Mother nature is treating us well this week. The radar shows heavy rain passing all around us and we've heard the rumble of distant thunder all morning, but all we got was a light mist that barely wet our shirts. We got in both the morning lessons with plenty of jumping to practice for tomorrow's show. We still could get some rain this afternoon, but it looks like most of the cold front has already passed us by.

The girls are all riding very well this week. Andrea and Kate are doing Puddle Jumpers tomorrow, and Olivia will probably be ready to try it next week. Danita is jumping full courses with more confidence every day. Laura - well just look at the new picture at the top of this page to see how Laura's doing!

Wild Girl, Emily, is getting her equitation down and doing a good job of being able to keep her jumper horses slow and under control before she turns on her patented "speed runs" in the jump offs. Jen's favorite horse, ShaBang, is lame, but she is concentrating on training "Brother", the three year old thoroughbred. She did a great job on him this morning on the scary outside course. Likewise, Maddy and Ho-ho did a great job on the outside jumper course with all the tight turns. Shelly and Emmy rode good jumpers, Quantum and Jenna in the control exercise this morning and were very good.

"The Crud"

We tell you when we have a problem at Longacres, large or small. Instructor, Mandy, has the "creeping crud", the generic name for anything contagious at a summer camp. In this case, it is an eye infection, "pink eye". She thought it was just irritation from her contacts on Monday, but it did not get better yesterday, so we sent her in to the clinic in town, and they diagnosed pink eye, which is easily treatable, but quite contagious. SO far no one else has symptoms. But we are watching closely and putting as much extra sanitary precautions to work as possible. Mandy has medication and the doctors think she will be beyond the contagious phase by Friday. She has moved out of her cabin and into the guest cabin, and will be taking showers up at the main house and eating separately for the next few days. She is still teaching and supervising. The girls are using lots of paper products at meals, trying not to touch each other unnecessarily, and washing hands frequently.

Hopefully this will pass without anyone else catching it, but the girls have all been briefed, and if anyone has symptoms we'll have them checked. We'll keep you informed, and will call a parent immediately if anyone else shows symptoms.

- Tom & Meghan

PS - I have some ideas on the formatting problem for this page, but it may take a day or two to rebuild it.

Meghan, Mandy, and I worked until well after dark putting the finishing touches on the jump courses for Thursday's show. We're supposed to get quite a bit of rain tomorrow, and it would be no fun doing this work in the wet. So we did it in the lights from the tractor.

I seem to have accidentally changed the formatting on this page so the text scrolls off to the right more than it did until my last update. Bear with me while I figure it out or if there are any HTML guru's out there, take a look at the formatting and let me know what I changed.

- Tom

Before I go down to watch the girls practice for the show and get video taped again, I just posted two great new pictures just above this update; scroll up and enjoy!

Scorching hot today, but we got in a very good morning ride after setting up the courses for Thursday's horse show. Tom and Mandy worked together teaching two lessons and video taping everyone doing multiple courses. We expect some rain tomorrow and we'll review the video if one of the lessons gets rained out. Some strong thunder storms passed close to Longacres this morning, but we didn't get a drop.

With the heat, we went straight from lunch to the air conditioned Kone King for dessert!

Many girls rode again when we got home, but Peyton, Andrea, and Kate went to the creek for a splash. They caught some minnows in a bottle. Kid old fashioned summer fun in the country for kids, and we're glad to throw some of that in at Longacres on a day like this.

We have another horse show practice tonight after dinner.

Perhaps the nicest piece of news we could pass on is to paste in a copy of the email we jsut got from 12 year old Ofelia who just went home from Longacres yesterday. Here's Ofelia:

Hi Tom and Meghan!

I am so homesick to be back at LA.:( My apartment seems so small and depressing and I miss the horses alot! It is really hot, humid, and boring here and I

can't stop thinking about LA!!! I miss everyone so much and I wish I could have stayed for much longer!

Anyway, enough with the sad part....

I saw all the recent pictures, especially the pictures of Kate and sweet Mer...I am proud to say she is

truely and officialy part of the ILMFC(I can tell from the pictures, and anyway, what is not to like about that sweet pony), and I really wanted to meet her!

Tell her she has to come back next year(as well as Sam) so we can bond with Merlin....:)

I miss everyone at LA SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO(whew,

that was long, but true) much, so please tell everyone I say hi, and if Kate could give Mer Mer a big hug and kiss for me!!!:)

Ofelia

PS:

I will send either banana bread of chocolate muffins

soon, so you can alert Peyton that a food of some sort

involving chocolate will come soon....

Also, I am very jealous of Laura(also known as the

overgrown 12 year old), since she gets to stay for

2(!!!!!!!!!) more weeks!

We have two scorching hot days today and tomorrow, so we should get in lots of trail rides through the cooler woods. Then it turns much cooler again for the second half of the week.

The new group of younger riders seem to have already bonded and are getting along together wonderfully. Laura and all of us miss you guys who went home on Sunday, but Kate, Andrea, and Olivia are proving good substitutes. Laura and Kate are hitting it off especially well!

Our July 8th session is now under way. The sad "goodbye's" were said this morning, but we've turned our attention to the new students arriving today. Olivia was the first to arrive this morning, returning to Longacres as a second year student. Andrea seems like she has been at Longacres for years even though it is her first time here as an official Longacres student. Andrea lives nearby and has shown at Longacres horse shows many times! And Kate is brand new to Longacres, a good riding ten year old from Quebec. The three of them are riding now, taking turns on Merlin, Star, and Zany as they get to know several Longacres horses in their first hour here.

Danita arrives with her own horse later this afternoon.

Most of the girls here for the full season are in town getting their laundry done, but Laura and Peyton stayed back here to help the new girls get settled in.

When the girls in town come back around three, we're going to have a training session for the young thoroughbreds and then watch video from yesterday's horse show.

Longacres riders all did a fantastic job at the Quakerfield Show today. Quantum won three jumper classes, was Puddle Jumper reserve Champion and Schooling Jumper Champion. Shelly and "Devil Horns" won one Special Jumper class after being unlucky pulling rails in her other classes. Ofelia and Merlin won a class. Danielle won a class, and many others won lots of ribbons! We'll post some lists tomorrow along with a huge picture album. We took 235 pictures today!!!!! It took us half an hour just to look at all of them on the laptop at dinner.

We will badly miss Danielle, both Amanda's, and Ofelia who have to go home tomorrow. Sob, sob!

We're having a busy day getting ready for the show tomorrow. We took a lot of video, but no pictures for today. We'll have a big album tomorrow night with pictures from the show.

Shelly took a scary tumble off her own horse today. Jenna tripped, not even very bady, but somehow Shelly got ahead and went over Jenna's neck. Shelly has a good bruise but is ok and rode Jenna again after dinner. (It is on video, which we are watching in about a half hour.)

It's hard to believe that we have to say, "Goodbye", to both Amanda's, Danielle, and Ofelia Sunday. We'll miss you! But we look forward to showing Longacres riding to Danita, Kate, Andrea, and Olivia. Olivia was here last year, Andrea has ridden at Longacres shows many times, we met Danita over the winter, and Meghan has spoken with Kate's family many times, so we feel like they are already part of the family.

Wish us all good luck in the show.

Is Tom cool? Well, that's what I asked the girls as I walked into dinner. I asked, "Am I cool?" The girls knew it must be some kind of trick question and there was some nervous looking around and a few giggles - and one or two, "Of course!" answers (good girls, I'll reward you later!)

Then, without giving them much time to think, I pulled my hand out of my pocket and held up my brand new iPhone!!! This is apparently a very desirable little toy for teenage girls as well as computer oriented old men, and there was a lot of screaming and "Way to go, Tom!" shouts. Everyone gathered around and wanted to push things around on the touch screen.

It is an unnecessary extravagance, but, hey, we've been working hard all summer, and it was about time for Tom to give himself a little treat (with Meghan's generous consent (well, she did get a little necklace out of the deal!)

And how about this for a coincidence: As Meghan and I were standing at the AT&T store counter signing up for the iPhone package, we heard an excited voice saying, "Meghan!" We turned around and there was Deb Hollasch from mother - daughter week! She was at our Mall with some of her family. It was a great surprise for us all! (Hope you're feeling better, Sam!)

That's about it for tonight. More pictures coming tomorrow.

- Tom (Mr. Electronic Gadgets to YOU!)

After losing much of yesterday's riding time due to the all afternoon rain, we seem to be returning to the Longacres streak of very good luck with the weather. After breakfast this morning I did my usual check of the weather radar on my computers and saw a line of thunderstorms slowly working its way out of Ontario towards Longacres. We kept an eye on the line as we ran a good 10AM lesson. We switched horses for the 11AM formal lesson just a little early to beat the storms which were forecast to hit us by 11:30 to 11:40. We all got in some good riding and picture taking before the thunder came too close to continue right on schedule. The rain hit just as the last riders were dismounting to go down the hill to the barn.

The rain is still very welcome for our grass, and this is a fast moving storm system that should move throug completely during lunch and rest hour. We should be good to go for our afternoon rides by 3PM! Nice luck!

No phone calls? We are getting less than one phone call a day from parents. Meghan and I figure that is because our regular website updates are answering much of your curiosity from home. But you ARE welcome to call and talk with us anytime if you want some information, or just to hear about your loved one first hand!

After getting in a good and long, but wet riding lesson this morning, we were out most of the day at the mall, a movie, and dinner. Everyone is safely back at the farm now, getting ready for bed as we listen to the sound of distant fireworks from neighboring towns and villages.

We soon split into two groups with Mandy and Emmy teaching from horseback. I helped with the younger kids first and we got in quite a bit of jumping in the sand ring before it began to rain harder. They stayed out working on equitation with Emmy as the rain came down harder - hey, we were all pretty wet already!

Then I went out in the field and we got in some more jumping and work on feeling leads as the rain came down. When I finally sent the girls down to the barn to dry out, Emily actually wanted to stay and ride more in the rain! Good spirits all around.

We're keeping an eye on the sky for later this afternoon. We may still go out to a movie, or might try to get in one more ride.

We went in to the town park where there was a band before the fireworks last night. Meghan, along with Peyton, Robyn, Emmy, and Emily did some SERIOUS dancing! We'll post some pictures later.

We woke up to some desperately needed light rain this morning, with heavier rain due this afternoon. It is letting up for a few hours now, so we expect to get som riding in this morning. We'll have the badly needed rain on and off today and tomorrow, with more great riding weather at the end of the week for the horse show. Spirits are very high, and this group will have a good time rain or shine.

The second week of a two week session when we have younger kids leaving soon can be a fine time to be at Longacres! We always have good riding opportunities and lessons here. But when some of our great younger students will be leaving soon, we try to pull out all the stops and add special events that will make their stay at Longacres even more memorable. You all come to Longacres to enjoy horses, ride for hours, and improve your skills. But often what you remember most years from now will be the unexpected, special events.

Last night as we were putting the horses away, we announced an unscheduled midnight ride under a nearly full moon, just for the junior age kids in Pegasus bunk. Emmy and Emily supervised the preparations, and Tom stayed with the girls the whole time to make sure they were safe. And what a ride! Moonlight rides come in three varieties - the "standard", the "Deluxe", and the "Super Deluxe". Beginner riders usually get only the standard. But Ofelia, Danielle, Laura, Amanda, Emmy, and Emily were in such great control of their horses last night that Tom let them have a "Super Deluxe" moonlight ride. That included cantering one at a time and JUMPING a small white jump that was lit almost bright as day by the nearly full moon!

It was Emmy on Ebony (invisible at night!), Emily on Ginger, Ofelia on Merlin, Amanda on Star, Laura on Zany, and Danielle on Kingsley. We finished off the night by standing on the woods side of the field all lined up, looking at the moon, and making a wish as we stood in complete silence for two full minutes soaking in the beautiful night atmosphere. It was a magical moment, and what is the very best about summer riding camp!

Tonight we all go to town for a great fireworks display at the town park. And the week has only just begun. This will be a fun week at Longacres, with many more special events planned!

- Tom

But it was also a very good day for big sister, Maddy. Maddy was a good, careful rider at Longacres last season, but just a little tentative and unsure of herself. Well, just growing up for another year and some hard work in her lessons over the winter have contributed to an amazing change in Maddy's riding abilities. Amazing!

Tom began noticing the change after only a day or two of this session. Maddy was paying attention to details of her riding like no one else. In her quiet way, Maddy just got everything done well. After only three days, Tom and Mandy took Maddy aside and told her she would go far if she keeps up this commitment to her riding. We began putting Maddy on the challenging horses like ShaBang, and she continued to do well. And especially well on younger green horses like Horatio. In the past two days we've been working on improving our ability to tell our leads and see how well the more experienced riders can feel their leads without looking. Turns out Maddy was able to feel the correct lead after just two steps without looking, something even our stongest and most experienced riders do not do consistently!

Well, that was enough for Tom. He invited Maddy and Ofelia to ride in a special semi-private lesson with him this afternoon. And asked Maddy to ride Quantum. Let's see how she handles THIS challenge, Tom wondered.

Just fine, was the answer, as you can see from the picture at the top of this page! Maddy jumped Quantum confidently and smoothly. Over some big timber! Maddy is certainly to be considered for the 2007 most improved rider award! Nice job, girl!

- Tom

A blessedly peaceful day here at Longacres for the first time in five weeks! Most of our customers for the first month in June are here for one or two week special clinics, so many are coming and going every week, we spend a lot of time on weekends saying "goodbye" and showing new people around the farm. This week, nobody is coming or going, the horses are on their day of rest today, Emmy and Mandy are "off" and sleeping most of the day, and our OUTSTANDING C.I.T.'s, Emily, Jenn, and Shelly are doing a great job of taking care of the horses and the other kids. Meghan and I actually had breakfast together and a peaceful drive in the country after!

Guess what? REGAN is coming back for Lazy Days, so we only have three spots left! We can't wait to see you again Regan! (Regan just got her driver's license - watch out if you're on the road down that way!)

- Tom

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz!!!!

- Tom

Check the picture of our little fawn friend above! We had good lessons in both rings this morning with lots of pictures and video for later tonight. The girls are doing well with drill team practice, and we think they'll put on a good performance to open the horse show on Saturday morning.

I'll be out in the woods with some of Meghan's boys much of this afternoon cutting out new logs for the cross country event at the show.

Late this afternoon is a town and mall evening for dinner and fun. We will post pictures today, but perhaps not until late evening.

The weather continues to be "great" for being outdoors, but we're getting into a serious drought condition that is making the ground very hard, even on Longacres' nice grass riding fields. We had a 70% chance of heavy showers and thunderstorms overnight. But the advertised cold front melted away over western New York and Longacres got only a few sprinkles this morning that did not even wet the dust in the riding areas. We had heavy rain pass within 25 miles of us, but nada here! The only silver lining is that we have five days of cool, pleasant weather coming over the weekend and into next week. But if we don't get rain soon we're going to begin having some of our horses go lame from the hard ground. It is going to be a challenge for Mandy to find ways to not overwork the horses in these conditions.

PS - No guarantee of pictures today. We're going into horse show preparation mode and the next couple of days we might miss the picture taking once or twice - maybe - - -

One last hot day on tap and then terrific cool weather the rest of the week! We had good lessons the past two days, so we'll be doing lots of trail rides through the cooler woods today. And we're lucking out in another way - we should get some desperately needed rain later today. And it appears that it will be very late, possibly raining only overnight. That would be good.

We're working on several new stadium horse jumps and two log jumps for our cross country event this week. We hope to have them all done for the show on Saturday. More later.

We are doing all right in this short heat wave so far. The girls all talked over the options last night and chose not to get up early for a before breakfast ride. Since the heat wave is only going to be a couple of days, we left the decision to the girls. If it were a whole week of 90 degree weather, we'd insist on an early morning ride to get in our full allotment of riding lessons.

So we had one hour and a half lesson this morning with lots of video for everyone and all the pictures in the above album. Lots of the girls did some good riding, but the stars of this mornings session were "Oratio" and Maddy. Maddy got the Gold Star for especially good riding. She had Hoho looking like a made equitation horse or show ring hunter!!

We're about to have lunch, a session in the air conditioned video room watching this morning's tape. And then a rare mid afternoon KONE KING trip! Then we're going to have a drill team practice where we just walk and trot during the hottest part of the afternoon. We'll finish with a long after dinner ride when it cools down a little in the evening. We'll end up with about 3 1/2 to 4 hours of riding today. One more hot one tomorrow, and then back to gorgeous cool riding weather for the rest of the week including our show on Saturday. We may actually have to wear sweatshirts the morning of the show with a forecast high of only 71 degrees that day!

We began the 2007 drill team preparations yesterday. Everyone but Mandy is riding in the mounted drill. Sometimes we spend much of the first half of the summer practicing and getting ready. But this year we're going to do an intense preparation just this week and put on a public performance to open the horse show this Saturday morning after just five days of practice! It is going to be a challenge, but we like the idea of working hard on this interesting project and then going on to other things next week. We will probably do another mini-drill team the third week of this session when we have some new riders coming in (so you'll get to do this also, Danita!).

More later - the pictures should be up already, since we got an early start today.

- Tom

After a fun month of Early Bird and other pre-season clinics, the regular 2007 season at Longacres is now under way. We said "goodbye" to all our great mother - daughter teams from the last week this morning. Well, not quite all, since Laura and Ofelia are staying on for part of the first half of the summer.

Maddy, Amanda, Peyton, Jenn, Shelly, Danielle, Amanda from Vermont, and Robyn have joined Ofelia and Laura and all have arrived safely. CIT Emily is coming in later this afternoon. The girls already here had a quick evaluation ride this morning and will have another at about 4PM, even though this is the horse's day of rest normally.

Tomorrow we'll have a full schedule of riding. We'll get as many hours in as we can Tuesday and Wednesday when it may get up into the 90's. We may get up very early in the morning to ride and take a nap in the heat of the day. By Thursday we will be back in a delightfully cool weather pattern that should hold right through our horse show next Saturday.

- Tom

Meghan and I are quite pleased with the way Longacres looks as we get ready for the first day of our regular summer camp sessions tomorrow. It is still quaint, rather informal Longacres. But many things have been rebuilt or improved since last summer, and many more improvements are still in the works. We're on a good track and we feel our hard work all spring is paying off.

This is also a good time to tell all of you who have attended our four weeks of early bird, Pro-Clinics, and mother - daughter weeks how very much we have enjoyed meeting and working with so many new people this spring. Beginning with Peggy and Luisa for adult week way back in May and right on through the great group of Longacres veterans and the wonderful Hollash family this week, we've had fine people this past month. We hope many of you return again next year (or come back this year like Hannah in August!).

Here's to giving thanks for the past month and looking forward to the next two!

- Tom & Meghan

Another great day at Longacres! We had planned a small, informal fun horse show with one of our partner stables in the Summer Series, Quakerfield. We thought it would be two quick hours of fun. But lots of horses and riders showed up and we didn't finish until a few minutes ago. Pretty much everyone got ribbons in either the games or the regular horse show events. Ofelia went in the regular hunter event on the outside course with her beloved Merlin. It was her first ever full course in a horse show and she was against eight other riders including adults and a professional trainer. She WON!!!!! Happy camper!

Speaking of Mike, Hannah has reserved one of the remaining spots for Lazy Days of August, and she will be returning for a second time in 2007 later in the summer. It will be great to have you back, Hannah.

It is actually cold here tonight. Everyone is running for their jackets and sweatshirts before the bonfire and smores in about a half hour. It will be good sleeping tonight, with temperatures in the 40's! We will wish we had these temperatures next Tuesday and Wednesday.

Instructors and kids are down at the barn getting ready for evening ride - mom's are up at the main house for a little after dinner "happy hour" with Meghan - TONS of shrimp! I just poked my head in and took my share of shrimp before going back to work.

We've had a maintenance crew working today (Tom and a couple of Meghan's crew!) getting everything trimmed and ship-shape for our new students arriving on Sunday. We can't wait to see you!

Peyton has arrived safely at Longacres to hugs and tears - she says it feels like coming home.

We got a CD of pictures taken at the show last weekend by Hannah's Dad, Mike. We'll post an album of some of them later today, along with more pictures of this week's riders.

Beautiful, cool riding weather today!

Not so cool for part of next week; Monday and Tuesday will be in the low 90's before the weather begins to moderate on Wednesday and Thursday. We may end of doing an early morning ride, a long nap, and evening rides with only a quiet trail in the afternoon. That's our "Plan B" for very hot weather. We also sometimes go to the mall or a movie on a very hot afternoon, but not during the first two days of regular camp, so that's out!

Very cool weather tonight, though, so we're having a camp fire and smores.

Hannah from the second Pro-Clinic week is seriously considering returning for Lazy Days of August. She just has to line up enough baby sitting jobs over the summer to pay for it. We hope it works out, Hannah - we'd love to have you for another week this summer at Longacres!

- Tom

Keep the answers coming about the quiz - you are close, but don't get the point of the question yet.

I know many of you at home are eager to get to Longacres. Do you feel the same way as Peyton who is on her way right now? Here is what she wrote about 4 AM:

well... the day has finally come, even though by looking out the window, it still looks and feels like night. But, snow, hail, rain, or shine, I will be in the NY state today!!

you will probably get this message in an hour or two, if you check your email every morning (like I do). By that time, I will either be at the airport waiting to board or already on the plane, headed towards Cleveland. Why they just couldn't make a direct flight to Longacres is just beyond me. : )

anyway, i will see both of you in a few hours!!!!!!! THANK GOD. I thought i was about to have a heart attack If I had to wait any longer!

<3impatient peyton

HOW DARE YOU GUYS GO TO KONE KING WITHOUT ME!?!?!?!?!?!?! that is NOT cool. i am very disappointed with you guys. *shakes finger madly a Tom and Meghan* humph. so, when is the next official Kone King run? I hope it is not before I get there!

well, i have to get to the airport now. : )))))))))))))))))

<3peyton

PS: im still mad. : (  

The quiz: Check the top picture on this page labelled "quiz". Can anyone tell me what the picture is all about? It is significant to those of you arriving at Longacres this week (don't let the wording of that hint throw you off.)

- Tom

- Tom

As I told you all earlier today, our good friend and hay supplier, Joe Grover lost his barn to a lightning strike fire last night. We were beginning to make calls this afternoon to find a new hay supplier for the rest of the summer. Then about five PM a truck pulled in the driveway filled with hay. It was Joe! We had him on our schedule to bring a small load of hay for the Orchard pasture tonight, but did not expect to see him at all this week let alone 22 hours after his barn burned down.

"How can you be here?", we asked.

"You had a load ordered for tonight, didn't you? - Of course I was going to be here!", answered Joe.

He told us that he has three other barns in the neighborhood leased and filled with hay, so he'll still be able to take care of us. He lost about a quarter of his hay supply. Fortunately, all his hay harvesting machinery was in other barns. He did lose most of his planting and cultivating equipment, but he has a number of months to replace that before he needs it again.

Joe was home at the time. When the lightning struck, it burned out the microwave and a lamp bulb in the kitchen. Joe ran out the door and to the barn when he saw the smoke, but the lightning strike had lit fires all over the barn and by the time he ran across the yard, it was too dangerous to get anything out of the fire. We're glad that Joe is ok and that he is still able to carry on his business!

- Tom

If I have kept track right, today is Carly's birthday. She was a good student last year, and is returning for Lazy Days week in August. (Thanks to Shelly for the reminder!)

Speaking of Lazy Days, we now have five people who have inquired about it this week. If they all signup, we will be full, but some of thenm won't know for sure for a little while. But don't wait too long if you are thinking about it!

Meghan does not do breakfast tomorrow, so she plans LOTS of picture taking! Check in after lunch.

Lots going on this afternoon! Tom taught the advanced group a lesson using an exercise similar to the one we watched at the Greg Best clinic at High Time last week. Ofelia did especially well!

Then we did some control exercises and a timed game with Katie, Deb, Sam, and Sydney. Deb was riding Zany and JUST barely edged out Katie on Ebony for fastest time.

The dining hall remodeling is almost done outside, with new cedar shake shingles on the three remodeled sides. The beat up old fascia and soffit boards were also being replaced this afternoon. We'll post a picture soon when it is all done and the construction debris cleaned up.

Tonight is "girls' night out" at the Bar-Bill with Meghan and the moms. Tom and the counselors will keep an eye on things here at the farm, with a relaxed evening ride.

- Tom

It's a great day for riding at Longacres. Sunny and cool with a nice breeze! Mandy gave a demonstration to everyone on how we're training the young thoroughbreds, with some of our more experienced riders helping in the saddle. It got a little exciting when Eva slipped and fell down with Martha on her. Martha is fine, and so is Eva.

There was another ride after the training session and we're having our formal lessons this afternoon, with another ride planned in the evening. Everyone enjoyed the good sleeping weather last night after the cold front came through.

Many of you know Joe Grover who delivers our hay and bedding every week. During yesterday's thunder storms, lightning struck his big old hay barn and burned it to the ground. Thankfully no one was hurt. We hope Joe is back in business soon. In the meantime, we luckily just got a full delivery of hay so we have about five days to find a new hay supply.

Pictures to come later this afternoon.

The rest of the story - As I wrote my last update an hour ago, I had a message from Meghan that everyone was at the barn and safe from the storm. After I posted the update I went down to the barn to joke with the girls about the storm, and found out the whole story. They had actually gone out on a trail and as the sky got darker and darker they decided they had better head back to the barn. They ALMOST made it before the storm hit. Just as they were coming behind Pegasus cabin, the high wind and torrential rain began. The horses were ok at first but became more excited as they passed the canoeing pond and were almost "home" to their warm, dry barn. Sydney was suddenly cantering past the trail leader on usually dead calm Star! Everyone made it across the lawn to the barn without falling off, but as Sydney put it when she saw me a few minutes later, "That was exciting! But a little scary."

Meghan just headed down to the barn to bring the "moms" up for a happy hour at the house before dinner. There are some advantages to being a grownup at Longacres!

Finally a little rain - see picture above.

Three of us got wet! We got our first lesson in this morning, changed horses, mounted and rode up to the show rings. Then the wind picked up and thunder came closer. Mandy called the lesson and started down to the barn with her group. Perennially optimistic Tom kept Sharon and Emmy up top to warm up and try to get in a few jumps, but Mandy was right. The rains began as Sharon took her first jump, so Sharon, Emmy, and Tom got soaked riding back to the barn while Mandy's group made it to the barn just in time to stay dry!

There are as I write severe thunderstorm warnings for a storm 8 miles south of East Aurora (we are four miles southwest of East Aurora). But the storm has moved past us, probably about two to three miles away. So we are damp but have nowhere near the rain we need yet. More is to come later this afternoon, but most storms look like they will pass slightly to the south of us.

The girls are untacking their horses and meeting in the tack room for a seminar on horsemanship. After lunch a long and much needed rest hour is planned. Most of our mother - daughter pairs drove 7 hours or more yesterday and jumped right into three hours of riding and an hour of video analysis without any rest. This break will be welcome. The cold front is fast moving and we're going to have cool, sunny riding weather for the rest of the week!

Besides taking video, teaching everyone at least part of a lesson and scrubbing graffiti, Tom had time to go into the city and buy a replacement for our too tired old freezer so we can have ice cream for desert again!

Even if you don't know the new students you might want to check out the picture album of the day - there are many atmosphere shots taken around the barn and at the big creek on our first official "Sneaker-creeking" expedition. Tomorrow there is a 70% chance of heavy rain in the afternoon - much needed, so keep your fingers crosses!!

- Tom

We're really looking forward to meeting some of our old friends as well as several first timers at Longacres all arriving in about three hours. Weather looks good for the week - very warm this afternoon and tomorrow morning, so we'll take some quiet introductory rides to keep our riders and horses from overheating. Then a fast moving cold front comes through tomorrow afternoon and evening with high probability of heavy rain storms. Yes, we may miss a couple hours of riding in the afternoon, but we desperately need the rain to soften our ground and green up the grass. After the cold front, the rest of the week looks to be gorgeous cool sunny riding weather. Yippee!

Kelly and Ruby both had a chance to ride Quantum this morning - see the pictures.

Mandy and Emmy are off until late tomorrow morning and tell us they're doing their laundry and then taking four showers between now and the time the new session begins tomorrow.

Meghan and I sat by the creek and enjoyed the beautiful day for a while (see pictures), and soon will take a relaxing drive and maybe go out to dinner. - - - and maybe sneak in a little mowing and clean up work.

- Tom

PS - Thanks again to the great parents who helped us out at the show!

PPS - Peyton sent me a Father's Day card - sniff, sniff.

PPPS - If any of you great Clinic Week students get on the internet from your hotel rooms in Niagara Falls tonight, email and say "hello" - we miss you already!

I know, I should be asleep now. But I am still wired from show day. Thought I'd write a quick note to let those of you who follow the goings on at Longacres know that we've been getting some other things done even as we ran a horse show yesterday.

More news tomorrow night after we catch up on our sleep, then a whole new group of riders show up for official "mother - daughter week". But tomorrow afternoon we REST!

AND - - - MANY THANKS to all the parents who took part in helping us run the show. Great job! Especially Regan's mom running the in gate, Hannah's dad taking all the HDTV video, and Annie's dad doing much of the announcing and championship points.

You should have seen Meghan's face when she heard the compliment. It gave us new energy to finish the rest of the preparations for the show.

Almost all the girls did well in a final practice tonight. ShaBang acted up on Annie and gave her a little trouble. But Annie has done well on ShaBang all week and I'm confident she will bounce back tomorrow. We should have a big photo album late tomorrow night.

- Tom

I can't promise that we'll have another update until late Saturday after the show. Tomorrow is going to be a grueling day of work setting the course and getting everything ready for the show, as well as preparing the girls to ride their favorite horses in their chosen classes on Saturday. I'll try to give a quicky report very late tomorrow night (Friday). We'll see many of you at the show on Saturday. It looks like we may have more than 20 people at the traditional Pasquale's dinner after the show.

Meghan and I feel like Longacres has been in session for months, even though it's been not quite three weeks. It seems so long ago that Peggy and Luisa joined us for adult early bird week. Now Annie, Hannah, and Katherine are getting ready to leave after two weeks of Pro-Clinics. Seems like we've known them forever! We have a great group of older teenage girls here this session. They all got along with one another well from the first day. And they've acted like big sisters in the best sense to our young riders, Kelly and Ruby. The teens have also treated Diana and Kay, "the moms", with respect, yet not like old ladies. Diana and Kay have just been two more students at th barn who happen to have their daughters here with them this week. We will miss this group, especially since they're all leaving at once this weekend to be replaced by a whole new group next week for official "Mother - daughter" week. We have five sets of mothers with their daughters coming in Sunday afternoon and Monday morning.

If they are anything like this week's group, it will be another great experience. But new groups are especially hard work for Mandy and Emmy who have to start all over showing everyone how we do horse care and barn work at Longacres. It will be good to welcome back returning Longacres people next week like Sharon & Laura, Martha & Ofelia, and Shelly & Debbie at the end of the week. They can help teach the new families the ropes!

Looking ahead another week, Mandy and Emmy CAN'T WAIT until Jenn, Emily, and Shelly are here to share in the leadership at Longacres and to provide the continuity they will bring since they are all staying for eight weeks! Mandy and Emmy know that this past week and next week they are working harder than they will for the rest of the summer because so many people are new each week. But they've done a great job.

Wish us all good luck at the show on Saturday. The riders have all shown especially good progress in their training just the past two days. I think they are going to do well!

- Tom

Mandy and Emmy have been doing a superb job planing rides and assigning horses to keep everyone mounted in lessons while we have several horses out with injuries. Finally it caught up to us after the first clinic this morning when our wonderful Merlin showed signs of a light colic and we decided to take him out of work for the rest of the day. He is still eager to eat, so he is not very sick, but he is too good to take any chance on. Everyone still got their important Clinic ride in, and only one person will have to sit out in some of the extra rides the rest of the day. Meghan is also calling in response to ads in the paper trying to buy a couple of new horses for the rest of the summer to substitute for Joker. More later.

The girls will be up here in a few minutes to watch an hour of video from the past two days.

Also, thanks to Hanah's dad, Mike, who has volunteered to be a gate person and ring crew at the show this Saturday. Although we already have most of our key people in place for the show, there are always useful jobs an extra person can take care of to make the show better. If anyone else coming to the show would like to spend a couple of hours on ring crew or another job, let us know and we'll put you to work! And we hope some of you join us for our traditional after the show dinner out at Pasquale's.

- Tom

Although each day is different during Pro-Clinic weeks, we are getting a full five hours in today. Yesterday we rode a little less since we had two guest lessons and everyone was also quite tired after their first two days of riding. We got everyone to bed a little early last night, so they are looking better rested today. I just taught a video lesson this morning, and we're getting ready to go out and visit the Greg Best Clinic at High Time Stables. We'll be back for afternoon rides here at Longacres!

We also had a brief and unexpected thunder shower roll through right at the end of this morning's lesson. It barely rained enough to wash the dust off the grass, but at least it was a little moisture on our parched ground. Bring us more rain!

The real spirit of Longacres this week comes from eight year old Ruby and 11 year old Kelly. They are both tiny, but decidedly NOT bashful! They are both full of life and overflowing with energy. They are always laughing, asking questions, and have lots to say. And that's on a normal hour of the day. We just came back from a Kone King expedition where the little ones had at least their share of ice cream and were on a sugar high on top of their normal exuberance on the way home in the RV. They were asking non stop questions, and I turned to some of the older girls and asked, "Where do all those words come from?"

That's when Jackie chimed in with her comment, "We should lunge them!" Priceless!

Other events today: Leslie Ann McCullough is bringing her western New York 2006 Horse of the Year ("Finis") over to practice on the Longacres jump course this afternoon. She's bringing a talented jumper pony along and wants some of our girls to try him out and perhaps show him at our show this weekend.

Tom is working clearing brush to make our two new in and out of the pasture cross country jumps. He also ran to the lumber yard to pick up a new door for the remodeled dining hall storage room and his next act is to be plumber and hook up the second stove in the dining hall. And he taught a mini clinic on how horses pick up their leads this morning. The day is young!

Well, maybe tomorrow night we will get to bed early. Horse care ran a little late and then we had promised to show everyone their video from today, so we spent an hour and a quarter showing HD video taken during the morning lesson and the clinic. We learned a lot from this first day video that we'll be practicing tomorrow. All pictures from today are now posted at the below links. I can't promise that we got everyone. If we missed YOUR student, check back tomorrow - Meghan keeps track of things like that and will be sure to get the pictures needed tomorrow for everyone to be online.

I had a note from a parent about the fact that there are not return links on the picture album pages. It's a good point; the way our picture software works, it's cumbersome to put a link on the album page that will return you to our newsletter page. A good work around is to "favorite" the newsletter page in your browser so you can return with one click. Also, some of you may not be aware that the album pictures that are all grouped together are thumbnails only, and you get bigger pictures when you click on the thumbnails. Enjoy!

All our accident victims were laughing and joking at lunch, so all is well. Katherine was introduced to fellow Texans, Kay and Kelly, and asked them, "Did Y'all do such and such - - -", in her best Texas accent which she had not used all week up among us "Yankees"!

Everyone has arrived but Kay and Kelly, and they're due any minute. The new arrivals will get on horses for a quick get acquainted right after lunch, and then we have our first guest instructor (Diane from Quakerfield Stables) at 3PM.

We did have two small accidents this morning so we're stressing safety and caution the rest of the day. Hannah was working with her thoroughbred project horse, Spice, next to the barn. Spice was a little distracted. We began working the three young horses one behind the other and Spice got panicky about being last. She made a big lunge forward and unseated Hannah. Hannah picked herself right up and worked with Spice on a longe line for another half hour getting her well calmed down. Hannah then rode in my lesson on another difficult horse, ShaBang.

Katherine got kicked by her horse while she was tacking up in the stall. Katherine wanted to ride immediately in Tom's lesson but Meghan made her sit out and relax for a while. Katherine is not one to relax, and when Tom went down to see how she was, she was already working on her share of horse care - but she will be sore and have a couple of bruises.

Safety first, the rest of the day.

- Tired Tom

Regan arrived safely - this session seems to have a very compatible group of girls. They were already bonding well doing evening horse care and at dinner. Early to bed for them and lots of riding tomorrow!

I'm about to sit down and watch the last ever episode of my beloved Sopranos TV series :( - - I will probably be depressed for the rest of the night, but I'll rebound in time to teach tomorrow.

- Tom

10:15 PM - Tony lives (and agent Harris bent the rules to help him) - all is well in fantasy land.

ALSO: The main dining hall opens for the season with the bigger group coming in tomorrow. Meghan has it all cleaned up inside and the major construction is done. We have a few more days work putting on shingles and cleaning up outside. We'll post a picture when it's all done and cleaned up!

Alex, Jacki, Claire, and Regan are all safely at Longacres and have done their first horse care session and some ground work with the young thoroughbreds. More later.

Good news! Kingsley responded well overnight to his antibiotics and is noticeably better. With luck he will be back at work in a couple of days. We need you Kingsley!

Tom spent the mornign weedwhacking and mowing to make everything look fresh and neat for our new students arriving later today and tomorrow. He is now recovering from hayfever symptoms in his air conditioned room while the girls staying over to next week are in town doing their laundry!

We had a great time last night at an "end of session" cookie dough and video watching party at the main house. The girls were all in a good mood after their exciting day away from the farm at the cross country course. They also had an excellent and productive training session with the young thoroughbreds. So they are in a good mood today. But quite ready for their sleep in morning today and the horse's day of rest. Things are going well with all our students.

The horses are also really ready for their weekly day of rest. We always try to tell you, our readers, any bad news at Longacres along with all the good. We've been having some tough luck with horse health this spring. First Joker got hurt at his winter home and is lost to us for most of the summer. Next we have had some very nasty horse flies in our area that leave a nasty welt that turns into a sore. Our vet tells us this has been a problem at other farms in our area. We seem to be over the worst of that with fewer horses showing sores and fewer serious bites. (we've been sending the horses out to pasture with liberal fly spray applications)

Now, suddenly, we have two of our most gentle and useful horses out of commision for at least a short time with swelling from kicks they got in pasture. Kingsley's left hind leg is swollen up like a tree stump and infected. He is gettign a strong antibiotic treatment from the vet and we are keeping our fingers crossed that he will be back at work soon. And Justin got a similar kick, but it is much less severe and not infected. We really need horses like Justin and Kingsley this week when we are having some mom's and some less experienced kids coming to Longacres. Our veteran school horses like Star, Merlin, Brownie, Bobert, and the like will be working harder than we would like this week. At home, keep your fingers crossed for a quick recovery for Kingsley and Justin!!

And that's the latest news, good and not so good, from Longacres.

- Tom

(First filly to win the Belmont in 102 years)

The weather is wonderful. We'll probably have another ride after dinner, and then we have good video to watch. More later.

News of the day is a big drop in temperature and humidity with the passing of yesterday's cold front. We will have bright sun and temperatures in the 70's all week with only a chance of scattered showers late in the week - just enough to green up our grass for Saturday's show. A big improvement from the hot humid weather the past few days.

Check out the video link below.

The thoroughbred training session went well this morning. Hannah continued to work well with Spice and Annie did a good job on Eva. Emmy and Mandy worked with the powerful "Big Brother". All the horses trotted over ground poles and behaved well. At least until the session ended. As they were riding into the center of the ring to dismount, Emmy got too close to Spice on Brother - he spooked a little when Spice backed up toward him and Emmy ended up on the ground. She is OK - a nice grass stain on her back. A lesson learned about paying close attention even when you think the lesson is over!

Tom taught a long lesson late morning. All the girls did well and enjoyed it. We did tough conditioning work first and then rode a long course giving faults for not getting the planned striding in each of a number of lines of fences. Liz was the star of the day making just two mistakes on Ebony! Runner up was Annie on ShaBang. Katherine was "most improved", riding too slow and adding too many strides on her first ride. Tom decided she should get a "do over", and she was far better.

We're giving Mandy a well deserved sleep in tomorrow morning and Emmy and the girls will do horse care. Then another thoroughbred training session, a mini cross country lesson with Tom, and then we load up the horses and truck over to High Time for our cross country training session.

We did get just enough rain to help turn our grass green for the new students coming in Sunday night and Monday. But unfortunately, the serious rain missed us again - we could use more!

We're looking forward to adding the seven new students coming this week to our well "bonded" Longacres family! It will be a busy week.

- Tom

I'm teaching my lesson this morning after the girls work with the thoroughbreds and some green horses in the first hour. Then we're taking a little break this afternoon during likely thunderstorms and going to town and out to a movie and dinner.

Saturday we're vanning the horses to Leigh Fischer's nearby farm where they have a long elaborate cross country course. They are hosting a Combined Training event on Sunday and they are letting us do an extensive pre-event schooling session tomorrow. It should be an interesting new experience.

Barb Glica gave a good guest lesson today; she's a unique lady, and she was one of the favorite instructors for some of the girls.

This was also an active day for our new thoroughbred training program. Spice, Eva, and Brother all had two ground training sessions. They made good progress calming down and feeling more at home at Longacres. We're going to begin riding them tomorrow. All the girls had a chance to work with the young horses. For some, it turned out to be something like real work after the novelty wore off. But Hannah thrived on the training! She is good at it, patient yet imaginative in thinking of new things to show her horse. She is taking special responsibility for Spice, the five year old chestnut mare. They were getting along very well together tonight. Hannah also had an especially good day riding, making something of a breakthrough in having more confidence with her control and security. She did a good job on Horatio, even when he got rather frisky in the ring.

We did get big boxes from UPS that look like saddles from Regan, Peyton, and Claire - they are waiting for you. Regan, Annie is also eager to show you around; ditto for Emmy looking forward to introducing Claire to Longacres and the horses. It's nice to have two new girls coming in this weekend who already know a friend here!

More tomorrow,

Tom

- Tom

The girls are doing horse care now and I'm going down to pick them up soon for the Kone King trip. We're then coming back and starting a fire at the main house while we watch horse video's.

As mentioned last night, we rode every possible hour yesterday on what was forecast to be a rainy day. It rained nearby but not at Longacres. Not so today. The drizzle began about the time the girls were to get on and ride this morning. Liz was a little tired from five hours yesterday and took a look at the grey skies and decided to sit the morning ride out and rest. We encourage our riders to sit out if they're tired, so that was fine. The rest of the girls did not want to miss a ride and tacked up with sweat shirts for the cold drizzle and we had a great lesson. Mandy taught the first half and Tom the second half; we spent about an hour and a half riding. Everyone did a four jump gymnastic in Mandy's half of the lesson.

We are beginning to teach our new girls about walking courses and riding lines that they've walked. We set up a new line in the big show field last night and everyone walked it off to see how well they could plan their ride over the line today and how successfully they could execute their plan. It was 84' between the fences, though most of the girls walked with steps too long and thought it was shorter. They had a choice of cantering in over the first cross rail or trotting in, and then cantering on to the second fence (a small vertical). Emmy rode Patty and nailed her estimate of a holding eight stride perfectly both times. Katherine, Annie, and Hannah all got their planned striding within two tries, in some cases adjusting their plan between! We gave out chocolate candy kisses as rewards for each successful ride. Everyone is now on a pre-lunch chocolate "high"!!

The scheduled Becky Bates Clinic is moved to tomorrow when the sun will be out and it will not be as cold and windy. More to come later.

We'd like to send out a deeply felt "Goodbye" and thank you to Peggy and Luisa for being such great students and friends during adult week. You are missed already! (Keep that fork down, Luisa!)

Continued good luck with the weather! We got in MORE than our scheduled two hours of riding this morning, including a Clinic with Diane from Quakerfield that ran almost two hours. Radar shows the showers moving away for most of the afternoon, so we should get in lots more riding. We took lots of video and pictures at the clinic and will post some of the better ones later today. Most are not too exciting since they were taken so the girls could check their positions over fences and on the flat.

So far, so good. On what was supposed to be a miserable rainy day, the rain tapered off during breakfast and the sun is peaking out now. It is wet, but we should get our full riding and Quakerfield Stables clinic sessions in this morning. - stay tuned!

Near Midnight:

It looks like we may be having a repeat of last summer's weather pattern at Longacres. Many violent thunderstorms with heavy rain passed within five miles to our north or south, but Longacres had nothing more than passing showers most weeks. Again today, many areas within ten miles of Longacres were hit with over three inches of heavy rain. Here at Longacres we've barely wet our grass - we actually need more rain! We may get it overnight, but it looks like we'll be riding plenty at least tomorrow afternoon. Wierd.

Late Bulliten:

The "surprise" can now be revealed. Carly Fisher is returning to Longacres for "Lazy Days of August" week! Carly was a popular 2006 student who had planned to return to Longacres this year until she bought her own horse. Horse expenses won out over Longacres, but now we will get to see Carly again. It was supposed to be a surprise for Carly on her birthday on June 20th, but her mom couldn't keep the secret any longer - we're glad, since we were itching to send out a "welcome back Carly" message!

The second week has begun, with the safe arrival of Annie, Hannah, and Liz. Katherine got a bad flight connection and is being picked up by Meghan as I write this.

The show was GREAT! Only Emmy showed, though Peggy wished she had taken Merlin once she got there!

Emmy won two out of her four jumper classes. There were about fifteen jumpers in her second winning class. Quantum was clearly the best jumper out there today! He could do no wrong and was F-A-S-T!

A third class Emmy and Quantum should have won. They were about six seconds faster than anyone else in the jump-off, but Emmy made too sharp a turn and missed the second to last jump; she did not have to turn nearly that sharp since she was so far ahead of everyone else. The fourth class - well, let's just say there was confusion about the course!

It was Emmy's best jumper showing experience ever - she did a fine job and is off to a good start for the summer show season. She should be able to give Shelley and "Devil Horns" a little competition!

We had the traditional "after show" dinner at Pasquale's tonight, with Hannah's dad and Annie's mom joining us. It was very festive, and was also a bit of a "goodbye party" for Peggy and Luisa who are leaving tomorrow. They have been the perfect adult week guests, and we will miss them. Peggy is scheming and day dreaming about coming back for a while next summer as a "camp mom" between her scheduled time as a teacher.

- Tom

Shelley's mom, Debbie sent this YouTube link - you've GOT to see it!

Emmy is the only one of our group planning to show tomorrow at Pony Club show; if it doesn't get rained out. Wish her luck. We'll report tomorrow night.

- Tom

More interesting pictures to come later tonight! Our 2007 thoroughbred training program is beginning to take shape. We made our second visit of the month to the Reading Thoroughbred Breeding Farm this afternoon and rode "Little Evy" and "Big Brother". Check the pictures later tonight. They are both nice bay thoroughbreds, both broke to ride but need Longacres conditioning and training. We are also taking "Spice", a five year old mare that we broke for the Reading Farm two years ago. She has not done much since. All three horses will be for sale in the Longacres training program, and will be very interesting training projects for our advanced riders. All our students will be able to take part in the training program for these promising horses by helping with ground work and longing. These three horses join "Jack" who is already at Longacres and being conditioned.

We keep looking up at the sky hoping for some badly needed rain, but now the sun is out again. The best chance of rain is Sunday through Monday night, but even then it is not supposed to be an all day soaking rain. Which is good for next week's students, since even with some rain we should get most of our riding time in. If necessary, we'll do some seminars and horse discussions between rides. The last half of next week sounds like cool great riding weather!

We're set for our guest instructors for the Pro-Clinic next week, with Diane from Quakerfield Stables coming on Monday, Becy from Hasty Hills on Tuesday, and Leigh from High Time stables probably Wednesday. Colorful Barb (you know who I mean!) will likely be Thursday or Friday. And wonderful Tom will be here every day!

And below is a nice little message from Peyton. At various times this winter, the most regular correspondent award went to Peyton, Marta, or Alex. But for the past week, it has been all Shelley, no contest! And Shelley writes LONG messages that we print out for all the adult students and Emmy and Mandy to read at meals. Here's Peyton:

We had a pre-season visit from Danielle Taylor and her family (all of them!), this afternoon. Danielle is coming from June 23rd for the first two weeks. She rode Brownie today and did a good job. Danielle is about the same age as Ofelia, Amanda, and Laura who will also be here those weeks. We'll post some cute pictures of Amanda and her family later - oh; did I mention that Danielle is a "legacy"? Her father, Scott, is one of the few men who is an alumni of Longacres. We always like getting second generation campers!

Pray for rain for us; it clouded up all afternoon but we didn't get a drop!

The girls were pretty "good" last night. Meghan was up at 7am as usual to get an early start on office work, but Mandy, Peggy, and Luisa did sleep in and are starting horsecare after breakfast. Everyone had a good time out last night and enjoyed talking about something besides horses for a change!

Western New York is beginning to experience drought conditions and even our lush green fields are starting to show some brown tips on the grass. There is a 20 to 40 percent chance of rain each of the next five days, and for once, we're hoping for the slight chance of rain to come true. The ground gets hard for the horse's feet and a little slippery on the turns when it is too dry.

We're looking forward to meeting new student, Danielle, and her family when they visit Longacres later today. Danielle's father, Scott, is one of the few male Longacres alumni!

It pleases us when we hear from you out there that people are actually reading these website updates. And it sometimes surprises me that people who don't even come to Longacres are regular readers. They say it is kind of like a soap opera where they enjoy keeping track of our "story line" and what goes on running a horse farm. Diane and several of the other adult visitors last night mentioned they are regular readers. Hi, Diane!

But that is not the end of "adult night" at Longacres. This has been designated as "girls' night out". There are some activities you do a little differently during adult riding week. We were giving Peggy and Luisa their orientation talk when they arrived last weekend and telling them about the various special activities during the week, including a "girls' night out" with Meghan. Luisa was handing a wad of spending money for the week to Meghan, and Peggy (who is a little mischievous), said, "File that under drinkin' money!" So I imagine the adult girls will have a few bottles of soda pop as they socialize in town tonight! I will report in tomorrow's update whether everyone gets up on time for morning horsecare.

- Tom (who is home alone holding down the farm while Emmy keeps an eye on the horses)

PS- To whom it may concern: Mandy is tonight's designated driver!

Great lesson after dinner! Luisa cantered securely several times. Peggy jumped long courses and a line of decent size verticles. Brody went very well for Mandy. And Emmy jumped the road line on Quantum for the first time this year. Great weather for riding, but we could use some rain soon to keep the ground soft and the grass green.

- Tom

PS - Thanks for the nice note, Mike!

Busy again today at Longacres. Luisa cantered a few steps for the first time, and Peggy is getting to know her leads better. It's a lovely day and everyone went on a good trail ride.

The masonry contractors are here with a big machine and the whole east side of the dining hall building is propped up over a deep hole in the ground. Trucks are bringing in loads of gravel and construction materials, and it all looks pretty scary. But when they're done we're going to have solid, safe foundations under the dining hall again for many years.

A frustrating thing for us is that we've been mentioning all our 2007 repairs and improvements on this website all winter and spring. And some you will notice when you arrive; the many improvements at the barn and all the new jumps and jump rails and barn equipment. But much of our heavy investment in Longacres this year is either over your heads (like the barn roof) or underground! None of you will probably ever notice new dining hall foundations. That's just something you take for granted.

The fact that Longacres is doing very well and filling most sessions far in advance is allowing us to not only do the routine painting and fixing up we do every year, but to get into deep rooted heavy maintenance that is long overdue. It looks very scary down at the dining hall today. But it is the beginning of a new era at Longacres and setting the stage for many more years of the Longacres Riding Camp! We hope some of the ten year olds coming to Longacres for the first time this year will be using the dining hall for years as they grow up and perhaps return to Longacres as counselors in high school and college.

Joel started on remodeling Esseress cabin, so that should be done by the time we reach full enrollment in another ten days. Tom got all the trails trimmed and mowed again, and we're making plans for our first moonlight ride of the year. Peggy has decided that Merlin is "perfect"! Do you agree, Ofelia?

Mandy rode "Jack" today, one of the new thoroughbreds here for the summer for further training and conditioning. And we may go up to Linda Readings thoroughbred creeding farm tomorrow to look at three more thoroughbreds that might come for training and for sale. Peggy and Luisa get to watch their first horse shoeing tomorrow morning.

Another day at Longacres.

An unexpected bonus; because our dining hall is right in the middle of major repairs and upgrades still, we're eating up at the main house in the great room for the first two weeks of early bird when we have a smaller group. We thought of it as a substitute eating area just to get us by until the dining hall work is complete.

Meghan is just coming in the driveway from her work decorating the jumps with flowers. What dedication!

Actually, both of us feel the same about putting on those last minute little touches. We work very hard to get Longacres ready every spring, and we want our guests to have a good first impression when they come in the barn driveway for the first time. The biggest reason we run a riding program is for the people. But a nice fringe benefit for us is that getting the farm ready to open every year is sort of like painting a picture. Longacres goes to sleep every winter, and we wake her up in the spring and put her all back together. We think you'll like what you see when you arrive this season!

PS - We think we have a surprise mystery registration for "Lazy Days of August" - we're not telling!

We're expecting thunder storms tomorrow (sorry Peggy and Luisa, but we need the rain). Then beautiful sunny, cool riding weather on Monday and Tuesday!

Everyone is knocking themselves out working dawn til dusk putting the finishing touches on Longacres so we will look our best for Peggy and Luisa, our first official students of the summer. They're arriving Sunday afternoon, and if I do say so myself, things should be looking mighty fine around the barn and show fields when they arrive. And the horses in the pasture are almost all fat and sleek. (Patti is just a little thin)

Mandy, Emmy, Meghan, and Tom are about to leave for a dinner "out" with Uncle Billy. We've all been working long hours and, he, it's FRIDAY NIGHT!!!! Time to get out of Longacres for a mental break.

We'll take lots of pictures tomorrow so all of you at home, EXPECIALLY SHELLEY, can see how good Longacres looks with some of the new improvements finished!

All the horses that have returned to Longacres so far look terrific. We do have some nice horses and ponies. I actually think that Merlin, Brownie, ShaBang, Quanum, and Zaney look better than ever before. After the bad news of Joker's injury a few days ago it it very nice to see the rest of the horses in such good shape.

Remember the article last week about the possible loan of two thoroughbreds from a nearby breeding farm? They are coming to Longacres on Sunday for Mandy and Emmy to try them out.

Oh, and Shelley - - - we've seen those emails to Mandy and Emmy about how mad you are at them for being at Longacres so early while you are still in school. And you're right - - - you are MISSING ALL THE FUN!!!! By the time you get here, the horses are going to be all worn out and BORING! Kone King will be all out of ice cream! And we are having SO MUCH FUN up here this month, it is impossible to describe. I guess you just have to BE HERE to understand all the fun and excitement. - - - Oops - you're not here, though, are you?

Just kidding.

- Tom

PS - A YouTube video of Merlin galloping around and meeting his friends in pasture will be posted here in about an hour.

Sorry about no update last night - I was exhausted! We'll try to get some new horse and rider pictures to post later today. All the horses that are back so far look terrific. Good job with Zany, especially, Laura and Sharon!

We started training with Brody yesterday; Mandy rode an exhuberant bucking streak out of him. Then he was fine. He is just full of energy. Quantum is a little fat, but feeling great and eager for work. ShaBang looks better than ever, and Brownie is looking great, but beginning to show his age a little - just a little stiff sometimes. We are working him in slowly. He will be saved for real beginners and special rides from old friends this summer.

More to come later today.

We also send out a Longacres "welcome" to Regan from Maryland who is coming for the June 10th Pro-Clinic week. You got the very last possible spot, Regan!

Below: A picture of Brody taken when he arrived a couple of hours ago.

For all interested parties, Mandy and Emmy both arrived safely at Longacres to hugs all around! You may email them here with their name in the subject line and we'll print out the message and hand it to them.

BELOW: Left to right, Meghan, Emmy, Mandy, Mandy's mom - AND Shelley is there too, kinda - they are reading the email she sent last week!

I hope you noticed the new link at the top of this page that lets you jump right down here to the latest news. I was getting tired of scrolling down the page.

We are READY for Emmy and Mandy and the horses. The bunk cabin is cleaned, the pasture is all ready, the water to the pasture is on, and we need nothing but horses and riders! We will post some pictures on Sunday night and lots more including pictures of the horses in the pasture on Monday night.

Hannah sent a cute message with a "Wow!" about all the grass in the pictures of our week's work. We sometimes forget that many people spend most of their riding careers on dirt rings or sand rings. There's nothing wrong with that, but at Longacres we feel nothing matches the natural beauty of horses on green turf, so we maintain a LOT of grass!

More great progress at the farm today with all kinds of work getting done on the kitchen, new showers, opening the pasture for the horses arriving this weekend, mowing acres and acres of grass, and Meghan spent time getting fresh notebooks and office supplies for Emmy and Mandy.

There is some bad news to report. Joker jumped out of his pasture two days ago and got caught in some wire. He has a bad cut on his hind leg and will be off work for a couple of months. The vet thinks he will make a full recovery but will have a scar. It would not have been so serious, but the people leasing him for the winter did not look him over carefully when they caught him and put him back in his pasture, and they did not even notice the bad cut. By the time they finally noticed the cut yesterday, it was badly infected and it was too late to suture the wound.

The moral of the story is look your horse over carefully every time he comes in from a pasture and especially if he gets out of the pasture and is running around loose! Wounds can usually be treated well when they are fresh, but after a few hours and after infection has set in it takes a long time to heal and does not ever heal clean.

The Good News? - Joker is expected to be ready to go back to work just about the time Cara arrives for second session!

One you will like shows Meghan with our new maintenance man, Joel. He's a great guy and really likes working around Longacres. Thanks to a suggestion from Olivia, we're remodeling the showers and installing two hand held showers where the two old "rinse only" showers used to be. There will now be 4 useful showers, with the handy hand helds in two of them.

The ugly picture of the dining hall foundation shows one of the worst spots we're repairing. There was a small leak in the outer wall of the building that over many years allowed the floor to rot away in a spot where it was hard to see. I fortunately did a thorough "crawl under" inspection of all the foundations last fall and discovered signs of the damage. We could only see the extent of the damage when we took the corner of the building apart this week. It will be good as new when our project is done.

We're still working, but as you can see, most of the farm is looking very good. We're way ahead of where we are on maintenance and repairs at this time most years.

And, the fox cubs are back! At least some of them. I haven't seen them for four or five days, but this morning I was walking down the trail below the old director's cabin and looked up and there was one of the little ones. He had almost doubled in size since last week and looked very healthy. But they are much more shy and cautious about people than they were a week ago.

When I took the video and pictures, they would come out into plain sight if I kept some distance from their den and stood perfectly still. Now they are very careful not to be seen when people are anywhere near. The loss of their brother or sister must have made them more careful. Anyway, it is nice to know that at least some of them are surviving and growing up at Longacres.

Today we really got into the work at the dining hall. It looks AWFUL right now with one side of the kitchen all torn apart. But it will be much stronger and SAFE after we are done repairing everything. The kitchen will be more spacious, since we took the old stoves that are no longer used out today. They took up lots of space. Some of you coming for the early bird weeks and Pro-Clinics will see some of the work still in progress. The foundation work should all be wrapped up by the time the regular season begins on June 23rd. But we'll be continuing to do more exterior remodeling during the summer to make it look prettier.

Thanks to Jenn for a nice letter telling us about Shabang's progress over the winter. She says he is doing well and is more balanced than last year. The video on our "Video Links" page taken of Jenn and Shabang at the Jumper Derby last summer is by far our most popular YouTube video. It has been watched almost as much as our monster Truck video's on our other website! It is rated nearly five stars by the YouTube community!!!! Good job, Jenn!

Sorry for skipping two days in a row of updates! But we are BUSY here at Longacres. We had a big crew working on cleaning out old junk that had been stored under the lodge so it is ready for the contractors to repair the foundations. We found stuff that had probably been under there for 50 years or more! We got lots done on cleaning up trails and fixing drainage next to roads and paths. We also got the electricity turned on to the cabins. That's always an issue since tree branches fall on the wires over the winter. The place is looking great already.

Tomorrow is pasture repair day so that we'll be ready for the first horses to arrive this weekend along with Mandy and Emmy.

Check the picture above of Brody jumping last summer. He is one of our most interesting projects for this season. His training was just beginning to really pay off at the end of last summer and we have great hopes for his future. He is v