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Dogs to the lay person but we’re talking HOUNDS! What a great day this past Saturday! I think the last time I had this much fun watching horses was at the Gold Cup in The Plains and how ironic the comparison! It was a last minute shoot as Joint Master of the Hunt for Old Dominion Hounds phoned me back on Friday night telling me of a hunt the next morning that was a fundraiser to stop the expansion of the power lines out past Foxhall Farm in Flint Hill. I quickly rearranged my schedule, couldn’t find a last minute Directory of Photography so opted to play all the roles myself and “wing it” and it came out beautifully.

ALL my misconceptions about fox hunting and fox hunters were completely dispelled! I have NEVER in my life met a more welcoming, down to earth group of people as in this field! By the end of the day three different people offered me horses to take out if I wanted to try it at some point in the future and MAN!.. do I? Are you kidding the hilltopping experience alone looks like an adrenaline rush and so amazingly fun and the range of ages was incredible! From one year olds on lead lines to who knows how old jumping past the little kids and everywhere in between. When emailing a dear friend and mentor about this she replied that “They are the salt of the earth” and how true!

Needless to say, I am so excited for this next episode “Introduction to Fox Hunting” to launch as well as shoot the series we’re planning. I must say it’s a big thanks to my interview with Robert Banner at The Chronicle of the Horse because our conversation and his passion for fox hunting and point-to-point really lit a fire under me to pursue this intro episode! This oh too cute picture of me shooting video of Gus and field member was titled “Proof that we survived” by this wonderful camera person I met. Karen Myers (along with some kind other folks) sent me some great images captured (as that is all that was captured being the fox got away!) that day. You can see Karen’s fabulous photo journal at http://www.karenlmyers.org/huntingdiary!

I had a GREAT time and a big education talking with Robert Banner, publisher of The Chronicle of the Horse! It was a huge honor to receive an interview from Robert and all too exciting to learn about fox hunting! I’m excited to discover more about this amazing sport that I’m thinking teaches you real riding abilities! I hope you enjoy the episode and to watch a better quality version of it, check it out at http://horsegirltv.com/episode17.php

Happy New Year HorseGirlTV too! I received the sweetest email from Joewell! Yes, Joewell, the horse, this past Christmas Eve Day and I have to be honest, it bought more than one tear to my eye. I’m sooooo happy to see that Joewell (or Jo as I’ve come to know him) is happy with his new family down in SoCal. Jo is part of the Barrows family now and what an amazing family it seems like. As you can tell from the picture, there is no lack of doating on the old boy and from what I hear Joewell will ride out his Grand Prix years with this family and then retire with them! I don’t think he could have gone to a better new place and I’m happy things worked out as they have.

Joewell’s email to me received on Christmas Eve Day…
Hi Mom,
I love my new home, but they make me wear this silly hat! It’s alot warmer here, about 70 degrees every day. I’ve made lots of new friends. My favorites are a black lab named Daisy and a 5 month old colt named Cosmo. Elliot is pretty heavy, but I’m struggling through it. I’m going to get him to lose lots of weight. I’m going to be very happy here. I hope you and Ex are fine. I miss you. Merry Christmas.
Love,
Joewell

Getting to be back in Oregon for the holidays was great! As a Texan by birth I have a love for the state and it’s proud people but I’ve always felt like I was going home every time I have returned to Oregon since I first moved out west years ago.

We are back home in Virginia now and I’m pretty excited to be interviewing the publisher of The Chronicle of the Horse tomorrow! I’ve heard Middleburg is lovely and the COTH is “THE” sport horse publication stateside so it’s an honor!

There is a GREAT article in this months Flying Changes magazine. Lauren Baker is a stellar writer and while all the facts are not 100% it’s still a great read about HorseGirlTV and I’m honored they featured us! I’ve been an off and on reader of Flying Changes for years now and they provide some really great articles on local companies, facilities and professionals. Several years back, I actually wrote and article for Flying Changes (while I was living in Spain ironically enough!) about Farwood CEM Center in Southern Oregon.

I’ll paste the text of the article below but I encourage you to read it on Flying Changes as they have a really neat link to “About Angelea Kelly” in which they asked me a series of fun questions. Thanks Lauren for featuring HorseGirlTV. It’s an honor to be featured in a magazine so close to my sport horse riding roots and my home in Oregon!

Read it online at: http://flyingchanges.com/htmls/article/article.html
Or link from their main page at: Flying Changes Magazine

ARTICLE TEXT BELOW:
“HorseGirlTV
Invites You to Tune In, Tack up
Lauren Davis Baker

Online video for horse lovers? Tune into HorseGirl TV. Billed as the Internet’s premiere equine-based podcast, HorseGirl TV is informative and entertaining, offering five to eight-minute semi-monthly segments on topics ranging from grooming for an Olympic rider to physical training for equestrians.

Creator Angelea Kelly is a life-long equestrian with over a decade of experience in online communities and Internet technologies, just as at home with both bytes and bits.

The Southern Oregon University graduate began her start-up company in the Northwest, with initial episodes being filmed in Ashland, Central Point, Eagle Point, and Sams Valley, Oregon.

Angelea is the show’s host, writer, producer, and director-in addition to handling marketing, public relations, and Web-development. Her boyfriend, Ex , serves as cameraman. Jackhammer Moving Pictures of Ashland does post-production digitizing.

While being in front of a camera is relatively new to Angelea, experience acting in community theater (1999) and repertory theater (2002) has helped. The possibility of a podcast came up in 2006 over lunch with Charley Lanusse, whose Starseed company developed the WebRing technology that was acquired by Geocities and then Yahoo! By September 2006 HorseGirlTV.com had been reserved and a limited liability company created by January 2007. HorseGirl TV launched its first podcast in May 2007. The first episode featured an interview with Tiffany Tyler, an Oregon rider who groomed for Anky van Grunsven. Episode 2 featured an interview with Penny Barreras, owner of Oregon’s Farwood Horse Park, a CEM facility. A more recent episode took a close look at FITS breeches, with Portland-area entrepreneur Sheryl Rudolph discussing the design of her revolutionary riding apparel.

In October of this year, Angelea headed to Virginia along with her horse, Joewell, a Trakehner from Germany, who was among the top-10 hopefuls in line for the United States Team at the Athens Olympics in 2004. Angelea began riding horses at age five and entered her first 4H competition at age 10. She earned a United States Dressage Federal silver medal in 2004 and a gold medal in 2006. She currently shows at Grand Prix level.

Angelea credits local Oregonians, Linda Jones and Kathy Everman with helping her gain a solid riding foundation, in addition to intensive training with Hilda Gurney and Washington dressage star Gwen Blake. “I’ve been fortunate enough to clinic with Bettina Drummond, Anne Gribson, Jeff Ashton Moore, and Sabine Schut,” Angelea adds. “I value immensely my training philosophy conversations and time with my friend, Lara Schleining, as she has been a wealth of information on sports psychology and equine athlete development.”

HorseGirl TV combines Angelea’s love of horses with a passion for technology. And what a fun job it is! The November episode has her interviewing Carl Rafter, jump jockey, at the International Gold Cup. Mingling with the who’s who of the horse world while dining, sipping champagne, and watching world-class competition are just a few of the job perks.

“It is the best and toughest job I’ve ever had,” Angelea says. “I love horses and working with online technologies, so it is a perfect fit. One of the best aspects is how many neat and diverse topics I get to learn about.”

While Angelea’s currently living in Virginia, she hasn’t forgotten her Northwest roots. “We are in the developmental stages of a project near and dear to my heart that we would develop at home, in Oregon-partnering rescue horses with foster children, through educational horsemanship classes,” she says. “It will be a great way for us to give back-not only to the horse world, but the local Oregon community in general.”

To check out HorseGirl TV, go to www.horsegirltv.com. Podcasts (including archived, earlier episodes) are easy to access, even for the computer-challenged. The site also includes reader submissions; a HorseGirl (or Guy) of the month; news; a blog; and a new series of horse gear.

“The beauty of podcasts,” Angelea says, “is that you get to interact with your viewers through e-mail, forums, and chats. We’re getting good reviews from iTunes and getting e-mail from all over the country and the world.”

Ultimately, Angelea would like to expand to cable or satellite distribution. “We would be very happy to entertain an offer from Animal Planet or Discovery Channel,” she admits. “We would fit well as a segment between one show and another on Animal Planet.”

What’s ahead? A trip to Europe to film upcoming episodes, including top interviews in Holland, Germany, Sweden, and Spain. Angelea also hopes to include episodes focusing on sport ponies, equestrian publishing, Breyerfest and fox hunting. Tune into HorseGirl TV and follow her travels!”

Look at that beautiful Thanksgiving Dinner table! Ex made the juiciest turkey ever stuffed with my mom’s cornbread dressing recipe! He also made his mom’s recipe for candied sweet potatoes and I tackled the pumpkin pie. We enjoyed a simple bottle of Georges Duboeuf Beaujolais Villages. A good and inexpensive wine crafted in the, obviously, Beaujolais region. It’s a simple, drinkable wine that you can pair with almost anything. I first tasted it at Brad & George’s place several years back and was impressed!

Like true American’s, we laid around all morning doing lots of nothing, began cooking and baking about noon and dinner was finished at 1700. We have lots to be thankful for this year one of which is that we were together. HorseGirlTV is going far better than I could expect and Ex’s in a good position being close to graduation at The Basic School and ready to begin the Infantry Officer’s Course in January. We’re headed home to Oregon for a few days for Christmas and life in general is just really good!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Yesterday was the 232nd celebration of the United States Marine Corp Birthday. It’s a big deal for Marines everywhere and people plan for the event months and months in advance. We traveled down to Richmond as it was held in the Marriott downtown. The hall was lovely and the gowns equally impressive not to mention the presence of some 600 Marines in dress uniforms (think tuxedo with a royal flare). This was my first year and I was impressed. They presented colors, held a traditional cutting of the cake in which the oldest and youngest Marine present is served first, a honored guests speaks, dinner is served and dancing ensues. It was quite the evening and we had a great time. The event was held right across the street from where we met Sheryl from FITS Riding at an equine vendors convention! All and all it was a special evening and I must say that we were quite the handsome couple!

What’s shaking at HorseGirlTV? Me!!! I’ve had way, wayyyyyyyyy too much coffee today, been chatting with some great potential partners for our show and we shot a really fun introduction to episode 13 to continue our series for The International Gold Cup Races! Yahoo! Let’s see what else happened this week? I hear Jo (the horse) is being a superstar that he is and that Dirk is having a blast with him! Jo (the boyfriend) was out freezing in the field earlier this week and finds out his MOS here shortly! Picollo (the dog) realized that eating pork bones is NOT a good thing and I, well honestly it’s been such a long, long week with so many highs and lows and long hours that I can barely remember what happened. Tehe! Gosh! What did I do?.. notes on rough and final cuts, voice over work, meeting with potential partners, working with IT on web dev stuff, looking for a personal assistant (this one is gonna happen soon and I’m sooooo excited about it), brainstorming with Ex (always fun) and oh yes Halloween with no trick-or-treaters and a definite longing for The Black Sheep. Bahhhhh! Big stuff happening Monday and Tuesday of next week with more fun announcements to follow!

They say a picture paints a thousand words! Less words and more pictures! Surprise Kristina!!!

The 70th annual running of the International Gold Cup was this past weekend in The Plains, Virginia! While I miss my family of friends in Oregon I am fast learning to love this amazing horse community here in Virginia. We had way too much fun shooting at this event, met some fabulous people and I even got a ride in a fancy Porche by days end! Did you know that you could haul a regular bumper pull horse trailer with a Porche Cayenne? No way I say! Sign me up!

Between enjoying the display of beautiful hats and tweed jackets in the VIP tent while partaking in divine (that one was for you Nicole!) hors d’oeuvres splashed back by a sip of champagne, watching some of the days seven races or the terriers do their barking and chasing, we were well educated about this adrenaline rush of a sport known as timber racing or steeplechase by various owners, riders and grooms. And I thought I was ambitious at the thought of someday taking jumping lessons. Whoa, these folks go full racing gallop towards solid logs. Yes, I said and meant SOLID logs and they aren’t low either!

Our team was able to get some amazing b roll as we were allowed ON the field and likewise offered the exclusive backstage pass to go into the stabling area and follow a horse from it’s preparation, to the paddock, to the course, and then onto the race. It was a treat and I am so thankful that Bendure Communications invited us.

The Marine Corp is small so I find it very serendipitous that the interviews and subsequent episodes presenting themselves are more often than not associated in some way with a Marine. The Double L Tack Store happened to be owned by a Marine who served in Korea for two tours and this past weekend we had the honor of meeting Nick Arundel who received Purple Hearts from both Korean and Vietnam! What a great interview it was. What amazing stories I imagine he holds and what an incredible philanthropist he is in saving the now Great Meadow land from development!

I could go on and on about the day and all its special moments but you’ll just have to catch the episodes to get a glimpse inside was this years’ International Gold Cup. I can’t wait for more!

Well it was a long and a short week. I started this past Monday out sending Ex off early in the AM to begin his weeklong field exercises. I also started out early that morning and ended up putting in a 16-hour day. By the end of the day I was completely trashed and barely remember the final few hours of work. Hmmm? Long days aren’t bad as I get so much work done but perhaps it’s best I stop around 10 to 12 hours from now on? Hehe!

It has been a week packed with work but equally packed with fun events! Amy had her first Longaberger Open House and my first home show type event ever. They have some awesome baskets and really cool pottery and although there’s really nothing I couldn’t live without, I ended up getting a nice 8 by 8 baking dish for those lazy days when I just want to pull a pre-prepped lasagna out of the freezer and bake it!

It was also Aisha’s birthday and with Short in the field as well I was honored to get to share her birthday dinner with her over at Pancho Villa’s off Garrisonville Road! Now I didn’t promise I wouldn’t put this picture up and it’s just too darn cute not to. If she sees this and asks me to pull it down, I will of course but until then enjoy this adorable picture of a sombrero-ed out Aisha with deep fried ice cream!

With fall in full swing out here in Virginia, what would an evening be without football, especially little league football! I went to one of Regan’s games to watch, visit a bit with Jenn and thoroughly crack up inside at the parents taking this sport all too seriously. I am all for training and working hard to win but it’s just too dang funny to watch some of these parents sprout grey hairs by the minute over something as insignificant to a lifetime as winning or loosing a little league game. Mental note to self, live my life to the fullest so I can never be accused of living vicariously through my children and rather enjoy watching and supporting them in their desired sports or hobbys! Now Jenn’s the perfect mom, supporting of their desires but not pushing them so they’ll end up hating it. It was too much fun and I ate WAY too many gummy worms!

I’m VERY excited to attend this years’ International Gold Cup! This is a big deal for HorseGirlTV and I’m quite honored that we were invited to attend especially since their blog states how they denied free tickets to Britney Spears! It’s good, yet sad to know we rate well above crashing ‘A’ list singers!