was the riding. Well I obviously made my point clear when I said that because my little buddy Hogan was right on top of the horsemanship, team work, safety and fun. I remember the first thing he said to me after our little chat...it was safety and...asking me for the other half of the phrase I said teamwork. Who would have thought that a message like that could have been so clear to a group of four kids?

After all of our teamwork and safety duties were over, we got changed and went over to the cross-country field to play some soccer. We had a hard time deciding on how to split the teams. So we all used our pony club skill and we came to conclusion that we should pick captains. It took us about five minutes to figure that out but we did it. We got the game moving along quite nicely. I wanted to be goalie. Well that did not last long...after the first goal I said "no way, I am outta here." So I went to the outfield and helped Rosemary score some goals. It was fun. My tuque goes off to Allison who got kicked in the shin and who will probably be some nice shades of black and blue for school! All in all we had some fun.

I will have you know this is the only game of soccer I have seen in a while with actual team work and safety (other than Allison's shin). The best part of that game was having our cheerleaders on the side.....GO JUMPERS GO! Thanks Kayla. Well we played until it was dark. Very dark. So then we had to check our horses one last time before lights out.

After that we went and had some ice cream bars for a snack...I had to do a double take when I saw the ice cream bar box. That is a groom's worst nightmare. It was a huge box of them too! After the ice cream it was lights out....well you could call it bed time because we had no lights..

You know it is the end of the summer when...you are sleeping in a tent on a freezing cold August night for your pony club. I had Allison in my tent. That was fun. We tried to go to sleep quickly because we had a long day ahead of us. That was a joke. The wind was so bad that we thought we were going to end up in a field or two away. Well Allison finally fell asleep. I did not. I am not too sure what it is with these rallies but I do not get any sleep. At least it wasn't the break dancing beetles this time. Just the wind and I had Allison talking in her sleep most of the night about some business. Allison, I hope your business works out for you and I hope you call me when you figure out what kind of business it was.

That morning everyone slowly rolled out of their sleeping bags and I mean slowly. It was too cold to get out of your nice warm bed. The only thing that motivated us was the heat inside the barn and breakfast. We got dressed and made our way to the barn. The first thing I heard was safety and teamwork. I couldn't help but join him. Teamwork AND safety. We got the stalls clean and horses brushed. I have never in my whole life seen a kid so enthusiastic about sweeping. By the end of the three days, Hogan turned me into an enthusiastic sweeper too. Everything was clean or at least we thought it was clean so we went to eat breakfast.

What would the pony club do without our world-famous cook Gail and her kitchen staff? I actually think we would starve at rallies. We had pancakes and bacon for breakfast with a side of orange juice. Yum! It was a very quiet breakfast if you ask me. I think everyone was still half asleep.

During breakfast Liz was going around taking pictures.....I bet they will go good with the "I am a survivor theme" ... especially because it was early and there were like 13 pony clubers up before ten o'clock am. Too scary for the pony club web page, that is for sure.

After breakfast we got every one tacked up that was supposed to ride and every one who was not supposed to got to participate in massage session for horses. I found it pretty cool seeing pony clubbers practicing it on their horses when the massage therapist left. We named a couple cats while we were there. I think we came up with Big Mama, Runt, Cat Aids and there was the prenamed Fez (long story). The best cat was Cat Aids. He had goopy eyes and 13 headaches (pony clubbers trying to pick him up). Poor cat! If you have ever been to Gina's you know about the cats.

Well on the second day I felt pretty sick...headache....goopy eyes and a runny nose. I was wondering what in the world it could have been...and then it hit me. I had cat aids! So the day went on and everyone was joking about the cat aids. It is contagious but only team captains can get it. We found that out when Allison also got sick on the last day. After recovering from the cat aids, it was lunch time.

Our lunch time table consisted of about six of us. Hogan, Allison, Nicola, Nathalie, the independent pair and myself. It seems at these rallies, all we do is have tons of fun and eat. It is true. We had a discussion about the rather large trophy that was on the picnic table. We still don't know if the rider is a male or female. We came to the conclusion that it is both a male and a female. But if any one knows please let us know.

After a wicked lunch we got the horses tacked up once again for their afternoon riding lessons. On the other hand Jenny was teaching `Barn Safety' to the kids who were not riding. You heard me, Jenny was teaching about barn safety!!! For the two of us it was looking at the flash cards seing all the bad things we have not yet done with the horses, instead of seeing what you should not do in the barn. I heard a quote form some one once...come to think of it, it was Kasia. She said this to me once "Do what I say and not what I do". In the Barn-Safety department stick with this quote! The Barn Safety is part of the National badge system, I think. Any ways...it was a session with Jenny and a test that you had to write to get your badge. Oh yeah I think you had to pass it too. Who knows? It was some good fun though. Thank you very much to Jenny for teaching us about Barn Safety.

Well supper came up rather fast for all of us. That night we had some amazing lasagna: meat, vegetables and mac and cheese. I will say that the vegetable was not my favorite. Althogh I did eat it as Hogan was sitting beside me saying "Eehww that looks so gross".

After supper we fed our horses and got them all cleaned up for our fourth stable-management check. Once we had everything spotless we went swimming. Yes, swimming, at a pony club event. Well you can tell the brave from the braver once it comes to pony club swimming. You see all those `brave' riders jumping 3 foot whatever...Well lets just say you don't see them jumping into a lake full of seaweed too fast! Or at least with any kind of passion. Once one person jumped in the rest of the gang slowly jumped in too. It was a heck of a lot warmer in the water than it was on shore! Then all of a sudden a boat came into the area...with a male driver. "Well who could that be?" said the little pony club girls. Why it was the pony club stud/stable-management judge's brother....why it was Mitch.. May I add that there are no rules saying you can't chase after the stable-management judge's brother. It is NOT in the pony club manual. Oh yes I forgot to give out one last award at the end of the rally. It was the .....Pony Club Stud Award and it goes to can you guess, well it's not Mark so yes. Mitch. I am not too sure he knows about the little girls swarming around him during this event. I am sure he caught on.

Once we got to shore we got wrapped up in towels very quickly. It was freezing. We made our way back to the barn to check the horses one last time. They were all happy as could be. I sat my team down once again. By the end of the three days we came close together, even closer than the bees were to the juice jug. It was really amazing being part of a team that had so much energy...mind you Hogan and I were most of the energy but it was still fun.

I would like to thank Liz for not putting me on the Kingston and Region team so that I could met some new people. I don't think I would have survived those three days without the independent pair, Curtis and last but not least Hogan. Anyways, we had our discussion again and then it was bed time. But did anyone go to bed? You could definitely tell it was the last night and everyone was hyper for the show. I think Hogan was dancing around the tent saying Teamwork and Safety for 20 minutes before we could fall asleep. I couldn't help but laugh and think about the monster I had created! A good monster though.

Well the night went by fast. It was very cold. Too soon came the morning....We all got up in a hurry and fed the horses so we could get our food into us before the show. We had honeycombs!! Instead of having them with milk we had them with orange juice. So we got all fuelled up for the show. So when everyone was tacked up and ready to go we went out to the dressage ring.

Who would have ever thought I would have turned into a pony club mom after three days? Sure as heck not me. I was bouncing up and down cheering for my team. I think they might have finally found out that I am a crazy pony clubber. Or as Gail put it...the 'Spirit Queen'. Ha ha ha. I was holding ribbons and a crop still cheering for number eight (Sondra). I think we did really well. All of my team went into the classes and cleared the ribbons right up! Good job Curtis, Hogan, Sondra and Carolyn.

The classes ended really fast. My favorite class had to be the musical chairs. My hat goes off to Hogan who fell off every time he tried to get off of Emma. You did great, buddy. So we got everyone untacked after all the jumping was over. Then we sat down for our awards ceremony.

It was so funny. I gave out four awards of my own...The Cool Kid Cool Horse and Cool Outfit award and it went to Curtis. The independent Awards went to Sondra and Carolyn and the sweeping award went to....can you guess? Yep you're right: Hogan. It was a fun day and we were all tired at the end. Hogan and I did one last cheer for everyone. Teamwork, Teamwork, Teamwork and Safety...But don't forget the fun.

To conclude such a wonderful three days I would like to thank: Liz, Gail and her kitchen staff, Jane and her parents, the team leaders for being there, Hogan for making this rally fun. Thank you. I can't wait for next year's rally!

Jessica Shipman, Kingston & Region P.C.