A belated happy new year to you all.

Can’t quite believe that we are nearly into February and hopefully Spring is just around the corner, although must confess I love those cold, sunny crisp days for hacking out, glorious.

AGM
We held our AGM last week, a small number turned out to hear a resume for 2018, the main thrust being that in the last twelve months, the club has thrived, with many new members and a greater variety of horsey activities being organised for all to enjoy.

Plenty is on offer for the coming season too, see our website for events listed to date, we hope to slot in a few more, as the year goes on and remember that joining our club is easy, there is a join option on our home page, and the subscription fee can be paid by bacs or cheque.

We duly thanked both Mark Lambourne & Julie Room, who have resigned from the committee, for their contribution to the club and welcomed on board Inge Studnik.

After the formalities were done and dusted, we then enjoyed a game of skittles and some food, needless to say, Craig won again!

Events So Far
So far this year, we are delighted to see that both the canter track afternoons & polework / SJ sessions, with Katie Withers, have proved to be very popular, so much so that they are filled quickly, with a wait list operating.

I attended the one on Saturday last and it was great fun, meeting a new rider Angela on her lovely Arab and Scarlett on her super new pony, Malley, very striking and such a good boy, especially as he‘d had to hack some distance to get there and behaved very well for her to achieve some good work over those pesky poles, even if he was a bit nappy at times, but Scarlett kept smiling !

Am sure at times, Katie was pulling her hair out, as some of us had a few “senior “moments and seem to be constantly riding in the wrong direction, such fun!

BUT, isn’t there always a but, Katie has found on occasion that some riders, although booked into the sessions, which are “ pay on the day “, simply don’t turn up or give notice that they can’t make it, which isn’t fair to either Katie or others, who might have wanted to attend.

Payment For Events
As a consequence, we are considering changing how these clinics are set -up, to pre-paid entries only, via website – payments either online to NWSC, at time of entry, or if by cheque, then to be received by Kathryn Tudor, secretary, no later than 5 days before the clinic with refunds only being given for withdrawals, with more than 48hrs notice.

The club shall update you via the FB /website events page, when any such change takes place.

In respect of other events that we run, to assist those who give their valuable time to ensure that the club trundles along smoothly and efficiently, please can you ensure that when making on-line entries, you pay by bank transfer at the same time, and if settling the fee by cheque ( via post ) that it is received promptly, within 5 days of making an entry.

The same refund policy will apply, 48 hrs notice must be given.

This will the save the need to chase for entry fees and thus save embarrassment, on both sides.
The club really doesn’t want to play “hard-ball” by not chasing up fees and simply disregarding unpaid entries, as the ethos of our club has always been to promote a warm, fun & friendly atmosphere, and long may it continue, but we need you to help us 😊

Forthcoming Dates For Your Diary
9th Feb – Canter Track afternoon
17th Feb – Polework/ SJ grid clinic – wait list for first session, places available for SJ session.
23rd Feb – Riding Test clinic with Charlotte Christopher, 3 places left, test intro – elem, see website.
9th March – Polework / SJ grid clinic
23rd March – first dressage competition of the season, to incl music classes – Judge Jo Lees.

We have already booked our dressage judges for dates later on in the season, Charlotte will join us again in April and Alyce King is booked for our long arena competition that we shall hold at Brook Stud in June.

We have decided this year to offer pre-entry clear round SJ, where each rider will be allocated a 15min session, so that you can warm-up around the arena on the flat and then pop a couple of designated fences, before starting the SJ round itself – these sessions are planned for April & June.

All details of our fixtures are on our website, look forward to seeing you all in the coming weeks.

Rita.

A horse walks into a bar. The barman confuses idioms with jokes and offers him a glass of water, but can’t make him drink.