Monday a friend came out to take pictures for a class project. She's taking a journalism class and has to do an article on a sport, so of course she chose horses. The plan was to get some pics of me riding Misty dressage and then do some jumping pictures of Jetta.
Neither horse was on their best behavior. But it was probably my fault with both horses. With Misty, I just didn't give her a solid enough warm-up so she was resistant the whole time and the only thing she wanted to do was open her mouth and chew on the bit. But she wasn't otherwise awful and tolerated PM laying on the ground and us trotting right next to her so she could get some "dramatic" shots.
Now with Jetta... I haven't jumped in MONTHS. I was worried my ankle wouldn't do well with it, but I thought Jetta would be totally fine. After all, she LIKES jumping which of course I told PM this exact thing. I think I jinxed it! (though my ankle was totally fine) Warmed up over a 2'9" cross rail just fine, so I set it up to a 3'3" vertical. She refused it a couple times, not badly, I knew they were coming, more my fault than anything for being wishy-washy with putting my leg on. Finally I got her over. First few jumps weren't super smooth, so I took her back over until we got two perfect jumps. I was going to stop, after all it was ending on a good note, we haven't jumped in forever... but then of course I decided "one more time" for the camera. Bad idea. Enter monster pony. She stopped DIRTY. Multiple times. I thought she'd be going over it but at the very last second she'd slam on the brakes and toss her head back catching me in the face. Fuuuun. So we dropped it back to 2'9" and popped over it a couple times then called it good. But I was not pleased.
Pictures will hopefully be coming soon though!
A couple pics to tide you over in the meantime:
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| Both smilin' for the camera |
Tuesday I had a great ride on Misty. We rode western, warmed up in the snaffle then put the curb in and worked on our reining stuff. She's improved so much in this area. It's just so much fun. We were practicing our rollbacks and she spun around so quickly I tweaked my ankle. Was definitely not expecting that and now it hurts :( I call it my half-sprained ankle. I just want it to heal and get back to normal!
No ride Wednesday (last physics midterm ever!!)
Thursday was another awesome day. For my animal learning class we have to do a clicker training project, so of course I'm working with Jetta. The goal is to get her to learn to "fetch" a cone. I don't know how successful I'll be, but already after our first session, I'm excited. I'll do a more complete post on clicker training, what I've learned in class and my observations so far soon. But, I just have to share how neat it is. The first step in training this behavior is to get Jetta to touch her nose to the cone to get a click and a treat. We "loaded" the clicker and then started with me holding the cone close to me. She was super determined to get treats out of my hand, but she'd only get a treat if she first touched the cone. Gradually as she figured out that touching the cone was the only way to get a treat I moved the cone further and further away until it was sitting on the ground and she'd have to touch it then get her click and treat. So cool to see the wheels in her head turning as she'd look at my hand with the treats in it, then at the cone sitting several feet away. I'm really excited to see how this goes!
Then I had a great jump school on Misty. I just set up a single jump out of barrels in the outdoor. She did awesome! Definitely have to keep my leg on and really drive her forward to get her to go over straight and not chip in, but she is so willing and I just love that about her! Plus having flying changes/most always landing on the correct lead is so nice, when compared with Jetta. Just way easier in general.
And then, the most awesome, amazing cross country school happened today. Details and pictures to follow :)
Hope you ankle feels better!
ReplyDeleteCan't wait to see more pictures!
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