Time Flies When Its the Weekend!

November weather was windy but mild and I played with the ponies three days in a row.  Alas, we didn't get the Saturday Party Lesson since Patty was in Stillwater to help with the equine special olympics but I am hopeful that next week will work out for LAL with my horsey friends.

After a couple of days in Kansas, I had Friday off so Mallory and I met for lunch in Catoosa and then worked some Clinton exercises on Raffles (Mallory) and Sister (me).  Sister was very responsive for ground work including yeilding the hindquarters and forequarters, lunging, backing, and de-sensitizing.  We added flexing on the ground and then I mounted up and tried some "one-rein stops" from the walk and trot - I did not try that at the canter.  Sister was a little snarky with one rump-hop the first time I used the "spanker" end of the lead.  Overall, she seemed to get the concept and we ended the lesson with cruising at the trot.

Saturday morning and - moving like a herd of turtles - the girls and I took Splash, Sunny, and Pico over to Che' Cheval spend the day while Steve held down the OSU football fort at the Wild Orban Ranch as they stomped again.

The girls rode their horses while I worked Splash in the round pen - lunging for respect.  Although better than the first attempt last week, Splash just couldn't bring himself to comply.  So, MUCH later, he finally realized that he better get with the program so we could stop before we dropped.  Whew!  So, THEN we mounted up and went to work in the big arena with Mallory and the girls.  We worked on walk/stop transitions mostly trying for submission and no back / prompt trot-off.  Then to took a lunch break before moving on to the next horse victim - Sister.

Sister is getting much better with her ground work and we breezed though the basic warm-up exercises and then Mallory tried to teach me "yeilding the forequarters."  Sister seems to get the concept although there was a lot of operator error on my part.

More horse torture on Sunday when Ivy started Pico in the Clinton Anderson exercises.  Poor Pico isn't the sharpest tool in the shed.  So I jumped in to help.  We free-lunged in the round pen until he figured out turning in and following.  Then, we concentrated on de-sensitizing with the stick and string and some yielding the hindquarters.  Pico got to stand at the trailer and ponder things while I worked with Splash in the round pen.  We started with lunging and then moved on to yielding the hindquarters and backing.  We finished goundwork with flexing.  Splash is very stiff (especially to the left) and we had to lower expectations a-bit.  But, we did manage a little flex and then mounted up for more work to minimize head-bob in the transitions.  Some progress so, lets hope for more improvement next week at the long overdue PARTY LESSON!  YaYa!