Liberty Attemps, Fun and Spanish Walk Finale!

Fabulous night last night! Tons of fun, lots of laughing and copious amouts of genius ponies! When I first got there Kota and Mo were both over by the shed so I went into the tackroom to fill my pocket with apple snacks and grab my carrot stick. I had a mild liberty plan forming in my head, just to see what would happen. Mostly I wanted to see if I could play with Dakota at all, to improve his spanish walking-ness.

Betweent he time it took me to fill my pockets and get back to the gate, both ponies were there! How nice! I gave them both some treats through the fence and then went into the ring. Kota was a bit standoffish but Mo was all over me - which brought up Kota's enthusiasm when he saw she was getting munchies! I let them swarm me and get their hugs for a bit and then tried to ask Dakota to lift a leg. He did - YEY- got his treat and walked away... hmm. I think Mo was making dirty faces at him behind my back because when I turned to look at her, her ears were mid flick and she was trying mighty hard to look innocent!

Oh well! Mo time! I friendlied her with the stick and string then threw the string over her withers and asked her to walk with me. It was kind of funny at first because she tried to yeild her hindquarters to me, since thats what I usually ask for with a string-over-back type thing, so I had to go back to L1 style driving, which was neat that it worked! We walked and trotted around a bit, lots of treats, lots of licking and chewing. Some sideways towards, and around. I tried to do a complete yeild/slowspin thing but Mo got confused and went "nanner nanner!" and canter pranced off. I had to laugh. She is such a goober.

She went over to Dakota so I headed in a vauge that direction until they both looked at me. Neato. Then I walked closer and Mo went "Oh you cant catch me yet" and went to leave soI altered course and went to the fenceline to chat and give treats to Crystal. Mo *hated* that and stormed right over demanding her treats and attention. *snicker* I love Mo....

This time I threw the string over her neck and played with yeilding around that way and walked over to the gate. Everything went shiny until we got to the gate and I paused to open it. Mo saw her opening and gave me the "nanner nanner" look again and she spun and cantered off - now she wasnt bolting off, she was daintily prancing her way slowly away from me, clearly playing catch me if you can. It was quite hysterical.

She went to the shed this time so we played some hide and seek around it, which was hugely fun. Until Mo caught me again and we tried the gate again, this time doing lots of Focus-Please transitions on the way, hoping I wouldnt lose her at the gate again. Success! We got through the gate no problem and moseyed right into the tackroom again - Mo is quite proud of herself now.

I saddled her, grabbed the hackamore and put a 22' line on, and back out we went. On the way back to the gate we had some grass snatching issues so we played with that a bit, making me realize I wasnt being soft enough! When she jamme don the breaks to stop, I was asking her to go again, but she would always JUMP forwards, how interesting. I slowed down and realized maybe thats why Mo has been so spastic lately - as she gets more sensitive to my requests, I havent really been altering myself to measure up to her. WHOA!

SO! With that new BFO in mind, we got into the ring and I started asking Mo to do things at the lightest possible phase. WOW. I got a nice slow straight yo-yo all the way to 22', ten questions before going out on the circle [usually she tears out before asking if I might have meant sideways or back] super soft gait transitions, EVEN halt! Gorgeous change of direction to! WOWY! Even when I brought my energy up for canter stick to me, she was right with me and completely came back down again afterwards [that has been a problem, she stays adrenalized] She was licking and chewing a TON and thinking about everything and trying her heart out! She looked so happy!!

We played with the weave pattern to, and Mo offered it at a trot! Good mood much? When I finally mounted up I was really excited to see how this ride would pan out... Mo's good mood had even held over through a quick bathroom break where we ran up to the house and she tried to climb the porch :-)

So I mounted, and Mo waited and asked for a treat [which she got] and I settled into the saddle, feeling out the new shim pattern, and it still felt good. Off we walked on a casual rein. We practiced our follow the rail and stopping in the corners. Mo has a habit of sweeping by corners! I knew it was working for her when we were trotting and I wanted to pass a corner and I felt her almost deke into the corner anyway - cool feeling, smart horse.

We went around doing walk trot transitions, she was super low and stretchy on the far side, but still getting tense on the spooksy tree side. Thank you Legend. *sigh* Eventually I felt good to pick up the canter so we did canter halt transitions for the long side - pick it up, canter the long side, stop in the corner. Trot to the next corner, canter to the long side. Lather rinse repeat. That seemed to help Mo calm down about the scary side because I had a fixed point and she got a treat every time she made it there.

I decided to step it up then and work on cantering a whole lap. Going to the left it worked out ok just because of where the scary place is in the ring. Going to the right she broke to a trot because of the scary place but didnt spook, so I am proud of her for that. It is so weird being concerned about her spooking.. this is a total first!

After cantering laps we walked around to cool off - had a time limit last night unfortunately - and practiced stopping off my body. Ok, you might say ew gross or yuck, but it worked like a charm anyways - I picked poo piles as our stop points because the ring is also a paddock and there is poop in various places - like the rail. By the end, even on the scary side, Mo was stopping off my body, exactly at whatever poo pile I picked. I was thrilled!

When I jumped off Mo looked around at me all proud, that was nice. I untacked her and put her in the back yard to graze. Dakota had moseyed over while I was putting away Mo's things so I grabbed some more treats and went to say hi. He is such a happy camper. We played with more spanish walk leg lifts and that got really good. Kota will do anything for food sometimes! Then I thought whay the hay and grabbed the hackamore for Kota to see if maybe I could get him to leg lift while I was sitting on him.

Turns out no, but I did get to canter around on him and ride his ultra uber super smooth trot that I love :-) S o that was rather delightful.

After I finished with Kota, I put Mo back in her feild, gave them both lots more love hugs and treats and finally had to leave. They both got dinner and were pleased with that though. A very good afternoons work I think. My weather goddess alter ego showed up to, just as I got into my truck it started to rain, so I am thankful I didnt have to get moist.

:-)
S

PS: I have been able to secure myself a lease horse! A wonderfully kind lady has agreed to let me lease her horse, a 16 year old Arab x Quarter Horse! That should be different from my usual drafty crossess....!