Achieving a Slow Western Pleasure Jog and Lope

One way to help achieve a nice slow jog and lope is rating.  It is a really simple exercise  especially at the jog and can be used as part of your horse's warm up and will really help them get in the mind set you are looking for.  This exercise is especially good for horses who have a tendency to rush when on the rail.

Rating for the Jog
Start by asking your horse to jog for 14 strides, then stop and back up 4 steps.  Then ask for 12 strides, stop back up, 10 strides and so on.  Do this all the way down to 4 strides, repeat the exercise at 4 strides 4 times.

Quick Tail Wrap

Winter is sneaking up on us again, so many of us are thinking about tail wraps.  However if you just need a quick temporary tail wrap this works well, especially for keeping hair out of the mud.  I have wrote an article or two on sewing tail bags, but what if you need a quick fix, because you either do not have the time or resources to sew a tail bag?  Then you can use this quick fix, which I used on my Arab mare just last week.

To sew and use cloth tail bags, check out this.

You Will Need:
Vet Wrap
Rubber bands

Slobber Straps

I love my slobber straps, they work so nice for training younger horses, the bit does not slide through their mouth as easily and the leather helps create a nice smooth transition from pulling on the rein to the bit contact.  Here is a quick little tutorial on how to attach the slobber straps.  

The slobber straps attached

Wedding Pictures

I know I promised some wedding pictures and sure have been taking my time at getting them up here.  These pictures are taken by Photography by Hope, she gave me permission to post these on my blog.  Here we go!

Getting ready: I had a really simple hairdo

Photography and Wedding

Hi everyone, I hope you are having a great summer!  Mine is going by way too fast.  I am hoping to get back in the swing of things and post some more again.  We'll see how that goes, maybe this winter.

Anyways, I am sure some of you are wondering about the wedding.  It went great, it truly was the wedding of my dreams, I could not have asked for more.  God has truly blessed my husband and I!  I just got the pictures back from the photographer not to long ago and hope to share some with you soon!

Also, for those who are interested.  I started doing photography.  I am very excited about it actually!  Some of you may remember when I bought my camera earlier this year, well I have been reading a lot about photography and practicing.  This summer I have also done some senior photo shoots and been taking pictures for our local 4-H horse group at their clinics and show.

My new photography website is: www.AmberLangerud.com

The Facebook page is: http://www.facebook.com/AmberLangerudPhotography

The twitter page is: https://twitter.com/AmberLangerud

It is Shedding Season!

I discovered this after yesterday :).  Well I had been aware, but the extreme extent of shedding season was made known to me after yesterday, that is a better way of putting it.  The coat I wore out to the pasture to groom my horses required extensive horse hair cleaning afterwards...it took a shop vac and multiple sheets of lint roller.  Oh how I love my horses!

Life has been pretty busy lately, but there seems to be a light at the end of the tunnel!  I am about 3.5 weeks away from graduation!!!  It is such a good feeling to see these 4 years of hard work turn into a degree.  It is taking just a bit of motivation to make it to the end, but I know I will make it.  I have a few final projects to finish up along with presenting my research at our local and state conferences.  I was honored with the invitation to present at the state academic conference.

Thanks & Wedding Update

My "Painted Performer" and I at the MN State Horse Show 2011

I have been meaning to write this post for quite some time.  I just want to say thank you to all my loyal followers.  I am really astonished of the impact this website has made and the small footprint I have made on the internet!

I remember starting this blog and being quite excited about it because it gave me a larger voice to reach people across the world (yes literally across the world).  That surprised me, I expected my audience to all be from the United States, but it is not, and that is great.

Continue reading to get the wedding update...

AQHA World Show

I received my AQHA World Show program book in the mail today.  Exciting as it is going on November 5th - 19th in Oklahoma City.

View results here.

How to Make Lotion Bars

Its that time of year again, fall is here and the dry air starts to take a toll on our skin, making it feel dry and cracked.

It is so hard to find a good quality lotion for my hands in the winter time, one that actually makes them feel good.  I figured if I can make lip balm, I can probably make this too right?

All you need is the ingredients, a mold of some sort and a pan to melt the ingredients in!

Horseville

Horseville has an affiliate program which allows you to earn money if you put a link on your website, you get $5 for sign up, $0.03 for every click and 15% of how much money they spend on Horseville if they choose to buy an ad. 

I though this was interesting and decided to add it to my blog because I know a bunch of you guys that read this have blogs and websites of your own and making money can be a good thing, even when it is just a little bit.

I just signed up to be an affiliate member, we'll see how this goes.

Thinking about becoming an affiliate too?  Go HERE for more information.  (If I refer you, I will get a 10% commission off of your commissions too, kind of a nice deal).