Autumn colours

The colours are absolutely beautiful at the moment. I have just been for my evening walk and this is the river at the bottom of our field. The house above is the Old Mill House and Chris and Han who live there are our nearest neighbours.

Yesterday we went to the Pytchley open meet, I was on Dream and Doug was on Jake. There were 150 horses out and both horses really loved it, with Dream, who is normally very steady, behaving like a proper racehorse and was leaping around trying to get to the front - if only she would do that in a real race! We stayed out for around three hours, it was such a lovely day and it was just so good to be out and catch up with a lot of people we hadn't seen since last season. It was just what Doug needed to take his mind off his father's death.

During the past week we have had a father and daughter, Hannah and Quentin in to help ride out - it was completely by chance that they came as Quentin originally phoned up to ask if we gave riding lesson as we are wrongly listed in the phone directory - I told him that we didn't give lessons and he asked if he could just bring his daughter along for a ride to try and boost her confidence. Anyway, we reluctantly agreed, thinking that it would be rather a nuisance, but they turned out to be very good riders and really helped as out these last few days, as with my bad knee and Will with his dodgy hamstring, we needed all the help we could get. Hannah absolutely loved being involved in the yard and helping with the horses and she really wants to come back in her Christmas holidays.

The clocks went back last night and as we had a late one it was much appreciated to have the extra hour, although I don't like the short days.

Must go as we are off to our local pub for a bar snack.