Guest post from a horse called Star!

By Star!

Well anyone would think she was doing me a big favour, that Phillipa, handing over the reins of the blog to me this month. Like I don’t have anything better to do.

I’ve had quite a successful summer, thank you for asking. I’ve done some dressage (completely nailed it) and won a couple of red rosettes. I heard some people congratulating my rider as if she had something to do with it. I even heard one woman say, ‘some people think the rider just sits there, they don’t appreciate the skill involved.’

I mean, is she for real!! Of course my rider just sits there. I’M the one with the skill! It wasn’t all bad though to be honest because I do enjoy showing the judges my moves, I like to hear the praise and I always – win or lose – get some nice treats afterwards.

I’ve been introduced to a new friend this summer. I share a field with Poppy and she is a breed called a ‘hairy old cob’ apparently. She is nowhere near as pretty as me and when we were first introduced over the fence, she took very little notice of me. I think she must be a bit daft because she wasn’t saying ‘wow, you’re amazing,’ and clearly didn’t appreciate how intelligent, beautiful and talented I am.

But we got to know each other and I decided she was okay so she joined me in my field and we get on fairly well. Not that she has a lot to say, she is nearly always nomming away on whatever she can. Grass, hay, abandoned lead ropes, fence rails…

Still I suppose it’s good to have some new company. They put in a nice new field shelter, mostly for Poppy as of course, I am special and come into the stables at night with the other superior horses.

I am ridden pretty much every day, practicing my very special routine around the arena with my mum. She often gets things wrong, but I am quite understanding and usually put things right for her.

I feel I owe it to her after what happened at my first ever outing. I had finished my routine, mum did her little salute, and I thought I should show how excited I was too.

I thought she did well to hang on, although it was a tiny little buck really and I bet the judges were too busy eating their sandwiches to even notice, but it was my first ever dressage test and the upshot was, we didn’t do too well. Apparently I wasn’t supposed to do that.

But I really got the hang of it after that and was very pleased with myself when I returned to the yard with my first rosette. When I discovered, a couple of weeks later, that me and mum were going to do another one of these dressage thingys, I was so happy that I raced around my field the day before my test and rolled and rolled and rolled in mud! It was great! And I think mum LOVED being able to spend all that time with me, brushing and combing and using lots of stuff, especially on my mane and tail where it was really caked on.

In fact, I know she enjoyed it because she told me how pleased she was. She kept saying things like, ‘Star, you really are something’ and ‘thanks a bunch for doing that Star, I really wanted to be spending hours sorting you out when obviously I don’t have anything else to do.’

Anyway, I’m quite enjoying life generally at the moment. When mum isn’t riding me and being impressed with my bladder capacity when mucking out my stable (She’ll often say, ‘You’re turning peeing into an Olympic sport Star,’ so I guess I’ll be in the next Olympic team!) she takes Poppy out for a ride.

She calls Poppy her ‘Happy Hacker’, and they just amble around the lanes for an hour or so most days. Poppy doesn’t jump (not surprised, she really could do with watching the calories) or do dressage (stiff as a board if you ask me), so they just trot about, then maybe have a quick canter and Poppy gets a bit sweaty and out of puff. But amazingly, mum still pats her and says ‘good girl’, and gives her a carrot! Honestly, anyone would think Poppy is as important as me!

Anyway, I’m going to hoof off now as I’ve just remembered it’s been a while since I’ve trashed a rug and I’m wearing one now which has just come back from being cleaned and repaired.

Take care everyone, and have fun!