Honest Scrap Award

Thank you Crysta at Go Diego Go and Danielle at If the Trees Had Ears for both bestowing upon this blog its first award ever, the Honest Scrap Award. Both are fellow endurance riders whose blogs I've been following for a while now, and I will have the opportunity in a few weeks to meet Crysta in person while crewing at Tevis.

When you receive The Honest Scrap award you must stick to some rules:

- Recognize your award presenter and link back to their blog in your post.

- List 10 honest things about yourself that others might not know.
- Present this award to 10 admirable bloggers and link to their blogs.
- Leave a comment on your recipients' blogs to let them know to visit your post to retrieve their award.

My honest scraps:

1. I think I'm destined to be a professional student for the rest of my life. After grumbling my way through high school and ranting my way through my bachelor's degree at Arizona State, I went back to school yet again for the (seemingly endless) task for getting my certification in court reporting. It's a long process, but for the most part, I enjoy it.

2. I've been very blessed to have my "once in a lifetime horse" as my first horse. I can't imagine having another horse that I'll have this kind of close, bonded relationship with again. I was so fortunate to have been able to spend so much time together when we were both growing up, especially since our partnership of green rider + green horse was an equation that never should have worked.

3. I'm a slightly OCD control freak. Lists and post-it notes dominate my life. The upside of this is it means I can have my horse trailer packed and ready to go to a ride within a couple hours. The downside of this is everything has its place, and only I know where that place is. My patient father has learned to just pull down the heavy stuff and hand it to me to do with what I will. Beware, anyone that volunteers to crew for me at Tevis...there will be pages of instructions.

4. I'm a very eclectic person with lots of various interests besides horses to try keep my mind occupied and prevent OCD fixation on any one topic (it doesn't work). These include writing, photography, reading, jewelry making, sewing, and travel.

5. I'm a former show person who used to be scared to ride outside of the comfort of the arena, since Mimi was "so bad" any time I'd ride off my trainer's property. (In the mind of a very cautious [read: chicken$#!*] twelve year old, outwalking the other ponies and "looking" at the garbage cans was cause for great concern on my part.) Now, I hate riding in an arena unless I absolutely have to, and have a goal of doing Tevis on this same pony. :) How far we've come. I think my former trainer's jaw hits the ground every time I email her one of my ride stories.

6. My biggest goal and obsession of endurance is Tevis. It's probably so cliched by now, and I'm hardly the first person to come up with this goal, but it piqued my attention when I first started in distance riding, and grabbed hold of me after my first year crewing at there in 2004. Not to jinx best-laid plans and all that, but if the stars align and the distance gods are feeling gracious, my goal is to make it to Tevis 2010.

7. I'm an Arizona native, which means I can theoretically handle heat well. I do, but not without complaint. However, I die in anything over 15% humidity. There is a reason I want to move to San Diego, where it is 70* year-round.

8. I'm an only child, and still live at home. This works out very well in several ways: I work for my parents, out of the comfort of our home; Dad and I ride together; I can concentrate on school an not have to be a Real Adult yet.

9. As mentioned above, Dad and I ride together. Mom and I are what my Dad calls the "creative geniuses" of the family -- we both have creative, artistic endeavors that we do together. Riding is Dad's and my thing. We've been "returning the favor" back and forth for years -- I was the first one to get into horses...Dad followed suit. He wasn't interested in the show ring, though, and started trail riding, which turned into competitive trail (NATRC). He got me out of the show ring and onto the trail. After a couple years of NATRC, I turned my sights on endurance, at which point, Dad bought a new, endurance-suitable horse. Now, we're both focused on Tevis, although I'm far more obsessed about it.

10. I'm a self-admitted geek in the sense that I love sci-fi/fantasy, computer stuff (although I'm bad at it), reading, writing, the works.

The ten bloggers list is going to be difficult, mostly because a lot of people in my immediate blog vicinity have already received the award. The problem with running in a small group of people, we all follow each others blogs, and I was slow on the draw to get working on this.

- Horse Stories Illustrated. Cristy Cumberworth is a friend, fellow distance rider, and amazing photographer. She was the photographer at my very first NATRC ride eight years ago, and she very graciously allowed me to be her photo assistant the following year. Her talents as a photographer are beyond amazing...check out her blog and see if you don't agree!

- Here, There & Everywhere. Christine is working toward her first distance ride with her Standardbred Bling and done-a-bit-of-everything mule, TAZ.

- Between Golden Ears. Lei and her Halfinger pony Mitch are both fans of trail riding, and working towards the possibility of competitive trail. Mitch is one of the cutest ponies ever!