2011 Annual Meeting and Banquet

A big thank you to all the SDQHA members who helped make the SDQHA Annual Meeting, Banquet, and Auction a success. I so enjoyed seeing SDQHA members. It is always fun to see people in a completely different setting then the show ring and in a setting where you have a minute to just sit and visit. It is not that I don't like getting to see you all at the shows! Congratulations to our newly elected board of directors and our new officers for 2011. New directors- Kim Larson and Hope Hall- west; John Kabeiseman-east; Kim Fordham Lien and Vanessa Gravatt- Central; Roger Wilson- at large; officers President- Amy Krueger; Vice-President Penny Petersen.

Please share pictures and information with me for our website. I can only post on our website what I know and/or receive.

2010 Awards Banquet

Make plans to attend the 2010 SDQHA Annual Meeting and Awards Banquet at Cedar Shores in Chamberlain on January 15, 2011. The annual meeting will be at 2:00 PM and social hour for the banquet begins at 5:30 PM. Don't forget to bring your item for the auction. Ann Marie Johnson has been working on getting the beautiful and well deserved awards. When you see Ann Marie be sure to thank her for all her hard work getting our award winners their fabulous prizes. Please get pictures for the slide show to Janet Hansen at jpslider@msn.com. Please send her trophy shots AND candid funny shots of SDQHA members and/or their horses.

I hope to keep the blog going more consistantly in 2011. I guess call it my new year's resolution. Maybe it is time to move SDQHA out of the blog on onto Facebook? Let me know be offering comments! Happy New Year and see you in Chamberlain January 15th!

Snow, Snow, Snow

I am home in the morning in the middle of the week- snow day. The state of South Dakota seems to be taking a snow hit the past few weeks. First the Christmas blizzard and now the first week of January or Epiphany blizzard! I hope this trend does not continue. Caring for our four-legged friends just gets tougher and tougher as the snow piles up. Simple tasks become big time chores. For example watering. The continuous flow artesian well works great until temperatures drop below -10 and the cows and horses outside hunker down for the storm and quit coming up for water regularly. Now the water tank requires daily checking and ice breaking. One of the heated waterers in the barn actually froze up. Time for more heat tape I guess. It worked great all last year, but heat tape must "wear out" or something over time. Mares are due to foal early February so I guess it is time to bring them in the barn. Up until today they have been enjoying their outdoor lot and freedom. It is rather fun to watch a ten month pregnant mare kick up her heels playing. I am always surprised at how athletic they can be when they spend most of their time waddling around from hay bale, to oats feeder, to water. I hope all SDQHA members and their horses are staying warm and looking forward to the SDQHA Annual meeting January 16, 2010 at Chamberlain. The long term weather forcast is great for then!

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

Greetings SDQHA members and visitors,
May you all have the richest blessings in the year to come. Please make plans to attend the 2010 SDQHA Annual Meeting and Banquet January 16th in Chamberlain, SD. Please reserve your tickets by January 1, 2010. This event should be a wonderful opportunity to meet with all your fellow horse friends in the middle of winter! I know I so look forward to some horse activity in January. It helps me to remember that winter must end sometime. All-Around winners please get you and your horse's picture to me as soon as possible for the website and banquet program. Also anyone who has earned a special award in 2009 such as a world show placing, an AQHA Championship, Superior... please send your horse's picture to info@sdqha.com. Also let me know what they have won.
Sincerely,
Kristen Gonsoir
SDQHA Secretary/Treasurer

Spring, where are't though?

I think spring finally showed up this past week. Just in time for Easter. It seems like the 08-9 winter was long. Really long. Really, really long. Really snowy. Really cloudy. Really windy. Really long. The horses must have thought so too because the outdoor boys are girls sported some really intense winter coats this year. Every time I thought, "here comes spring!" Wham, more snow. Get your hopes up and the door came slamming shut. Spring? "Ha ha ha! You shall be doomed to another blizzard!" That is why I am not getting too confident that this week of nice weather is the potential start of spring. What a pessimist I am being. That glass is sure half empty. April showers bring May flowers, but all that March and April snow has brought April mud. Muddy ruts, muddy dogs, muddy boots, muddy garages, muddy entry ways, muddy clothes, muddy horses, muddy stirrups, muddy trailer, muddy truck (inside and out) surround me. Some of the normally simplest tasks have become dreaded chores. Filling the mineral feeder. Normally, throw two bags of mineral on the 4-wheeler and ride on out to the feeder and fill it. Pretty simple. Not so the other day. Load the bags on the 4-wheeler. Get the 4-wheeler half way to the feeder driving on what looked like muddy but would work ground only to sink the 4-wheeler in over half way. Now, not only do you have to fill a mineral feeder yet, you also have to try to get the 4-wheeler out. Get off 4-wheeler, pick up bag of mineral and try to walk to feeder without losing your high rubber boots to the quagmire. Don't forget there are two mineral bags. The more you carry the deeper you sink. You have to make two 4-wheeler to mineral feeder trips. Feeder full. You still have both your boots, even though you are breathing like a winded defensive lineman. You can take a breather on the stuck 4-wheeler. It does not seem to be sinking yet as you throw yourself across the seat. It is at this point, rather than set out on my own journey for the tractor, I phone for help. After all it is going to take two people to unstuck the 4-wheeler. Son brings tractor to edge of lot. Son throws chain. Chain lands half way between tractor and 4-wheeler. Son points out you are already covered in mud. You walk and get chain. Carry chain back to 4-wheeler. You dig in mud, and you dig in more mud, and you dig in even more mud to finally uncover a place to hook the chain. You sit on 4-wheeler as it digs its way out of the lot like a spatula in chocolate cake batter. Okay, that is just bad imagery and I don't think I can bring myself to bake a chocolate cake until it dries up a bit outside. You wash mud off of 4-wheeler. Only one hour has passed and you have completed a normally 5 minute task. Don't forget that after it dries up some you will still have that awful rut you just created to level off. So much for a quick chore and then going to ride. Where did I think I was going to ride anyway? Happy Spring!

Congratulations Dr. RM Christensen!

If you weren't at the Sioux Empire Fairgrounds on Friday, April 10th, you missed a wonderful surprise celebration of Dr. RM Christensen's 40 years (give or take a year- since 1968- a personal favorite year of my own) of hosting of the Sioux Falls Quarter Horse Shows. Following the completion of Friday's halter classes, Doc and his wife Linda were lured to the arena, under false pretenses I am told, to receive his award. Doc was presented with a beautiful plaque commemorating his years of dedication. SDQHA would like to thank Doc for all his work and dedication in making the Sioux Falls April shows a success. Following the award presentation everyone enjoyed cake in Doc and Linda's honor. Thank you Dr. RM Christensen!

Poudest Moments

If you are a parent you probably can relate that your proudest moments involve your children. Things your children do greatly out shadow anything you may have done in your glory days, like throwing the winning touch down, placing at the AJQHA (American Junior Quarter Horse Association- the name AQHYA used to be called, I still have the coat with the old acronym) World Show, going to the National High School Rodeo. None of these things can compare to the pride that wells inside us from the actions of our children. It isn’t that their feats are so much greater than ours, but viewed through the rose colored glasses of parenthood, nothing can compare to what they do. The proud parents’ buttons burst at the first steps, the first words, the first games, the first prom, the first grandchild. Our hearts swell in pride at the smallest things our children do. On the flip side, yes, our children do embarrass us too and when they become teenagers we suddenly embarrass them beyond belief, and our intelligence greatly decreases, but that is another story.

The proudest memories I have of my children did not occur in public events, however. My proudest moments are quiet events that few people know about. These moments are often shared only between a few people, but that doesn’t make them any less memorable, rather they are even more memorable. The proudest moments are not winning rides in the show pen, graceful dance performances, or breathtaking bull rides, even though I must say I have swelled with pride watching my kids do these things. My proudest moments with my children have been watching them interact with others showing the utmost compassion and empathy. Finding out that my college age son took the time to call and visit with a family friend whose father had just died. As he told me, “I didn’t really know what to say, but knew I should call and say something.” Welcome to adulthood. As he learned, it is not what you say, but the fact that you took the time to show you care. Finding out your preteen daughter offered to help someone that looked like they needed help. While it wasn’t building a house for Habitat For Humanity, it was the recognition of a fellow human being in need of a helping hand and doing something about it. It certainly would have been easy to just walk on by, but she took the initiative to see if help was needed. Her heart was certainly in the right place. These are not just isolated examples, but two that really made me proud. Only a handful of people know about these events. Nobody won a belt buckle, a state champion trophy, or a full ride scholarship, but they still top my proudest moments. These are the kind of actions that go unseen most of the time, yet are the source of my greatest pride in my children.

While we should feel proud of our children’s and our own special accomplishments, we should remember that how we interact with each other, whether winning or losing, is what is really important. Twenty years from now very few people will remember who won the class, the state championship, or even the world championship, but people will remember how you treated other people. People will remember the phone call, or the offer of help. That is why I am a proud parent.