November 17th

Rode tonight BUT not the normal schedule.

When I got home Sean was there because Zoe (our dog) had broken a fence board and was going back and forth from our yard to the neighbors... he fixed the fence while I changed and we were on our way to the barn. Normally he isn't home till 5:40 ish so it was really nice to get an early start!

I tacked up, lunged and hopped on. There were 5 other people riding in the indoor and two of them were jumping- it was a bit crowded but was really good for both of us. Like I have said before, I'd rather ride with people then alone :)

So I continued to work on what I did in my lesson Tuesday. He felt better and much more responsive when I asked him to S L O W down to do the sitting trot.

I also worked on getting a working trot from him which really isn't hard for him but to go forward with out rushing was my purpose.

Lastly I worked on steering ... cutting across the diagonal, big circles, small circles, reverses, going around the jumps ... you get the point. I want to make sure that he is responsive when I ask him to turn AND that I am supporting with my leg to help guide him.

I felt like he was doing a great job of working hard for me and listening. There was a lot going on around us so the first 10 or so minutes of my ride was just going around the arena on the rail and getting in our groove. After that he was such a good good boy. We also did a lot of walking under saddle (with super long reins) to try and get him as cool as possible and then un-tacked and walked/cooled him out all the way. I am going to talk to my trainer about doing a trace clip because it takes so much time to cool him out before I can re blanket and put him away.

Maybe something like this...



Or something like this ..


Oh and I brought my tack home so hopefully I can clean it all tomorrow- exciting Friday night I know :)