Fun rides - one of mine and one student's...

Had a lesson the other day that was reasonably entertaining. I rode Dixie, which after years of riding only greenbeans, always feels a little like cheating :) A fairly traditional jumping exercise made interesting by the proximity of the jumps to the arena fence... Small jumps - nothing over 3'. Set up with one parallel to the arena fence and the other two like wings:

So start off the left rein and jump 3, turn to the right and come back to jump 1. So far so good - easy turns and with a nice forward 3 strides after you leave the track before coming anywhere near a jump. All good.

Then make it a little more interesting and jump 2 off of either rein. A little trickier - pretty much the definition of a square turn. Challenge being of course to keep the quality of canter through the turn to have enough impulsion to be able to jump. Depending where you turn you either have a forward 2 (hard to get off that tight a turn) or a *really* tight 3 (which then makes having enough impulsion for the jump the challenge).

But really, I was riding Dixie. Entirely adjustable and totally honest to her fences so not nearly so much of a challenge as it should've been. Alright, so step it up a bit. Canter off the left rein and roll back to 1, land and turn right and roll back to 2. Much trickier. Lots of fun though. Dixie was a little confused the first time "Seriously lady, would you just pick one! We have these other two options that are *much* easier to get to from here." But, she did it :)

I was entertained anyways - was fun and easy and totally stress free.

And speaking of entertainment; Hailey rode Sienna for the first time yesterday. hahaha and she did a great job. Si has a lot more power than most of the horses she's ridden up to now, but even when Si felt the need to go for a gallop, H just laughed at her and kept riding. Which is exactly the right response for that horse. Was really great to see my very dedicated working student and my horse having so much fun together :) Some things just make you smile, so I thought I'd share :)