What's Up Wednesday

 

I don't have a ton to report this week. I also failed to snap any photos of my horses. I need to be better about that! I'm definitely better with media when the horses are home. A couple of years ago I contributed to Pivo's crowdfunding campaign for the redesigned Pivo pod. It kept getting delayed and I had honestly forgotten all about it. But it arrived last week, so I'm excited to try it out this summer when the horses get home. Hopefully I'll have lots of fun media from that this summer. 

I THINK Eros and Shiny will get to see the vet on Friday, but I haven't actually gotten confirmation on that. I'm not sure if I put them on the list early enough or not. Our barn manager assistant trainer has been back and forth to Florida, and she's the one that is supposed to relay these things to us. It's... interesting boarding in the winter when the people in charge aren't around, and there's not a consistent liaison on the premises. But HOPEFULLY we will get some vet time. 

I finally put Eros on Benadryl and his hives are much better. Not completely gone, but significantly better. He'll stay on it until they are completely gone though. He's been a perfect boy for his hand walks. Yesterday was really nice here, in the 50's and there was sun! So we walked outside. We both really enjoyed it. I'm hoping we'll get cleared to start tack walking. Fingers crossed!

Shiny was pretty funny this week. She definitely is coming due for some maintenance so hopefully we'll get that done Friday. When she needs vet work she tends to kick out when I ask for canter. Every time. So she's been doing that. But she can't be feeling that badly because she was SASSY in our weekend lesson. She started out kind of sulky and behind my leg, but then after popping over a few fences she changed her mind about that and was kind of feral. But like... in a fun way. At one point, we landed off a diagonal fence and there was a horse standing (not at all in our way) that we would be cantering past. Well, she was terribly offended by that horse's presence apparently, because she did a leap and a buck. A BIG LEAP and a medium buck. Nothing that unseated me (there's a lot of real estate on that pony's back) but it was a good effort. She also nearly got the horse strides in the outside line which is especially impressive since the jumps were like 2'. It's not easy for a pony to gallop down in the horse strides over small jumps like that. But we almost did. Not on purpose. So much sass. I love that pony. She's perfect. 

Al's been pretty good of late. We had two good lessons in which we managed to jump nearly every fence in the ring. They're still tiny jumps, and we're still staying a bit off the end of the ring, but he's a lot more relaxed now. He's also starting to give me some nice work and accept some pressure from me. We achieved a nice forward trot ON THE BIT several days in a row now. I don't ask for it for too long, but I get a little more each ride. I'm happy with him. He still spooks at things, but he's starting to think before he reacts, which is what I'm looking for. Does he still break from canter? Yes. Sometimes when he's worried. But he keeps trotting at least. And truthfully, I'd rather he break when he's scared, than whirl around and run away. 

I feel like horses are so hard. Just when you think you know how to do ride them, one like Al comes along that makes you rethink everything you ever knew. The past two months with him have been hard emotionally for me. I'm in an environment where there's only one way of thinking and it doesn't work for this horse. And while I've never cared much what other people think as long as my horses are healthy, happy, and performing at their best, there's still a part of me that feels... I don't know exactly what it is. But I feel like I'll be judged for stepping back so far with this horse. Deep down, I really, TRULY think I'm doing the right thing for him, but I also know that others do not think that. And for some reason that's been hard for me. But that's definitely a me problem, and my plan is to just keep on doing what we're doing. Spring is coming so hopefully we'll be outdoors soon enough. 

So that's about it from here this week! Sorry for the really boring wall of text. If you made it this far without any pretty photos, you're the real MVP. Hope your horses are all doing great!