Girls Just Wanna Have Fun

Megan had Monday off while I took my weekly all-about-me lesson. The lesson went well. I think I may eventually remember how to ride. Energized with some ideas on riding a plan out to the barn I went.

I didn't bother with side reins and just let her trot and canter around in each direction on the lunge. She was mellow as could be. Just as I was getting on, Cindy and Pele were finishing up their ride. Pele is Megan's neighbor in the barn and her current love interest. Like a teenaged girl, she has to preen a little when her crush walks by. Preening and working are somewhat mutually exclusive. This conflict of purpose became our lesson plan for the evening.

Circle to the left? I can't Pele is to the right. Oh, oh, oh here he comes!! I'm gonna fall out of the ring and bump into him so he'll see me. C'mon Mom here we go. No we don't baby girl. Oh, oh he disappeared into the barn, I should stop and wait for him to come out. No, walk on. That final conflict elicited a little temper tantrum. She blew through all my aids and bulled off at the trot with her head in my nose. Whatever. Compose yourself. And she did.

The next 10 minutes were her loveliest work to date. She trotted round, relaxed and soft into the contact. I concentrated on keeping my hands low and following and moving her shoulders around the circles. Occasionally she'd begin to fall in and I focused on "brushing" her over and into the outside rein with my inside leg. Darned if it didn't work.

We also worked on some of those awesome halts and I worked on really staying soft in my seat and asking her quietly. They were consistently very nice. She stays soft on the contact and doesn't move a hair. No flinging of her hindquarters to the inside or outside like I'm so used to from my former mounts. She's just there. The next thing to work on is the downward transition from trot to walk. She interprets my aids as halt and the transition doesn't move smoothly to a marching walk. Gotta stop playing with that cool whoa button so much.

She'll have the next 6 days off and I wonder how she'll be when we pick back up again.

She keeps knocking her left hind fetlock and I can't get the sore healed up. I wonder if she's wearing her hind feet funky and getting off balance. Tomorrow she sees the farrier and it will be interesting to see if it starts to heal after the trim.