Any connection between your reality and mine is purely coincidental.

Blog? What blog? hahaha ok ok I know I've been a little less than dedicated about writing here lately, but you know occasionally life gets in the way of the internet :)

So today's lesson was that "dressage should be fun" hahaha Yeah I know -- on what planet? Even the DQs I know never claim dressage is fun >;-P Challenging, interesting, addictive, and a few other such words -- but never fun... However, the point here was that to do dressage *well* you have to be relaxed. And too often people come into the ring look around and go "I'm in a dressage ring, in dressage tack, we have to do dressage NOW. PUT YOUR HEAD DOWN!!!!" and it gets worse from there *g* Now that might be a *slight* exaggeration, but the point is valid -- as soon as the word dressage is mentioned, people get tense... And then the tension goes to the horse, which makes the rider MORE stressed, etc etc etc. Not fun.

So what did we do? We goofed around like little kids on horseback, had a blast, and by the end the horses were moving unbelievably well. Classic eh? Of course I was tempted to take it too far *g* but I behaved myself :)

This all was after a repeat of the dressage w/ speedbumps lecture -- w/ canter work being used to improve the trot, and mini-jumps being used to improve the canter. Gotta admit -- it works, AND it's fun. So really, why not do it that way?