What a Great Day!!

Today was a lot of fun!

We got to have a bareback lesson with Berin, riding in the halter with one rein - which is something I am really confident about, so I was primed to have loads of fun.

Me and Mo warmed up online in a 50' round pen, playing with our new maintain gait program and fixing our broken change of direction - which wasnt broken today! She was a superstar, really getting into the game and playing around with her posture and things while maintaining her cantering. From there we went into our lesson, which turned out to be a great time.

We were playing with throwing the rope over our horses heads [which was challengingly fun due to some high winds!] at a walk and a trot, and then doing so on a weave pattern! Cool! It was really fun, and Mo was great at allowing me to occasionally bonk her or catch her ears when the wind took the rope or I just threw awkwardly... Poor Mo, she is such a trooper, she just kept on keeping on for me. She sure spoils me sometimes!

When we finished weaving through cones, it was time to weave through each other! That was sure a fun challenge! I wish I had 20 people to play that with at home! Mo did great, and she is really getting good at allowing other horses in to her personal bubble without trying to eat them, I am really proud of her for that, since it makes pre and post lesson horse shoes oh so much less eventful!

After weaving around we lined up two by two at the cones, and played with crossing our arms and going sideways to the next cone, about fifty feet away! Mo did really well and tried really hard for this. The really cool thing was that she really allowed me to direct her - when something was lagging I could isolate it and say 'hey, hindquarters, you should catch up' and she wouldnt take offense, just move that part and keep going. When we would get to the next cone, you would back up to the fence line, about 150 feet away. Mo was really solid in her backup, again allowing me to direct her when she drifted from straight, but it was a little slow, so we are going to play with speeding it up a bit in the future.

When the lesson was done we had our own personal horsemanship time until lunch time, so Mo and I headed out into her pasture area, since it is a big-ish open area that ISNT sand! Since the footing is more solid, that means Mo has more go! To be fair, I am not a fan of slogging through sand either, and the arena at the Foundation Station is DEEP, so it makes Mo more introverted feeling than usual. Anyways, out in her pasture she was happy to move about, so we started with some nice follow the rail at a trot, just to get used to the new situation. Even though she lives there, I didnt want to make assumptions that she would be calm there. Ive been wrong that way before!

She was a superstar, and relaxed at the trot almost imediately. When we started to pick up the canter she offered me the left lead, as usual, even though I asked for the right. The transitions were really nice and easy though, so she gets credit for that! Each time she would pick up the wrong lead I would softly bend her to the rail back to a trot and ask again. It took a few times, but eventually she got the right answer and I let her canter off on a casual rein for a little bit around the rail. We continued this pattern for a bit, until my brain couldnt *not* jump the log sitting there anymore!

There is a log in Mo's pasture, and I have wanted to jump it since I got here, so do dee doo, off on our right lead we aimed and popped over... waaay over jumping because Mo missed a stride somewhere, but it was awesome and we stopped right after! GO EVEN IMPULSION!

We played on a circle after that, on a bit more of a concentrated rein. I was trying to help Mo find the right bend in her body to get the right lead, it seemed to help. The number of left lead departs before finding a right lead depart went down. So yey! We jumped a few more times, which was super fun, and Mo started finding her distances, which was delightful!

When our circles got pretty good I turned it into a figure eight, so she could pick up the left lead without feeling wrong. That went pretty well, and on the last round she got the right lead from a halt!

It was a really fun session because I could feel her collection herself, sitting on her hind end, and the lightness in the bridle was just unbelievable! She was actually carrying herself properly and not asking me to hold her up! So cool! YEY canter -walk/halt transitions!!!!

After finishing up with that, after lots of cantering and STILL finishing with motivation and an effective gas pedal still in place, we moseyed around, I took her bridle off and we rode back to the tack room. Mo got a drink and I unsaddled her. She got a well needed bath and we went to hang out in the sunshine to dry [both of us... Mo tends to share baths] and eat some grass [just Mo]

The best part was, when I went to feed Mo her dinner tonight, they already had their hay and she left her hay to come hang out with me - AGAIN! All I did was brush her and feed her, but still, thats such a nice feeling, and it tells me that I didnt cross the line into a bad place today. I didnt feel like I did at all, but it was a lot of cantering for Mo!

I am actually really proud of how things went today. I was so calm and relaxed and having fun, that a situation that could have been in the past, really frustrating, was just a fun puzzle to solve. Maybe I should have POTC 3 music in my head everyday! I dont know why, but it was running through my head over and over.... Like Pat always says, I would have been proud to have Mo's and my mom watching! I kind of wish my mom *had* been watching... then I might have some pictures of Mo looking all amazing!  Oh well... I will just have to live with FEELING the amazing that she was today!

:-)
S