However, my choir director called for sectionals yesterday, which meant I had an extra half hour before needing to be at school. That opened up my time enough to allow for a ride! Yippee!! :D
It was quite a nice ride too, considering I had not ridden at all in over a week. <gasp>
I focused on the Figure 8 pattern. She is still very herd bound and drifts in the direction of The Pony, especially during circles, so one side of the Figure 8 was more difficult than the other. We worked on this until both sides were more even.
Interesting side note: After more observation and consideration, I believe I have decided that Lady is more stiff through her right side. Of course, she also seems stiff through her left shoulder, but I'm pretty sure that is due to my stiffness in that shoulder, and I think I block her sometimes. Food for thought!
Once the Figure 8 was looking better, we went off down the driveway. Right now my goal is to get her going up and down the driveway (away and from home) without difficulty or herd-bound-ness showing up too much. So far, she is doing pretty good, other than the first 10(ish) strides, but once she settles into her "job" she is fairly good. Forwardness and obedience change quite a bit depending on which direction we are going, but its nothing too bad. One of the nice things is that once we turn back towards home, she is quite forward and stays fairly straight, so I can practice posting to the walk (so, so hard...) whereas going away from home she tends to stop if I stand in my stirrups (my fault too, probably).
We worked mostly on calmness and obedience during this time. One of the things I was trying to do is to get her to give me her nose when I ask for it. She will bend okayish, but keeps her nose pointed towards home the whole time. So, my "exercise" was for her to give me a nice bend so I could see her nose. Since she is very stiff through the poll (and often the rest of her neck) it was quite challenging. She was also better bending to the left than to the right, and she liked to stop a lot. Hmmmm! Something we'll keep working on!
Blog Challenge, Day 12 - Dream Trailer.
This One would be awesome! Of course, I would rather the living quarters be a bit less fancy and the horse side of it be even better. Surely I'm not the only one who couldn't care less about the human side of the trailer? o.O
No comments:
Post a Comment