Keegan being a rock star

Happy recovery Monday to everyone.  I enjoyed the weekend.  Lots of barn time and some great meals and wine.  Wednesday night, Henry and I started his birthday celebration early and went to Sovana Bistro.  The wine that night was the Greenock 2005 Alice's Shiraz.  Thursday, I had work and then a great dressage school on Keegan.  I got home just in time for the big wind to blow through and knock out the power (luckily dinner was already cooked).  The power remained out for 16 hours with a very widespread outage.  Friday, I was happy to discover that Delaware had power so I did Pure Barre,  and then after the power returned, hung out at the barn for a couple of hours, then had a dressage lesson.  Things are starting to come together, although I need to work on sitting trot for longer periods of time and continue to work on the trot lengthenings. The canter lengthenings are quite good.  The leg yields are doing well to the right, not quite so well to the left, but getting better as we practice.  Friday evening, more good food and wine at home.  Henry's sister Judy joined us and then we went off in search of ice cream, which took some doing as several places didn't have any as a result of the power outage.  In the end, we had success and ice cream for dessert.  Saturday, Keegan had and I had a nice hack with Fie and Jean.  Fie is a lovely Danish Warmblood mare, who has been at Blue Hill Farm since early winter.  She is very well behaved and I enjoyed the company and hearing more about her on our ride. Saturday evening, Henry and I enjoyed attending one of my colleague's wedding.  It was a nice ceremony (although a little hot outside) and the Farmhouse in Delaware was a very nice site for the wedding.  Henry and I got to dance a little bit, which is always fun.

Sunday was great.  Pure Barre first thing, then a little bit of gardening to replace one of the butterfly bushes taken out by the winter storms.  The afternoon was schooling at Windurra.  As always, the jumper course was challenging and on the excellent footing.  I goofed on the first try, coming to fence 3 underpaced on a counter canter and then chucking my shoulders at the fence, but I set off again from the start, and Keegan jumped around perfectly.  We then headed out to the cross country and had our first go at some preliminary fences.  It went very well, with Keegan jumping everything he was pointed at and me eventually getting my form into decent shape and finding the right pace with some consistency.  We jumped a one stride to one stride coffin, the trakehner, two versions of the same corner and the keyhole as well as a bank and a couple of logs on lumps.  Keegan took it all in stride and other than a brief peek at the trakehner on take-off and "ducking" through the keyhole leading to a somewhat awkward jump, he was very good about everything.  I was surprised at how good he was staying straight to the corner.  Brigitte and Harper also had a successful day and Devon rode both of hers, the youngster Salty at novice and her seasoned boy Dan at Preliminary to knock the rust off.  Lexi rode her Merry over both training and prelminary show jumps and did a bit of work out on the xc course trying out some tack options.  I think everyone felt it was a very successful day.  It was great seeing Steph Cauffman out on her boy Dylan and seeing Cindi Cauffman and their adorable puppy Beezie.  Annie Jones apparently is looking at a Danzig grandson and she admired Keegan when she saw him.  Always nice to see lots of eventers in this kind of fun, laid back setting.  Nilson da Silva and Laura Vandervliet were there with some nice youngsters as were Ryan Wood, Jane Sleeper and Pam Wiedemann.  Caitlin had a day off so I didn't get to see my buddy Brody.

Now back to a busy work week, ending up with SBIR grant review day in Bethesda Friday.