5 Life Lessons I Learned From A Spanish Movie Star

 Last summer I was working for my little sister as her personal assistant (she’s a singer and if you haven’t already, go look her up immediately) and she was invited to perform at a ranch roping competition in Italy. Luckily for me I got to tag along, drink copious amounts of wine, ride nice horses and participate in the roping. I had briefly met our hosts, Drew Mischanti and Natalia Estrada once before and happened to read an article in Western Horseman right before we left about the "Italian Cowboys." Natalia is Spanish but lives in and is married to an Italian. The article mentioned that Natalia used to be an actress before she found her current love in the vaquero style of horsemanship and cow work. I am embarrassed to admit that I dismissed this as possible misinformation. I mean, every time someone interviews Adrian for an article something gets misquoted. I’ll never forget when an article stated that she was bilingual. If Adrian’s bilingual that means she’s fluent in sarcasm and profanity. So I figured that’s what this was: an exaggeration or misprint (sorry Natalia!). Upon arriving in Italy, I was shocked to find that article had only understated what a celebrity Natalia really is in Italy! People see her and rush up, clutching pieces of paper and pens to their chest, asking for autographs and lining up to have their picture taken with her. 

Walking to a café in Milan for a morning cup of espresso is an event because construction workers exclaim out loud “Natalia Estrada!!” “It’s Natalia Estrada!” I’ve never seen Natalia react with anything but charm and grace, she is a wonderful role model and someone I seek to emulate. Not only is she classy and charming, but she is also an excellent horsewoman. She helped me a lot during our stay with learning the basics of Dressage, something I’ve always been interested in learning more about. Thinking about our stay with Drew and Nat, I put together a list of the 5 things I learned from a Spanish movie star who turned out to be a friend, and I think we could all learn from her example!

Class

Natalia displayed class no matter how tired she was or what situation she found herself in. Whether she sipped her wine instead of gulping it, or took the time to graciously talk with excited fans while trying to enjoy a private moment with friends and family, Nat showed that she is always a lady.

Horsemanship

Natalia is naturally athletic and has amazing timing. She could “get by” just fine with her horsemanship without spending a modicum of effort on it if she wanted. Instead, Natalia constantly worked on improving herself and her horses.

Fashion

Natalia showed me that fashion and horses do mix. Yes! Natalia easily mixed high fashion and cowboy boots and pulled it off because she’s confident in herself and her style. She can introduce an opera in floor length Versace and ride colts in Wranglers. She wears what she wants when she wants no matter what is “cool” at the moment.  

Personal Development

During our stay at their house, Drew and Natalia were up every morning at 5:30am riding colts. She is an extremely passionate woman, and that passion includes her horses, roping and life and she makes sacrifices to improve herself in any area any chance she gets.

It’s OK To Be Multidimensional

Natalia is not just a movie star, nor is she just a cowgirl. She is multidimensional and that is one of the things I love most about her. She can ride dressage, compete in cutting, jump horses, throw a fancy big loop shot, shoot a gun or camera with skill, dance, act, run a multi-continent business and can throw together a first class 5-course meal after a full day of participating in all of the above mentioned activities! She is comfortable in all of these and doesn’t change her personality in transitioning between them. She is Natalia Estrada and she is comfortable in her own skin.

xo xo Elizabeth 

Cowgirl Chic in Venice

Adrian is wearing a blouse from H&M, Cowboy Honor jeans from Sissie & Me Ranch Royalty, her own custom belt, Sissie & Me Ranch Royalty Jewelry, Paul Bond cowboy boots (not pictured) and Holy Cow Couture bag.  

xo xo Liz & Adrian 

A Saturday Ramble Thru Cigarette Smoke & Poly Ropes

Happy Saturday, Dolls and Gents!

It’s overcast and grey here, the clouds heavy and saturated looking. Mornings like this I wish that I could paint, that I could perfectly capture the right blend of grey and blue on a canvas and so keep that wild and windy feeling forever.

I am brimming with ideas and ambition this morning, my list sitting here in front of me, items waiting impatiently to be checked off throughout the day. I woke up this morning feeling as sick as a dog…I’m thinking that if I only notice it in a sideways manner the feeling will slink off like a stray…that’s what I’m hoping for anyway.

Adrian and I are home for a week or so, and the days to be spent here at home with the mums and dad and dogs and horses, stretch out in front of me like a red carpet, inviting and full of possibilities. I want to use this time to catch up on things I miss when we’re on the road, gypsying it from show to show…like my braiding, shooting clays, riding my fat horse and roping the dummy with dad. It’s an odd feeling, bouncing back and forth between traveling, being on the road, going from show to show, to being home where the rhythm of life is different, a little calmer maybe. When Adrian and I are on the road, we wake up sometimes at 2:30am so she can get to TV and radio interviews on time, then she has sound checks in the afternoon and a show at night, which generally lasts until the early morning while she talks to fans and visits with people about bucking horses, guitars and singing. Then there’s a day of traveling and the process in some form or other repeats itself. I love being on the road with Adrian and she gets really restless when we haven’t seen the blacktop in a while. When we’re home, we’re home. It’s lovely. I wake up and have coffee with dad, he tells me about his business and I tell him how Buckaroo Barbie is coming and what we hope to achieve with it. I go on runs, lift weights, eat whenever I want, do massive loads of laundry, cook with my mums at night and get caught back up on my sleep quotient. It’s like two polar opposites and I love both in different ways.

“These are the good old days.” I keep reminding myself.

The sounds of an Italian voice drift around my head like the cigarette smoke I haven’t smoked in months, lilting, lyrical sounds that I feel my tongue used to know before it knew the English I speak now. I’m trying to learn Italian, and the voice coming from my computer has me repeating, “La donna quida una macchina!” “Cane” and “L’uomo mangia.” Adrian got the amazing opportunity to preform in Italy last spring, and I got to go as well! We hadn’t been in Europe since we moved back to America from Scotland and the experience was wonderful. I hadn’t flown an international flight since I was 12 and either the seats have gotten smaller or my butt has gotten bigger. I’m afraid it’s the latter that’s to blame. I didn’t understand why people in ITALY wanted to hire Adrian to sing cowboy music?! At a ranch roping, no less! But then we got off the plane, I hugged Drew and Natalia, and it was like coming home. The appreciation and love the Italian buckaroos have for cowboying and the West really reminded me of how I felt when we lived in Scotland. I missed it so much that it felt like a hole had been punched out of my middle somewhere, and that hurt, that aching desire is what pushed me to learn as much as I could about cowboying again when we moved back to America. I admire these buckaroos who desperately want to find a better way to get a long with their horses, finding times and places to rope when roping is looked upon as cruel in Italy. They have a certain spunk and desire that I admire, that I want to cultivate in my life. So I work on my Italian here in my California bunkhouse, in the hope that one-day I will go back and be able to communicate and live in Italy for a time, a Buckaroo Barbie in an old land.

I shove my bare feet into sheepskin slippers (I hardly wear shoes when we’re home), and walk into the saddle shop to start organizing my rawhide, so I can start braiding again. My head is full of electric guitar rifts, red/white/blue poly ropes, painted and quilled elk hides, new cowboy boots and dreams of a Van Norman colt….dreams and goals and happenings all mixed up in a jumble of happiness.

I am home.

It is good.

xo xo Liz

Roman Ruins and Nevada Sage

I want to roll out spinach-flavored gnocchi

In my underslung cowboy boots

Clouds of flour rising from my station at a 250-year-old kitchen counter.

In the corner, a bundle of Nevada sage will hang from the rafters alongside

Hackmore cores

Bundles of chilies and garlic.

I want to leave a trail of ION dirt behind me as I

Happily stamp my way through the streets of Milan,

Cobblestones vibrating beneath my booted feet.

I want to watch the Mediterranean Sea

Kiss the Roman shore as we work wild, horned cattle.

And then I want to fly back to you

Saturated and filled to the brim with another’s history,

Songs, hopes and history

And live out my days

In the shadow lands of this California sky

Nevada sage and the kiss of memories from Italy’s green shores

xo xo Liz  

A Song Across the Sea

Although I won’t be able to post this for another day or so, I’m writing this sitting in the airport in Milano, waiting for our flight for Frankfurt. That was actually a hellish ordeal. Trying to just get our tickets to get on the plane took three hours, because you have to go back and forth between so many different counters it’s ridiculous! Italians like blonde hair, and since we have cowboy hats we stick out. The men at the airport are lovely and all want to know where we got our hats and where we live in America. The women….were not quite so helpful this morning.

Alora (well). Our trip….was everything I could have imagined and more. Our hosts were such incredibly lovely people that I personally learned a lot from…about dogs, cattle and strength of character. Natalia Estrada is a Spanish beauty who can put a stop on her colt that leaves you surprised with just how hard he tries to bury his ass in the dirt. She’s also a famous actress with a heart of gold. Drew Mischanti’s family has a ranch outside of Rome and his family has only ever stopped raising cattle twice….and that was for both crusades. I’m not even kidding.

We arrived in Milano and to our surprise Drew and Natalia picked us up in a Ford King Ranch pickup. I definitely wasn’t expecting that! On the way to their home, we stopped in a village that I can’t remember the name of and drove into a lovely farmhouse for a three hour dinner. There are no menus because everything that is served is grown or made within a one-mile radius to the farm. Innumerable courses later, we were on the road to the Rockin AN.

The rest of the week passed in a colored, lyrical blur of roping, riding, meeting new friends, passionate discussions about horsemanship and the “cowboy way of life,” cheat sheets of Italian words carried in back pockets and of course delicious food and drink. I met so many people who I really and truly felt connected with and was so touched to watch these Italian buckaroos work hard to rope the way they want, while I sometimes take it for granted because it’s so common here in the US. Silver bits and spurs glinted in the sun, Hamley saddles passed me by and all the while the beautiful, lilting music of the Italian language swirled around us. Yeah, I’m waxing poetic I know, I can’t help it right now, so give me a break. 

There was a cow dog clinic and some of the cutest, well behaved puppies I’ve ever seen were started on some French cattle (GO CODY BALLARD!!) Adrian sang her little heart out and watching everyone mouth every word to Old Time Vaquero about made my heart split in two. I love it when other people adore my little sister almost as much as I do.  Sunday we roped all day long, people jumping off and on horses, loaning each other their ponies and encouraging the newbies by calling out their names as they headed towards the herd. Tali (Natalia’s daughter) and I roped together and won the branding which was kind of fun and Adrian and I roped together but I’m afraid we didn’t do very well! 

Sunday night a caravan of cars and pickups wound their way through the mountains and stopped and had the most delicious dinner of real pizza….just wow.

Adrian and I flew out of Milan with Italian dirt on our boots, new friendships in our hearts, rope burns on our palms and an excitement to return as soon as possible.

Thank you Drew and Natalia for such a wonderful time.

xo xo Liz