WEF bridles

I'm not done with BreyerWest. However, I am taking a break from BreyerWest coverage to catch up on other things, including this wonderful series of tack photos from Susan Parker. Susan recently spent a day at the Winter Equestrian Festival in Wellington, Florida and has kindly allowed to share some of her pictures here. Thank you so much, Susan!

Hunter and Jumper Bridles at the Winter Equestrian Festival

by Susan Parker

All hunters seemed to use the same D ring snaffle.

There it is again! The only difference was the color of the leather.

Equitation had a little more variation.

Then I walked to the warmup area for the jumpers. 

This is where things began to be interesting.

There was the simple.

Still simple...

Then there were variations...

These included lots of gags...

and pelhams...

and variations on gags... 

and pelhams. 

Rear view of the previous bridle

 Bitless #1

Bitless #2. 

The horse was NOT happy. Can someone explain this??? (note from Jennifer: I think it's just a regular gag bit with an trendy, "anatomic" type flash noseband.)

Or explain this? (Yeah, I can't even...)

As always, it's really interesting to see what's being used in the show ring as opposed to just what's available in a catalog. Thank you so much for sharing these wonderful pictures, Susan!

DogsWest

There aren't a lot of people who like dogs as much as I do...

but Mackenzie Purdy might like them even more.

We both missed our dogs while we were at BreyerWest, so we started going on dog hunts.

Fortunately, there were almost as many dogs at the Northwest Horse Fair and Exp as there were horses.
There were little dogs,

medium dogs..

and big dogs.

There were dogs in sweaters, 

dogs in strollers, 

deaf dogs...

and dogs who looked like pillows...

with a face!

All the dogs...

were given pets,

and kisses... 

and butt rubs.

I had so much fun playing with the dogs of BreyerWest, I barely had time to miss my girls.

Just kidding! I always miss my girls...

and I know Mackenzie missed her Baxter...

but this was an awesome dog filled weekend nonetheless!

Halter workshop

As you can see in the picture below, I really enjoyed teaching the halter making workshop at this year's BreyerWest.

photo by Sandra Gibson

Workshop participants received a brand new Topsails Rien Maker and a baggie full of tackmaking tools and supplies.

The first part of the class was devoted to preparing the lace. This is hard, messy work...

and there was a little bit of bloodshed. 

Still, nearly everyone figured it out pretty quickly.

Once the halters started to take shape,

I invited the class to come up to my table for a demonstration of advanced techniques. These included stitch marking, hole punching, rolled throatlatches, tongue buckles and roller buckles.

Some of the more ambitious students were able to take this information and put it to immediate use. Cece...

and Mandy's halters had rolled throatlatches...

and Amanda's featured a rolled throatlatch and tongue buckles. So awesome!

Some people finished their halters in record time,

others took a little longer...

but in the end,

everyone went home with a finished halter.

And I think we all had fun, too.

Right?

Right!

Thanks to everyone who participated in this workshop, and also to Leah Koerper, for her invaluable hands on assistance and amazing problem solving skills. You all are the best!

BreyerWest Sunday

Sunday was the last day of BreyerWest.

There were no shows on Sunday, but there were still plenty of hobby related activities. 

Shana Bobbitt manned an informational booth...

and spent the day demonstrating answering questions...

and demonstrating finishwork and prepping techniques. 

Bethany Shaw and Stacy Quick...

taught a customizing workshop. 

Appropriately, Stacy's shirt reads "I will cut you."  

Here's a group photo of the workshop attendees with their models. Good work, ladies! 

photo by Erin Corbett

I also taught a workshop. More on that later!

photo by Erin Corbett

The day ended with some impromptu Breyer giveaways. 

Every day at BreyerWest good day, and Sunday was no exception. Thank you so much to BreyerWest host, Erin Corbett...

and Breyer representatives, Jamie and Rowena, for making all of this possible.

BreyerWest 2016 was a huge success. Here's looking forward to the 2017 edition!