Quick catch up including Keebler News

My horsey time this weekend was at the USEA annual convention.  This year in downtown Cincinnati - not quite up to the standards of the Broadmoor.  I got lucky with my flight times in relation to the weather and had no delays getting in and out - not true for everyone.  There is lots of convention coverage on Eventing Nation so I won't repeat it here.  As always, it was great to see friends, meet more eventers, and get to hear what is and/or might be going on with our sport.  My least favorite innovation - combining the ATCs with the AECs, but since I don't really have intentions to participate in either, my opinion is pretty irrelevant.  I'm hoping that PRO will offer a volunteer award next year (I suggested it and they seemed interested).  It was great seeing Sheri Weber win the PRO owner's award and Kathleen Blauth the PRO groom's award.  The big award ceremony was also great (congrats to Lee Ann Zobbe on her Cornerstone Award, Reed Ayers on the Amateur rider style award, Sally Cousins on being the leading lady rider for the 6th year in a row and all of the others).  I also was once again inspired by David O'Connor's words.

In warmer lands, Jordan and Keebler completed their first Training level event as a team and totally rocked it.  This took place at the Rocking Horse Schooling horse trials on Saturday.  Jordan was in a class that included professional riders and several adults.  She was a bit worried about the dressage during her lesson leading up to it, but Cyndi pointed out that the goal at a move up event is to finish.  They ended up having quite a good test and a score of 38.6, which was better than anything I ever managed at training level on him.  They had one rail in SJ, but that is really easy to do at Rocking Horse as the ring is small and there are plenty of tough turns.  When Keebler moved up to training at XC with me, I was amazing at how it didn't really feel harder.  Apparently, Jordan had the same experience as they ended up clean and fast xc and netted a 6th place ribbon.  Thanks to Jordan's mom, Billie for this great picture of Keebler and Jordan.