Here there be dragons...

"I'm telling you stories. Trust me." - Winterson

Remembering to have fun....

My pony finally had the edge off her today. Not tired, but not high either. All it took was four outings in five days! hahaha gotta love TBs. Had to laugh at Si on Tuesday. I pulled the beast out and hooked it up to the trailer, which I then parked directly beside the mare's paddock as that points us in the right direction for the highway. Now the beast really is a Beast. It's incredibly loud and not a small vehicle by any means. So every mare in the field came over to see what was going on - they were all lined up along the fence watching my every move. Except Sienna. Who took one look, gave the equine equivalent of rolling her eyes, and went back to the hay which she no longer had to share cause all the other horses were watching me. hahaha Gotta love it. So I loaded her to take her to her dressage lesson and she walks on perfectly, absolutely no hesitation, all is well. Except that after all her recent excursions and multiple trailer loads on Sun, she now thinks everywhere she goes she should have a buddy. Stood perfectly quietly until I closed the door without a friend on the trailer. Oh well now that was just not acceptable. hahaha quite the temper tantrum. But she settled again fairly quickly. Had a decent lesson - pony was a little stiff, but not bad, and grazed her for a bit before heading home. She did hesitate briefly before loading, but it was only half a second or so, so all good. So then last night I took Nicole to school XC. This being Sienna's 4th outing in 5 days I wasn't sure how thrilled she would be, but both critters just walked on, no problem. It is awfully nice to have horses that load hassle free. The environment is one Si's been to before and where she's quiet, so I was able to tie her to the trailer (which I've just started doing in calm scenarios). Made life super easy to get tacked up and ready to go. N tried to use the giant mounting block, which theoretically would've made things easier but unfortunately it was rather precariously balanced on a rock so was a little like trying to mount from the middle of a teeter-totter. hahaha Amusing from my viewpoint but I think not-so-much from hers *g* Esp as when her horse is excited he doesn't stand long for her to mount. So we head out, her horse definitely in the lead, having no idea where he was going but determined to get there first. We took our time warming up -- went for a long walk and then an equally long trot. N warmed up over a random PE log while I took Si up and down the equally tiny bank. She's definitely got the hang of up (even for the big ones). There's still hesitation on the down but I'm happy to say there was no launching at all and by then end she was actually stepping down properly. Woohoo! Progress. We jumped some little courses -- N's horse was having a blast! And once she got the hang of putting your leg ON to stop (kinda like hitting "start" to shut down the computer) she did too :) She managed to get him over the scary painted fence on the first try! Woohoo! and introduced him to the world of up-banks. Sweet. By the end they were complete pros! As for Si, her confidence is slowly coming back. I admit I let her look at almost everything before jumping her over it, but it lead to a significant increase in our success rate. Still mostly jumping out of the trot, but at least that's getting better. Hillwork went really well and general behaviour was excellent, so that was good. And the best part - she was having fun! I haven't felt that from her since before she was off, so it was really nice to experience. And grazing them afterwards as the sun set on a warm summer's eve? Yeah, it doesn't get much better than that.

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