Fun weekend

Look, I was born too early for My Little Pony. So I’m taking inordinate pleasure in dressing up My Big Pony.

This weekend really couldn’t have been any more beautiful – it was breezy and sunny, with temperatures in the mid 70’s.  While I don’t anything particularly earth-shattering or insightful to offer, I can provide a picture of Derby in his new spring green outfit.

On Saturday we tooled around with Christy and Amy (and Liam and Manny) in the outdoor.  We did quite a bit of canter work, trotted over the poles, and I will admit that I fleetingly thought about trying the x.  I still don’t feel ready to handle things if Derby over-jumps it, though.   He put in an effort that would have cleared 3′ plus, cracking his back (he has quite a bascule) and popping my butt right out of the tack over a couple poles lying on the ground.  I need to be prepared for that to happen – and I would like a better result than riding around his neck and then falling off. So, instead, I did some work in 2-point, letting the stirrups rattle on the bottom of my feet (i.e. keeping my weight on my inner thighs and knee, not the balls of my feet.

To finish the ride, I ran through Training 2 again, and then did some good walk work, focusing on connecting through the outside rein, to cool out.

Today I had the outdoor to myself.  I worked on Derby’s right lead canter, which can feel pretty awful – he can get lateral on it.  So we worked mostly in a circle, and I was able to break up the lateral pairs (I think, at least it felt like it) and get him to round.  That, for me, is real progress.   We also worked on adjustability in canter. Christy was complaining that he wasn’t really covering ground last week in a lesson.  It takes some bravery for me to say MORE CANTER, but today I did it.  Down the long side, I definitely got a bigger gait.

We also went back and forth through the poles.  Derby is starting to pick up his feet and bounce through the poles, rather than shuffle, hitting them as he goes.  This is also a welcome change of events.  I wrapped up by dropping my stirrups.  We trotted around both ways until my thighs were burning.  Then we cooled out, hit the showers, and had a nice long graze.

There’s my Mom, and she has cookies!

Then it was up to Wisconsin to visit Jag.  My dark bay boy has stood outside in the sun all summer, baking is brains out and bleaching himself into a bayskin.  His coat is rough and bleached, but once he sheds his blond hair, he’ll be sleek, shiny and dappled.  October is Jag’s best month. He always looks beautiful. He is fat and happy, sharing a pasture with his pal Stoli up at Wyngate Equestrian.

While I was up there, a rain shower passed over the area, leaving an unbelievably vivid rainbow.  While my camera phone picture left a but to be desired, you can get the gist.  And needless to say, this rainbow was terminating in a Golden Delicious apple tree.  So, no pot of leprechaun gold, but I think the horses would take the apples any day.