Wedding, dressage lesson and dissertation!

Wow, what a busy couple of weeks. It all started with my sister's hen weekend on the 7th September which I had organised to be a complete surprise for her. The atmosphere and mood leading up to the hen was rather tense as only mum and I knew what I had organised and everyone - including my sister - attending absolutely no idea what they were going to be participating in! Thankfully everyone enjoyed the day and it was a success. Which was a huge weight off my shoulders.

I had organised for us all to do "It's a Knock Out" which is exactly like the game show on television in the 90's. Teams had to do a number of games and activities and at the end the overall winners were the team with the most points. An example of the type of games we had to participate in was a large bouncy castle slide, covered with washing up liquid and water. The aim of this game was to grab onto the rope and pull ourselves up the slippery slide whilst on our knees only. It is more difficult than it sounds and all of us were thoroughly drenched!

Other games included dressing up in large penguin outfits and battling it out with other teams to see who could "floor" who first. One team member had to take part in this and Lauren from our team did a fantastic job! Another game was half of your team had to go one side of a long inflatable slide, whilst the other half went the other. Inside the slide was a rubber dingy that team mates had to take it in turns to jump into, whilst the team mates used the ropes to pull the dingy from one side to another. Once it reached one side the person in the dingy had to jump out and allow someone else in - all as quick as possible. It was made difficult by washing up liquid and water being thrown into the mix again. Of course I had to be one of the first to end up belly flopping into the dingy and ending up flat on my back whilst being pulled from one end to the other. All good fun...


We all had an amazing time and were thrilled to get 6th out of 11 teams!! Bearing in mind we were the only team to have less than the recommended amount of team numbers, we were all girls and three of our members were under 16! So, we were more than pleased with that result - and of the course the competitiveness in me was pleased.

To finish the day off we went back to Terri-anns, had a gossip and then got ready to go to Prezzo's.

Overall it was a brilliant day and all I can say is - I am glad Terri-ann enjoyed the surprise!


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Next up was her wedding the following weekend which I could not quite believe had come around so quickly! After endless conversations about whether her and Danny would get married in Vegas, Scotland, Portsmouth....they finally decided to get married in our home town of Nottingham and then go travelling in their campervan for the honeymoon. Just 2 weeks before the wedding Danny surprised Terri-ann by telling her they were actually going travelling in America for 2 weeks just two days after the wedding. First up they were going to Las-Vegas, then LA and Hollywood and then New York. They are there now and it sounds like they are having an absolutely amazing time. I am not jealous at all......

All the girls got to the wedding venue, which was in the Park in Nottingham the evening before the wedding, meaning the groom as left at home to think about whether or not my sister was too much to take on! Thankfully he decided he could cope with her high demands. Ha!

We had a lovely meal the night before and it was nice to get people together that both Terri-ann and I hadn't seen in a while. The early night that we had initially planned went right out of the window as we didn't finish eating and drinking until gone 11pm and then it was time to head to Terri-anns room and sort out the seating arrangements, table decorations and everything else!

We finally got to bed around 1:30pm and to be quite honest I don't think I slept a wink. It's not every day your big-sister gets married!

The following morning was a flurry of nerves, laughter and everything else that came along with a wedding. I'd had a silly idea that because it wasn't a big wedding I would do a speech for Terri-ann and talk about the times we shared when growing up. Only I could leave planning and writing this until the day of the wedding though. Oh well, I work better under pressure.

Terri-ann seemed calm throughout the whole morning, which meant one of two things. She simply had none or was either very good at hiding her nerves.... I'd go for the latter. If there is one thing that wound me up about my sister leading up to the wedding was how relaxed and laid back she was. About three months before the wedding I asked her who was doing our hair. "Oh, do we need hairdressers then...?" was her reply. I'll say no more! Thankfully everything came together nicely.

I had arranged Rob, the photographer to come for the entire day of the wedding so he could capture every special moment of the day. Again, up until a couple of months before the wedding there was no photographer as we weren't sure if we were just going to get family and friends to take photos, but after putting my foot down that no she needed a photographer I went on Twitter to find one. Thankfully Rob replied to my tweet and request of a more natural photographer rather than one that took lots of staged photos which I had witnessed so many times at various weddings I had been to. The photographs from the whole day are absolutely amazing, I'm not quite sure how I will decide on just a couple to buy!

The whole day went smoothly without any hitch. I was over the moon when my sister and Danny told me (during the ceremony!) that I was one of their witnesses. You can imagine my surprise and I cannot thank them enough. My sister looked as pretty as ever and her dress was gorgeous. She went for the natural look as she didn't want to look "fake" in piling too much make up on and she never had any intention of wearing a big puffy dress because it just isn't her. I think her decision was right for her as she looked nothing short of stunning. Danny also scrubbed up well and I don't think I have ever seen him looking so smart - nor shed a tear!

For the evening disco Terri-ann and Danny had decided to hire a photo booth which went down a storm. It is a fantastic idea instead of having a wedding guest book. The people who run the photo booth print out your photos there and then for you, give you one copy and put the other in the bride and grooms guestbook so the guests can write a message at the side of their photos. I think the majority of us spent a lot of time in there messing around with the props and having funny photos taken. It was definitely well worth the money as an ice-breaker and something for guests to enjoy.

Overall we had another thoroughly enjoyable day and I cannot believe my big sister is married. I am sure both her and Danny will have the most amazing life together. Congratulations to the both of you.

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The week following the wedding was equally as up in the air as the weeks leading up to the wedding. My 15,000 word Masters in Sports Journalism dissertation was due in and I had booked in a dressage lesson for myself. Oh well, remember I work better under pressure!

For the few weeks leading up to the dissertation deadline I had gone into some kind of meltdown. I was adamant I couldn't write and I may as well give it all up. I think pressure does funny things to me. Anyway, with a little help from Mark who got me back on the right track I realised I could write and I could finish the dissertation.

Since handing it in I have been inundated with requests from fellow riders asking if they can read my dissertation as the topic is of interest to them. I am currently looking at how I can make it available for people to read, whilst ensuring it is all copywrited so please bear with me. For those interested, it is on the unrepresentation of British Eventing in the British Print Quality Media. The conclusion is not one I thought I would reach and for an outsider I can see why it would make such an interesting read. Fingers crossed I pass though! £60 later to get it bound like a book and two copies printed out I was considerably skinter and my Masters is finally (hopefully) finished. Wow, what a year!

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My dressage lesson was thankfully also a success. I am feeling much more confident since my first lesson and although Ceaser still throws in the occasional spook I feel Amy has now showed me how to prepare and deal with it better. This time round we had absolutely no hissy fits and Ceaser worked lovely for the entire hour. I have no idea how, but Amy also had me cantering around the arena on our bad rein, with barely any contact.

Instead of concentrating on getting him working into his contact more and less like a coiled spring we spent the hour focusing on different lateral moments we may encounter in our dressage tests. Amy also gave me a royal kick up the bum as I told her I wanted to try for the British Dressage Northern Region teams but had a phobia of competing in front of large amounts of people.




Ceaser worked really nicely and did some rather nice leg-yielding in both trot and canter. We haven't worked on that for such a long time now so it was nice to do something different. Amy also had a look at our centrelines which she said I seem to be setting him up wrong for. Because he falls through his left shoulder occasionally she said I need to set him up differently to how I would a horse that didn't - which could be where we are losing marks so it was good to work through that.

Afterwards we did a little walk to canter transitions on both reins which went well. He finds this much easier on the right rein but struggles on the left, so we spent more time trying to get him right on the left and again. Amy said I needed to set him up a little differently to help him get the correct canter lead better on his difficult rein.

Overall I felt the lesson was once again very productive. I have now booked in for the Area Festival at the beginning of October so it is all systems go with training and preparing for this - Watch out Valegro and Charlotte....Ceaser is about (haha, I wish!).

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Labels: british dressage , british eventing , Dissertation , dressage , Masters in Sports Journalism , Nottingham , sister , The Park Nottingham , Valegro , Wedding