Alaina and Sister

The OK weather warmed up to 65 and Sunny on Friday - WOW - wish winter was always like that.  After being in Kansas for a couple of days I was able to get away early enough to catch a quick ride with Sister on my way home from work.

After almost 2 weeks since my last ride, I was a bit nervous.  Lunging went OK after Sister worked off a bit of excitement and she gave me fairly good Whoa's and reverses.  Mounted, we warmed up with long trot before working on SLOW.  I concentrated on sitting deep and keeping my hands as steady as possible and we worked for collection, straightness, and (as needed) bend.  The work went well - we got fairly good - if a little fast - jog and I quit with a little backing.  No nerve for canter after the long break and growing dark.

Saturday promised to be balmy after a crisp start at around freezing.  We heading to Patty's for lessons and lunch.  The current dilema is Sunny - he got a serious cut on the bulb of his right fore foot and might not be healed in time for the Will Rogers Classic at the end of February.  So, options for Alaina include Splash (a difficult ride after his long recovery from injury last year), Sister (still green), or lease a horse from a friend.  So, Alaina rode Carmen (the Mongolian war horse look-a-like) for the lesson with Ivy and Pico.  Alaina loved riding an Arab again and Ivy had some beautiful jumps to finish their lesson.

Kathy and Call, Jolie on Casper, Julie on the paint mare, and Splash and I rode in the party lesson.  I admit to using the German Neck Stretcher.....  (I KNOW - but the 12-step program is on hold).  The sun was out and the weather was fine.  The four of us stretched legs down and back for warm-up, trot circles and arm circles before we picked up the trot.  Call and Kathy were looking really good - they will dominate at the Will Rogers Classic!  Jolie and Casper seemed to  get along fine and they even managed canters both directions.  Julie and the mare were doing well too although the first canter attempt was exciting.  Splash was really resitant to comming out of retirement.  But, we got both canter leads - even while we were falling out at the shoulder during those pesky transitions.

After the lesson, Alaina gave Splash a try and even managed a brief canter without a whip.  Jolie and Alaina swapped for a bit and Alaina did pretty well on Casper.  Jolie loves Splash even though he is a slug...

After lunch at Graham's, we dropped horses back at the Wild O Ranch and headed to Cheval Lake so Alaina could give Sister a try.

Sister gave Alaina the usual resistance at the beginning but they worked through it.  Since Alaina is interested in Western, C helped her with slow - sitting deep and steady hands.  They were able to canter both ways without kickout.  Yeah!  Much work still needed before Alaina and Sister are show-ready, but...

Sunday and the normal OK winter weather returned.  Darn.  But, since it was 'almost 40' and the big winter storm was still out to the NW, Alaina gave Sister another workout with more success.  Followed up with S'mores around the campfire lakeside. 

Then, home for the trailer to move Sister to our house for the storm to give stalls to Romeo and Jody.  Cross all fingers and toes that the big storm misses us and that riding weather will return sooner rather than later.  YaYa.