Rainy this morning, but we have eager riders in this session's group so the girls rode in a drizzle for the first lesson this morning. Tom taught and had the girls trot towards a jump and announce exactly how many cantering strides they would get from the time they ask for a canter until they take the jump. It was hard at first! Lindsey and Jen were the first ones to figure out that it is easier to try to judge when you can fit in six or seven strides than it is to judge when you can do two or three. More strides makes it easier to shorten or lengthen to adjust. Once everyone else figured that out, they began to do quite well. Alex Softness was the most successful at this exercise, judging exactly correctly several times while she was riding "Gus".

Those of you following the "Peyton Story" at home will be impressed to hear that after riding with the younger girls and the more beginner group for the first four weeks of camp, she is now "mainstreamed" with all the rest of the quite advanced riders we have this session. Peyton does everything the other girls do, though sometimes a notch or two lower on the jump stands. Good job, Peyton!!

To be honest, this is one of the very rare nights that I can't give you a full detailed report of the afternoon and evening rides. Meghan and I had an appointment to run an event away from Longacres for the afternoon and evening. We did keep in touch with our counselors by phone and got reports that all was going smoothly and everyone was "safe"!!

More to come tomorrow, and welcome back Michelle!

I designated Peyton, Robyn, and Becky as a committee to decide when to take our first "Kone King" trip of the session. They were told to choose sometime between lunch today and Saturday night - they did not wait long! They announced "Kone King Time" right after evening ride and horsecare - so off we went to town. BUT - not before Samantha entertained us all at dinner with her horse whinny! Accompanied by Jen's "barking dog imitations".

Kelsey was in fine spirits at dinner and full of energy at Kone King. She'd seemed subdued early in the day and I asked about the sudden change - she and Lindsey said they'd just needed a few hours to get rested and used to the time change after flying from out west. Also, Kelsey says she's "not a morning person"! Lindsey has "jumped" right into Longacres, pardon the pun, quickly taking on some of our hardest jumping challenges. She seems a perfect fit for Quantum, and will be taking over Emmy's roll from first session as the designated "Quantum Leaper". It took her only a day until I turned her loose on the famous "road line" of jumps - she looked right at home! We'll post pictures of her jumping big soon.

Shelley, who always means well, but has a LOUD voice is practicing softly spoken horse care COMMANDS around the barn so as not to intimidate all our new students!

Kahley seems to be an especially good match for "Gus Because" and may show him this week. Kahley won our informal contest in my lesson this morning for getting the striding on a course perfectly correct with all the right leads on "Gus". Samantha was almost as good, with all the correct strides and one wrong lead on "Ebony".

As of last night after only one full day of the new session I asked how many new horses each rider had tried. Kelsey was champ, having ridden seven different horses on the first day!

Just so you know that we haven't forgotten our loyal full season students, Jen taught a good lesson tonight as a guest instructor, and Peyton jumped Justin, a big thoroughbred, for the first time! As most of you at home know, Peyton NEVER rode a horse at all until four weeks and one day ago. She has been jumping the quiet ponies for several weeks, but this is the first time she's tried a big horse with a big jump - she did just fine!!!!!

A few riders in my first formal lesson of the session this morning ran afoul of Tom's obsession with paying attention to your position, form, and exact spacing while waiting your turn to perform in the lesson. (Does that sound familiar to you guys reading from home?) There were some gentle reminders at first, followed by a few more vigorous reminders. Everyone reads about our formal lessons before they sign up for Longacres, but few are prepared for the level of commitment I expect in my lesson until you arrive and actually experience the eyes I have in the back of my head catching you slouching in your saddle! But I will tell you what pleased me very much - the rider who I most harshly came down on in the morning lesson had been considering sitting out the after dinner ride to relax. When I mentioned that I planned to be at the barn after dinner, she asked, "Oh, are you teaching again?" And she did ride, and well.

Well, this has been a long report to catch up on second day news. This group is ahead of schedule - they began to "get it" and bond with each other by lunch time on the second day and were all in high spirits by dinner and "Kone King" time. All the new girls seem to have made new friends and found someone of a kindred spirit to sit with at meals and walk with on the way to the barn. We are off to a good start for this final session of 2006!

- Tom (signing off at 2:34 am - I fell asleep while getting the pictures ready to post and just woke up a half hour ago to write this update!!!!)

Everyone has now arrived safely for second session. Kahley was the last to arrive from the airport (one lost suitcase!). All the girls have been on several horses already (Kahley just getting on for the first time a few minutes ago). We have many very good riders this session. We should have a strong show team for the Erie County Fair. Our first show is at High Time in just four days, so we'll be working hard to get used to the new horse and rider combinations. Meghan is down at the barn now taking video of everyone to show tonight and still pictures to post on the website late tonight. We'll post again about 9 or 10 PM.

- Tom

Danielle and Sarah are our instructors for second session. They were both at Longacres last year and return with experience. Sarah spent a week here with Lillian in June opening the barn so that she is already well prepared with our 2006 procedures. When Lillian drove away from the barn at 5 this afternoon, the torch was passed.

Kelsey and Lindsey arrived safely from California and met us all at the mall for dinner before coming out to the farm to join the team. They are the "advance guard" - the rest of our second session students arrive tomorrow morning.

Meghan and I will be up until nearly midnight tonight, so if any of you who are traveling to Longacres tomorrow have any last minute questions, feel free to phone! We'll meet you all tomorrow for the real beginning of second session, 2006.

- Tom

The girls slept in until 11am this morning! Lillian had several meetings with Meghan and with Sarah and Danielle, our second session instructors to go over all the barn procedures and plan a smooth transition to the second session which opens Wednesday. There was a quiet ride this afternoon on some of the horses that need work while most of our hard working horses continue their four days of mid-term rest.

One of the big events of the coming session is the Longacres Bold Jumper Derby on August 10^th. We watched video of last year's Derby to see what's coming. The girls are excited!

After six straight weeks of continuous horse and riding activity at Longacres, a brief period of calm has descended on the barn! We are in the first of three days of our intercession break. All the first session-only girls have left for home. Meghan is on her way back from the airport where she dropped off Mary to fly home to Utah, and Emily W. to meet her mom for her flight home to Tennessee. Emily P. has left by car for Maryland; Olivia by car for New Jersey; and Michelle by car for Rochester, NY - but not for long! Michelle may be returning for a special two day visit this weekend. Michelle was shedding a few large tears of sadness about leaving her human and horse friends at Longacres, and we were already missing her, so we invited her back for a visit since she lives closer than any other camper. And she might come this weekend!

For the next three days, we'll be vegetating - resting up to start all over again with our second session and big plans for more horse shows, the August 10^th Longacres Jumper Derby, and the Erie County Fair. Lillian and Emmie are here for a few more days to pass the reins of the riding program over to Sarah and Danielle, our second session counselors and instructors. Sarah came in with her horse last night, and Danielle is arriving later today.

We probably won't post many pictures or updates during the next couple of days - I am on "rest and recuperation" leave along with the horses! But we'll have a big update on Wednesday night after all the new riders come in and have been on horses. Two of our California girls are arriving on Tuesday evening and the rest on Wednesday. More later - nappy time now!!!!!!!!! - Tom

A busy day watching video and riding between rain showers on the final day of the session. We'll try to post again tomorrow after the girls from first session leave. The pond pictures are now posted.

The girls, as a group, did their best riding of the summer today! At the halfway point of the season, our long term students are really beginning to "get it", and the two week girls from this session all rode at their highest level today. All our jumper riders won ribbons, especially Emily - Opps! Maybe that is partl because she was the only one in her class! Seriously, she did a fine job on Patti.

Shelley Kearney won all four of the jumper classes she entered with her own horse, Jenna, along with two Championships.

In the intermediate ring, Michelle won a trophy; Emily W. won 2 trophies and 2 Reserve Champion ribbons; Olivia and Julie also both did fine riding jobs.

We have not many pictures to post because Meghan and I concentrated on taking lots of good video of everyone. We're going to have a special "picture with your favorite horse over a big jump" day on Saturday and we'll post the best of those pics! The two pictures posted above are of Mary on Wizard and Alex on Justin; these two are wonderful shots of each girl's favorite horse doing a good job in today's show.

The rain held off until about an hour and a half after the end of the show. We're getting a nice soaking rain overnight which will soften the ground and keep the grass green for another week. Good timing!

Much more to come along with full results tomorrow.

- Tom & Meghan

We worked very hard preparing for tomorrow's Longacres horse show and "thanks" to the girls who all pitched in to set up the jumping courses this afternoon. All the courses were carefully measured in true Longacres style, so many of our new students learned some things about striding and measuring lines. It was hot wqork, so we made a "Kone King" run after the jumps were set.

Peyton is the "Official High Executive Asst. to the Horse Show Director" for tomorrow. She was helping Meghan with EVERYTHING that has to get done the night before a big show. Meghan just sent her to bed. Meghan still has to run to town to make copies of the course diagrams and finish a little paperwork for the judges. Then it is up early tomorrow for some last minute trimming of bushes and tree branches around the edsges of the show ring and we'll be under way with another horse show. We should have good pics to post here tomorrow night!

Some of the girls seemed a little tired today. Even though we have taken it easy over the past few days with quite a bit of down time in the heat, we've been very active mentally, what with two days of horse shows Friday and Saturday and the two very hot days on Sunday and Monday, including several field trips. But tired or not, we put in the full schedule of five hours of riding today with good lessons to make sure we do our best to get everyone their money's worth! We did finish up a drill team practice early tonight and are getting everyone to bed a little earlier than usual to try to catch up on our rest. Another great weather day is in store for tomorrow so we'll again get in our full five hours of riding. Then we have the Longacres horse show here on Thursday.

We'll probably take a lot of video of everyone jumping tomorrow to study right before the horse show.

The girls got back on to ride about 8 this evening and rode until it was nearly too dark to see anymore. Very pleasant riding conditions. They are preparing to open the show on Thursday with the mounted drill team performance.

A cold front is moving through overnight with some possible early morning thunderstorms and then cooler, dry weather for several days. We'll be getting our full ration of riding in tomorrow and the next day!

It is hot today, as expected. The girls got up and rode at 7am before the serious heat came on. Then some went back to bed to catch up on their rest, while many went to the creek to swim or sun bath. We showed up with the camera in time to watch Emily Weir trying to catch minnows while Tom taught Michelle and Olivia to skip stones on the water. After lunch we'll do a final watering of the horses and head to the movies and air conditioned mall for the afternoon. We'll ride again late in the evening. It is not as bad in the woods as we expected; there is a strong breeze blowing through the trees and it's really quite nice in the shade, but we're glad we're not up on the riding fields on horseback!

A cold front is dropping through from Canada sooner than expected tonight, so it should be back to five hours a day of riding for Tuesday and Wednesday. The show looks like it will go on as scheduled Thursday, but check before traveling - there is a slight chance of weather forcing us to move the show to Saturday.

- Tom

The heat wave has hit Longacres. As most of you know from the story below and the posted pictures, we had a great time showing yesterday at Hasty Hills. It was warm but there was a strong breeze and low humidity. Not so today! Very hot and humid and worse tomorrow. Fortunately, today was the horses' day of rest and we did not ride except for Olivia's evaluation ride (which she aced!)

Because Monday is going to be so hot we are planning a special Sunday night ride after dinner tonight when it cools a little to get ahead of the schedule for tomorrow. The girls are then meeting together to decide just how early to get up tomorrow morning. Probably 5:30 or 6AM to get in perhaps two lessons in the cool of the very early morning. Then it will be "Plan B" all day just to try to keep ourselves and the horses cool on what is supposed to be the hottest day of the year and perhaps a record breaker. We plan a good nap after breakfast, then a sneaker-creeking expedition in the Cazanovia Creek in front of the camp. Many of the girls got a head start today and I heard many squeels of excitement coming from the water early this afternoon!

After we get out of the creek (if we ever do), we'll head for the mall and air conditioned movie theatres for "Pirates of the Carribean". We will have another late ride tomorrow night, perhaps not until 8PM.

That's the Longacres plan for beating the heat. It will be warm all week, but a little better each day after tomorrow. Most of the girls are dealing with the heat fine under "Plan B"; little Emily has a touch of heat exhaustion and is resting in bed as I write. We'll be in touch with any parents if anyone else shows signs of over heating.

- Tom

Following are some of the results of today's show AND the show at Quakerfield last week. The girls typed these in and we know some ribbons aren't recorded. But it will give you an idea of how everyone did.

Hasty Hills Results:

Emmy and Quantum:

Puddle Jumpers - 4th

Schooling Jumpers - 2nd

Special Jumpers - 5th

Shelly and Devil Horns:

Schooling Jumpers - 1st, 5th, and 4th, Reserve Champion of division

Special Jumpers - 1st, and Champion of division

Michelle and Charlie Brown:

Walk/trot equitation - 1st

Walk/trot cavalletti - 1st

Walk/trot pleasure - 4th

Emily Peterman and Peppermint Pattie:

Puddle Jumpers - Reserve Champion of division

Emily Weir and One in a Million:

X-rails OF - 2nd, 4th

X-rails US - 5th

Equitation US - 5th

Low and Slow Hunter OF - 2nd, 4th

Low and Slow Hunter US - 6th

Annie and Wishful Thinking:

Pleasure horse - 1st

Low and Slow Hunter OF - 5th and 3rd

Low and Slow US - 4th

Jen and Sha-Bang:

Schooling Jumpers - 3rd and 4th

Special Jumpers - 6th

Jen and Quantum Leap:

Schooling Jumpers - 6th

Mary and Brooklyn Wizard:

X-rails - 2nd

Novice Eq OF - 4th

Low and Slow Hunter - 2nd, 5th

Low and Slow Hunter Us - 6th

Julie and Lasting Impression:

Pleasure horse - 4th

X-rails Hunters - 3rd

Laura and In Retrospect:

Walk/trot pleasure - 2nd

Walk/trot cavalletti - 2nd

X-rails US - 6th

X-rails equitation - 6th

Walk/trot/canter equitation - 6th

X-rails equitation - 5th

Alex and Just Infallible:

X-rails - 1st

two 3rds, 4th, and two 5th in other classes

Quaker Field Show Results

Peyton and Brownie -

Walk/trot without diagonals - 1st

Walk/trot - 6th

Walk/trot cavaletti - 4th

Laura and In Retrospect, a.k.a. Zanzibar -

X-rails - 4th

X-rails - 3rd

Walk/trot/canter - 5th

and honorable mentions!

Emily and Peppermint Pattie -

Schooling Jumpers - Champion

Puddle Jumpers - Reserve Champion

Emmy and Quantum Leap -

Special Jumpers, class 1 - 3rd

Special Jumpers, class 2 - 3rd

Jen and The Whole Sha-bang -

Schooling Jumpers - 4th

Mady and Take 5 -

Baby Hunters - Reserve Champion

Carly and One in a Million -

Carly did very well and got quite a few ribbons on Merlin!

Cara and Joker -

Hack division - 1st, 2nd, and 3rd

We just returned from the second day of the Hasty Hills Horse Show where EVERYONE won ribbons! A fine job of riding and coaching by our counselors! We'll post full results this evening and pictures late tonight. Everyone is down doing horse care now at the barn, then we'll go out to dinner, have an evening ride, and watch video from the past two days at the show. Everyone said a sad, "Goodbye" to Kelly who is on her way home to Florida. We'll miss you, Kelly.

Following is an e-mail we just received from former student and counselor, Mandy Bartlett:

Hello to everyone there!! A special hi to Kim, Lillian and
Shelley...miss you guys! And i hope all of the new girls are loving
Longacres as much as i did! I have been watching all the updates and
camp looks great...i would love to come see all the new additions to
the turnouts, and ofcourse your new fence Meghan!

I have seen a couple pictures of Wizasrd and he looks great...i still
miss him alot. I also miss camp a whole lot, and I wish that i could
have been there for the first session but oh well! I really want to
come visit but I dont know that i will have time this summer...i think
i spent a total of 2 weeks at home since May, so needless to say i have
been very busy.

Hope everyone is having a great time and hope to hear from you soon.

~Mandy

We had a good day at Hasty Hills jumper show this afternoon. Longacres won the majority of the jumper classes with several one-two finishes. Kelly Hill on Quantum was one of our first winners, along with Emily Peterman on Patti and Shelley on Devil Horns. We'll post full results tomorrow night after the hunter show. Sorry for the late post. We took nearly 100 pictures today and will post good jumping shots from the show tomorrow, as well.

I asked, "Have you ever done a moon light ride before?"

Emily answered, "Never - - (pause) - - This is AMAZING!"

I am glad to work for months preparing for the summer if it allows me to experience just ten seconds of a conversation like that.

But that's not all. We always let the girls ride quietly on the show field under the moon light if the weather cooperates during a full moon. Tonight it was perfect. Not a breath of wind and perfectly clear skies. The horses behaved perfectly and we let the younger girls trot once.

Then the older girls got on and did the routine on the show field. They were all mounted on good reliable horses, and it was a group of our best riders. I felt the conditions were right to try something we haven't done in years. We jumped in the moonlight! It's not quite as scary as it sounds. I set a cross rail jump with bright white rails facing towards the moon. The horses could see it nearly as well as if it were the middle of the day. I let everyone trot up to the jump and canter away after. The horses were all great, though it was a little spooky jumping over the moonlit jump and into the dark shadows!

This was a great experience for the 9 girls who stayed up late. Several were tired and took showers and hit the sack early. Emmy, Lillian, Jen, Emily, and Kim were the girls who got to jump in the moonlight.

More tomorrow - - - after a late sleep-in!

- Tom

- Tom

It turns out that more rain came in after I posted yesterday, but we did get in two lessons. One in the afternoon doing careful control exercises in tight patterns. And another after dinner when we began plans for the drill team that will perform at the opening of the Longacres show on July 20^th next Thursday.

The sun returns from now right through next Monday, at least. It will be warm at the show on Friday afternoon and Saturday, but the humidity should be at least bearable. We'll run the air conditioner in the RV for the girls to take a break.

Meghan and I will each take some pictures today and try to post some nice jumping shots tonight.

We report the many good things happening at Longacres every day. You all love to see pictures and hear good stories at home. To be a balanced and full report, this page should also let you know that Longacres runs into little "problems" now and then, like any other camp. This past week two girls who shall remain nameless because they have been otherwise great students disobeyed a direct request and reminder from one of the counselors to stay with a group of at least three while in town. They took off anyway by themselves for McDonald's. Not a big deal in a way, but a huge breech of trust to me. We have a very permissive and free camp, which makes the rules regarding safety and security that we do have vitally important. I had a very stern talk with the two girls when I was informed. I let them know that this failure to follow safety rules will not result in some minor penalty in the future - it will result in being sent home. I have chosen not to specifically inform these parents because it could be any of your kids and when you talk to them make sure they realize how important it is to follow our safety and security guidelines to the letter.

Another failure to follow directions with an impact on safety occurred last night. The counselors assign carefully which horses will be led out to pasture by which girl. Some horses are more difficult to handle and must be led by an older girl and some are gentle as lambs and can be led by the youngest riders. An older girl was assigned a particular horse, but on her own decided she'd have more fun leading her personal favorite out. One of the younger girls saw what happened and began to take the more difficult horse that was left behind. Meghan was in the barn, saw this, and stopped the younger girl before there was any chance of an accident. But it was another example of a seemingly minor failure to follow instructions that put a student in danger. We don't tolerate this kind of behavior and another stiff warning was given.

I report these incidents not because there is any widespread disregard of rules at Longacres. 95% of the girls are doing wonderfully and working hard on their riding and being a great part of the Longacres community. But we want you at home to trust our reports of how things are going at camp, and part of that is knowing that we have problems like anyplace else; we deal with them and report them to you as necessary.

More "good news" to come later today!

- Tom

Today, Wednesday morning, is wet and dreary, but we seem to have gotten off easily once again compared to what was forecast to hit us. The creek crossings held up well and the bulk of the rain has now passed to our east. We should be able to ride in another hour and get in most of the afternoon rides. The rest of the week is supposed to bring clear but very warm weather. We got just about the right amount of soaking rain to keep all our pretty grass fields green and fresh.

The girls did sleep in this morning when the rain was still falling heavily. We had a late breakfast and they're starting horse care as I write. We have a few in barn activities planned this morning while the horses eat and should get in a ride before lunch. The slow morning came at a good time - the girls were getting a little tired after riding five hours each of their first two days.

We'll report again this evening.

- Tom

We planned to have a moonlight ride on the show field tonight, but the rain is moving in and the moon has hidden! Heavy rain forecast for tonight and tomorrow. We have been very lucky with rain passing all around us for most of the season so far, but it looks like a widespread rain tomorrow may finally get us. We'll try to sneak in a ride between showers, but it may be a day of barn activities. Read a few paragraphs down for the rainy day plan we had a week ago. It turned out to not be nearly so bad a day as forecast and we only finished about half of the stuff on the rainy day list, so we'll go back and finish tomorrow if the forecasters are correct. Some of the rain could be heavy and result in some flooding. We have good drainage so there is no danger to our people or horses from flooding, but we have a couple of vulnerable creek crossings that wash out in very heavy rain. This happened to us twice last year, so we're keeping our fingers crossed. It's just an annoyance if we have to fill in a washed out road crossing, but we'd like to avoid the bother.

We got in a full schedule of riding again today with everyone who came in this past weekend riding several new horses. Our most experienced riders took a trail to galloping field for the first time this year, and I let the three most reliable horses have a real gallop. Shelley on Jenna, Kelly on Patty, and Jen on Joker lined up and turned them loose for a short sprint while Kim and Emily who were riding more excitable horses waited at the top of the field to help the others stop. Joker is F-A-S-T!!!!!!! Jenna crossed the finish line first, but Joker was gaining on her in a full gallop as they came to the top of the field!

We're adding more special events like the "galloping field romp" every week as the season progresses. Longacres offers good riding and showing for everyone who comes to our shorter two week sessions, but there are many special events all summer long so that only our full season students like Shelley, Jen, and Peyton get to experience them all.

Meghan picked up a small air conditioner at Walmart yesterday for the video watching room at the house. We used it this afternoon when we had well over an hour of video to review from the first two days of this session. It worked too well; the pleasant temperature and the hum of the air conditioner put several of our riders to sleep during the video!!! It was good timing for Meghan to get this now, as the long range weather outlook is for some sticky weather over the next seven days. If it gets too hot, we will get up quite early in the morning and get in a ride or even two while it is still cool, then take a long "siesta" during the heat of the mid day and ride again when it cools down in the evening. This is our standard "plan B" for very hot weather. Stay tuned.

More pictures coming soon as the weather permits some bigger jumping.

• Tom
• PS - Hello to Ofelia from everyone at Longacres!!!! Thanks for the bread!

Our good luck with the weather continues - the forecast called for 70% chance of showers and thunderstorms today and, indeed, it rained early in the morning. But it stopped during horse care and we then got in both morning lessons with only a few rain drops. Heavy thunderstorms passed both to our north and our south and we often heard thunder during the day. We got in both afternoon lessons, and just as we were putting the horses away a heavy downpour finally hit us, but it passed through in fifteen minutes and we got no flooding. The squall line went through quickly and the sun is peeking through the clouds again after dinner. The girls are tacking up for a short evening ride. Then we're planning a quick visit to "Kone King" to celebrate Shelley's return from her weekend trip to the Pony Club regional jumper rally where she finished fifth and qualified for a reserve spot on her regional team (if I got the details right??)

After ice cream it's back to Longacres to watch all the video we've taken during the first two days of this session. We have video of everyone jumping to check out in slow motion! It will be a late bedtime so we might get a sleep-in tomorrow morning. We can accept that since we got in our full frive hours of lessons today.

Meghan just got back from the riding area where all the girls were having a relaxed evening grazing their favorite horse on the lawns around the barn. We'll be posting pictures later tonight! Emily and Mary arrived late in the afternoon and got a chance to ride before dinner. We took video of all the girls today and we'll be watching it tomorrow, especially if it rains in the morning.

The new group is getting to know each other. We're waiting for Shelley to return from her weekend jumper rally in Pennsylvania and we're hoping she won (as usual!).

Meghan and her helpers did a fantastic job of cleaning up around the barn and cabins and setting up the jumps. The farm looks its best and I'm very proud to show new people around Longacres! Good job everyone!

Our first session students did a good job putting together a drill team demonstration with only three days practice. We're going to do more drill team this session and the drill team will perform at the opening of the Longacres July 20^th horse show. Let the practices begin!

More to come later today including new pictures.

- Tom

It was a good final day of camp for the five girls who are going home tomorrow. We had a good show at Quakerfield stables. We'll try to type in all the winners tomorrow and post the results. Check the picture of Mady on Kingsley above - she won a class and did a great job. Peyton, our new student who has only been riding now for ten days rode in her first ever show and in her first ever class won first place in the walk-trot division! Yahoooooooo, Peyton! Emily won a first in jumpers on Patty and Cara won MANY ribbons on Shabang and Joker! More details tomorrow.

• Tom

PS - The website may be down for a day during the next few days. Our website has become so popular that internet traffic to our site has exceeded the allowable band width and we have to shift some pictures to another site. Forgive us if we go dark for a day or two this week!

Everyone is at the barn late tonight. Thegirls who know how to pull manes and braid are teaching the girls who don't have this experience. We're primping several of the horses (Brownie, Merlin, and Zanzibar) and pulling manes only on Ebony and Joker so they'll look great for tomorrow's show. We leave at 8:30 am for the 11am start of the show.

From East Aurora take Rte #20A west for about four miles. When you begin to get into the village of Orchard Park watch for Freeman Road stop light and turn left.

The girls are all down riding now after spending a couple of hours out at the mall for dinner and "shopping". We're making sure we get in our full five hours a day of riding the final few days of this session, since with the occasional rain over the past week we did miss a few lessons here and there. They are working on a drill team presentation which we'll do Saturday night at the end of the final day of this first two week session. We're only practicing a few days, so it will be simple, but it is a good exercise in control and team work.

The new horses are all doing very well. Brody was the star of the Pulverman jumping exercise today. You'd think he had been doing it all his life.

Lillian is taking her first night off since she arrived at Longacres, and she is VERY cheerful! She is going out for the evening with Meghan and Erin, so it should be a good time. Tom is staying here to hold down the action here at Longacres for the night.

Meghan got Peyton a little horsey present of her own color coordinated grooming brush at the tack shop today. You should have seen the smile on Peyton's face!

Cara had a great morning - mostly (@$!!) She successfully made Joker jump the cavaletti exercise his very first attempt and it was the first time all summer she has accomplished that. Then she got him to do the whole Pulverman jumping abstacle so well that he was used as an example of how to do it for the other horses. (There is the minor sidelight that she took a small fall while making him do it the second time, but we won't mention that too much!!) Good job, Cara!

More pictures to come tomorrow!

- Tom

Not too much special to report from yesterday. Sorry I missed an update. "Annie" the horse, our most sensitive and challenging new horse training project has finally been thoroughly broken and calmed down by Shelley. Other girls will be riding her now. What a beautiful horse! Shelley cantered and jumped Annie yesterday and the horse was dead quiet.

Tom taught Amanda and Peyton yesterday. In her first nine days of riding, Peyton has walk, trot, cantered, and jumped cross rails. She cantered about five times yesterday!

Meghan and I have marveled at what nice groups of girls we've had each of our three sessions so far in 2006. Everyone got along and had a good time in pre-season Clinic; also mother-daughter week. And yesterday, Meghan turned to me after dinner and said, "We are really lucky this year - for the third straight session, EVERYONE is getting along, nice, and having a good time."

I thought for a minute and said, "Have you considered the possibility that it's partly because we're working very hard and doing a good job running a riding camp?" I hope you folks at home will agree after you've debriefed your students after they come home!

We have been very lucky at Longacres during the past week of rainy weather all over the east coast. Rain has fallen all around us including flooding very nearby. We've had a few showers and one afternoon of rain, but mostly we've escaped the significant rain. Even as I write Tuesday morning we are in a break between showers on what is supposed to be an all day rain! But it will be rainy today, fortunately for the final time this week. Five straight days of gorgeous cool, sunny riding weather coming up beginning tomorrow! In the meantime, we're not wasting today. Following is our special plan for today:

1) Horse care

2) Evaluation and discussion of each horse

a) physical examination, cuts, feet, shoeing needs,

mane condition & need for trimming/pulling,

condition of frog and soles, eyes, ears, whiskers

(need for trimming ears & whiskers?), discuss

other special needs, training status, showing suitability

2) take pictures of horses not on "Meet the Horses" yet

3) type into computer new 2006 student descriptions of

each horse to add to the "Meet the Horses" page;

everyone work together on this while horse is being

examined; especially new horses not on the website

= = = = =

4) Video at the house at noon; including some old videos

of Derby and old camp promo video; also horseless

horse show and newer video’s

5) Seminar at house on planning and running horse shows;

budget, course design, judges, facilities, etc

6) Discussion at barn on tack; different kinds of bridles, saddles,

care of tack and tack cleaning techniques

7) Review of safety standards; keeping horses from getting hurt;

keeping RIDERS from getting hurt; human safety handling

horses!!!

8) Team tacking up race; rules and teams to be announced!!!!!!

We got in two good lessons this morning and another long lesson and trail this afternoon. Then we did horsecare early so we could be ready to leave for town and the fireworks right after dinner. The girls had a grand time dancing to the band at the town park and watching the fireworks. (There were BOYS at the park!) The band invited some of the young people at the park up on stage to sing along with "Yellow Submarine". Peyton and several of our girls were on stage with the band for a few minutes.

It looks like we have one more day of off and on rain tomorrow and then superlative cool, dry riding weather for the rest of this week and into next. Finally!

The big excitement today was an after dinner horseless horse show, planned and managed by Laura Foster. Laura had the idea and showed Meghan and the counselors how to set up the event where everyone pretended to be horses. The first class was hunter pairs, judged on cantering over jumps, using your hands to pretend they were horse's ears, and maintaining a smooth pace. Then we had a timed "jumper" event for speed, won by Emily and Mady. I wish we could have recorded the sound of all the cheers and laughter to post on the website!

Right now (11PM), Meghan is down giving a surprise ice cream pie party to the girls in the older bunk. The younger ones had their own special movie watching party a few days ago.

Check out the picture at the top of this page of Jen and Cara "cantering" over a jump. On the way home from town day when the girls were talking about the horseless horse show and they realized that we might be taking pictures, I heard Jen say, "OMG, I just told all my friends at home to check out the website tonight for jumping pictures of me!" So, friends of Jen, look at how much fun she's having at camp pretending to be 10 years old again. That's what Longacres horse camp will do for a sophisticated teenager!!!!

For the first time in three weeks or more, Meghan and I had a chance this evening to catch our breath, sit down on a bench together, and enjoy looking at what we've put together at Longacres this season. We spent a little time working together cleaning up around the barn and the show grounds after the show and I mowed and trimmed the grass lawn in front of the barn. Then after dinner while the girls were riding we sat down on one of our new park benches under the tree in front of the barn.

I had just spent the afternoon helping Peyton to do a better posting trot. She is coming along very well after only one week of riding - ever! I gave Amanda a few tips on getting better control of her horse and moving her leg back a little. Laura was in the ring getting help from Lillian and I watched that lesson which also included Mady doing a good job on one of our new leased horses, Barby. Several of the other girls were out on a trail ride.

Then this evening while Meghan and I sat we were able to watch Shelley canter for the very first time on "Annie", one of our most difficult horses from the group that is here in training for the summer. Shelley has done a great job working up to this point and Annie is finally ready to really go to work. Jen was working in the same training ring with "Mooney", another promising horse that is here on training and for sale.

Meghan and I turned to each other almost at the same time and expressed the same sentiment - we have a LOT of very nice horses at Longacres this year! Perhaps more nice horses than we've ever had at Longacres in the same season. Many are horses that Meghan has purchased for us permanently over the past four or five years. But there is a sizable group of very exciting and gorgeous horses that are loaned to us for the summer or are here on training because we have a good reputation in the western New York horse world. Annie, Mooney, Barby, Wizard, and Brody are the horses here that we do not own, and they are all interesting projects for the summer!

After we sat on the bench for a while, we walked up to the show ring to watch Emmy and Lillian giving lessons to the other girls and Kim working with Aleeta. Aleeta is one of the more difficult horses in the barn and one of the new thoroughbreds we bought this year. She is a very interesting project - the jury is still out on how well she will jump once she is better trained!

The girls came up to the house after horse care to watch more video of their rides in the show today. It's a little late to bed this evening, but tomorrow is sleep in morning, the horses' day of rest, and "town day". Those of you at home will likely here from your Longacres student sometime tomorrow afternoon!

Because of the holiday weekend only a couple of outside horses returned today to finish the classesd that were rained out at the end of the day Friday. That took away a little of the excitement of the competition in big classes, but it opened the door for Longacres riders to rake in the trophies and ribbons. Everyone won something and we'll list today's results later this evening. Carly and Annie had a battle for the Championship in the pony division which included the final three classes of the show. Each rider won one of the over fences classes and it all came down to the flat class under saddle. Both horses broke from a canter or had a wrong lead, but the judge called it for Annie and Ebony, and they were Champions with Carly and Ginger as Reserve Champions! Pictures coming later. We also used the HDTV camera to take hi def video of everyone's rides today. We'll be watching that later. -Tom

We had a great show until 3PM when the rains finally came. The show had to be called off until tomorrow morning when we'll reconvene to finish the final classes. I'll post a picture or two later this evening and the results of the classes that were finished today. The girls rode well and our riders won several of the classes! Many more pictures coming tomorrow!

Below are the results from both the Hasty Hills show on June 25^th and the Longacres show today, with some classes still to run tomorrow:

Hasty Hills Show 6/23/06

Shelly and Jenna- Champion- schooling jumper, Three 1^st schooling jumper, Reserve Champion –special jumper, 1^st and 4^th special jumper

Kelly and Shabang- 2^nd, 3^rd, 5^th in schooling and special jumper

Emmy and Merlin- 2^nd and 4^th in puddle jumpers, 3^rd in schooling jumpers

Longacres Show 6/3/06

Mady- 4^th in x-rails (kingsley), two 6^th in puddle jumpers (ebony)

Amanda and Merlin- 4^th in walk-trot over caveletti’s, 5^th in walk-trot

Jen- 2^nd in eq. on flat 4^th in Road Hack (Kingsley), 4^th and 5^th in special hunters (shebang)

Cara- 2^nd in puddle jumpers (shebang), 5^th in walk-trot caveletti, two 4^th and 5^th in hack division, 3^rd in eq. on flat (joker)

Peyton and Brownie- two 7ths in walk-trot

Kim and Star- 3^rd and 5^th in puddle jumpers

Annie and Ebony- 1^st in x-rails

Carly- 5^th in x-rails with Ginger, three 3rds and reserve in hack division with Justin

Laura- 1^st and 6^th in x-rails (Brownie), 6^th 4^th and 5^th in beginner hack division

Emily and Ginger- 3^rd in x-rails, 1^st 4^th and 2^nd in puddle jumpers

Today has been busy with last minute training for tomorrow's show as well as lots of work getting the courses ready for the show and all our guests from other stables. There was a brief shower a few minutes ago, but it's been a mostly sunny day for a change and tomorrow has only a 20% chance of showers and cool weather - great for a show!

Tom gave a lesson today in which everyone who is jumping in the show practiced careful turns and control on two courses. Peyton and Amanda both jumped again today and both are showing in the beginner classes tomorrow.

This evening Meghan had her own crew setting up the inside ring course. Cara, Laura, Annie, and Peyton and Amanda were the big helpers for Meghan, working almost until dark.

Kim, Jen, Maddy, Emmy, Shelley, and Emily are all showing jumpers and they borrowed our course charts to make copies for the bunks tonight so they could memorize the tricky courses. We are keeping our fingers crossed for good weather all day tomorrow for the show. We'll report late tomorrow night after the show and should have some new pictures to post!

- Tom

I spent the morning at the barn taking still pictures of everyone who is jumping in lessons. I also taught Peyton and Amanda personally for a while and let them both go over a tiny jump at a trot. They're making good progress.

Amanda, Laura, and Peyton are coming up to the house in a few minutes with Lillian and Meghan to watch the video of "Seas Biscuit" and have a little party especially for our youngest group.

I'll be taking the computer down after lunch for all the girls who had their pictures taken so we can analyze their form. The weather is good today, though we expect a few thundershowers later this afternoon. Weather forecast for our show on Friday looks to be the best day of the week with only a slight chance of showers. The grass will look good with the rain we're having off and on during the week!

- Tom

Everyone had a good time going to a movie and the mall this afternoon. Sure enough, the minute we pulled out of our driveway the rain let up for the first time, but the girls needed a break from all the constant riding and horsecare of the past couple of days. Tomorrow we're back in the saddle again with only two more days to prepare for the first horse show of the summer on Friday. We're getting lots of calls and it looks like another good size show!

The rains held off again over night and at 7am it looked like we might get a third day of riding in afterall. So by 7:30 everyone was at the barn to bring the horses in. Down to breakfast and then start back to the barn for morning riding - and then the promised rains finally came! And it has rained steadily all day, just as it was supposed to all day yesterday. Late in the morning everyone came up to the main house to watch the video we shot over the first two days of the session. We spent an hour and a half watching ourselves on HDTV, much of it in slow motion. The girls were properly impressed with Longacres' crystal clear hi def video.

The first two days we were all just getting used to the horses and basic control at Longacres. Now that everyone has been on a few different horses and knows a few that they're comfortable with we'll begin choosing horses for this Friday's show. We'll also begin working on each riders special challenges and issues. After watching the video so carefully we all know something we have to work on.

We got ready to tack up after lunch in case the rain let up, but it didn't. Tom went out on the field with an umbrella and taught Emmy Hammond riding in the steady rain. Emmy is taking on a huge challenge riding our hardest horse, Quantum, in the jumper classes at the show on Friday, and we did not want to let a day go by without having her work the horse and get used to his special quirks. So a lesson in the rain it was!

Emmy worked on collecting Quantum and stopping him when SHE wanted to stop. For the final exercise, she jumped the first fence in an eight stride line and held Quantum to a very short stride for four strides, then extended him to a near gallop for the final four strides. She and Quantum were perfect! She has a shot at doing very good things at the show even though this is a difficult horse.

Everyone is now getting ready for a "town trip" to the movies and dinner. You folks at home can expect to perhaps get phone calls sometime between 6 and 9 PM while we are out and about. We plan to sleep in tomorrow morning to let everyone get rested up a little. All the riding and barn work the first two days have worn down many of our girls after they had to travel so much to get here on Sunday. The rains should ease by tomorrow and we should get in some good riding.

We'll be picking horses for the show soon. Amanda wants to try Merlin - she hasn't yet, but we think perhaps she can show him in walk-trot at the show. We'll write more about which horses everyone is riding tomorrow.

- Tom

We're off to a good start - the bonding process with this group of girls seems to have come quickly. I just returned from the barn where everyone was working well together putting the horses out for the night and doing chores. Our youngest girls, Amanda, Peyton, and Laura were in high spirits and doing their share of the work. There was a lot of bantering between Lillian (our head counselor) and the older girls. I taught and video taped Jen, Carly, Annie, Madeleine, Cara, Emmy, and Kim myself early in the day and I spoke with all of them this evening about their after dinner ride. I was out mowing on the hunt course while they had their after dinner riding hour. Shelley worked with the gorgeous but nervous new horse, Annie, this morning and rode "Mooney", another horse here on training. I also had a chance to help Peyton learn her first posting trot lesson.

The rains have continued to come down all around Longacres but it only rained for a short time this afternoon right here, shortening only one of the five hours on our schedule. The girls were actually begging for rain by this afternoon - five hours a day of riding is a LOT when you aren't used to it. If we do get the promised rain tomorrow, we have a lot of video tape to review in slow motion and we might go out for a movie in the late afternoon if it's too wet to ride.

We're very happy with how the farm looks. We knocked ourselves out doing maintenance and repairs all spring and the farm is in the best shape it's been in years. We're having a good cash flow this year with our completely full enrollment and we're putting every penny of it and then some back into the farm, repairing roofs, foundations, fencing, equipment (Tom's new Kubota tractor!!!!), and much more. We invite all our former alumni and friends to stop by sometime over the summer to look the farm over. Try to come during one of our Longacres horse shows, especially the big "Awards show and Jumper Derby Party" on August 10^th. Longacres is the central organizer of the South Towns Summer Series of horse shows, along with four other barns. We hold four of the shows in the series here at Longacres.

Want to be a Sponsor?

If any of you would be interested in sponsoring one of the horse show divisions for the summer, we'll gladly add you to the sponsor list. It's $150 to sponsor a division for the whole season to cover the costs of the Championship trophies and awards. If you like, we can list the sponsorship as "Camper Name & family". The sponsors are announced at each show.

The weather gods have been very kind to Longacres. Heavy rains were forecast for all last night through this Wednesday. But the band of heavy rain is holding about 20 miles southeast of Longacres and we got in both lessons this morning, took more video of everyone for when the rain does arrive, and we are crossing our figners that we may get still another ride in this afternoon!!!

Here is a link to a page full of pictures taken at Longacres yesterday of all our new arrivals.

Everyone but Annie from California has arrived safely and has been on a horse. Our never-ever before rider, Peyton, did a great job on Brownie in her first ever riding lesson. We got the beginning of it on video and may do a short film on Peyton learning to ride! We got video of almost everyone this morning and we'll be watching video during the rain coming tonight and tomorrow. Too bad to have rain in the forecast for the first two full days of camp tomorrow and Tuesday, but we do need the rain badly around here. We'll be riding in between rain showers and storms. More to come later tonight.

Shelley and her own private horse, Jenna (aka Devil Horns show name) was our hero for the afternoon. They WON four out of the five jumper classes they entered!! Against some tough Hasty Hills Farm competition. Shelley was Champion of Schooling Jumpers. Emmy got a second place in one of her classes and jumped very well in all of them. It was Emmy's first ever jumper competition and she found the tricky courses challenging to learn and went off course once. She did a great job with Merlin and we are proud of her second palce ribbon.

Kelly rode Sha-Bang to several second place finishes right behind Shelley. Sha-Bang and Kelly are a great combination and many trainers at the show commented on how well she rode the horse. This was also Kelly's first ever jumper competition.

Everyone went out to dinner afterwards with Uncle Billy joining us for dinner at Pasquale's. We watched video and now it's time for bed.

The farm looks terrific for you folks arriving on Sunday. Erin and Meghan put in a lot of flowers here and there today and the grass is all trimmed for opening day. We think you will approve! (And Peyton is arriving in about 21 hours!!!!)

• Tom
• PS - picture taken a few hours ago at Hasty Hills is below featuring Jenna and the girls with their ribbons.

This was a big mix of different levels of riding experence, with Emmy and Kelly the likely favorites. But it turned out that each of the four teams won one of the events. I can't remember the last time the results of a Gymkhana (mounted games) were so even. We did a figure eight race with the pairs holding a piece of toilet paper that they were not allowed to break; then we did two rounds of tandem pole bending where one horse followed the other weaving in and out of the markers. Finally we did the same tandem pole bending with a required dismount and mount of both riders out on the course.

Sandy and Kim won the first event to set the pace, but then all four pairs took turn putting in the fastest time. A GREAT time was had by all and no one fell off!

PS - I forgot to post the Mother-Daughter week welcome message the other night, so here it is:

Although we’ll start the week with a wet day, the weather will be cooler and drier for most of the rest of the week - great riding weather with a few possible scattered showers later in the week.

Some breaks in the rain are expected late this morning, and we should be ready to tack up and squeeze in a ride by 11am. We’ll try to get in some saddle time today between showers, but plan to put the time to good use around the barn during the rainy periods.

Mother - Daughter week is traditionally a time to be around horses and a barn with your daughter, spending time in a low pressure relaxed program for the week. We’ll be planning a lesson for everyone each day, sometimes in groups, and sometimes with just a mother - daughter pair. But mostly it’s an informal week of fun with horses.

We’ll plan to have each of you choose a special horse today in consultation with Lillian and Meghan that will be "your horse" for the week. You’ll still ride other horses part of the time and we may choose to assign "your horse" to someone else for a particular hour, but mostly you’ll have access to your special horse whenever you like to take an informal ride alone or with your daughter. If we feel it is appropriate we’ll have one of the counselors or junior counselors tag along on your ride to help as needed. Ask Lillian or Tom for guidelines on how much work is appropriate for your horse and plan to ride other horses to not over work your horse. Canter in short stretches and be sure to let your horse walk frequently to avoid over stress.

A part of mother - daughter week has always been helping out to finish opening the barn and putting on the finishing touches to the farm as we prepare for the regular season to begin next Sunday. We’re far more prepared already than most years, but there are still things to do and we’re grateful for any help you can volunteer to Lillian, Sarah, and the junior counselors in finishing all our pre-season chores. (Just don’t spend ALL your time helping others and working, Debbie!)

Some planned events: lesson with just the "moms" Tuesday afternoon with Tom; Mom’s night out with Meghan or Happy Hour trip Tuesday evening; private lesson with Tom for each mother daughter pair sometime during the week; special lessons for the advanced riders and junior counselors each day; group "trail clearing" party early Tuesday, then chances for buddy trail rides latter half of the week.

If you need a break, just give Meghan or Lillian a heads up that you’re taking a rest or going to town. It’s a relaxed informal week.

- Tom & Meghan

Today is "pairs day". We're spending the day riding in pairs and this evening we'll be holding a pairs gymkhana with games and tests for pairs riders. We'll also spend an hour working all together on drill team maneuvers.

Last night we had more jumping lessons, took lots of video for a video watching session later today, the "moms" went "out" together ?#$$!!!; the jumper riders did speed turn and extension - collection exercises, Emmy had more adventures getting used to our most difficult horse Quantum, Kelly was FAST on Sha-Bang; Martha and her daughter Ofelia arrived giving us a record of four mother-daughter pairs at the same time, we went to Kone King for ice cream, and we finished the new orchard pasture and used it overnight for the first time. And lots of other stuff happened, believe it or not! Phew!

- Tom

There was lots going on at Longacres today. Mother - Daughter week is in full swing, along with several extra "daughters" along for the ride. Debbie, Sharon, and Sandy are enjoying being "moms" part of the day and "girls" the other part! I'll post the welcome message for the mother-daughter week students below so that those of you at home can get an idea of what we're doing this week.

The mom's night out in town with Meghan has been moved to tomorrow night so that Martha can join the rest of the crew to get acquainted.

Tom taught a special lesson for the moms this afternoon in which Sandy joined the dusty bottoms club on a fast corner, but did a great job jumping Merlin!

During evening ride Kim got Star to do a great flying change several times. Kim's just starting to work on good changes with Star.

We also had a jumper training session for Shelley on her own horse, Jenna; for Kelly Hill riding Sha-Bang; and for Emmy Hammond riding Quantum. Quantum is a very strong and very challenging horse. He was bouncing Emmy around a bit for the first part of the lesson and gave her a bit of a bloody lip during one leap, but Emmy hung on. Tom gave her some hints on the best way to ride this kind of powerful horse and she started to get the upper hand. Emmy rode two good jumping rounds to finish the training session, and set her personal highest jump ever when we practiced jumping high fences from a trot with the good jumpers at the end of the lesson.

Kelly, Emmy, and Shelley will be representing Longacres at the Hasty Hills jumper show this Friday - perhaps Kim also.

Stoney came down with a mild case of colic this evening and the counselors and Meghan spent many hours at the barn caring for him along with our vet. He is much better now and eating happily in pasture (12:04AM) - the girls will be checking on him again about three AM -aren't horses fun????

Tom taught a lot more than usual today and took video of many of the riders. He also used the new tractor to clean up the trails after a number of the riders took turns clipping overhanging brush so that the trails would be safe and clear of obstructions during trail rides the rest of the week.

We have 8 horses here that are new to Longacres including two that we've purchased and six that we have on training or consignment for sale. Kingsley is the most broke and looks like he'll be very useful and easy for many of you to ride. The others are all getting used to a new farm and are pretty spunky so far! Adventurous for our trainers. We have some fancy looking horses in the barn!

More to come tomorrow.

- Tom

Meghan and I have had a successful weekend. The Longacres horse show yesterday was a huge success with 76 horses taking part. It was one of our biggest shows. The girls all rode well, and we'll post full results tomorrow. Below is a picture of Emmy on Merlin. Today we had a commitment to run one of our truck races in Ithaca, NY. We had to drive four hundred miles round trip to run that event, but it was also very successful. We had a near record crowd and made enough money to pay for a horse or two. We're exhausted, so more details coming tomorrow. It looks like a rainy day so it will be good for updating web pages! The rest of the week looks like good, cooler riding weather for mother-daughter week.

• Tom

We'll be sure to get some pictures at the show tomorrow - the jump courses look terrific, and everyone here at Longacres contributed to the effort. Thanks to all! It's now nearly midnight, and some of us are still working sorting ribbons and getting all the judges cards and course charts organized. Many phone calls have come in and it sounds like a big horse show!

Of, and by the way, we're still working to open the camp at the same time. Tom climbed ladders and hung on tree limbs to get the electricity working in the other cabin in time for Monday. Meghan had a visit from the health department to inspect the kitchen - she passed with flying colors - no write ups except for the inspector telling her to keep up the good work. More new horses arrived at the barn and the girls had a second Leigh Fisher Clinic and a Clinic from Barb Glica of BZG Stables. All the girls who have been here for Clinic week are showing tomorrow - good luck to all!

- Tom (bedtime!)

We got in five hours of riding today including my lesson, two practice rides, the Becky Bates Clinic this afternoon, and a training session with some horses that need extra attention after dinner. Becky Bates had some interesting exercises that we'll include in some of our regular lessons from now on.

We also worked very hard setting up all the jumps and measuring the courses for the horse show on Saturday. The farm was looking beautiful by the time the sun went down this evening. We could run the show tomorrow, but it is nice to know that we have one more full day to put on the finishing touches and trim the grass around the fence posts.

Tovah arrives tomorrow for a two day quick visit and to judge one of the rings at our show. Busy, busy, busy, but things are going well.

Back at Longacres we stopped at the house to watch 45 minutes of video from the last two clinics and Tom's lesson today. We did a lot of slow motion playback and everyone enjoyed seeing themselves in HDTV. It was a great day to be running a camp. Tomorrow we spend a lot of time setting up for the horse show this Saturday.

- Tom

This was the Diane Perello clinic day and she gave the girls a full two hours of instruction and another view of their riding. Everyone had a good time and Diane may come back later in the summer to give us another dose of "Quakerfield Stables riding".

Kelly got to ride Quantum and did a good job, but it really gave her a workout. She also rode Aleeta, the new thoroughbred mare this evening and got a lot out of her. Jessie got to be the first one to try Brownie when he returned to Longacres this evening. Melissa had good rides on Ginger, who is the horse I think she gets along with best so far, Emmy was the first rider of the year to join the "Dusty Bottoms Club", so she will be honorary 2006 president of this prestigious group!!!!! She went off when Joker did one of his spinning refusals at a very small jump. Emmy got right back on and took Joker over the jump two more times and then out on a trail where Joker behaved very well.

Tom's new tractor and mower arrived today and he had a good time mowing most of the show field areas for this weekend's show. He is very pleased with his new Kubota!

Junior counselor Kim is doing an outstanding job organizing the barn and getting things ready for Lillian's arrival this Friday night. Kim is very good at organizing and planning ahead. Every time a new horse comes in, Kim seems to have a stall all ready for him and tack ready. Fine job, Kim!!!!!!!!

NOTE: Please do not send picture attachments with your emails for the girls. Our slow dial up country connection chokes on the big files and they have to be deleted. Just messages, please, or perhaps a very small picture file (less than 50k if you know how to do that). Thank you!

Kim is happy! Her beloved Dallas Mavericks are winning in the first quarter of their playoff game. We promised Kim she could watch the games this week, and all the girls are downstairs at the main house watching. Some will bail out early to get some needed sleep, but I bet Kim (who is a HUGE basketball fan) will stay to the bitter end. So far her team is winning.

Picture is posted below of the girls with Meghan in the video watching room. Although the Mavericks are the center of attention tonight, the girls will be back tomorrow to watch video of themselves riding.

Kim, Melissa, Emmy, and Kelly all arrived safely today and have been working with the horses they'll be riding tomorrow to get used to them. We left a list of a few chores to help get the tack and barn ready while we were out this afternoon. The girls were amazing! They went far above and beyond what we had asked and have the barn well on it's way to being fully organized. Riding begins tomorrow morning with my lesson, a practice ride, the first Clinic Lesson, and an evening ride.

One of the toilets backed up while we were out, and Kim resourcefully called her dad at home for advice! Nice call for a parent of a junior counselor at camp to get on the first day - "a toilet is broken, what do I do?"

That's summer camp for you.

It has been another busy day, but very rewarding - Longacres has really awakened from her winter slumber and looks like a horse farm again. Meghan is still down on the show field putting flowers in front of some of the jumps so they will look their best when clinic students begin arriving in ABOUT TWO HOURS! Meghan will soon be on her way to the airport to pick up Kim and Emmy, and Kelly and Melissa will arrive from Florida mid day tomorrow. Riding lessons begin first thing Monday morning, although the girls who are here tomorrow will have a busy day getting acquainted with their horses and handling them on the ground.

If you tuned in last night, you read how frustrated I was with a plumbing job that went badly yesterday. I got roped into some more plumbing today, but it was much more fun. I had to get the pump going that brings water from the pond to the horse troughs and fix some leaks in those lines. It was outdoor work on a nice day. Not bad.

Most of Meghan's day was spent working with Matt cleaning up from all the construction and maintenance projects that have been under way for the past month. There are a few things still to do to make things look their very best, which they will by official opening day on June 25^th. But we're pleased with the way the farm will be presented tomorrow to the Clinic Week girls.

Below is a picture taken about an hour ago of the horses in the newly upgraded pasture. You can see the new split rail fence in the foreground, the ribbon fence in the background separating the geldings and mares, and in the far background the gate to the "Orchard" pasture.

Merlin, Star, and Ginger arrived back at Longacres today and they look great. They'll be good mounts for our clinic guests. Meghan did more work on the new fences today, organized the hay storage areas, had a lot more painting and clean up work done, and more.

Tom had not one of his favorite days. On his work list was "turn on the hot water heater for the showers". Sounds easy. But it had been off all winter and did not want to light. Do not ask why we didn't test this a week ago when it would have been no emergency - I guess if you read the updates from the past few days you know some of the reasons - we have been busy.

But we shouldn't have let this go to the last minute. Plumbing is just about Tom's least favorite thing to work on. When we found that the water heater wouldn't work, of course we called our plumber. And, of course, he could not come today. The girls need showers by Sunday, so Tom to the rescue. Tom (me) is old and grey enough so that he has some right to claim seniority and get out of jobs like this. But a lifetime of experience at Longacres as a jack of all trades means that he does know how to fix things like cranky water heaters. So he experimented and found out that no gas was getting to the pilot light and then took the burner assembly apart. He found the problem (a corroded pilot light jet), but now it got difficult. (Did I tell you that I HATE plumbing work?) All the parts were rusted together, so things broke when they were taken apart. No problem - I listed the new parts I needed and called our local plumbing supplier - oops - they don't carry parts for that brand; neither did the plumbing store in the next town. OK - ONE plumbing supply house in all of western New York does carry this brand of water heater. Tried for half an hour to get through to their parts department, but kept getting stuck on hold. With fifty minutes until they closed, we drove to Buffalo and luckily found a nice man at the counter who did not have exactly the right parts, but did have a returned heater of the same model out back and gave me the used parts of it.

Back to Longacres, down to the showers, down on the wet floor peering into the rusty water heater (did I say that I hate plumbing?!?!?!?), and installed the new-used parts.

There now is hot water for the showers - yeah!

So to wind down I turned my attention to a maintenance job I usually enjoy, mowing our lovely grass riding areas. Five minutes of good mowing and "BANG" went a pulley drive. Just not my day. Fortunately, we have a smaller backup mower, so I finished trimming around the fences at the show ring with the smaller machine. The show ring will look good when some of you arrive this weekend!

Meghan's day went much better than mine and she feels good about being ready to open for clinic in one more day. See you all VERY soon! Teaching riding is MUCH more fun than plumbing work!

Most years Longacres doesn't open for another week, so we're still not used to the idea that we'll be teaching lessons in three more days. We think we'll be ready! Everything is ready in the dining hall, the electricity now works in the cabins, and all we've got to finish is some final clean up around the barn. We mowed everything again today - actually the grass where we're setting up jumps tomorrow got mowed twice or three times today to make it look really right. Nearly all the jumps have fresh paint; we only have to paint some of the colored rails tomorrow, and perhaps a few on Monday.

Shabang returned from his winter home today and he led the new horses on a great romp around the pasture. See picture below!

Above: Shabang leads Aleeta and Kingsley on a gallop.

These are the two new horses Meghan recently purchased. Alita is a stylish and bold Thoroughbred mare who likes to jump. Kingsley is a quiet, older "gentleman" gelding, bomb proof and a comfortable trail ride horse.

Clinic Week is pretty well organized now. Guest Trainers will include Becky Bates, owner and trainer at Hasty Hills Farm. She will be opening the week with an evaluation and short session on Monday, and she will return for a more extensive follow-up lesson on Thursday. Diane Pirello is head trainer at Quakerfield Stables, and she will be here on Tuesday. Leigh Fisher is owner and trainer at High Time Stable, and her clinic with us is on Wednesday. We may have one additional guest, still pending. You Clinic riders will have many critiques and evaluations of your riding during the week! We'll also take lots of video.

Besides barn work preparing for the new horses arriving, we tested the dish machine and other equipment in the dining hall, got the showers running, cleaned and painted more stuff, and fixed electric wires so you will have lights in your bunk. Another pre-camp day at Longacres!

Meghan and I just took a short walk along one of the trails near the main house with the moonlight filtering through the trees and lighting the trail just enough to see where we were going. It is one of those perfect early summer nights at Longacres. Cool, but not chilly, crystal clear skies with plenty of stars and a half moon, and not a breath of wind. The fire flies are just beginning their summer season. And as we walked, we realized that there will be a full moon next week, and if all goes well during Clinic Week, those of you here next week will get a moonlight ride on the big field some night! See you all soon - VERY soon!

A long day - All New pasture gates installed, long final talk with owner of "Aleeta" and "Kingsley", the two new horses Meghan bought this spring which are arriving tomorrow night; rented a backhoe and fixed the flood damage to the main camp road between the dining hall and the barn; fixed washout on the horse trail; painted two outside walls on the dining hall; painted the eves of the dining hall; cleaned up more of the mess left over from demolishing the old canteen building; started landscaping around new "seating area" where canteen used to be; cleared some brush to enlarge horse show parking area; patched up some damaged wire in pasture fence; cleared fallen tree and downed electric wires for cabins to get ready for electricians tomorrow (me!); ready for bed - will be asleep in two minutes!!!!!!!!!

- Tom

Below is a picture of Meghan getting ready to unload new stuff for the barn - new watering troughs, new gates, fence repair materials, and more. This is how we'll be working most of this week. We ran into Frank, the horse van guy, at breakfast and Meghan talked with him about when the first horses will come to the barn over the next few days.

Hi everyone. We've been very busy workig around the barn the past couple of weeks with all the new pasture fences and work on painting and repairing jumps. Finally last night I got out on the trails with the tractor and mower. Most of them are nicely trimmed and ready for the first trail rides with Kim, Emmy, Kelly, Melissa, and Jessica next week. Hard to believe that we will be doing lessons and working with the horses and setting jump courses in just seven days!

We'll be trying to give you website updates pretty much every day from now on through the summer, so check back often.

Meghan spent last night drawing up a careful budget for the rest of the summer. Many years we just spend what we need for the camp and don't bother with a budget. But this year with a completely full enrollment and a good cash flow we are doing many extra things to fix up the farm and make things as good as possible for this season. We realized that we better be careful not to "over do it"! You will be glad to hear that Meghan tells me she put money in the budget to purchase one MORE horse for Longacres this summer, not including the two she has already bought!

There are many less glamorous things in the budget, like renting the big backhoe next week to repair the flood damage to our creek crossings on the camp trails. But there are also many new "horse toys" in the budget - new water troughs, new gates, so on and so forth. More updates to come soon!

- Tom

Maintenance man Matt has been painting jumps under the porch at the barn while it rains, so we're still on schedule to have all freshly painted pretty jumps for our first arrivals the weekend of June 10^th!

Bulliten!!! Brianna's "prom" pictures arrived by snail mail - who'd a "thunk" Bri was ever a barn rat?!!???

It is now NINE DAYS until Kim and Emmy arrive!!!

The first show in the 2006 South Towns Summer Series was held this past weekend at the Pony Club show. We'll be posting the point standings soon - the second show in the series is right here at Longacres on June 17^th, and all of our Clinic Week riders will probably take part. We'll have a full album of pictures from that show to post for you all at home.

Longacres has always had a rule in our literature that cell phones are not permitted at camp. Most camps have the same policy and the reason is that we believe an important part of camp is bonding with your camp friends. Time spent sitting in your bunk chatting with your friends at home takes away from that.

However, in general, Longacres is a liberal and permissive place. During the past couple of summers as more and more teenagers have become accustomed to carrying cell phones all the time, we have tolerated camper phones with a wink and a nod at our rules. But especially last summer, this tolerance was abused by some. There were several incidents that resulted in weepy boyfriend conversations late into the evening and one case where a counselor walked into the bunk to find four students all on their phones with their backs to each other. I made up my mind at the end of last summer (as Brianna suspected) that we would revert to a more formal cell phone policy for 2006.

Our policy will include some accommodation for "teen phone addicts"! You MAY bring a personal cell phone to Longacres this year, but you must turn it in to the office upon arrival. This accommodates the wishes of a number of parents who want their child who may be traveling alone to Longacres to have a phone while in airports, etc.

No cell phones will be allowed in the bunks, and this rule will be strictly enforced. The only exception will be that one staff person in the bunks will be allowed to have their phone for emergency use only.

Field Trips - "Phones Gone Wild!" - Every time we leave the farm on a field trip, your cell phones will be returned to you for the afternoon or evening and you are encouraged to phone family and friends to your heart's content. Out of camp trips have always been the time when we encourage our students to contact home and keep in touch with your family. This does not impact what we consider important "bonding time" on the farm. We are usually out of the farm at least two to three times per week, so there will be numerous times when you can chat with family or friends.

We hope parents and students, both, will understand our concerns and will find this cell phone policy to be a reasonable compromise.

Sorry to spend this evening's "update time" on icky rules stuff, but it is important to make our policy very clear to all.

- Tom

Meghan's day is being spent partly in the office and partly outdoors. She's busy lining up judges for all the shows for the summer and sending out video and info to the new families interested in the Clinic Week. Outdoors, Meghan will be spending the afternoon finishing up the new pasture fence preparations - the contractor is coming tomorrow for the new split rail fencing. Meghan also says to tell you all that she's looking forward to our first horses coming to the barn next week.

As people in the horse business, we wish to extend our sympathy and best wishes to all those connected with Barbaro, the favored horse that broke down in this afternoon's Preakness. It is perhaps useful from time to time for horse lovers to get together with one or two close friends or family and talk a little about how fragile our powerful looking equine friends actually are. Many other kinds of animals, including people, sustain injuries all the time, and are fixed up by doctors or vets with good results. But horses are a little different. Modern veterinary science has no trouble repairing an injury right after it happens, but horses make very poor patients after any kind of surgery. They tend to thrash around and harm the repaired joints or bones, and if they are heavily sedated and suspended, they tend to succumb to pneumonia or other respiratory problems. The outlook is usually not good after any major equine injury.

All we can do as horsemen is to try our best to be careful and avoid getting hurt ourselves or having accidents that hurt our horses. And we must be grateful for every good day we have with a sound horse, knowing that bad things can happen and when they do, there's not much we can do for a badly injured horse.

Longacres has had good luck at avoiding serious injuries to horses on our farm for some time - (And I knock wood four times as I say that). But we have lost some of our very best horses to accidents during the off season at their winter homes. "Lacey" and "Lucky" were two of our very best horses when they had to be put down after breaking legs in the off season during the past ten years. We know what it is like.

So talk to a friend, prepare yourself for the day when it happens to a horse you care about deeply, and give thanks for every good day you have with one of your favorite horses.

- Tom Kranz

We had a backhoe in the other day and now have all the heavy new gate posts for our four new gates in place. Meghan and her crew also have half of the new pasture posts set, so we will surely have all the new fencing done by the time any of you arrive for this season. Meghan has now signed the contract for the new split rail fence along the road next to the pasture. Work should begin Monday, and it will look terrific!

We're hosting a "horseman's bonfire party" here at Longacres this coming Wednesday evening to kick off the 2006 show season. Most of you live much too far away to come, but you're invited, if you happen to be traveling in this area! We'll try to post a picture or two after the party to show you what it is like. More coming soon!

This morning Meghan met with a new, well recommended contractor about repairing a section of barn roof, putting up some of our new fencing, and other stuff too complicated for our regular part time helpers. (You can see that we are pre-occupied with maintenance at this time of year. The western New York winters are harsh, and hard on summer horse farm infrastructure. Stuff that we painted just last summer often has to be completely redone.)

We sometimes have to defer maintenance work in a season with a tight budget like we had last summer. Then in a year like 2006 when we have a full enrollment and a healthier budget, we get caught up. The farm should look EXTRA nice this year when you arrive. Meghan has almost made up her mind to replace the pasture fence where we throw the hay in along the road - she has wanted to do this for several years. Stay tuned! We've been buying some new saddles and other horse equipment so we have plenty of spares - and we are likely to build some additional horse jumps. And don't forget the all new "Orchard Pasture" - see below.

That's the report for May 15^th!!!!!!!!!

We have lots of interesting news, especially for our returning students who have a way of knowing what will be new at Longacres this year. Can you spell "pastures"? Meghan has been talking to me about different ways we can add more separate turn out areas. Longacres has many great horse facilities and riding areas, but we have always been short on pasture space. Last summer we had several horses laid up and off of work for a few days at a time just because they had been fighting in pasture. We began work yesterday on some substantial pasture improvements. While we're at it we're buying some brand new gates, adding new heavy fence posts at the gates so they swing easily, improving existing pasture fences AND adding completely new pasture space.

We will be putting a new fence down the middle of our existing turn-out pasture so that we can separate geldings and mares into two groups. That alone will greatly reduce fighting in the pasture.

But the biggest improvement will be in adding a whole new pasture area. None of you who were here last year have likely ever even walked through the area we are clearing and fencing. It was an overgrown old apple orchard. If you are standing along the road "up top" and throwing hay into the old pasture, imagine looking all the way across the pasture to the fence on the other side - the new "orchard pasture" will be in the woods behind that fence and will be almost as big as our existing pasture. And there will be shade trees around half of it. This new "orchard pasture" will be for the quieter, best behaved horses that just want to munch on their hay in peace and not be picked on by the pasture bullies!

We're also improving the fencing in the old "baling twine pasture" down on the level by the barn, but that will still be the "older gentlemen horses" turn out!

Tovah Abrams, one of Longacres most successful riders, students, and instructors of the past ten years just wrote in with the following message: "I just read the website... I want to wish Peyton luck; it sounds
like she's going to have a lot of fun, and I bet it'll be fun to teach her and watch her progress." Tovah also wrote that she has been missing Longacres reading about all our show plans and especially about how some of this year's students may get to ride Quantum in the Derby! As some of you know, even though Tovah now works someplace else during the summer, she still takes her beloved Quantum to college with her in the winter, keeps in close touch with us year round, and in fact, is coming to judge the first Longacres show in June.

We consider every student at Longacres to be special and memorable in some way. That's one of the nicest things about coming to a small, family style horse farm like Longacres. We know all of you. I'm proud to say that I can tell you exactly how every student from last summer rode while they were here, what were their strong points, and what they were working on. And Meghan is spending many, many hours this spring emailing and telephoning with new students and their parents to get a head start on the summer and learn everything she can about all the new girls coming this year. (Parents, do NOT think you are bothering Meghan if you want to call and tell her something about your children. Meghan really enjoys this part of her job. Although we will get to know your children soon, anyway, it is a help to hear something about each new student before they arrive.)

Peyton and her mom chose Longacres because of our emphasis on riding. Peyton's looking forward to really learning to ride at Longacres. When she first gets here, Peyton will be riding with the least experienced group of students. Which is not so special, because even though we get many very experienced riders at Longacres, we are glad to have girls who are still beginners. But there is something pretty unusual about Peyton's experience with horses, especially for someone coming for the full season: Peyton has NEVER ridden before! Meghan has spoken quite a bit with Peyton about the commitment to a new sport and the hard work she faces as she comes to Longacres with no previous riding experience. But Peyton is looking forward to this new challenge and to the opportunities that await at Longacres. I'm impressed!

And we here at Longacres are also looking forward to this unusual opportunity to watch a student develop from the ground up, so to speak, over the course of an eight week stay at Longacres. Eight weeks is not such a long time, but at Longacres that works out to something like 240 hours of riding time. That's the equivalent of five years of weekly riding lessons!! I pledge to commit all the considerable equestrian resources that Longacres has to offer to the goal of sending Peyton back to Texas in August as a competent rider. Although it is unusual for a student to come to Longacres for their very first riding experience, and especially unusual for someone planning a full season stay, it is not unprecedented. Lauren Cybulska from Staten Island, New York spent many full eight week summers at Longacres, beginning a little younger than Peyton and coming back every year until the end of high school. We have a letter out to Lauren asking her to remind us just what her riding experience was when she first arrived at Longacres. Lauren was certainly nearly a beginner her first summer at Longacres, and she became an expert rider over the years. Here's hoping that Peyton will follow in Lauren's footsteps. We at Longacres will do our best to help. We invite all of you more experienced Longacres riders in 2006 to join us in offering Peyton encouragement and help in learning what this english riding and showing stuff is all about!

And this story on our website in May will serve as "proof" that Peyton is a beginner at the start of the summer. BECAUSE, I have a feeling that by the time Hamburg Fair comes around at the end of the season in August and some of our neighboring trainers see Peyton ride into the ring and hear that she has only been riding for eight weeks, they will say, "No way!" I will be proud. (Not trying to put any pressure on you or anything, Peyton!)

• Tom Kranz

The Summer Series Horse Shows:

If you read down several paragraphs you'll see the 2006 schedule of South Towns Summer Series horse shows. Longacres takes a key roll in planning and coordinating one of the most successful horse show series in Western New York. It's important for us to put the work into this to be sure that we have quality horse shows where all our summer students can learn and compete every week during the summer. The series has grown in importance as more stables have joined in the planning and brought more of their students to the shows. The series now begins several weeks before Longacres actually opens for the season, and our first show here at Longacres is held during our pre-camp week. Points are kept at all these shows and season Championship awards are presented at the Longacres "Derby Day" event and Awards Party on August 10^th. Even after missing the first shows, Longacres horses and riders have won many high score awards over the years. One of our best prospects for this year is Shelly and her private horse, Jenna. Shelly will be here for the full season, and Jenna is an excellent jumper. More of you are likely to win trophies, which go back to fourth place in each of the 13 show divisions.

These shows are not nationally recognized events. But they are very nice horse shows and much more like regular local "member shows" than most local horse shows. All our members shows do a great job of building courses and painting everything before their show events. Those of you new to Longacres are going to enjoy this summer series!

There is a treat for those of you coming for the August session at Longacres this year. "Derby Day" has always ended with a special big money high jumping Derby event where most of the riders are regional professionals. It is a very exciting event, but one where only a few Longacres riders were qualified to compete safely. There will be a new format this year, in which there will be four or five "Preliminary Derby" events during the afternoon before the featured big "Bold Jumper Derby". Each of the preliminary events will show at progressively higher fence heights over the same long, beautifully decorated course that is used for the big Derby. The first "Pre-Derby" section will have the fences as cross rails or less than 2 foot jumps. This will be a fun day where anyone will have a chance to take their horse out on the course and when the big guns ride in the evening, you can all say, "Hey, I bet I could do that - I rode the same jumps a few hours ago - well, MAYBE just a little lower!" And, of course, one or two of you just might get to ride in the big Derby on Quantum or Shabang or one of our new horses - ya' never know!

Quiz Result: Lauren and Bri both responded quickly and guessed that the old canteen building was being torn down and disposed of. Correct. Lauren was the first to respond with an accurate answer, and she hasn't even been to Longacres for two years!

Bri made me (Tom) both laugh and almost cry with her answer. She correctly pointed out that some of the old unused buildings around Longacres have more than half a century of Longacres "history" and many stories to tell if they could talk. Taking one of them down may clean up the camp and put a little more of Longacres back to nature, as Meghan is quick to point out. Meghan is the driving force behind cleaning up and getting rid of "junk". I am very slow to tear down even unused and unnecessary buildings like the old canteen building (the one across the road from the dining hall). I am more likely to slap one more coat of paint on an old building and keep it standing for another year just out of nostalgia for days gone bye. Speaking of stories about the old canteen building, try to catch me in a reminiscent mood and ask me to tell the story of "Zippy and the Freezer Queen" sometime! (Is anyone lurking out there in long ago alumni-land who remembers Barb Check?)

We've had several emails today from new families telling us they just mailed their final tuition payment and it is on the way. Don't worry - anytime in the first ten days of May is quite OK with us. But thank you for thinking of us and letting us know.

Meghan is out for the afternoon with Alyssa on a "road trip" test driving and taking pictures of new horses. If we're lucky, we'll have some nice pictures to post here late tonight. The first two pictures are of horses that we are purchasing for Longacres.

Above: Alyssa & MoonDancer warming up! She is a 15 yr. Old TB Mare who doesn't act her age - She has SPUNK! Yet has a very sweet disposition to handle.

Above: Kingsley with his former (!) owner getting his favorite spot rubbed. He is super sweet to work around and will be a horse a lot of different riders can handle.

Above: Alyssa about to graze Brody

Brody is a horse that is for sale while he is at Longacres this summer. He is a 9yr. Old QT with a very calm attitude. I can just picture him in the hunter ring now! I have seen pictures of him at shows - he KNOWS what to do with his ears and knees to please judges!!

Other interesting horse news: Our regular returning students know western New York trainer, Barb Glica, and her BZG Stables. She has some nice horses from time to time and she is the person we got Jenna from for Shelly. Barb has two horses she is planning to offer for sale this summer and if they aren't sold by the time Longacres opens, she is putting them here for the summer for us to show and exercise. One was one of the STSS Series Champions last year!

In the meantime, let's have a little "what's this contest". Check the picture below and see if you can tell me what's going on:

Meghan spoke this afternoon with a horse owner at a neighboring stable who has a nice show horse for sale. They would like to board the horse at Longacres for the summer and have YOU Longacres riders show the horse and exercise it while it is offered for sale. This looks like another interesting horse prospect for us - I told you Meghan has been busy with horse deals this week!!

Lots of exciting things have been happening this weekend, beginning with Peyton signing up for the final spot on our regular session roster. (See below!) (Hi, Peyton!)

But more exciting to most of our 2006 students is how quickly Meghan is moving in adding to our herd of horses. We got confirmation today that Wizard will be at Longacres for the summer. He is already listed on the "Meet the Horses" page, so you can read all about him and see his pictures - - - BIG grey thoroughbred! Wizard has spent several summers at Longacres, but was not able to be here last year, so he will be like a new horse to many of you. He's a fine horse!

I wrote earlier today about Meghan's horse test drive trip this morning. Meghan had another long talk with the owner of the horses she looked at this evening and it looks very promising. Meghan liked both horses she looked at, a teenage mare and an older but very sound and healthy gelding. The gelding is a great pleasure/trail horse, and the mare has good jumping experience. Both horses are gentle and can go right to work at Longacres with any of our riders. We'll post pictures once the deal is final, but we want to keep you all up to date on the plans for new horses.

- Tom & Meghan

Well, actually we now have space in a special "Pro Clinic Week" we're running from June 12 to 18^th. But after welcoming Peyton from Dallas, Texas as a full season student, all Longacres regular sessions are now full. Meghan is hard at work finding some new horses for you all to ride this busy season. Meghan took a road trip with Maddie and Alyssa, two area girls who are working with Meghan to organize horse shows and open the barn. They tried out three horses today, all of them good possibilities.

Also, special thanks to Kim and Bri and Lindsey who all wrote to us in response to our "lonely during Easter Holidays" message! Thanks for cheering us up!

I hope you are all enjoying great Easter week vacations. You must be doing something. Up until the beginning of this week we were getting three or four emails a day about Longacres. Suddenly, the internet has gone silent this week! We're guessing that many of you folks are wrapped up in family get togethers and vacations. Perhaps we'll be swamped with emails tomorrow; perhaps not for another week since many are off school this week?? SOMEONE please write - we're lonely!!!

- Tom & Meghan (looking for more horses even today!)

We took a long walk after breakfast this morning on the trails between the barn and the river. It wasn't so long a walk in distance, but it took a long time stopping every five or ten feet to throw logs and tree branches off the trails! There were lots of wind storms this winter and that translates into lots of work clearing trails in the springtime. It was a lovely morning, though. It was great to be out working around the farm!

Welcome to new students, Samantha from Florida and we confirmed the enrollment of Emmy from Alaska. Take note on the top of this page of the only three remaining vacancies.

We also have most of the 2006 South Towns Summer Series horse show dates planned and are having meetings to refine some of the rules and class descriptions for the series. Following are the show dates.

May 28^th, Sunday, EA Pony Club Show

June 17, Saturday, Longacres

June 24, Saturday, Hasty Hills

June 30, Friday, Longacres

July 8, Saturday, Quakerfield

July 15, Saturday, Hasty Hills

July 20, Thursday, Longacres

July 30, Sunday, High Times

August 5, Saturday, Longacres

August 10^th, Thursday, Longacres Bold Jumper Derby and Hunter Classics and Series Championship Awards Party.

(Erie County Fair "A" rated is not STSS points, but we show there August 15 to 17^th)

Hey, Kahley, we did get your signup materials yesterday, and your information packet is on the way back to you!

I have several personal trips to make in the next two weeks, but I will be checking email and the answering machine regularly. If any of you have questions or need to get in touch about one of the final enrollments, we will get back to you. Just be patient. It could take a day or two.

After April 12^th, we are here at the farm working to get ready for the summer full time. Now that we have all but the final week or two of the 2006 season filled, we are turning our attention to both seasonal maintenance and to buying and leasing a few more horses. With the new horses Meghan has added during the past two years we have enough already to run a good program. But with a full enrollment all summer long we want to have an extra cushion so that each of our horses gets enough hours off during the week to stay fresh and healthy.

Some of you surely remember Majic, the black gelding we have often borrowed from Wendy P for the summer. A friend of Wendy's wrote last week and asked if we would like to take her Appendix mare for the summer. She sounds like a great horse, so we're off to a good start. We plan to add about six horses to the barn for the summer, some permanent purchases, and some on loan or lease.

If any of you are looking for a horse to buy this coming year, let us know. We have lots of good contacts in our part of the country and while we look for new horses for Longacres, Meghan can be looking for additional sale horses. We have found some good ones for customers in the past.

The phone and email have been very active the past few days as our enrollment gets closer and closer to capacity. When we got home from an evening out at the mall last night we had three new messages all asking, "How can I reserve one of those final spots?" Depending on the ages in question, Longacres may be full for the season very soon. Telephone or email us if you are interested in one of the final spots available.

I have another interesting human interest story for you. We've been quite pleased that our 2006 students are coming to Longacres from all over the country. In addition to our neighbors from New York (2), Pennsylvania (living in Spain now), and New Jersey (4), we have students attending this year from Vermont, Colorado, Massachusetts, MARYLAND (5), Georgia, Kentucky, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, South Carolina, (maybe Missouri), and a number from California (6)! Many of you are coming from far away. But that's nothing so far; I have been corresponding this week with Robin H. about having her daughter, Emmy, attend pre-camp weeks. Robin and Emmy live in Chicken, Alaska! Following is an excerpt from one of Robin's emails describing the "highway" through Chicken and how far they have to go to do their grocery shopping!

My uncle mapquested us and found they list our great and glorious highway as a "jeep trail"!!!!! Ours is one of the most traveled hwy's in the state but...all things are relative!! This I can tell you; it's still mostly gravel, they do not plow it in the winter, it gets very narrow in places and the hordes of motorhomes we see in June/July/August find it... a bit of a challenge. I run the little Post Office so I see a lot of people and I've found that, of the ones who bring up the subject of the road, they tend to either try to outmacho me telling me that "That was nothing, we have worse roads than that in Montana" (or where ever). Or they tell me it was the "most horrible thing of their lives, they nearly died and that motorhomes shouldn't be allowed on that road!" As always, the truth lies somewhere in the middle ;-). Tons of people negotiate it fine and even come back in 5 or ten years to do it again so it is certainly not like driving through the Hindu Kush. And as for the macho ones, I have learned to tell them that...they most certainly do not have a major hwy like ours in any state! They are comparing it to a logging road and that isn't accurate. Also, some of the nightmare stories they hear are just a matter of timing. Just because they passed thru on a good day doesn't mean it can't all change tomorrow and then I'll give a few examples and that generally straightens them out ;-). Also, the first (going towards Tok) 66 miles has recently been much straightened and chipsealed (pavement, for all intents and purposes) so some of the "adventure" has been lost. And I just today heard they plan to chipseal some more this summer.

We are expecting the plows in any day now altho it won't technically be open until they plow all the way to the Yukon AND the Yukon has gone out and the ferry is in. Oh, that's another sad thing, they plan to put in a bridge at Dawson!!!!!! :-(

We used to live where my husband now summers (and we go out w/ him on weekends to help when we can) which is about 13 miles from here by trail. Chicken proper has gotten crowded!!

I'm glad you enjoyed McPhee's book :-).

Fairbanks is about 300 miles (6 hrs), Anchorage abt 400 (8hrs), summer only of course. We used to only go to Anch. when we needed to go to town because that is where Dick is from originally but now we often do our grocery shopping in Fbx. They got a Sam's Club several years ago and it's just a much easier trip, not only is it 100 miles closer but the hwy is just straight and mindless whereas the run to Anchorage whips you, even with all the straightening that's been done in recent yrs. The amazing thing is, now that you've been looking at a map of Alaska, people will think they've seen Alaska if they've driven the hwys but truly, it's only a small part of this great state that can be reached by highway!!

I'm obviously full of opinions and full of pride for Alaska...if you and Meghan ever come north do let me know and I'll happily do my best to help you with ideas and logistics :-).

We do have lots of wolves and they are a very cool animal :-). You can tell Meghan that we don't often hear them howl but it sure is a treat when we do.

Okay, I'd better send this email and then get to business!!! ;-) We had just finished dinner when I got on the computer and saw you email. Robin :-)"

How cool is that? - Tom & Meghan

Emily, Mary, and Julie's forms and deposits have all arrived at Longacres, so the July 9 to July 23^rd session is now completely full and closed to further enrollment. We have one spot left from June 25^th to July 9^th. It is reserved for a 10 or 11 year old student for one more week; then open to any age on April 1^st.

There is one spot open the very final two weeks in August and two from July 26^th to August 6^th.

We also welcome Kahley S. from Denver, Colorado. We're saving a spot for the second session at Longacres while Kahley sends in her enrollment. She has a lot of riding experience. We're going to have a good group of riders training for the August shows and Erie County Fair!

Maybe Mandy? Good news came by email today! Long time Longacres student and former program director, Mandy Bartlett, may have some time off this summer and is thinking about joining us for a few weeks as a guest instructor. Longacres always welcomes help from people like Mandy. We're already very happy with the 2006 staff of Lillian, Kim, Sarah, and Danielle. But with a full enrollment, guest instructors will be a great addition. (The invitation is out; if any other former Longacres staff are checking in, and you would like to come as a guest instructor even for a day or two, we'll try to fit you in.) Just a month ago I was a little worried about who would fill all our 2006 staff positions. One of our great advantages at Longacres is that we have been doing this for 67 years, and we do have loyal alumni and contacts that keep popping up just when we most need another staff member.

Pictures & Video!

I had some unexpected fun this morning. Emily from Tennessee was in a horse show last week, and they sent me a very good video of her riding. Good job, Emily! You will fit right in at Longacres. And it's a good digital video. It used to be that people who sent in a video sent a grainy old VHS tape. Now more and more people have good digital video equipment like we use at Longacres. It was just like watching Emily on television!

And Mary from Utah sent a nice photo of herself on her horse bareback. But that's not even the most interesting part of the picture. Meghan and I enjoy traveling through Utah - it's one of the most beautiful states in the country. We were there just this past fall in our RV. And right there in the background of Mary's picture are the beautiful Wasatch Mountains just outside Salt Lake City! (If I have the wrong mountain, forgive me Mary. But it's a great mountain range!)

We are holding three of the final spaces in the first session for new girls who are sending their deposits via overnight mail, including Mary from Utah, Emily from Tennessee, and Julie from South Carolina. (As you can see, we're hosting 2006 Longacres students from everywhere!)

Speaking of saving spaces, we do like to be able to reassure those of you who are making up your minds on Longacres at the last minute that you will have a space if you choose us and send in a deposit. But it is awkward for us if we promise a space and then your enrollment form does not come in for a few days while we keep someone else waiting. We really hate to sound like the money is the important thing, but in fairness to those who are scrambling to make plans for the final remaining vacancies, we cannot save a spot beyond the time and day we promise.

First session is essentially full now if everyone we have spoken with takes the space they've indicated. We do have a couple of spots from July 26 to August 6^th, and one spot from August 6^th to 19^th. (or a full second session spot from July 26 to August 19^th. That's it. Then Longacres will be fully subscribed.