We hope everyone had a happy holiday and is looking forward to the New Year, new show season and events! The SNC chapter has a wonderful line up of shows and events planned for the 2005 season. In addition, the championship show is in the north this year, which means it will be at Rancho Murieta - not far from home!! If you are looking for an idea for a New Years goal this year, here's one …qualifying for the CDS Championship show! More information on qualifying scores, championships and awards can be found at http://www.california-dressage.org/awards.html Good luck to everyone in 2005!!
As everyone is probably already aware, there will be no meeting this month. We all need a break after the holidays and a chance to dig ourselves out of the snow. If anyone has any pressing news they need to get out, please let us know and we'd be happy to send the information out.
The next chapter meeting will be on Monday February 14th at 6:30pm at Susan Ward's house. The agenda for this meeting will include the annual awards dinner details, the upcoming April-May SNC show/clinic sign up details, show awards/prizes, Annual Meeting information, chapter meeting schedule for the year and details about the amateur clinic. We wont be doing any snacks or meals at this meeting.
Last year, all of our shows were full. This year, all of our shows will be 2-day shows giving everyone more opportunities to ride. In addition, for shows that don't fill, we are working on having the second day be a clinic with the judge! This would allow riders to ride and show the first day and get some more direct feedback the next day. We are still in the process of ironing out the details but we will keep everyone posted as to how this will work out.
Our first season show will be April 30th and May 1st with Angela Littlefield "S". We will be working on a clinic sign up sheet for this judge in the event that the second day of the show doesn't fill. More details to come in future months!
The Amateur Clinic information will be coming out soon. If you are interested in going to the CDS amateur clinic, now's the time to start thinking about your essay. It is required that any interested chapter member apply to the Board of Directors for the clinic. As part of the application, an essay shall be written by the applicant describing what they are currently doing in their dressage training, what their goals are and why they feel they should be the member from our chapter who gets this opportunity to ride at the clinic. The amateur can be a Junior. Applications must be submitted to the Board of Directors at least one month prior to the clinic date. For more information please contact Susan Ward (Chapter Chair) at sw4horses@sbcglobal.net. (775) 853-4175
Attention! Attention! We would very much like to post all of the local 2005 clinics on the web site. This will benefit members and clinicians alike! If you know of any upcoming clinics, or would like to give feedback about a clinician, please send us the information and we will post the information to the site!
Cancelled! Please be aware that both of the clinics scheduled for this month (January) have been cancelled due to weather and other circumstances.
The 2005 Board was voted in unanimously by show of hands at the Christmas party/meeting in December. The contact information for the board members can be found on the web page under "Chapter Information".
Chairperson | Susan Ward |
Director of Treasurer | Cindy Hoonhout |
Director of Shows | Lou Christensen |
Director of Education | Jennifer Smith |
Directors of Communication | Steve and Michele Ting |
Dressage in the Sierra | Wendy Hayes, Jennifer Smith, and Carolyn Graebener |
Director of Junior Membership: | Lou and Mary Anne Christensen |
The Annual Meeting and Expo is coming up January 28th - 30th. Cindy Hoonhout, our chapter treasurer, will be heading to California to represent our chapter and take the SNC Chapter Basket. She is still accepting donations to the basket and cash donations or gift certificates to local attractions are certainly welcome. If you would like to donate please contact Cindy at 853-0302 or by email at cindyh@unr.nevada.edu
The Sierra Nevada Chapter of CDS had a busy 2004. The interest in dressage competition in our area continued to increase. Our number of juniors riders continued to increase as well. We sponsored three CDS recognized one-day shows and one triple recognized two-day show (Dressage in the Sierra). Once again, our one-day shows were oversubscribed and the later entries had to be denied.
Dressage in the Sierra was a wonderful event, made even more special in 2004 by our awards sponsor, Skagen Designs. All of the first place class winners were offered Skagen watches. All of the high point award winners received Skagen's artistically designed barbeque sets. Dressage in the Sierra was not as well attended by chapter members as in prior years due to date conflicts with the Northern CDS Junior Championships.
We have altered our plans for chapter sponsored shows for 2005. We will have three two-day CDS recognized shows in order to better accommodate the increase show participation in our area. In addition, we plan to have our final Dressage in the Sierra in 2005, unless conflicts with the Northern Junior Championships and Reno Livestock Events Center availability can be resolved. Skagen Designs has graciously offered to sponsor awards for the 2005 show.
The Sierra Nevada Chapter has ten general membership meetings and board meetings as needed to address specific issues. Our member communication was predominantly by email and website. Our shows and annual awards banquet were the best attended chapter events. Chapter activities were staffed by member volunteers, with the exception of Dressage in the Sierra show management. In 2004, we sent a participant to the Amateur Clinic, participated in the Omnibus, and had chapter members go to the Annual Show, Junior Championships and Annual Meeting. All of our chapter activities were self-supported through profits from shows and fund raising. Our junior program was particularly active in fund raising with show concessions and used equipment sales. Several chapter members united and created a special awards division for our juniors which included ribbons, high point awards, and season-end awards.
2004 was a good year for the Sierra Nevada Chapter. Increased numbers of chapter volunteers and increased rider participation in Dressage in the Sierra would make for an even better 2005.
Susan Ward,
SNC ChairpersonThe holiday party at Susan's house was a great time. Thank you Susan for hosting! The majority of us brought desserts and left with sweet tooth overload! The brown bag auction became a silent auction with all of us circling like vultures around the table. The bags were full of fun items and the club made over $250!!! Thanks to everyone who participated.
The following report was sent to us from the chapter treasurer and is a summary of how the chapter did financially with our 2004 shows.
2004 April Show & Clinic | + $541.26 |
2004 July 11 Show | + $599.58 |
2004 DITS | - $1598.67 |
2004 September Show | + $318.36 |
Silent Auction at Christmas Party | + $259.00 |
There's a new arena in town! If you haven't seen it, there's a beautiful new indoor arena in Washoe Valley on Lakeshore Dr. Recently, Cindy Hoonhout, Vicki Cliff, and Carla Viola went for a visit. The club was hoping that the arena would provide for a new show location. They reported that while the arena is enormous and beautiful, it would be difficult to have a dressage show there because of the layout. There are some other locations we are hoping will open up for the club to use. At this point, we aren't anticipating any location changes for the 2005 season but if there are any we will send out a notice.
We recently received the following email from Kathy Scheidemann…
Happy Holidays to Everyone.
I wanted to thank everyone for the wonderful time my daughter had showing with you this summer. Everyone made showing dressage a pleasurable experience for her and her pony. Dressage is not at the top of her list for things to do. I don't think the pony was that up on it either. Boring! Oh, but how they both need it for the hunters. We are moving to N. Carolina in January and will miss you all during the 2005 shows. We hope to get in a few dressage shows next year along with the hunters shows. I may even show the pony myself in dressage. Again, thank you all for the wonderful time we had,
Kathy and Courtney Scheidemann and Heritage Hall's Social Graces
Thank you Kathy for the kind email. Good luck to you and your family in North Carolina!! Congratulations to Courtney and Heritage Hall's Social Graces for all their success in 2004!
The monthly E-Newsletters are sent out to any Dressage Enthusiast that would like to subscribe. If you know of someone that would like to receive this E-news please have them contact us at snc-cds@charter.net. If you have a news item or announcement that you would like added to the monthly E-news or to the website please send it to snc-cds@charter.net.