The Dark, Cool Time

I did so much with Misty tonight. I will probably be editing this blog a few times because of all the important things that I felt. My mind is racing trying to process it all.

I had a bad day at work--Misty remedied the bad feelings I had.

First I went out with just the halter and carrot stick. I had a clear plan to catch her heart before I caught her. I started by whistling. She turned and went into the corn crib. I slowly followed in that direction, but she turned around and started coming to me, so I backed up until she caught me. That was really a nice thing. She had positive energy and a sweet face. I gave her a cookie and really just stood with her for a few minutes, not even touching her.

I had the feeling that this would be a good time to do some liberty stuff with her because she was just connecting with me so well. It was like she was telling me she wanted to speak with me. That is just not something she tells me very often, as far as this summer has gone. So, I took that offer. I started by leading her by the tail. I just used a pinch of hairs and taught her that if I tapped on her butt, she should back up faster. She did not really have to learn it, she just read my intent and knew what it would mean. After a few of those and having her go further back than I have before (we went 10+ feet), I did a lot of friendly game itching her butt, standing and doing nothing, etc for about 3 minutes. Then I started playing with driving from zone 5. Now that Misty understands lead by the tail, I want to start pursuing another big goal of driving by the tail. I worked on the teaching phase of having her follow the feel of me pulling her tail to the side. Eventually, that will be how I steer. She had opposition reflex at first, and I quit when she yielded with only a little support from my carrot stick tapping her hip. Next, I had to make sure that she understood how to go forward, so I....will finish later

I have to go to sleep because I am falling asleep right now, but I will make a quick list of what I need to elaborate on:
driving at liberty from zone 5-getting over her confusion of whether to go forwards or backwards
sideways to me
haltering
talking with my mom
side stepping away from her and drawing her to me that way (completely passive)
going to the gear on the fence, I thought she would see it all and want to leave, but she stood just fine while I put the nat hack on
when I got on, put food behind my back so she would put her head down, her back up, and feel happy.
played with lateral flexion, indirect, and direct reins all without reins
Figure 8 at the walk--attempting precision

Canter, many

Sleeping.

LOOSE HORSE: WooooOOOOOoooooooOOOOO!

Official Records Information:
Misty, 30 minutes, afternoon, 8-13-10

I was honestly planning on having a session with both Blu and Misty after I got out of work, but when I got out, IT WAS DARK!

I did run down to the farm between shifts to do something with a horse for 30 minutes. Well, I decided to have my 30 minutes be catching Misty and then taking her out to graze. Everything was going great--she came towards me when I whistled, she did not try to leave when I haltered her, at liberty before haltering her she did leading by the tail way better than she did during my lesson with Meggie, she got sweet feed while I fly sprayed her, I used the purpose of backing her out the gate to get lead by the tail backwards with only 10 hairs in my fingers--and right at that point, when Misty was out of the gate, Connor cantered her over. *EXPLITIVE!* There is a bittersweet bush growing on the fence and it is really tall, so I did not even see it coming. I sighed--everyone was fine--and shut the gate. Then I took Misty behind the barn to graze, as planned, but Connor was following us. I waited until he did not feel in trouble--you could tell he felt like he was in trouble--before I even looked at him. He just wanted some grass! I played with Misty a little bit, just a yo yo, so he would feel completely ignored. Then I approached him, gave him some sweet feed, and went back to Misty to play with the yo-yo. I repeated that and progressed it to rubbing him with the line that was attached to Misty, and then to catching him with it. I let them graze some more before putting Connor away. Then I took Misty to the breezeway door, set the line on the screen door handle, and checked the time inside. It was already 4 minutes past when I was supposed to be on the road headed for work, so I hustled Misty back to the pasture, said good bye, changed my pants, zoomed off in the Barnkat. The Connor thing was not planned, of course, but it was a good puzzle to solve. All I know is that there are no sirens going off when horse gets loose on my farm.

I am going to repeat today two more times, so hopefully I will actually have time for a session before Monday--my blessed day off.

Note to self, go to the white cupboard dry erase note to see the note to self about what exactly you did with Misty up until you caught her.

Natural Horsewoman Out.

Witty Title

Official Records Information:
I am going to do a pattern interrupt and put the ORI at the end. Toss the salad, people, toss the salad.

I have been watching some of the Parelli DVD material that I have in my personal awesome-library. It was prompted by my lesson. Meggie asked me what patterns I did freestyle with Misty, and I answered, but my mind kind of froze up on me. That happens frequently when she asks me questions that have correct answers because I am still not over being nervous around her (it is just me and how I am with new people), but I realized that I did not know all of the patterns like I know the 7 games (Friendly, Porcupine, Driving, Yo-Yo, Circle, Sideways, Squeeze) or the 7 keys to success (Attitude, Knowledge, Tools, Techniques, Time, Imagination, and Support)--that is all burned into the back of my eyelids. So, I watched the free style patterns DVD. Well, that was neat! Nothing like watching something again with fresh eyes. So, I began watching other DVDs--enjoying the brand new DVD player I bought at an auction for $15!

So, long story short, I had a lot of fresh ideas, concepts, and principles swirly-swirling in my head for tonight's sessions.

Blu was funny catching tonight. He does not put much effort to getting away if he is not coming straight to me. It is almost like a game to him, whereas with Misty, she really is communicating something like "I don't feel like it." So Blu walked off and went through the corn crib and I very slowly followed him. When I came out of the corn crib on the other side, he was defecating and facing me. I smiled and he came up to me like "where have you been?" He, then followed me to the other side of the pasture where I had a halter on a barrel with a 45' line and carrot stick sitting on the ground.

At the barrel I revived our dame (In spanish, the verb "give" conjugated into command form with the attached "me" meaning "to me," so Give to Me) command with the halter. I got him to the point where he understood that when I point to the halter and say "dame," he bites it and lifts it. I made a point of not giving him a treat until the halter was in my hand, but I don't think he made that connection. I decided that we made enough progress on that front for one night, though.

No problem putting the halter on. . . let's see, next we must have stood out in the pasture for a few minutes and done some friendly game of rubbing. I cannot tell you how important that is to your horse. I fit the friendly game into my sessions at many points. Don't underestimate it's awesome power!

Next, I yoyoed him out. He was kind of "eeh" so I had to do long phase 1 quick 2-3-4, so when he got to the end, I did the friendly game, slapping the ground and then swinging the carrot stick around by the savvy string. At first he shifted his weight as if to go on the circle, but that was as far as that thought went before he said, "oh" and stood. Then, I turned my back to him for about 30 seconds. When I turned back around, he was intently watching me. When I asked him to go off to the right, I really liked his expression and response. He seemed to see me, process the request, and commence going to the right all in a very timely manner. Turning my back to him did a lot to catch his attention. When he completed the circle, I brought him back in and played some more of the yo-yo game. He was stepping his hind end out and getting to about 30 feet out and getting dull. So, I focused on keeping him straight and when he petered out at 30 feet, I did long phase one, quick 4. Another thing I think I could have tried is to ask him to come back in before we hit 30 feet, like at 25' feet, then have him stop at 15' feet and back him to 30', then forward to 20', then back to 35', etc. It would be interesting to see if that technique would work. I just thought of it now, but I think it would be less noisy (By "noisy" I mean the phase 4).

When I was satisfied with the yo-yo (by the way, his bring back was fine), I moved on to my session goals, which were:

Get Blu to jump the barrels (laying down barrels)
Ride Blu over the barrels if he does well enough on the ground, otherwise, just jump him over something while riding

So, I sent him out on the circle and played with transitions up and down from walk to trot. It has been a while since he circled at 45', so I think he was kind of "wide open spaces, la la la," for a bit, because he was kind of dull at first when I was asking him to slow down with the carrot stick. Once he was going up and down, I put his circle over the barrels and he stopped and talked for a very long time with the barrels. I had a ground pole on either side to keep him from rolling the barrels away, because all though that is wonderful, sometimes we want him to jump over them. So, in my set up for success, I did that. When he finally stood still with his head hanging over them, nibbling on grass on the other side, I began inching toward zone 5, but not putting slack in the rope. Pretty quick he stepped away from the barrels and I snuggled him for a bit. The next time, which went similarly (slide to a stop in front of the barrels and eat grass on the other side), I did not snuggle him after wards, but sent him off in the other direction and moved the circle away from the barrels. Now I began to ask for him to maintain the canter. I will note here that Blu has much better impulsion than Misty. He is an LBI, too, but his impulsion is more of a 4 or 5. He is much easier to get multiple laps out of than Misty. It only took 3 direction changes and he was doing 5-10 laps with absolutely no problem, maintaining a nice shape, slack in the line--lovely. Now when I moved the circle the barrels, he skidded to a halt but this time, he wedged his leg between two barrels and made a 4'' gap that he squeezed through. I just stood and watched. Once, he asked a question and I just smiled. After that is when he began to put his leg on it and then squeeze his way through. After that I had him into snuggle and I killed a B52 Bomber that landed on him. The next time he came to the barrels, it was in the opposite direction of what he'd been doing all night, and he stopped again. This time, he did not put a leg over. I yo-yoed him from way out there to and from the barrels. Finally, he put his head down and ate from the other side. I brought him in and friendlied before sending him out again. This time, he suddenly noticed the barrel 45' from the barrel jump. He was not sure, but he wanted to investigate it. At first, he would stop and face it (away from me), so I used it as a way to ask him to stop from the canter with the carrot stick. But the problem was that he was disconnecting from me, so I asked him to change directions everytime he broke gait. When he got to the barrels the next time, I asked for a change of direction before he could stop. Huh. When he got around to the other side, I did the same thing, and as he cantered off, he noticed the set up again and I let him drift there and get a bite.

The next time he got to the barrels, I let him go over them, and it was wonderful. He stopped and ate then sent him around again. I made the decision that I did not want to ride him over it tonight because of just how hard it is for him. It does not seem to be an "I don't want to," just difficulty wrapping his mind around jumping over them instead of rolling them away. He has jumped tires and wood and seeing the same set up of a barrel after it really helped him think "jump it." I will play some more with this, though.

I sent him over them again, let him eat, then brought him in to stand with me. I sat down and let him chew his huge mouthful without the halter on. When he began to want to move around, I got up and played at liberty with him. I did some cutting game and stick to me. He did not even look at the barrel, which was cool. He was trotting to me, stopping and backing up when asked...good stuff, folks. Then, the ultimate test, I ran around to the barrels, and instead of going off to the side or trying to run me over, he went over them and ran with me to the barrel. In order to progress this, next time I will ask him to stop with me before we get to the food barrel then walk to it, and maybe in a couple sessions away I will decrease the barrels from 3 abreast to 2.

We walked and trotted and stopped and backed and trotted etc. in the stick to me game on the way up to the fence. I decided to ride bareback but wanted to put on the bridle. As I walked to the fence and picked up the bridle, Blu began to amble off, so I ran to the barrel with the food on it. Pretty quick he was running after me, and when I stopped, he was caught up to me and we were back at the barrel. I let him clean up the food bucket changed the barrel jump into cross bar jump with two up-ended barrels as stansions and the ground poles I had used to keep the barrels from rolling as the bars. It was about 2' high, I think. Then, I refilled the food bowl, put the bridle on, hopped on, and off we went.

So, I took him away from the barrel to two cones to play with the figure eight. I was very particular about making to nice, round circles in the same track. Blu was bending his body very nicely, but was took several 8's to catch on to going on the same track. Also, at first, he would pick up the canter when I put my leg on him to bend him. Interesting, just a simple miscommunication that I just let him figure out by himself. When he did two figure 8's in a row on the same track and maintained a consistent movement in the trot, I asked for the canter and we cantered together straight for the jump (which was changed, remember), over it, and stopped at the food, where I promptly hopped off and took off his bridle.

After Blu finished cleaning the bowl (which was him dumping it onto the barrel and cleaning off the barrel, he followed me to the other pasture. There we hung out for a while. I took him to the water and told him to get a drink. The whole time, Misty was hanging around us. It was very nice and took about 10 minutes for me to decide to start with Misty. I went to the back gate to close it so Blu did not go out and walk through the back pasture's fence (bad Blu. he does that every time he goes out, so now he does not get to go out till we get the fence fixed!). Misty and Blu followed me. When I went to Blu, Misty came to see if I was sharing anything edible then ambled back to the front area. I walked with Blu with his head under my arm for a bit--he likes that--then decided to play a game with him and Misty. I walked bent over and crept very slowly, ducking below Misty's view behind her zone 5. Blu followed me as I swerved away from her eyes, keeping his head low like mine. I was telling Blu, "Now, we need to stand up and smile as soon as she faces us," when she turned and faced us. Blu and I stood up and smiled and she came to us. Fun. Also, while I was over there messing around, I lead Misty by the tail, totally at liberty, no proper playing or safety net and after a little waiting, she remembered and was leading like a pro, much better than she did for me when we were in front of Meggie the other night. Gah! I went to the gate and I felt I needed to hold onto her while we went through the gate. That is definitely one of the little things that I am looking to get better as the relationship does.

I himmed and hawed for all of 30-60 seconds before I decided to just ride her bareback and bridleless with a neck string and carrot stick. I decided that we were good to go after the nice things we did on the ground in the other pasture. I wanted to ride around the cones and see how our figure 8 was now that Meggie was not here (there is a trend of us not doing very well in front of Meggie, if you haven't noticed!) and work on not touching the steering device (reins, string, carrot stick). The cones were in the same place and I hardly used the carrot stick, never used the neck string, and she even followed the track very well (put my hand out and used my peripheral vision to keep my hand covering the cone, so our loops were the same). I stopped in the middle, another thing I was particular about. If she did not stop right between the two cones, I backed her up (with just my seat and feet, by the way) to the middle. When the walk felt really good, I moved on to the trot, and when that was good, I did one figure eight at the canter with a simple lead change. Super. And, coming to a stop in the middle, it was all great, even at the canter we went from canter to a stop with just my energy. I hugged my horse.

As promised, the Official Record Information at the end of the post:

Blu, evening, 8-12-10, 2 hours

Blu and Misty, evening, 8-12-10, 10 minutes

Misty, evening, 8-12-10, 30 minutes of awesome

Natural Horsewoman Out.

Sweet, Sweet Blu

Official Records Information:
Blu
8-11-10
evening
1 hour

I called Blu to me and he began to walk to me and then got distracted and began to walk to the two mares. Then he changed his focus again and began to go to back gate. I followed him crouching low to the ground and as he ambled, he would swing his head side to side trying to keep an eyeball on me. I kept dodging his eyes and the instant he got it in his head to turn around, I stood up and smiled and took a step back. He hesitated a few moments and then came to me and snuggled. I let him walk with me at liberty for most of the way back to the North Pasture before putting the halter on. Next time, I need to remember to have cookies so I can do the dame command with him.

I stood with Blu for a bit and enjoyed him. He is such a cool horse to be around because his energy is so positive, light, and happy. He and I stood and watched the other Green girls play with horses and he made a few comments about it and would snuggle me every now and again. I progressed our just sitting to the extreme friendly game. I was thinking about how Misty's extreme friendly game was when I had my first lesson. She was a little tight. Blu was tight for about 15 seconds before he put his head down low and was absolutely going to sleep while the carrot stick and savvy string swung and slapped around.

My play session went in phases of "work" and "rest." I moved his front and hind end around a bit to see how little I could do. He was driving around with just my eyes and I did take some time to make his porcupine off his nose a very light touch to slide back. I also played with lead by the leg. It is an unfinished and unrefined task that I would like to move into his mastered check list. I just searched for small, light successes in that area. I also did the very lightest signal with the carrot stick to get him to move sideways, another thing that I noticed was a bit "holely" at fair.

That "work" was followed with him standing on the tire pedestal while I talked with my mom, my sister, relaxed, chatted, then relaxed some more. I noticed that any time I looked at Blu, he would turn his nose to me and touch me or just check in. That is so priceless to me because Misty does not have a guaranteed "will melt your heart" sticker on her forehead the way Blu does. He makes me feel good about myself so I can play with Misty. He is my therapy.

So, Blu learned that his job was to stand on that pedestal until we were not doing that anymore. During the 15 or 20 minutes we sat there, Blu came off 2-3 times. He licked and chewed on the last time and that is when I decided our break was over. Our next work was short lived because I coached Ellie on how to get Misty to think more about her as she road her around. Ellie was trying to get her to put her nose on a barrel, but Misty was quite worried about the other horses going out back to fetch Hoosier. Blu's job was to stay away from Misty. At one point, I had asked him to back up several times by wiggling the carrot stick. At first he was not getting it, but he did start to wake up and I sent him to a ground pole to give him something to target. That helped and he did not try and come back over until I invited him back. Good boy.

I played the circling game and it is so much better than Misty's. Slack in the line is no problem, he has perfect slack, nicely shaped body, thinking about me. I had his circle going over the ground pole and he was going over the center without pulling. However, when he went over, he broke down to the lower gait. So, I did change of direction everytime he failed to maintain gait. It only took a 4 or 5 changes of direction and he was maintaining, so I rewarded him by moving the circle off of the pole. Next, I played with his transitions with the carrot stick. I counted 5 trot strides and asked for the walk, then 5 walks and the trot, so my carrot stick was going from zone 5 to zone 1 pretty quick. As soon as Blu got what I wanted, I invited him back in and we relaxed.

Next was some play time. I did mirror me/stick to me and Blu was very exuberant with flying lead changes, sliding stops, airs above ground (when I did airs above the ground!), and then putting his head down when I bent over.

Good boy, Blu.

Natural Horsewoman Out.

My Third 2* Lesson (Riding)

Official Records Information:
Misty
2 hours
8-10-10
evening

My Warm-Up
Tonight was a riding night, so I had to have her worked on the ground, saddled, and flight-checked before Meggie arrived. As far as catching goes, she did not take off or anything, of course, but it can be in the record that it is still not what I want catching to be like.

I did friendly game for a while--just standing and relaxing for a few minutes. Then I did extreme friendly game, got a very bored look from her, and moved on to the circling game. I did a few yoyos to get her mind on me with long phase ones quick 4. I also began to sneak to her zone 5 if she was not looking at me then stand up and smile if she looked at me. During the circle, she was not putting slack in the line, so I did the bullseye pattern to cause her to focus on me. That made a big difference and got slack in the line and her body bent on the circle nicely. Her canter to walk is still looking better and better. She still only canters one circle before I ask her to walk, so next time we play, I will work on that with something like change of direction.

We ended up running about a bit doing some cutting game and then I bowed and she put her head down. Then we continued the stick to me game and she was really doing a nice job of cantering when I did. Then I turned it into a squeeze game over a few barrels, going over them, turn/face/and waiting and back over until she was doing it fluidly and looking like it was not taking any effort. Walking up to the fence, she was very sweet looking.

Saddling up was a non-event. Maybe I can mention that I tightened up the girth and then changed my mind and took it down a hole because it looked to tight. When I rode, I checked her indirect and direct reins and lateral flexion then went off to and did my little exercise. Everything was looking good, so I went off to do my exercise.

I chose a T-post for one corner of my invisible arena, then there were two ground poles laying together so that they overlapped. My plan was to go over the ground pole, aiming for the middle where the poles overlapped (that was a good way for me to judge how well she was following my lead/focus), then, in line with my chosen T-post, we stop, rest, turn left to the T-post, stop and touch it, rest, turn left, at my other T-post, I turn my focus, then, when we are in line with the ground poles, I turn my focus left again and repeat. At first, she needed a lot of rein correction, did not want to go over the poles, would stop and look into the bushes instead of touching the T-post (that was a right-brain thing that was helped by the consistency), and really wanted to not go. I moved from the walk to the trot, rests got shorter, she needed less rein, she went over the center of the ground pole overlap, she touched the T-post right away.

Meggie's Lesson:
Meggie and I chatted for a few minutes, which was enough time for Misty to go into snooze mode. When the lesson started, that definitely had something to do with the slow reaction time and mental disconnection. So, the lesson began with a billion "can you?'s" for me to think about. I showed her our lateral flexion, direct reins, and indirect reins. For the direct, Misty was not planting a foot like she would if she was thinking. No matter, though. I would think that this should be something that Misty and I can do with a little less waking up. The "Can You....?"'s

Can you do it without reins? Tried it, and the answer is maybe for the indirect and direct if I really worked on getting her focused, she could do a very yucky one, but otherwise no. Also, definitely have a no rein lateral flexion on my list of homework items.
Can you do it with just a carrot stick? Usually, yes, no problem. Not very well for Meggie, though. Still, that goes on the homework list of things to make much better.
Can you rock your horse? Yes. I can also do the thing where you take a step back and then forward, and back, and forward. NOT FOR MEGGIE, though. This I am not too worried about because I really know she can do it well.

Conclusion: I got to know just how crippled Misty and I are when she is not mentally engaged!

So! Next!

We decided to do a figure eight to check out steering. The biggest issues we had were that Misty was drawn to the fence and that she did not want to go. We discussed how I use my legs to steer. In order to turn right, I used to plant my right leg in the middle and shift the left leg forward to bend the front end around. Well, Blu does not steer well that way when he is scattered, so I began to turn right by putting the left leg back instead of forward. Well, that works REALLY well for Blu, but putting the leg forward works better for Misty. So, I need to make sure I do what makes more sense to her. After some time, I was able to muscle her away from the fence by putting the leg forward. Of course, my homework is to refine that so I don't muscle her around at all!

Then I began to stop in the middle of the eight to get her more motivated. Meggie suggested it just as I was beginning to do it! Licking and chewing came pretty quick. When we began trotting, I took the saddle off because Misty moves better sans-saddle. Meggie read Misty's sweat pattern. There were no dry spots where they shouldn't be, but there was a spot of hair on both sides in the same place where it was going backwards. Meggie said that is friction where there should be none, caused by my riding. I think it was from when I was moving ahead of Misty's motion, a bad habit I have when she is not going fast enough. Homework!

At the end, I did a few laps of the canter around the pasture so Meggie could at least see it. She did not seem conclusive, but she felt that there was just some disharmony in the way my hips move. She said that if she could see me go around at the canter for a while she could be more sure, tell me if I was braced/stiff somewhere, etc, but I will be taking videos of the canter to see if I can find it and fix it by myself. We conversed about how smoother horses can be harder to be perfectly in harmony with because if you are off just slightly, it does not feel bad. On the other hand, with the Quarter Horse and Hanoverian I have ridden who belong to other people, if I did not stay in harmony with those horses, I knew it! It seems this is a very fine art, being in harmony with a horse as smooth as Misty.

At some point, I also showed Meggie how I frog hop onto Misty's back and also vault. Some day she will have to see how Maggie has Ginger bow so she can hop on. Or how Connor throws Bridget onto his back when she climbs on his neck.

HOMEWORK CHECKLIST:

No Touching The Reins

Synchronization at the Canter? (video?)

Bridleless- be very interesting

Have Tail Driving PERFECT so I can show Meggie! (this is my personal addition to the list; I want Meggie to see how good Misty is at this now--every time I go to show her, Misty is zoning out or something)

Pattern/Track-be very particular about where Misty steps (maybe draw lines)

Point-to-Point with Cookies

Direct/Indirect/Lateral Flexion Without Reins


This lesson was a huge success for me. I am glad Misty got to relax and disconnect while we talked because that brings to surface some problems. Ideally, I don't want Misty to be so difficult to get back into mental collection and connection, and I was able to get some tangible visuals to keep in mind as I am doing my preflight checks. I like doing these "can you do this simple thing very well, right now?" stuff. It's all about finding holes so that I can fill them in. Very constructive!

Natural Horsewoman Out.

Blu and Misty: a novel

Preface:

Official Records Information

Blu and Misty
3 hours
8-10-10
morning

This morning, I did not really have a positive plan. I knew what I wanted to do with Misty if I played with her; I knew what I wanted to do with Blu if I played with him; I knew what I wanted to do if I ended up playing with both of them; I just did not know what way we would go once I got there.

Misty did not want to be caught, but Blu really wanted to play. He was picking up the carrot stick, walking off with my line, trying to hand me the halter. I almost haltered Misty once, but then I changed my mind because I knew she did not want me to halter her. I played a little with Blu, specifically pointing and commanding him to "dame" the halter (meaning "give me" in Spanish), which I have not worked on in a while. So then I haltered Blu and took him up to saddling him. And so ends the preface to my novel and begins . . .

Chapter One: Saddling Blu and the Figure 8

Blu is not a morning horse. That is one of the reasons horse shows are tough for him: too early! So, I was not going to just saddle him up and go play with Misty, and I knew it would probably be a while on the ground. I was right.

Two cones. Two cones out in the pasture waiting to be turned into figure eight centers. Blu was not seeing that. I did not want to micromanage him through it, though. He wanted to not go at first, so I spanked the center to get him moving through that spot with more speed. Well, then it was that he was not connecting with me and hauling zone 1 off into no-man's-land after coming through the center. So, I did pattern interrupt and got a "Oh, good morning" look from him. Finally, after much "AAAAHHH"ing and whatnot from Blu, he jogged a nice 8 with no intervention from me, and then did one cantering with a flying lead change.

Blu was very happy to take the saddle. I walked him around for cinch tightening. I put the 23' line with halter attached on the horn and rode off to catch us a Misty.

Chapter the Second: Catching us a Misty

This endeavor took probably an hour. I am not in possession of a cell phone or a wrist watch, so who knows how long it really was. I got close a few times and then she changed her mind. And by "got close" I don't mean that I snuk up on her and almost wrangled her from Blu's back. If you have been keeping up at all with the times, my catching troubles with Misty have nothing to do with me physically being unable to catch her; I am paying close attention to her mind. When I say I came close, I mean she was following us around, but purposely not putting her head near me, and sometimes walking off. Once, I was in the process of haltering her when Blu decided to touch her. I could not stop him in time to save her feelings and she huffily walked off. I called Blu a jerk and told him he should not touch a lady like that, especially the temperamental ones. I doubt he took it to heart because later on he was touching Misty again, only then she was caught and could only make dirty faces at him.

Anyways. I have a lot of luck doing the same thing I do on the ground when I am catching Misty from horseback, only I don't get so tired because Blu is doing all the running around. At first, I just stayed on her tail going a little bit slower than she was until she understood that we were not going to give up. When she moved into a trot and canter and was getting a bit upset, I did pattern interupt, as, thus far, she had just been circling through the corn crib (a building with an entrance on two opposite sides). As she hustled through and made a wide arc to the door, Blu and I cut in close and hustled faster so she would have to turn around go back into the other door. It only took 2 or 3 of those before she moved into phase 3 of catching: Dancing.

Dancing, as some who have read since the beginning of time would know, is what I call that thing when you yield the horse's hindquarters, turn around and arc to the other hindquarters, rinse, lather, and repeat. Then, whenever the horse moves toward you with the front end, you "fade out," as Linda Parelli says. This sounds simple, and it is, when you are on the ground. With a horse, it means your horse has to be very connected with you, because the facial expression matters. Blu is finally understanding that he needs to have a driving face when we are driving the hindquarters. He has the inviting face for fading out down, and we utilized his sideways and back up a lot. Misty took a while before she could trouble herself to look inviting. Interesting, not surprising, but interesting. The goal of dancing is for the horse to keep moving the front end toward you and follow you. It took a long time and sometimes she would be following and then something would happen, as I said, to cause her to disconnect and we would have to dance all over again, but it is perfect for me because Misty is following us, choosing to be with us.

Interesting note before we move on to chapter three: at one point, my mom showed up and was chatting while Misty was standing in the corn crib after Blu touched her (see earlier). My mom went through the corn crib on the way out and patted Misty on her way through. Misty was happy to be touched and followed my mom curiously to the door way. I wonder if she was hoping my mom would take her out back where the other horses were or what. Interesting, though. Maybe she was saying, "Wait! Don't leave me with Dumb and Dumber!!" Just kidding about Blu being Dumber.

Chapter 3: The Circling Game--my lesson homework, no less!

I went over to the Northwest corner of the pasture and worked on my circles with Misty. Blu, I will say, was totally still. He did not even try to eat. He seemed to understand that there was a purpose to standing still and keeping his head low. Or, maybe I am just thinking too much of him and he was just happy to finally stand still. Good boy, Blu!

I worked with the yoyo game first, made sure she was backing up straight, and rhythmically and coming back in ok. Once she was, which was just one or two yoyos to get the better rhythm, we were off to checking for slack in the line. No problem! I think that having Blu be the center of her circle did a lot towards that nice slack in the line as well as her concentration on the center. It is a very interesting thing, in deed.

Her canter to walk and walk to canter transitions came next. She can canter comfortably for a full circle or circle and a half before I ask for the walk. I had to do long phase 1. . . quick2-3-4! to get the walk at first. I called it a good time to end when she cantered right off then came down to a walk when I lifted the "longe whip" (that is what I use to work with horses from horseback, but I don't whip, of course).

Chapter 3+some: Ground Driving from Horseback

I tested some things, introduced the concepts. I used a figure 8 pattern to help us have a goal of doing a complete figure 8, but it was by-in-large a big testing and introducing item for both horses. Blu needed to get a bit quicker at stopping when I did as well as keep a polite distance from Misty's business end and Misty had to get comfortable with stopping with us back there and make the "this is ground driving" connection. It took a while, lots of correcting, and lots of Blu somehow ending up tangled in the lines, but we got our one good 8 and called it done.

Chapter #5: Grazing and Mama/Baby Relationship

I rode the kiddies through the gate and took them over the hill to graze. In between grazing, I would go around the yard and ask Misty to stay next to us. Not behind or in front, but next to us, like a baby and mama. Blu was a very good mama, and after Misty understood the rules of the game, she was a very good baby, cantering, walking, trotting, jogging, stopping suddenly, you name it. After our last lap of success at the canter followed by a stop, which both horses did superbly with, I got down from Blu and "hand grazed" them for a bit. Then I took them back to the pasture and let them go. Blu of course followed me and Misty followed Blu. Good boy, Blu. It was a very special horse conga line, and I conga-kicked all the way to the fence with the saddle.

Epilogue:

After a lovely morning with my two spotty horses, I gave them a pile of hay. I had to split it into two after a bit because Misty did not want to share. I sprayed them with water, which chases Misty away but Blu enjoys. That only works while the water is on and I had to leave, so I separated the piles. Oh, Misty.

The End.

Natural Horsewoman Out.

Fair 2010

For those of you who are unaware, I am a member of 4H and have been since 2003. My first fair was in 2004. That year was a big learning experience and I won fewer ribbons than I could count on one hand (but, again, I learned a lot). The next year, Misty and I won Champion for English and Reserve for Western. At the shows, we became solid performers. Over the course of several years, I took Misty from trotting, to loping, to cantering, then to running in speed classes, as well, and after a year of running, we were actually big competitors in that discipline, too. I was doing everything by myself as far as training her went. It was not until winter of 2007 that I began Parelli with her. All along, I was not too concerned with winning. I enjoyed winning, but I was mainly concerned with what other people thought of Misty's and my performance. Pretty soon, my concern made me a very nervous person during the summer, and that nervous pattern transferred to Misty.

It is now my goal to conquer my nervousness (which I have done pretty well, now) and to reverse the pattern I created in Misty. This year's fair was the embodiment of that goal. Fair is a five day thing for the horses. Sunday is arrival, Monday is in hand day, Monday night is fun night, Tuesday is pattern day, Tuesday night is speed, Wednesday is English day, Thursday is Western day, and Thursday night is winding down night and departure. Friday, we put the horses all out back to graze for the day while we cleaned up the fair grounds, trailer, house, and farm and then napped. It was a big effort and I will give a blow by blow when I have time.

I also don't want to let myself forget to record Saturday and Sunday's sessions with Blu and Misty.

The Blow by Blow of Fair will be coming soon....as soon as I can....it's comin'!

Sunday night: Misty and I wandered around looking for my mom, who was going to give us the green ball to play with so I could build Misty's confidence. She was pretty high on adrenaline, but then it did not take her long to begin to relax a bi and start connecting with me. I gave her lots of rope all the time. Here and there I would stop and gently wiggle her to a stop. Soon she was stopping with me, no wiggling needed. In the warm up arena, I began playing with her. Some of what we did and some notes about it:
~circling after the ball, changes of direction and stopping at the ball to get her to focus on it
~lots of "thanks I needed that" throughout
~Blu/Connor/Ginger were all out in the beginning, then were each put away. She was able to reach a relaxed enough point before they left that she did not go haywire when they disappeared.
~wanted to trot (not walk or canter)
~wanted to change direction toward the barn
~finally got slack in the line and was able to play with transitions, but then the slack went out again, so I focused on that again
~ended the session when she completed a circle with slack in the line all the way around
~I put the ball in front of her and she kicked it all the way back to the barn.
I was not exactly where I wanted to be when we ended (I was hoping for just a little bit more relaxation from her), but she had definitely calmed down a lot.

I was a nightguard, so I slept on the grounds in a donated RV that had amazing air conditioning and a sofa sleeper, but I could not get to sleep that first night. I ran around the grounds, visited the horses, ran some more, washed Blu's water bucket (he pooped in it!!). By the time my shift started at 4 a.m., I had achieved about 2 hours of interrupted sleep. Excellent!

Monday: Showmanship was a huge waste of time. I played with Blu before it started, but it was before I was cleaned up. Basically, I spent the whole morning cleaning my stinking white-spotted horse only to go into the ring with him not very attentive and do a silly silly job of the pattern. He was not as bad as he has ever been, and we did beat ONE person (placing 5th of 6), but he was not 100% mentally or emotionally collected, so the physical did not show up. I just went in and stayed calm and let him try his best, which I could tell he was trying to think. I was pleased with myself for keeping my cool. When we came out of the ring, I had to put him in his stall and help everyone else make it into their showmanship classes. It was a big hustling effort with everyone but me running around with their heads rolling away. I just smiled and helped. When everything quieted down, I took the time to play Blu into a better state. Also, Connor stepped on Bridget's foot and nearly broke it directly following her showmanship class. She spent the morning and afternoon at the hospital getting xrays and Dr's orders. Fun.

Misty had a great Monday. It made me feel like fair was going to be excellent (not ribbons-wise, just emotional-wise). I had one class with her, a ground driving obstacle course. I played with her two times before the class. Our circling game notes are:
~Looked for slack in the line(that took a while)
~Sporadically did friendly game before sending her left or right to make sure she was confident
~Changes of direction, and lo and behold, she did them great with my new and improved timing!
~Played with transitions. Canter to walk was rough at first because she was not quite 100% connecting with me in the beginning. But they got to where I could go through my phases and go the walk in about 1/2 a circle. Up transitions where easier because she was kind of high. In fact, several times, I spent an awfully long time asking her to maintain the walk--she really just wanted to keep jogging.
At the end of my circling game, I tried back up by the tail and it was like I was leading her by a halter! Whoa! I tried it again and was still there! How great. As I began to drive her, things just began to come together. There was a line of cones next to the driving arena and I used those to set a goal for me to quit upon reaching. I decided that when she could get around the end cones without a big fuss, we would call it good because when I started, I frequently had to do a lot of correcting there. As she continued to not understand that we were going to continue around the weave on the end cones, I put in a pause/rest after the loop around the ends were complete. That made things much easier and we reached our goal. My mom told me as I was putting her back in her stall that she looked very connected.
When my class was coming up, I realized that I forgot to pack my long driving lines. I asked around and finally found someone who had a long line I could use. Unfortunately, that left me with two heavy lines to hang on her bit and thread through the surcingle D-rings. I was able to borrow two large rings to clip to the surcingle, but the heaviness was a major communication hindrance. I warmed her up as best I could with the funky gear and we went in the class first. When I rang the bell, Misty was so relaxed that she bent down and ate. I know it was naughty, but I was SO HAPPY that she was calm enough to cock a leg way away from all the other horses, the barn, the normal arenas--I was the only one who was consistent--new environment, new horses (she rarely sees minis and they kind of weird her out), etc. I was her hub of confidence. I was so happy that I was smiling all the way through our pattern. Misty really tried her best to work with the lines and we completed the pattern correctly, but it looked ridiculous because I had to keep lifting the lines high to feed them back to her. It lightened the mood for everyone around. We got 3rd, aka last, but I was SO happy and proud of Misty.

Tuesday morning, I decided to do things for Blu, make sure he was ready for his first class. Showmanship morning was tough because we were in the first class and there was SO much cleaning up to do, but Tuesday, our bill was English/Western Riding Pattern (a pattern class with 8 lead changes), Reining, Judge's Choice Horsemanship Pattern, and Dressage. By the time Blu was set to go, it was pretty close to show time and I had not ridden him yet, so in a fluster, I decided to do skip ground work and ride him so he would be ready. As he was cantering, I thought, "Gosh, this is scrambly," then Blu fell over, going right under the plastic dressage chain. He stood back up, I stood back up, we were fine, but that snapped me out of it, that direct-stupid-line thinker I was being. I told my mom I was scratching out of the first class and going to take the time to play with Blu on the ground so he could canter properly in the reining class. I was ticked with myself for even going to that spot I had been at, but hind sight is you-know-what.

Some things happened that got me very upset and emotional and my whole noble plan ended up going belly-up and Blu's day in the ring was much less awesome than it could have been. Our reining pattern was trashed and so was our horsemanship pattern. I was planning on scratching from dressage, but as we were walking over to watch, a show mom asked if I had asked her to read for me. Right then I decided I wanted to do this. I looked at the pattern, watched the other competitors, relaxed, let go of a lot of tension, and went into the ring. Blu was much better. I did not worry about him being physically collected, round, etc. I just let him relax and make lovely transitions, perfect circles, straight lines, and settled halts.

Some more things were said and I ended up running Misty in speed in a very poor emotional state (both of us). I rode English for the first time competing and had to do a bit switch from snaffle to kimberwick after speed and action. I really wanted to just trot the patterns, but that was not happening. For poles, Misty hardly needed any direction. For speed and action, I fell off (it was the most feathery landing, and the 7th or 8th time I have fallen off in my life. Definitely softest fall). I just remember losing my seat, thinking "I am going down," very calmly, and in slow motion, leaning down and pushing my hands on the right side of her neck so I kind of launched myself away from her. As I floated through the air, I looked after her and watched her swerve to the left to avoid trampling the judge and go to the gate. Then I relaxed and just slid through the aren. The breath was not even knocked out of me. I did skid six feet and as I lay there for the first moment and went "Puh" my dad saw the dust cloud poof out of me. I stood up and shook like a dog, waving a thumbs-up as my 4H leader who was announcing for the night told me to stay down if I was hurt. I looked like I had been freshly exhumed from a beach and there was more sand in my breeches than I care to share, unless you need some for your children's sand box.
I did the bit switch because in the snaffle was folding up and pinching her. The kimberwick made a world of difference. She stopped gagging, I could keep light hands, and she was no longer tossing her head. In the flag race, I have a photo of picking up the flag as well as throwing the thing right into the sand and watching it plop on the ground. Misty ran fast and went right next to the barrels, though. Our cloverleaf barrel race was a 23 or 24 second run, I like it to be at about 19 seconds. Misty tooka long drag toward the gate after going around the first barrel and I was barely able to get her back on track before we hit the time line and got DQed. We got 5th in that class. The last class was a new pattern called the bowtie. Misty did another huge drag toward the gate after going around the first barrel.
This show, to me, was a huge learning experience. It was Misty's second speed show because she has been injured at all the others but one. Her gate problems were the same, her emotional problems were the same--I really did not want to run her in my heart, but other factors that I am not at liberty to discuss made me feel like I had no choice but to do the show. I spoke with a lot of people, especially those wanting to hear about my fall (I "never" fall off, obviously).
There are some situations where the horse cannot come first, even if you want to put her first, unless you plan on hurting some people. I felt so out of control that night, like I could not make the decisions I wanted to make. If I could have a do over of the night, what I would do differently is . . . have Connor step on my foot and take myself to the hospital for the evening? What I really struggled with was communication. I was trying really hard to make myself understood, but my perspective was just not being accepted. The most terrible things were said. However, from the pain of Tuesday, I went home, slept, and woke up the next morning with a clean slate and a new day, ready to love my horse.

Wednesday: I played with Blu, don't recall what my online play was, but went into the first class, may have gotten 7th out of 10 or something in equitation, then got 5th or something out of 10 or something, but I understood that Blu and I would not place high because Blu has not mastered collection and at the canter and he does not have the "head set." I of course am not aiming for head set, but collection. He has a "head set" at the walk and trot because he can collect at those gaits. Most everyone in the class has achieved the proper "head set" via martingales and tying their horses' heads down while longeing. Lovely. So, I don't use ribbons to determine success in these rail classes. Blu was wonderful. He was mentally and emotionally with me, a huge improvement from yesterday.
Jumping was absolutely the best part of my fair. I had him signed up for a two jump hunterhack class and an 8 jump equitation over fences class. I was pretty sure that I would scratch from the 8 jump class because by the time you get to jumping, your horse has been through a long day, and this is only Blu's third show this year. So, went in to our first jumping class with competition it--there were 6 of us. The practice jump was to go over the 18'' jump then swerve before going over the second jump that was 2 or 3 stride following. Blu looked great. We went straight out and Blu got his bite of food from Maggie who was standing with it. Lights went on and I knew he knew what it was for. "This is just like at home!" In the class, Blu had great impulsion, and the horse who can only plow and scramble through jumps jumped the 18'' then the 24'' inch like a pro. He went to do the same swerve we did for practice, but I put him back on track to go over the second one and he put up no fuss. Just an "Ok, yes ma'am." My mom could not even tell he started to swerve. Then, to make matters better (!), Blu performed a lovely hand gallop and then halted right where we were supposed to with absolute willingness. I attribute his readiness to stop to the fact that my dad was watching the class and holding Connor right where I needed to stop (Bridget could not be there to get him out because of her foot, so my dad was grazing him when my class started and he had moved over the fence to watch, not knowing how that would affect the dynamics of Blu's performance). I don't think anyone noticed him. Well, we got FIRST PLACE. I was so proud of Blu. I watched the others jump and he really did deserve it. We did very well on the rail and Blu got his grain after the class let out, plus many hugs and snuggles from my family. Blu loves a munch and snuggle. I scratched Blu from his other class and let him relax in his stall with some hay. I placed in bareback, not in trail, but I don't remember much about those classes because my mind was totally focused on pink bunnies and purple unicorns after that Hunter Hack class.

Thursday: We got there very early and I did some circling game in the arena, first so Blu could get comfortable in the ring before it was time to do the class in it. He was very exuberant and we played a lot of bucks out of him!

I saddled him and played with him some more. More bucks of exuberance taken care of before I was on him. Then it was off to class. We totally bombed the pattern because he got groggy standing in line to go in. I attribute that to his show experience. I just go in and he is not paying much attention to me or not mentally fast enough to understand me. He did have really nice pivots and back up, plus a very smooth and relaxed jog. Actually, the only problem with the pattern was that he took off on the wrong lead and pushed through my leg into an awkwardly shaped circle for that lope. I guess totally bombed is incorrect. It was a good pattern with a two large faults that put us out of contention for a ribbon. In pleasure, though, I was very surprised when Blu got 5th out of the 12 or something there. In trail, Blu tried everything, but struggled over the fan at the lope and then followed me when I ground tied him, so I had to go back and reiterate "Whoa." We got a 35.5 score, and the 6th-1st range places were 44-52, so no cigar. I think we should have gotten a higher score on the rope gate because Blu did it nearly perfectly but for one step to the right when we were backing up. He was relaxed, willing, etc. We only got a 5 out of 10 on the obstacle, though. Oh, well, I know how awesome my horse is.
Bareback was the best class. Out of 6, we placed 2nd. The horse/rider we did not beat is a girl in my 4H club (I think of her as the sweetest person in the entire universe) who goes to circuit shows and has been high pointing or reserving at every show they go to this year (I think they have been to 30-40 shows this season). That is the pair we did not beat. I felt good about that. I did ride-a-buck, a fun class and placed 6th out of 20 or so. In that class, a person puts a piece of paper under your knee and you win by keeping it there the longest. It used to be a dollar and the winner gets to keep all the dollars. I won it when I went in and they used dollars. I think I won twenty bucks on Misty. It is fun.
The other awesome moment on Thursday was when this young girl was practicing the trail obstacles and could not get her horse through any of it, especially stepping on the bridge. After watching her few times, I asked her if I could maybe help her with the bridge. She said sure. I told her that I would ask her to stop and go, so to be ready to stop on my cue. Go. Before he could put his feet on the bridge or step to the side of it, I had her stop and back up. After waiting a few seconds, I asked her to go forward again. This time, I asked her to stop as soon as he had one foot on the bridge. He stepped his second foot up and after no more than 5 seconds, I asked her to back him up. He got a rest then repeated, but this time after stopping with two feet on, I did not have her back up. There, on the bridge, I said to her, "Now, let's wait for a bit and he will probably start licking his lips like this," I imitated a horse licking and chewing. She gave me a funny look and leaned over to watch his mouth. When Sunny began licking and chewing a moment later, she looked at me with her mouth open then exclaimed, "Are you psychic?!" I laughed, because that is just not the response I expected from her. I explained the theory behind why horses do that and why we did what we just did. "Now, ask him to walk over." He stepped all the way on and went right over and I asked her to stop again and let him relax. Her mouth was open again. "Now, let's see if he can walk fluidly over it." Tralalala. Perfect. She then trotted over to her dad and asked, "Did you see that?!!" It was the most rewarding thing, helping her. She is friendly with me because her speed horse looks just like Misty and ever since we have been buddies, so this was really cool. Oh, and by the way, that simple little change in how she handled the bridge made Sunny more trusting and cooperative with the other obstacles. She got 3rd in her 10+ class.

Thursday Night: I played with Misty on the ground for a LONG time getting her left brain so that all the 4H kids could ride her for our bareback horse-swap-athon. I started with aiming for her attention on me. It looked a lot like the level one video of Linda and the one-eyed horse. She was stary eyed and high-headed for a long time before she finally started coming around. I played with my homework items at that time and got really great transitions after Misty finally put slack in the line. At first in the arena, Misty was tight and tense, but after some riding and relaxing, she finally chilled out. I was able to let several people ride her and they all got down reluctantly and commenting on how smooth she was. I got to ride (and vaulted onto) a 17 hand Hanoverian named Zouse (rhymes with "mouse"). He was one of the jumping horses today. If his rider sticks with it and betters herself, he has a TON of natural talent jumping (duh) and they will be able to do a lot together. Otherwise, I WANT HIM!! He was very tight and head-tossy with her, and she could not stop him very well. By keeping a loose rein, I was able to go from a canter to a trot to a walk without touching the reins. His trot was a lot of motion all over, but using what I know about fluidity, I was able to sit it just fine. My mom said I made it look like it was smoothest ride ever. The other horse that sticks out in my mind is a horse named Bunny. She was ticked. I waited for her to give me permission to get on, which took a long time. Then, once I was on, I did not ask her to do anything. We just stood in the middle. The rider thought I was afraid of her, but I explained to her that Bunny was taking it very personally that all these people were just getting on her and pushing her around. The rider said that this horse was the biggest challenge she had ever had because she has such fight in her and gets so angry (the horse, I mean). I got down when bunny offered to walk without pinning her ears and the rider put her in her stall so she did not have to be ridden by any more random people.

Many hours. Many days. Many horses. Many lessons. My last fair.



Natural Horsewoman Out.

My Second 2-Star Parelli Professional Lesson

BEFORE YOU READ: It is very late and I have not bothered to proof this post, yet, so be patient with the grammar, spelling, and sense-making of my words--thanks!

Official Records Information:
Misty, 2 hours, 7-30-10, evening

I quite enjoyed tonight's lesson. Before Meggie got there, I had to get Misty warmed up, so I got there an hour or so early to do that. Misty, Connor, and Blu were up front and the other two horses were out back. I took Blu and Misty to the round pen--Misty in a halter only being led by my pinky, Blu with the 12' line around his neck, Connor trying to get by us--the whole thing could have ended badly, but I set it up for success. I made sure that Blu and Misty were not going to get into an argument with one another by leading them around together and giving them pellets when they got close to each other. Misty's ears would pop forward and Blu would stop thinking about nibbling Misty somewhere annoying. Then, I shooed Connor away by shaking my head at him until he cantered off in a fit. By the time he came back to the gate, Blu, Misty, and I were standing together on the other side.

Safe in the round pen, I let Misty graze at the stubbly stuff in there with Blu for 5 minutes so I would have fewer "I am not happy with this change in environment and Connor is running around" emotional issues when I started playing with Misty. While they ate, I brought out the plastic bag on a stick, a carrot stick and string, and a 23' line.

When I got back, both horses looked at me. I let myself in and they came over to greet me. I stood and pet them and gave Misty pellets whenever she tolerated Blu. Then I shooed Blu out of her space and began to assess how the tail leading was coming. After a few phase 3 with no rhythm in the yield, I decided to wait until I had done something to get her more focused on me, first.

I was wearing a pirate hat from the craft store--it's for Blu's costume at fair--and I decided that would be another good friendly game to play with Misty. She liked that pirate hat, I think. I should have taken pictures.

Exactly what order I did the following items is kind of foggy, so bare with me:

Figure of 8 at liberty to get our communication up and running. She was very focused on me. At first, she wanted to turn away from me when she was supposed to go around the left cone. I would step to the right and swing the carrot stick the way I do when I ground drive and she responded correctly by moving her zone one to the left. Then, when her left eye was to me, I would step back and draw her in. She was very willing to come in--had a very innocent look on her face. After two of those, instead of letting her come in, I would send her around the other cone. After that, she did the pattern no problem.

Now, Misty was very connected to me and I had her at liberty (this one of the things that I am not sure about where it happened in relation to the other events). I began my tail leading and progressed us from a couple steps back at phase 2/3 with a little bit of hair to--wait, no she must not have been at liberty or maybe I put the line on her because I moved on to turning and using the line as a phase 4 to move her hind quarters. I think we got through one figure of 8. . .

Put the line on and played my circling game. I was not getting straight backs for sending, so I would correct her and back her up again. I worked on stopping with the carrot stick by stopping her at the gate, where Blu was on the other side of and a tire was leaning against it. That worked very well. Later, when I was circling for Meggie, I would have to work through the opposite--having her continue without stopping at it. That was not too bad, though, I don't think. I also would use it as a marker for her downward transition.


Meggie arrived while I was examining Misty's shooed hooves and deciding to not run her at fair. I will do ground driving with her, but if I show in Speed, we will most likely just be walking/trotting.

Circling in the round pen notes:

My send was pretty disrespectful on Misty's part! She was not backing straight and she was definitely not backing rhythmically. I used long phase one, quick 2/3/4 to fix it, but I need to pay special attention to this game for homework. I did a thing where I looked and flicked at her hiny if she took a crooked step back. Meggie had me do the friendly game at various parts of the backing up to make sure it was not a friendly game issue. It turned out to be more of a respect issue

Slack in the rope still needs work, but not too much--she made a lot of progress in that tonight. She was able to ignore the weeds in the round pen, and when we left, she got back to putting slack in it there, too. However, she sometimes takes it out. Meggie noticed that when she is going left she is tending to look out more and I told her that she is usually fine going to the right, but going left, about half the time she is counter bent and looking out.

Change of direction. I worked on my timing (per Meggie's advising). I was going back into my bubble, but not soon enough because sometimes Misty was going into that space in the center as she changed direction. I realized that subconciously, I was thinking that if I went back sooner, Misty would not be pushed forward but go around behind me or something. I have never thought this to myself, but once when I was doing as Meggie said and going back sooner than I had been, I got that feeling "oh no, she won't make." Then I was like, 'wait of course she'll make it!" Kind of the BFO for the night. That really made her changes snappier. My homework in regards to this is to refine it.

Next was canter/walk transitions. We worked on my timing--asking her to go to the walk right before she was about to break from the canter anyways and asking for the transitions in the same spots. Misty began to do both up and down transitions better. I personally was thinking it was pretty cool for the time we spent on it. The benefit of having a PP there coaching.

We moved to the pasture to work on the other direction and see how her slack in the rope held up with out the round pen to shape her. It was not perfect immediately, but we ended well. Now I just have to make it all the norm. One of my homeworks is to now have a long phase one, quick 2/3/4 or 4 for the transitions. As an important principle as I do this without her, remember to take care of Misty's responsibilities in order: if she has no slack in the rope and poor transitions, I take care of the slack in the rope first, then the transitions.

Misty's lead by the tail for Meggie came as a sort of sidenote after we talked about the circling game, Misty's looking away, etc. She was not really connecting with me and I could see she was thinking slowly. I really wanted Meggie to see how far we got with it with her own eyes, but mayge next time--which is not until August 17th! Since I have two weeks to work on all this, next time we will have a riding session.

Looking away: I think I sometimes I misread her "ignoring you" face as an unconfident face. I know I did tonight, at least twice. I definitely don't always misread it, but that is another thing on my homework list--when I think she is being unconfident, I will ask myself "Is she really unconfident??" That is so basic, but obviously I need to work on it.

Homework:
Reading unconfidence properly
Looking away--what creative things can I do to end this when I am sending her on the circle or the yoyo
straighter yoyo/send
continue with lead by the tail
refine the transitions and change of direction
slack in the rope
Phase one long, phase 4 for transitions
General "attitude problem" of Misty's
~how can I make a game out of things to make things more interesting?


Overall, I was really glad to hear that Misty was being more disrespectful than unconfident. I am assertive and building confidence does not come as naturally to me as building respect. I can instill confidence just fine. I feel that this is kind of the turning point for Misty in her emotional condition. She has been so unconfident this summer and now several respect issues have been sprouting up lately, which means she is probably getting her confidence back. I know that sounds twisted, but that is how I feel. So, there.

Natural Horsewoman Out.

Returning to Jumping--it got even better!

Official Records Information:
Blu, 1 hour, afternoon, 7-29-10

I squeezed a session in with Blu in between work shifts. I saved horse time for last because I had a lot of 4H responsibilities to take care of, first. By the time I got the two jumps set up and all my stuff out for Blu (23' line, halter in a barn know, carrot stick with plastic bag on it, and a Korsteel broken snaffle bridle), I had an hour for Blu. My plan was to warm him up on the ground with the 23' line, then put the bridle on and jump, then take the bridle off and jump and do some other freestyle things for the cool down. That just so happens to be just how it went.

I am very fond of Blu's relationship with me. He is so easily drawn to me--he comes when I call--then he sticks to me really well during and after our session. I do not take what I have with him for granted. Since I have to work so hard for Misty's heart, I can truly see all of the value in the way Blu is with me. So, during my sessions, I am constantly keeping mind that I want to have the highest priority be that after the session, Blu still wants to be with me.

Our on the ground warm up consisted mainly of the circling game. I started with the figure 8. He was not doing the pattern on his own, sometimes he was not maintaining his gait, and once he went RB and pulled to the end of the line and trotted off. I just tracked behind him and as soon as he relaxed I called him and he came right to me, like "Oh, hi. What just happened?" I decided to work on his change of direction and maintenance of gait on a simple circle for a little. When he was more relaxed and maintaining gait, I went back to the figure of 8 and he did it perfectly. Then I moved us into the canter and did moving circles. I was very pleased that he maintained all through it: he went over uneven ground, did flying lead changes for the two changes of directions I asked for, went over a big lump--lovely. Then, the tire jump was in his path and the kid targeted it and went straight over the middle. Nicely done Blu! I had him come in after that. He got a long snuggle and scratches. I was going to work with his unconfidence with the barrels so maybe I could jump him over them while riding, but I could tell that he was going to take a while (and I was on a time budget), so the first time he finally looked at me with a question, I welcomed him in, took off the halter, and he followed me to his bridle.

Just to mention it, Blu is excellent with bridling. He is relaxed, takes the bit, head low--I like it. Then, he stood and waited while stepped out of the pasture (just 15' away) and turned up the radio. Lalala. Also, he stood nicely while I vaulted on. First I tried to off my bad ankle and I just oofed into his side as I changed my mind--hurt my ankle anyways. So, I ran over to his other side and got on that side. On occasion, Blu shows displeasure at me getting on and I then work through it until he gives me permission, but today he was happy to go from the start.

For a ridden warm up I did follow the rail in my invisible arena. I used the northwest corner fencelines then, as the southeast corner of my arena, I used the tire jump. First I just rode a lap at the trot--which he offered--to see where we were. He was cutting the corners and bowing the invisible sides. So first we did corner to corner to straighten those line. I only did each corner once. Note that this means he had to stop right in front of the jump. I trotted then cantered then changed directions and did the trot and canter laps and all of it was straight and quite precise. Then, I changed direction again, trotted a lap, cantered a lap, but when we came to the jump corner, instead of turning right I kept looking straight ahead and Blu jumped it like that's what we were doing all around. I knew we were ready to begin our jumping session.

I had the stansion jump set at 24'' (his highest jumping record, so far, in his jumping career--which is this summer), then the was the tire jump, which is only between 12''-18'' high, but is 2'' feet across. I had the barrel with food on it set up 30' after the 24'' jump. First thing I did was jump the tires, then rest, then loop around and jump them again. The second time he did not put as much effort into it, and like dingbat I decided to loop around and do it again. This time I heard his hoof scuff the tire and he went over the space between the two cones I had set up on either side of the jump (about 8'') instead of the center. So, to fix my transgression, I cantered around to the barrel of food, let him get a little bite, stood and let him chew it, then tried the tire jump again. That time he did it perfectly. I am glad I immediately realized that I made the wrong decision in looping back around and jumping again. When your horse is not motivated, doing it again is not going to make it better! Duh!

I tried several combinations of jumping. Blu did knock the 24'' over the first time he went over, but then he was clean the rest of the time. At the end of the session, I went over 4 jumps without stopping for food and I put the jump up to the 30''. He did just barely clip it when it was at 30'' and the wobbly/rotted stansion pitched a fit and fell over. However, that jump was so full of try, that was it for us. I got down, took the bridle off, rubbed him and let him eat, got back on (his necklace was already on), and rode to the trees where I had the carrot stick and bag hanging. He did not react at all when I pulled the hanging carrot stick from the tree. Good boy, Blu.

Our bridleless ride was super. I rode through the weave pattern at the jog. When he got that, I did the tire jump then jumped over the stansion/pole mess that was left of our 30'' jump, and then stopped to let him eat. Then I did a short bit on his spin progress and backing up with the plastic bag, both of which got better. He is just beginning to spin quicker without me using the plastic bag and backing is better, too.

Afterwards, Blu followed me to the fence. He watched me take care of my gear then stood while I sprayed him off from the other side of the fence. He loves getting sprayed. He is even very good about having his face washed. You know, it's great to know how to use the friendly game to get your horse comfortable with things like that, but it is very special for Blu to just be this way. I can hardly take credit for a lot of his good attributes, other than to say that I have not ruined them.

Natural Horsewoman Out.

Homework Lesson

Official Records Information:
Misty, afternoon, 1 hour 15 minutes, 7-28-10

Misty did not come out to me, again. I sat in the corn crib on the steps with a carrot stick, 23' line, halter, and fanny pack of pellets. As soon as I settled my things and turned away from her, she walked straight to me and stood. After I felt her relax completely, I gave her a few pellets, which she greedily accepted. Then I began to halter her, which took (my estimate) about half an hour. I would hold the halter and do approach and retreat with it in the arced position. She progressed her draw through the following stages: look at the halter, touch the halter, put her head under my arm, stand while I pulled the halter string over her ears, put her head down into the halter. My goal was to have her do everything on her own: I did not want to lift the halter onto her head, for example, I wanted her to put her head down into the halter. I would rate the final haltering a 5 out of 10 because she still had inklings of reservation about being haltered, though it was better than other times.

Now that Misty was haltered, I assessed that she was pretty alert, attentive, relaxed, and whatnot. So, unlike last night when I went to do lead by the tail and she was still quite introverted, I knew that now would be set up for more success. So, I did and she took a step back on the first try with a phase 2/3. I did a few more, gave her some pellets, and went out to the pasture, where I furthered our lead by the tail progress. She was so cool. This is, I believe, the furthest I have ever gotten with this concept. Twice I asked her to take 10 steps back. Not only did she do that, but she was going a diagonal pair at a time (as opposed to one foot at a time) and she was doing so with rhythm and good speed. Also, I only had a pinch of hair between my fingers (not even the diameter of my pinky). Several times, she backed up to me with just me stepping back! That's just what you get when you work on things when your horse is in the right frame of mind.

I changed gears to one line driving, but I used her tail to back her up every now and then because she offered it. I had to be very clear as to whether or not I wanted her to go forward or backward because at first, she was trying to back up every time I wanted to go forward (confused, not disobedient). But once she understood me, she was reading my energy VERY WELL. To stop, I just exhale, to go, I bring my energy up and start walking. I was surprised at how well it went. I did not do any trotting because I was so pleased with her and I did not have enough time to take her out to graze and come back and start up again. So, that was this morning/afternoon. Pretty cool, huh?

Natural Horsewoman Out.