Hi from newbie

[wimble]

Hi.

I've been lurking around for about a year, both here and on facebook, but I finally got a memebrship  .

Quick introduction on me and mine.
I live in Sweden (still with mom even if I'm 26), study at uni, I have one horse and one pony and mom has one horse, 4 cats (indoor and outdoor) and 1 cuddly stray + the neighboors to hungry young cats (in the stable), sheep and hedgehogs (they decided too live in our barn  ).

All horses are barefoot, my horses are saddleless and bittless, not moms though... My current mucho-guru is Bent Branderup, actually the pony loves this training and I'm lucky that I get too tag a long. Haven't ridden for himself yet, need to be a squire for that, but I quite like the two knights I've trained for. But since I'm studying now I probably won't be able to afford it for a while... unfortunatly... Fortunatly I know just what we need to work with  .

Piccies (sorry about the quality, computers and all  )

Cassis


old pic but my favourite 


Twix




Some cats (the 4 indoor-outdoor ones)
Sotis (cuddles)

Gohan (he definetly knows how to use a pillow)

Groucho (That's a twoseatsofa that he is occupying)

Fia (Lady of the house)


Now you know I'm here 
// Wimble

[wimble]

forgot old Uncle Robert (real name Robot)  moms horse mostly but we always wanted him, been nagging the ridingschool since he got there  . He has a tendency too look abit like Rosinante but this is slightly better. Of course if there are no humans visible he's as movable as any youngster 

[crdodgeon]

hello and welcome - lovely pics of your gang, too! Have you checked out Sparky's blog? He might want to have cat penpals (if he has the time, of course, in his hectic schedule...)

[wimble]

Thank you 

Haven't seen Sparky's blog before, it was fun reading!

Seeing as I would have to be the one doing the cats writing I don't think penpaling would be such a good idea, it does sound very nice, I am notoriously bad at writing (back)/keeping in touch  . You'll see, very likely I might write another 10 posts perhaps and then I'll be back to lurking... happens all the time  .

But I appreciate the idea. The cats opinion right now is *zzz*, their winteroccupation 'sleeping more than usual' takes up alot of time right now...   

[crdodgeon]

Yes, 'sleeping all the time' is a very important pass time 
Not that I know Sweden at all well, but whereabouts are you? North? South?

[wimble]

I live in the south, nice area of Sweden, close to many things (horsey as well). 

[crdodgeon]

You're probably colder over there than we are here, I guess! 

[wimble]

-10 C and 10 cm snow (what's that in english?  )
Just bought a new winteroverall (boiler suit?) so I'm coping fairly well now  ... not used to all this winter, most years it's just been lots of rain.

But I'm still trying to figure out ways to move me, family and pets to a nice and warm place  .

[crdodgeon]

Oh, not that different then! It was -18 in some places, due to be colder, and you should see the 'anyone got snow???' thread - far more than 10cm in places. But just silly stuff that'll turn to ice here in London :-(

LOL, we'd all love to move somewhere warm, I reckon!!

[wimble]

We had that last year, -20 and a meter of snow, had to shovel snow of the roofs... and to top it up the sheep were constantly sick, worst winter ever . I'm really hoping it doesn't get any worse... I can live with this...

I did look at the 'anyone got snow' thread, very quickly though, so that I wouldn't get nightmares  . But there were alot of nice pictures...

My dad and his family live in London... can't say I'm jealous, citygreyslushieice is quite useless but of course so is the regular white kind that never stops falling down... sorry, have a tendency to rant when talking about snow nowadays 

[crdodgeon]

We had a 'really bad' snowfall here a couple of years ago and all of 10cm must have fallen in London. You'd have thought we'd have 2 meter drifts....
(Saw you'd tried chat but nobody was in - do try again, there are normally a few of us but really quiet tonight for some reason!  )

[Heather]

Hi Lydia!

Nice to welcome another Scandinavian member! We have Olav in Norway and Renta in Finland, and Lippa who is Finnish but lives in Hungary!

I am just in the process of designing a new bitless bridle for EE, although I do not choose to ride bitless myself, I can see that many riders like to, and if I have a horse, as happened with my Arabian stallion, now long retired, he did not like a bit, I rode him for some years in a bitless.

Just a word of warning though, when we did the pressure testing of my saddles with the German Pliance computerised system, bareback created the worst pressure of all! It can cause some horses to have 'dead' spots on their backs. So perhaps consider a bareback pad? That means you get the best of both worlds!

My horses are all barefoot and have been now for nearly 5 years, they are so much more surefooted!

And as for your cats, well Sparky watch out, I think you have a rival, even a lookalike rival!!

Welcome anyway, and love the pics of your horses.

[wimble]

crdodgeon:  a bit like Jerusalem closing down for 1 cm.... 
about the chat... I very carefully made sure it was empty so that I could check it out first... not very brave you see. Might be braver some other time .

Heather: Nice to be welcomed. 

What type of bitless? or is it a new type? I've considered trying the one with the wheels, but I quite like my very simple sidepull... it's been very good for my riding and the considering of the riding. 

I am aware of the possible negative effects of bareback, haven't noticed anything yet (perhaps it's my round and soft bum  ) except that my horse suddenly outgrew her saddle... I have a bareback pad, but I feel that the girth is to static and my horse goes all tense and 'falls' down between her frontlegs. I've considered trying a normal (or two) saddlepads with an elastic girth (for rugs) but I keep seeing myself sliding of and the horse heading homewards with everything on her stomach which would be alot like us  .

[Amanda1950]

Hello 

Lovely pics 

[wimble]

Amanda1950: Hi , thank you