2015 Goals Recap

I had a FANTASTIC 2015 - I hope you did too! While I didn't complete *all* of my personal goals - let's face it, I've been saying for about 10 years that I am going to lose 25 pounds, but I really enjoy food so I never actually do that - I did accomplish every single one of my business goals and most of my personal goals too. I am super happy with where the year took me, super happy with the success of the business, super happy with our new house, super happy with my amazing herd, super happy in general. Everything is great. I'm well aware of the fact that life can change in a moment, and that there will always be hard times somewhere along the way, but I fully appreciate that these are rich and full times, and I don't take them for granted. I've worked extremely hard to get where I am today, and I'm proud of what I've accomplished. 

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2015 Horse-Related Goals:

1) Have a healthy, happy, bouncing baby horse!
Success!! Pax is a wonderful little monster baby. At 8 months old, she is charming and devilish all at the same time. She is very easy to do everything I need to do with her now, including walking up and picking feet or blanketing out in the pasture with no halter on. She still can be kind of a maniac when leading her around outside of the pasture, but hey, she is only 8 months old after all. She'll get there.
There has been discussion on and off concerning selling her.... I'm still totally on the fence about all of it. I don't know if I am going to breed P again. I know I am moving steadily away from riding competitively, and towards driving competitively. What I would *really* like to do is cross O a few times to Dylan to get a matched driving team. Because that would be amazing.

2) Compete in the Three Amigos Challenge
This one didn't work out whatsoever - but there were good reasons for it. First of all, and most importantly, the Challenge never actually ended up taking place because the rules governing it weren't written out clearly enough - so they decided to cancel it officially. Secondly, while I did compete at Sunrise Ridge, I didn't get to go to the Pine Hill HDT because of the horrible weather and the fact that O had just kicked herself, and I didn't get to go to the Black Star CDE because of the No Laminitis conference. The conference only takes place every other year though, so no worries this next year! I don't know if there will be a Three Amigos Challenge this year - probably not, from the sound of it - but I will do my best to attend every HDT and CDE that is feasibly possible this year.

3) Compete in local pleasure shows/NTW Games Days
Success!! I didn't hit *every* show, not by a long shot - including the big pleasure show, due to my truck malfunctioning - but I did get to go to every single Games Day. I didn't enjoy the Romp all that much, but the regular playdays were a BLAST as usual! I am considering buying my little red cart back from the client I sold it too, because it is just so useful and great to have around. I will be doing them all again this year, though I may just skip on the pleasure shows. My primary interests are directed towards HDTs and CDEs - I guess not unlike an eventer who maybe does some straight dressage or straight jumper shows, but lives for actual eventing with everything altogether at once.

4) Hone and improve my reinsmanship and general driving knowledge, all year long!
Success!! But, there is ALWAYS more to learn! This is less of a yearly goal and more of a lifelong goal I think! I learned a ton this year, and will continue to absorb everything I can.

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I'll have a separate post up for 2016 plans and goals, since it will take a bit of thought and organization to really lay them out. This second half of the year I feel like I didn't have enough concrete plans/goals, and as such I totally lagged and didn't get much really accomplished. It's fine, we were so busy with the new house anyway that it didn't really matter much - but I need to have more concrete plans in order to really have something to shoot for. If I don't have something clearly laid out, I have a tendency to just flounder around and not know what I am trying to accomplish. When I had Gogo, I had ALL these really tidy and specific goals, but I also only had her to worry about and literally almost nothing else. I have a LOT more that takes up my time now, so things operate quite differently now.

This coming year, I have two show horses, two babies, two old farts, and these two new little projects to play with. That's a LOT! And there won't be time or money for everything - how could there be? But with half of them not really needing much during the week, it makes things a lot easier. Being at liberty to set my own schedule makes such a difference for me, and now that I have everything settled in, I feel strongly that things will mostly operate smoothly and the way I want them. Or at least, that's the plan anyway! XD

I also mean to be much more strict with my blogging. I have been really bad about writing things down this year and I completely intend to rectify that. I love having everything recorded, and I really have no reason to not do it!


2015 was one of my best years yet..... and I think 2016 will be even better!!