For those attending the Equine Affaire in Pomona, California, variety was the theme this year. It started with the weather, which had us checking in to the barns in the rain on Wednesday and ended with warm sunshine on Sunday. Luckily, our demo, which was on Saturday at 11 am, was in the covered arena as the outdoor arena was deep in mud until Sunday. Our booth in the breed pavilion was partnered with the Gypsy Cob and Drum Horse Association and we shared a breed stall with them. GCDHA members Charles and Jan Cox had brought their beautiful Vardo which just about filled their booth and directed lots of attention to our booth with it's video and information. We had lots of members participating in both booth detail and the demo on Saturday and the breed spotlight on Sunday.

Members Raymond and Jillian Barrett's Photos from the Equine Affair

Since many of us are also members of the Gypsy Vanner Horse Society, there was an extra chance to have our horses seen in their nearby booth and a chance to show off our new AGHBA shirts to everyone who was attracted to the beautiful horses in the booths. The turnout of members working the booth was terriffic and we were able to help out the GCDHA and GVHS who were both somewhat shorthanded. For the record, we all got along famously and really enjoyed visiting with Deirdre Cash of Clononeen Farm which has recently moved from Ireland to England. Clononeed Farm is now a corporate member of the AGHBA.

We had 16 horses turn out for the 15 minute demo and although I probably got overly bossy while acting as a first time "stage manager", the event went off without a hitch and was the most popular demo at the Equine Affaire. Five stallions entered the ring first, illustrating the variety of color and sizes as well as athletic ability available in our stud force here in the west. Jim and Diane Harris' Lord MacLeod at 15.2 hands was easily jumping jumps with his beautifully costumed rider. My 13:2 hand bay and white, Gaelic Dancer was showing off his western pleasure training while Finnvarra, Carol Carter's 2 1/2 year old Wisdom and Stephanie Burlington's Tango were shown in hand. After the stallions were safely out of the way, the mares and geldings showed off their paces in English, driving and doing tricks. Robin Bailey showed off part of Her mare, Maggie's bag of tricks as Lynn Strauman drove Miss Bodi and other Cobs and Vanners showed off their paces.

The crowd favorites are always the foals and our youngsters were the icing on the cake. They delighted the audience with their "airs above the ground" and the crowds poured out of the stands to meet them after the demo. Kay and Larry Weeks had brought two lovely weanling fillies, Tessa and Brandy, and Raym and Jillian Barrett brought their filly Soonς, who was in long lines. Most importantly, Lord Duncan, the colt that the Harris' donated for the Angel Baby raffle was there to encourage the public to go to our website to buy raffle tickets on this lovely boy to help support our Angel Baby program.

Sunday's Breed Spotlight was a slightly scaled down version of Saturdays demo and with 1 less stallion and mare, it went a bit more smoothly. There were far too many wonderful people working long hours to list them here, but special mentions should be made of Jim and Diane Harris, who always go above and beyond and who are always the last to leave after clean-up. Lynn Strauman has been running the booth, as she did the Vanner booth for many years and I am awed at the way she she did all that work and not only kept her sanity but managed to show off several of her horses as well. She was working hard all weekend too.

All in all, the 2007 Equine Affaire in Pomona was a great kickoff of our show and expo season and our Angel Baby raffle. President, Al Williams thanked us all for our hard work (not to mention his own) with a wonderful Mexican dinner on Saturday evening. Now everybody go out and sell those raffle tickets!

-- Submitted by Barbara Cross