This year’s weekend fall benefit dressage show was held at the Reins of Life facility in Michigan City, Indiana. I have posted about my previous appearances at their facility in South Bend, Indiana but had never been to Michigan City. The grounds in Michigan City are truly lovely, and fortunately the weather cooperated too and we had warm temps and lots of sunshine–along with one afternoon of wind gusts. For my part, my booth was indoors (which was convenient–it kept the wind from blowing everything around). I can’t say enough about therapeutic riding–it just about brings tears to my eyes every time I go to Reins of Life because I can appreciate how much the volunteers and the horses do for so many people with so many varied physical, emotional and mental issues. If you’re interested in finding out more about it, you can just click here. This little blurb from their website may tempt you to explore further: “Reins of Life now serves over 500 riders with 3,000 hours of lesson time annually for residents of 10 counties in Indiana and Michigan.” Pretty darn amazing!
As usual, I peeked around outside to watch some of the dressage competition and also worked on a couple more little Aquabord™ watercolors. I’ll leave you alone with the photos to tell the story!
Ducks and geese welcome (well, sort of) visitors to the Michigan City facility.
Beautiful large indoor ring which was used as a warm-up ring for the show
All the barn stalls open to the outside, letting in lots of light and fresh air.
Nice open feel to the stalls, with a competitor doing her last-minute preparations.
The widest booth space I’ve ever had! I was located next to the indoor warm-up ring.
My painting table, with work in progress. I got lots of “wows” this weekend, and not just from the kids!
One of the paintings I was working on–still needs the rest of the background.
Early morning long shadows slice across the dressage ring.
It’s still green in the Midwest. But the horses feel the snap of fall in the air!
The cutest kids are always on the cutest ponies.
Just like last year, the show featured a Prix Caprilli class–dressage jumping!
Alli Farkas Artist Adventures 
very moving post. what a wonderful organization. very much enjoyed your photos and artwork. all the best–ron
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The painting looks great. You really caught the action well.
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Thanks so much. This is one painting that was really lots of fun, once I had decided that I got everything right!
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