fun fun fun... in the sun sun sun

I had the best fun this weekend and hardly rode myself at all :D

My folk's were away so I was in charge of the menagerie. It's not a great idea to be by yourself in that situation so a friend kindly agreed to come visit with his 9 year old daughter (G). I haven't seen the friend for 10 years and have only talked to the daughter on the phone - so it could have been a nightmare, but turned out to be a dream...

I was worried that we would have a repeat of recent weather - wind, rain, snow, in any combination. Instead the sun shone, and the wind only muttered slightly on Sunday. Based on past experience, I grabbed the chance of a fine Friday afternoon and went ahead with getting G on to Rosie and seeing how they get on. Rosie was keen to stay by me, and G was struggling with rising trot - so I bunged on the lead rein and we went around the grass field a couple of times. Rosie is much more forward going out of the school and G enjoyed it. One of the nice things was that I didn't need to suggest where she should go the whole time - she was making her own plans - which way to go, to weave in and out of some blocks etc.

G was keen to do everything she needed to get her Brownie badge for riding. The riding part was to walk, trot, stop, turn in an enclosed space without being led.

So on Saturday I figured it would be worth seeing how she got on with Dudley. He is a hand bigger but G is almost as tall as me (!) so I felt it would be fine. And it was. She was weaving in and out of blocks, walking, trotting, and then even had a canter on each rein. Big smiley grin from G and Duds appeared to be having a ball as well. There was a real rapport there. Duds didn't even take a look at the blocks with his normal OMG attitude, he just got on with it.

On Sunday we went to my sister's place to see lambs and calves, and G ended up going for a small hack on big sister's welsh B pony K. K doesn't get as much exercise as she really needs, and is prone to laminitis. She is ridden with grass reins as she can be a bit greedy. As we headed along a large grass field and tried a trot, K figured she would head home and veered off. I was already running along side so got left behind. I had briefed G beforehand to turn her if anything like that happened but K was just too strong. There was G and K, pelting off across the field at frantic trot - with me gasping behind thinking the worst - that I'd put G off riding for ever and her father would never forgive me for letting his child fall off !

Luckily G managed to halt her, and was fine, so off we went again. With some caution and me with a ready hand to grab the grass rein if K decided to make another dash for freedom...

Later that day, big sis appeared at my parent's on her highland - so that made pony no. 4 for G to ride, and then my folk's got home early enough for us to go play with Rosie all together.

I'm not sure who had the biggest grin - me or G :D

Oh, and I did manage to ride Fi - on Saturday. She had seemed a bit stiff so I was going to stick to walk and trot; she had been offering left lead canter on both reins on the lunge. But she actually offered a nice canter on both reins so I kept the session short and just aimed for good behaviour and a good state of mind :)

:sigh: bad behaviour

Fi's been a tad difficult this week. She managed to take a chunk out of my mother as she being led in during the week. And in general has been causing chaos.

How much of it is down to being sore and achy, we just don't know. They've tried bringing her in by herself - and she was even worse.

It is as if she wants one of the others to go ahead into the farm yard and just throws an "oh My God" into the picture to achieve that.

I've finally given in and went and got her a "calming" supplement today, but it will take a while to see if it has any effect.

I lunged and long reined her in Saturday, despite high winds, and she was fine. I am sure the lack of work can't have helped her state of mind :( The upside is that she looked relatively sound.

She was shod this morning, which should help as well..... but she was still a complete pain coming in. She stopped part way up and then backed up at speed into the other two (who got out of the way - understandably).

In the meantime, it looks like my old guy (35 this year !) has her sussed. While she was being shod, she was tied up outside his stable and proceeded to pull menacing faces at him. Rather than move back from the door (as Rosie might - Rosie is right next door to her all the time), Red seemed to take a moment to think, eyed up the situation, and then grabbed the loose tail on her headcollar in his mouth. He held her there, with her head to one side, for about 4 or 5 minutes. She appeared not to be able to move. When he let go, she stood back and gave him his space.

He did again, a bit later.

It was at the same time both funny and an outstanding piece of mare management :)

one step forward, one airs above the ground, one lame horse

:sigh:

The weekend before last I rode Fi on Saturday but felt she was not quite right. So on the Sunday, as the weather was not so great, I just did some ground work.... and then made the "mistake" of letting her loose to do some loose schooling.

She... ahem... let off some steam...

When we then turned them out into the bigger paddock, she let off some more...

and was then lame for the next week.

She was still not right by this weekend, so I long reined on Saturday and just did some (on line) groundwork on Sunday. She seems to be getting less sore

In the meantime I long reined Rosie on Saturday, and she was a star. I did an exercise with her to work on steering and her "compliance" to what you ask for.

The weekend before we loose jumped her (again she was a good girl). When I went to warm her up on a single line on Saturday, she felt she ought to canter down the side of the school we had the jumps on. It seems she is very literal at the moment in what you teach her and needs some help when you change that (now we don't want that, we want this....).

Anyway, having sorted out that she didn't need to canter down the long side any more, I got her doing an exercise where you come off the long side at, say, K and head to X. At X you make a 10m circle to the outside, and on returning to X you then head back to the same long side i.e. to H. It took one or two times on each rein for her to "get it", but then she was great. Interesting when we tried the same exercise under saddle the next day, she was much more hesitant and less "firm" in her steering ? She is coming on nicely though :)