Apparently I accidentally published this with no title and didn't notice for a couple days. Whoops.

In our last installment, Jazz was fresh off a great lesson.  I promised a story about a lesson which was now almost a month ago. Oops.  I'm going to go ahead and make this the last time for now that I make excuses and cite my insane schedule, blah blah blah.  From now on, I'm just gonna write about what I want to write about and get back to basics.

No farm visit pictures, so here's my cat, Casey!

I had a lesson waaaaaaay back on March 8 I want to talk about.  I arrived a little late, and didn't end up having time to lunge beforehand, the first time I had not lunged before riding since I started doing so a couple of weeks before.  Started with all the standard exercises, but the real showpiece was the canter.  Right lead was business as usual, but left lead quickly became World War III.  Jazz was having absolutely none of it, pulling on her martingale, popping mini-rears, the works.  I had so much trouble, my instructor popped a lungeline on her.  After she got a canter on the lungeline, I got back on and tried to get a canter on the line.  Jazz had a couple fits and ultimately ended up bucking me off.  She threw a couple crow hops and I ended up with my left foot out of the stirrup and over Jazz's right hip, and Jazz pretty much stopped there, so I just slid off the right side.  Luckily for me, Jazz really doesn't have much of a buck, I just consider it a side effect of the martingale (she'd rather be rearing), and she doesn't appear to want to throw me, just teeter me off balance enough that I stop pestering her.  After that episode, my trainer got on and had just as much trouble with her attitude as I was having, but eventually she did coax a left lead canter out of her.  I have to admit that I felt a little better seeing my trainer having as much trouble with my horse as I was having.

He's a very talented cat, capable of being a lump and coveting your dinner at the same time.

I had one other lesson before I went away for spring break on the 18th which went different than I expected.  I had another commitment that ran long, so I was running very late to my lesson.  Luckily my trainer is awesome, so she had my horse caught and in the barn for me when I got there.  We got her groomed and tacked quickly between the both of us, and I got to do the majority of my lesson.  We spent the bulk of my shortened lesson working on leg yields off the quarter line at the walk and trot.  It was mostly okay, but Jazz was getting lazy, especially towards the end.  Jazz likes to shut down and turn everything into a fight as soon as she decides that she's done.  I ended up getting the crop out to encourage the forward a little, and Jazz started doing little rears.  I brought her into a tight circle every time, and we eventually got a little co-operation out of her (luckily right at the time my lesson was supposed to end).  As a really great bonus to a successful lesson, my trainer even said it was the best she's seen me ride yet.

Measuring up

I am officially finished holding out on you after this post.  It's been torturous not updating on our progress, but I was really disinclined to either spoil it or jinx it, and I can't wait any longer or I'll explode!  Though I technically made the vaguest possible allusion to my plans recently, I'm so excited to share that Jazz and I did our first show this past Saturday!

As a quick aside,  I want to note that I'm purposely pretty anonymous. I'm just not comfortable sharing too much personal information on the internet, so I tend to err on the the side of saying less. That said,  it's probably quite obvious I'm young. While I'm still not being specific,  I'm young enough that I'm still in pony club. So,  when my pony club leader sent out an email back in August about some shows coming up, I thought to myself,  "Hm, October 25th... I think I could be ready by then."  So,  it's been a couple months of accumulating proper show attire (a jacket, show shirt, bridle,  new bit without the fancy sides, medical armband, etc.), and working with my awesome trainer on show prep to do the trot poles, and it all came to a head Saturday.

The day started bright and early, with a 6am wakeup, and the show team headed to the barn.  A friend, K stayed over to come and help out at the show, and we went to catch the horse while the slaves  helpers hooked up the trailer.  Just after I'd caught a very confused Jazz - "Why are you here? It's dark and stuff"-, K said, "Are there supposed to be horses there?" while pointing to two horse-shaped silhouettes over by the barn.   I assumed it was the barn manager, who had told me she would be there about that time to load her horses for a different event she was going to.  I told my friend, "It's probably just [barn manager]'s two horses."  At this point it was tactfully pointed out to me that this was three, not two horses running loose in the yard, and the barn manager's car was not there yet.  At this point I called the barn manager and my friend hurried to close the perimeter gate.  I ushered Jazz into the barn where she would be out of the way of the loose horses (all of which were strangers to her).  Meanwhile K was trying to herd or catch the horses back into their pasture, the six  kittens were running around in the dark, and it appeared as though both lights had burned out in the rather dark barn where I was walking around my half-asleep horse (plus my half-asleep self).  Not the start I had pictured for the day. 

Before long, the trailer was hooked and parked in the yard (with the perimeter gate still closed), the horses were herded back into the nearest empty pasture, and the barn manager finally arrived.  Then all that remained was to load the horse.  Har har.  An hour, more than a couple tears, a few scary rears (thanks, young horse attitude), many failed bribe attempts, and much more struggle than could be considered necessary, the horse was on the trailer, and I was trying not to consider the fact that my classes were due to start 55 minutes from the time we got into the truck to leave, with the show being approximately a 50 minute drive.  I was not happy at the prospect that all that work, time, effort, and money may end in missing the show (thanks, early morning start times for baby trot pole classes), and mostly held it together as I also tried to figure out how to do my hair (the show hairnet/clip I had bought was defective and broke a few times before I could rig it servicably), changed, and attempted not to freak out some more.  My trainer was waiting for us at the show grounds, and she had let the officials know we were coming at least.  

This was the beautiful sunrise on the drive over, another welcome distraction.

We pulled in, finally, at 8:52.  Eight minutes to go.  I pulled on my boots (which co-operated and went on correctly for the first time in probably a month.  I really need to sort something out for my boots), and by the time they were on,  my trainer had found us, K had unloaded Jazz, and she was getting ready to tack her up when she asked, "Hey, where's the brushes?"  I said they were just in the back of the truck, and opened the tailgate.  Nope.  "Oh," I said, "I guess we must have thrown them in the trailer tack room." Nope.   "Hey, did anyone perchance grab the brushes from the (dark) barn aisle when we went to load the horse?" Nope.  In a burst of extreme luck, Jazz was spotless (seriously, she is never that clean), and we didn't have to beg the people at the trailers nearby to use theirs, because she was more than passably clean, and there was not a speck of dirt on her saddle patch.  Then my trainer pointed out that I should go start memorizing my course, and the lifesavers grooms got to work tacking up my horse for me.  I read the pattern and then went to walk the course with my trainer who suggested where I could cut corners and where I would have to go around.  Then, the ring stewards kicked us out and called everyone in my division for tack check.  I ran back to the trailer and found a (thankfully) tacked up horse and thanked everyone about a million times before briskly walking back to the ring with horse in hand, and tightening the girth as we went.  

Naturally, based on the course of events of the day so far, I was the first rider to go.  I was registered in three classes, the easy trot poles, the challenge trot poles, and the walk/trot equitation.  

First was challenge trot poles because the show officials accidentally put it first before easy trot poles. Jazz went into the ring nice and easy,  and I decided to trot a little circle before the timer like I always used to do at gymkhanas, but she spooked at one of the jumps. It was a Halloween show,  so there were all kinds of spooky obstacles and decorations. The jump at the front gate that was causing the present issue had two large tombstones leaning against the front standards,  and a skeleton propped up on the back one. Apparently she didn't get the memo that it wasn't really haunted. 

Either way, it was a minute or two before we were ready to actually start the course. Technically, I did try once before we actually did start, but she backed up (apparently the first jump was just as scary as the skeleton jump).  By the time I got her over the first pole,  I was so stoked about starting that I completely forgot my course and where to go. I knew which pole I was supposed to go to next,  but I was not lined up for it at all,  so I circled. Jazz also thought this one was scary,  so she backed away,  at which point the officials in the ring thankfully reminded me I was supposed to approach from the opposite side. Oops. After that I mostly remembered my course, and Jazz paused to consider a few more obstacles (there was one with a big fake spider she really leered at, and I don't blame her. Spiders are creepy). We survived,  and before I knew it we were exciting the arena. 

At this point Jazz decided to pull out her inner rock star and be the chillest chill horse while we waited and watched the other riders. She was behaving really well,  so I left her with K while I went to go figure out my second course.  It seemed much easier, basically a big loop of the arena with a figure eight in the middle.  While we waited, I watched the other competitiors, and talked to the girl next to me, who was riding an adorable little bay pony dressed up as a wizard.  He had a little wizard hat on, and the little girl riding him was wearing a long velvet cape.  Talk about a good pony!  I also noticed at this point that Jazz was, for probably the first time in her life, the tallest horse in the arena.  She looked positively huge compared to all the ponies.  If she's really stretching, she still might not brush 15 hands, but she's been doing so well lately, really starting to use her muscles better and coming into herself, that, odd as it may sound, she just feels bigger when I'm riding her.

After all the riders had gone and I had remounted in preparation for the second course,  they announced the placings.  I came in fifth, and I'm fairly sure the girl on the wizard pony got first.  I was thrilled, as I knew I wouldn't place high since I'd gone off course.

 Almost immediately after the placings were announced, I found myself back in the ring.  I tried to stay nice and relaxed, while still being prepared for spooks.  As it turned out, that was relatively unnecessary, because Jazz kicked into gear and ROCKED IT!  It was probably the best trot poles course we've ever run (to be fair, I did a limited number at home, and they were all bumped up in difficulty to prepare for the highest level of technicality at the show).  Before I knew it, I had crossed the electronic timer eyes, and I was done.

K remarked to me after the second course that my horse was calmer at this show than her very experienced show horse (whose last show was a national finals with her previous owner) was at any show she'd taken her to (so naturally, I had to brag a little about that here).  Our next class was equitation, so my trainer gave me a few tips as I double checked her girth and watched the last few riders do the trot poles.  When the class was over, they announced the placings, and WE WON! I couldn't stop smiling.  What a good pony!

It was at this point, with probably 45 minutes of very patient waiting, that Jazz started to get a little antsy. In fairness it was largely my fault for getting on too soon.  The jumps crew were still moving poles to get the track around the rail clear for the equitation when I mounted up, and Jazz was ready to go right that second.  Of course, considering the fact I literally drove up eight minutes before my classes started, I hadn't been getting on until right before I had to go for the previous two classes, so me being on her and not directing her to do something right then was a little confusing.  I did a little movement, circling and the like, until she chilled out a little, and then hopped off.  Naturally, about 45 seconds after I did so, they welcomed the riders into the ring to walk around and warm up until the judges were ready (the officials were also waiting for a rider who had just gotten there and wanted to make their equitation class).

Jazz went in nice and steady, and when I tried to subtly ask my instructor over the fence how I was supposed to manage passing, one of the officials kindly helped me out.  All the little ponies in the class were awesome and quite well behaved, but moved a little slower on their shorter legs than Jazz, who was energetic but still listening perfectly.  She was just in that perfect sweet spot where she was neither lazy nor raring to go.  Apparently my plans to have 45 minutes to warm her up to that perfect degree (you know, the ones thrown out the window because of the trailer debacle) were unnecessary.
The equitation class was overall quite good.  I felt pretty centered and balanced, and my legs were feeling fairly solid.  There were a few tiny hiccups when I had troubles with speed and distance between the other horses, so I circled through the middle and kind of got stuck.  It took a few tries and redirects, but I eventually ended up back on the rail.  There were a couple of little hiccups where I would apply a little too much leg and Jazz broke to the trot for a couple steps, but overall I felt great about it.  At the end, we lined up in front of the judge, who commented that everyone had very good leg position, and every rider had occasional issues with contact.  She then told us the results would be tabulated and the results posted soon.

We walked straight out the door and across to the racetrack once the class was over.  I probably should have mentioned the show was being held at a racetrack that had been closed a few years ago. I'd had grand ideas of messing around on the track for a while before cooling down, but the ground was pretty hard, so I opted to dismount as soon as she was cooled down sufficiently.  My trainer, and everybody else for that matter, asked how we'd done and what the judge had said, but we were still waiting for the results.  We took a few more photos and headed back to the trailer to get Jazz some food and water.

Demon pony has glowing eyes.

I know I already have this picture at the top, but this was her expression for the entire show.  What a great horse.

I left her with K to go find water and return my number, and headed over to the officials' table to ask where I could find a hose.  Immediately they asked my name, and handed over my ribbons before I could even ask about the water.  They gave me the already expected 5th place green ribbon and 1st place red ribbon (from trot poles), and also a shiny blue 2nd place ribbon from equitation! I was thrilled because I honestly couldn't have expected better considering the little bobbles we had (the short breaks of gait and when I got stuck in the middle of the arena for what felt like forever).  I handed back my number and headed off in the direction I had been pointed to search for water.  The lady at the officials' table had thought there would still be water behind the bathrooms, but most of it had been shut off for the winter already.  I tried the bathrooms, but I couldn't fit the bucket into the sink, and I couldn't even get enough water to cover the bottom of the bucket.  I went outside to wander some more when C came looking for me.  I showed her my ribbons and we were excited about that for a few minutes before remembering that we had no immediate way to get water to my horse.  I suggested we might be able to get a cup or something that would fit under the tap in the bathroom and just dump it into the bucket, and we found a long abandoned water bottle that would fit that bill.  Once I had filled it up in the bathroom sink and dumped it into the bucket four or five times over, C went around the corner and said, "You know there's a shower here, right?"  Oops.  We were sure to let the officials know so no one else would do anything quite that stupid in search of water.

I arrived back at the trailer to an untacked horse eating hay happily as a crew of slaves grooms brushed her.  Jazz was less than impressed that I wanted to tack her back up for photos, but there was no way I was leaving my first show without ribbon pictures with a tacked up horse.

Unfortunately all of the pictures with just the first place ribbon turned out pretty awkward.

Awkward pony and rider are awkward.  Plus return of the demon pony. 

Luckily the ones with all 3 ribbons mostly turned out better.

Of course, the awkward wasn't gone for good.

This one was definitely my favourite. 

 After all that, the drive home was pretty uneventful, and Jazz was back in with her friends before most of the competitors at the show had even ridden.  The perks of riding in baby classes.

It was no sunrise, but my view on the way home wasn't half bad either.  

p.s. I'm hoping to get the videos functional soon! 

  

Toss up

[Insert halfhearted apology for lack of recent pictures before arriving at the issue at hand]

Lesson day again.  This was the first one in Jazz's new English saddle, and it is not what I'd call a lesson to sneeze at.

I have a half hour lesson from 6-6:30 and it's generally on Wednesday, unless there's a cancellation and I have to do a make-up lesson.  Tonight my 6-6:30 Wednesday lesson ended in me finishing up and dismounting my horse at almost exactly 7:00 with a few prospects I'm not presently thrilled about.

It started out relatively standard.  It was absolutely pouring rain, and the sound of it on the tin roof was nearly deafening.  This made Jazz a little distracted, but nothing terrible.  I did some short groundwork exercises and she seemed fine.  I put on her bridle and brought her to the mounting block where she was kind of fidgety, but we also need a lot more practice with mounting blocks anyways.

By then my instructor was there and we started with a really simple, nice walk.  Then she set up some poles (the pole bending kind, not the trot poles kind), and we worked on bending using more leg than rein. It was fairly difficult at first, but then my trainer moved half the poles from the center line to the quarter line so each had three poles twice as far apart.  That started off much better, but once I knew how I should be asking, Jazz stopped listening and began totally ignoring my leg, especially my left leg.  It was getting more and more blatant and head-tossy until my trainer suggested I change tactics.  She had me do a new exercise where I face Jazz perpendicular to the long wall of the arena.  Basically the exercise is to ask Jazz to move sideways, and if she's not co-operating and generally being rebellious, to push her forward into the wall.  This should have been fine, but remember alllllllllllll the rollbacks we did back in the day? Remember alllll the anticipating Jazz started doing, backing up and sometimes actually trying to do rollbacks when I just asked for a stop or one step of backup?  Well a little rein and leg pressure she didn't want to deal with + a nose in the wall = Jazz backing up halfways to Timbuktu.  My trainer suggested if she really runs away backing like that (as in the reins are very loose and I am both clucking at her and squeezing/tapping with my legs), to make it just as much work as what she's avoiding (read: back her up until backing is the least appealing option available).  That did seem to help a little bit with that, and she did have a couple halfways decent leg yields in that exercise.  We just worked on that briefly before moving on, with my trainer explaining that it's an exercise that can be a bit nit-picky and very frustrating to a horse that has difficulty or is just not fully understanding it.
So we tried to go back to the poles and bending.  The wheels fell off a little there.  She was totally blowing past the poles and still choosing to pretend my leg was not there.  My trainer had me do small circles to try and get her back, and that devolved to Jazz drifting in her circles until she was practically running over the other horse in the arena, and generally freaking out and throwing her head every which direction.  It took a long time and a lot of circles to work out all the general knobbing about she was doing and she finally calmed down for two seconds, long enough to end our lesson on an okay note.

Thing to work on #8
This. Just all of this nonsense.

Here comes the un-thrilling prospects part.  My trainer said she wanted to try her in a tie down.  Everything I've seen and done and been taught since I've been working with horses (and more specifically Jazz) makes me very hesitant to immediately turn to big tools the second something's going wrong.  That being said, it's not safe to be riding a six-year-old idiot running around saying "screw you" to the simplest possible exercise (you don't even want to know how many circles we had to do before she did one full one without flipping out so we could stop and I could finally get off and end my marathon lesson).  I also have no knowledge whatsoever on tie downs, martingales (running or standing), or any such contraption.

This is where you readers out in blogland (if there are any) come in.  What do you guys think? What experiences has everyone had with using training tools like martingales? I've done a little research so far, but good descriptions of the differences in action between running and standing martingales and tie-downs would be helpful.  What's my long term course of action if I do decide to use one? Keep in mind I currently have an English saddle but a western bridle with no noseband.

Riding? Yes, I'll hold

I suspect the fact I'm getting daily single pageviews of my page but no specific post means I've got a reader or two awaiting an update on little miss Jazz.  My blog has been broadcasting a lot of radio silence lately, and most of the reason for that is that I've had a lot of balls in the air where Jazz is concerned.

My last post was about my first lesson with my new trainer and Jazz's crazy head tossing.  I was trying to downplay it, but I was positive it was primarily an issue based on her teeth.   So, we had an appointment scheduled with the vet today to get Jazz's teeth done.  

Snoozy Jazz. 

She got two doses of sedative. 

Horses are such majestic animals. 

Exhibit A. 

Lots and lots of rinses.  Jazz was apparently saving a lot of grass for later.  

Maybe I should go back and redo my bit it up blog hop... 

Once she was done she just stared at the wall for a while. 

Then she rested her whole face on it and contemplated her entire life for about fifteen minutes. 

Anyways, there were, as expected, some hooks that were most likely the source of a lot of our issues.  Those were sorted out, and Jazz should be a lot more comfortable now.  

What was there and unexpected, was something else.  An ulcer on the right side of her upper lip (which I unfortunately did not remember to photograph).  The vet said she had maybe bitten her lip or something, and it looked a lot like the horse equivalent of a canker sore.  And as a person who suffers from canker sores, I fully understand why she was not having any of this 'flexion to the left' nonsense recently.  

I couldn't find a good diagram of a bit, but a bitless bridle is the same basic idea. Just in case you never stopped to think about the mechanics of bit pressure; when you pull one rein, the bit puts pressure on the opposite corner of their mouth. So, pulling on the left rein puts pressure on the right corner, hence Jazz's all-but-total refusal to co-operate and bend her head left in the bridle lately.  

So, with any luck, her little ulcer will clear up in no time and she'll be right as rain again soon.

Oh, wait.  Jazz also got trimmed on Friday, aaaand she's a tad footsore.  The vet looked at her and said they just seem a little too short.  So that's unfortunate.  She does seem okay on softer arena footing, though, and its not the end of the world.  Everyone makes mistakes, and my trimmer is very good, so a little time will fix her up nicely.  Now all we do is wait.

At least I've got kittens to entertain me in the interim.

Babies!

Curious progress

Well there's no question about it, Jazz is a different horse than she ever has been before.  Practically every day I'm at the farm now I can just ground tie her outside in the sun and groom her there while she dozes.  Her ground manners are almost all there, with occasional hiccups that are usually fixed with just a minute or two of ground exercises.

Things that are getting better #5 (remember when I used to actually remember to do these?)
Ground manners and more ground manners.  She could not be more chill ground tied for grooming most days now.

That being said, she isn't all different in good ways.  Jazz has always had evasions. It used to be laziness.  When I first started her, she was impossible to motivate.  I sometimes find that hard to believe considering how much she wants to go all the time now. Luckily, she isn't usually terribly stubborn, so she lets go of them as soon as I find an effective way to correct or deal with her evasions, that is until she finds a new one.  They usually aren't terribly big or showy (says the girl who's been sorting out her rearing on the ground within the last couple months), they're just little tests from her to see how she can get out of work.  Lately Jazz has been really improving, which naturally means stepping up the difficulty a bit and asking her to engage her muscles more and more correctly.  This naturally leads to a whole host of evasions, because it's much easier for her if she can derail me from our work by acting out, and she doesn't have to work so hard or engage her muscles so much.  She's a funny little mare with an attitude.

Recently it's been a bit of head tossing.  I think I've mentioned before that her main attitude issue, especially when it comes to contact, is to get huffy.  She just gets sort of frustrated, and starts snorting and moving her head a hundred tiny little moves in every direction at once.  I figure a small part of that is a pain memory from back in November when she needed her teeth done and it took me a week or so to realize it.  That being said, it is a lot just attitude.

Today was my first lesson with my new trainer.  I really like her, she's very good and I think she can really help me get places with my riding.  She seems to have a more English slant, compared to the more Western style of my previous trainer, but there is nothing wrong with that.  When I brought Jazz in, she was just as chill as she has usually been lately, and I was ready to get on soon.  We started out pretty standard, and the instructor had me doing 20m circles and working on going straight and bending to the inside and the outside.  Believe it or not, we had never done counter bending before, but Jazz seemed to be picking it up not bad.  Then we worked on it at the trot, and she also did fairly well.  We worked on trot to walk transitions, because the instructor wanted me to work on pushing her forward into walking, so that she would use her hind end to do the transition rather than pushing down into it with her front feet.  That was one thing that stood out to me as something that would be really good to work on, because traditionally, her trot to walk transitions have been kind of scrambly sometimes as she tries to keep trotting (she loves her forward).

Thing to work on #5
Trot to walk transitions

Thing to work on #6
Bending and counterbending using proper leg and hand positions.

That was when things got a little interesting.  The instructor asked to see Jazz's lope, and I started off on her right lead, traditionally her better side, and she did pretty okay.  Of course after that she was getting really rushy and kind of charge-y.

I rode yesterday, and she was really rushing.  She had almost no rate and wasn't listening to my half halts very well.  I decided to just bite the bullet and let her go, because I still felt like I had breaks, just not particularly sensitive ones.  Also I was feeling young and enjoying the summer sun and I don't really feel the need to justify it further.  Anyways I brought her into a lope that quickly turned into more of a gallop.  It was a blast.  She's pretty quick when she wants to be.  I let her go a couple laps of the arena and then slowed her back down, and we both took a rest for a minute or two.  I then made the mistake of deciding to take a lap or two the other way.  She is less balanced heading to the left on her left lead, and she made a fairly wide, leaning turn at the first corner, and just past the second she started crow hopping.  Whoops.  Maybe that wasn't such a good idea.  Anyways, I stuck it out with no problem (thank god.  I really need to make that post about Jazz the bucking bronco soon). And I did a cool down after that and hopped off, telling myself I wouldn't be stupid and push us like that again.  

So, back to today, she was really rushing her trot after her right lead lope.  Then she started counterbending against me and really cutting corners on our 20m circle, utterly ignoring my leg.  My trainer had me slow way down and move back to the walk, where she was still blowing all the way through my inside aids.  Then my trainer had me do a quick exercise that is basically stopping facing the wall and doing a hind end yield back and forth a couple times to re-establish that yes, you do know what leg means.  Then we worked our way back up, bending again at the walk to get her attention back.  Eventually we started trotting and then it got a little fancy.  Jazz was head tossing.  Not like she was before, though, like actually throwing her weight around and nodding like a trick horse.  It was lucky that it happened in the lesson actually, because the instructor was very helpful in keeping me calm and helping me focus.  She said how it was important, especially with a young horse like Jazz not to overreact to her little tantrums and to be extra sure to just keep doing the work as best I could so she's not getting out of it by acting out.  Not gonna lie, it was a little scary at least a couple times, and I was just doing my best to not picture Jazz rearing up and over like one of the horses at one of my gymkhanas last year.

Thing to work on #7
this newest evasion.

On the lighter side there's five new barn kittens and they finally all have their eyes open.  Here's the best picture I have of one of them.

Update: I have been really terrible at taking pictures of my horse lately.  I will hopefully take more soon.  With any luck I'll have something good to photograph coming up soon!

Back in the Saddle again... plus more history of Jazz

I am long overdue on this post (both in the writing of it and the events it entails), and I don't want to put it off any longer.

As the title suggests, I finally, Finally got back on my horse.  A real ride and everything.  I had a lesson on Sunday, and I told my trainer that I was really wanting to start riding again.  Jazz was ready to start working under saddle again. I intend to keep working on strengthening her groundwork, but not full time. It's time for us to start working back up to regular riding again as an added challenge on top of her ever-improving ground manners.

So, that's exactly what we did! We started with a quick drive/lunge/whatever-I-ought-to-call-it like I've been working on and Jazz was much more attentive right off the bat when I started her.  The last few weeks whenever I've first started with that exercise she's been pretty inattentive and bent away when we start out, with occasional shenanigans and rearing in there to spice things up, but with a few quick reminders from the rope, she found her manners again.  Then the usual quick work through of shoulders and backing straight, and after that we quickly moved on to lateral flexion with both the bridle and the halter to help with linking them.  Then we tied the rope around into reins and I hopped on.  Jazz did awesome!

It occurs to me that I mostly started writing this blog after my last ride on Jazz, so I haven't really talked much about where we are or were at in terms of progress and goals with riding.  Jazz has a solid w/t/c, she's nice and soft on her mouth, and she's fairly responsive to leg and seat aids.  However, she's pretty straight, and has yet to grasp the concept of contact on the bit.  Our lessons up until around mid-November resolved around primarily exercises at the walk and trot to encourage her to bend more, and some walk/trot transition work.  She has an okay canter, but it's not particularly balanced or collected, and she generally can't turn well at the lope, so we did the vast majority of our work at the trot in hopes of eventually fixing that.

You may notice I said mid November, and that's because in late November or so, I started having a bit more trouble with Jazz.  She had long had a habit before of... I'm hesitant to describe it as head tossing, because that really isn't what it was, but head tossing.  She would just start wanting to run, but she wasn't being particularly rude about it.  She'd sort of try to break into a slow lope, but wasn't able to really break forwards because I was usually ready for her, and the result was a fairly up very funny dressage-y sort of lope for about a stride and a half before I could bring her back, and the way she did it always made her head sort of pop.  She just was very excited to run, but generally easy to bring back. She had for the most part gotten past that late last year, and it was never a major or serious issue.

Anyway, in late November, she started actually head tossing.  And trying to turn right pretty abruptly when we were circling left at the wall after the open side of the circle.  We also did a lot of work on spiraling in and out of circles at the trot, and she was getting more and more resistant and head-tossing, especially to the left. As time went on, it seemed to be escalating, to the point were we were doing one rein-stops almost every five minutes, and even those weren't helping really much at all.  The last lesson I had in November I just got off, because even in the one rein stop I felt very close to being separated from my horse at any minute. Her head tossing and evasions were just getting worse and worse, until I started wondering if it wasn't just resistance.

I had her vetted as soon after that as I could arrange, and she had big hooks on her teeth, which were worst on the left side.  I had her floated, and she was an absolute champion (a relatively heavily sedated champion, but a champion nonetheless).  The vet said that she had some lacerations on the inside of her left cheeks, so it would probably heal totally in the next two weeks.  The difference in her after the floating was huge.  She was practically a new horse, almost completely back to her old self.  I had a few good, gentle rides on her at the beginning of December, and then went away over Christmas to see family.  By the time I got back, she was acting out a bit, and I started up on our groundwork re-start.

Back to Sunday, I got back on, using both the reins and the rope-reins.  I did what my trainer calls follow-your-nose circles, which are basically just very tight circles until she really bends nicely around my leg.  Those went really well, and then we worked on yielding her hindquarters, which was a little sticky (which was somewhat expected based on her last experience doing so under saddle), and rollbacks against the wall.  We had been working on those a lot last year, but she just never really had that breakthrough.  Now, since we've been working so much on them from the ground, there was a very modest improvement.  My trainer suggested we might try to get her to use her shoulders by having me in the saddle cuing and someone on the ground cuing at the same time, and I think that might work well for her.  The best part was her backing.  She moved nice and soft and straight! Yay! She used to be very huffy whenever I asked her to back straight, and my trainer told me that she had never worked with any Arab or part-Arab that would back straight without significant work.

Back and better than ever!

...or at least we will be.  The re-start is really paying off in a lot of ways, and even little things are taking leaps and bounds.  It's kind of a strange process because with some of the exercises it takes a little work, but you can really see when Jazz starts to get it (like with moving from her shoulders, which is awesome by the way! she can do full circles to both sides now that she gets it), and with other exercises it takes more time and effort and consistency, but I can see gradual improvement all the time (like with respecting my space, mostly when I'm asking her to change eyes without pushing her shoulder through me), and there are other things that we have essentially done before that she just gets in no time at all.

For example, we've been doing groundwork with Jazz wearing the saddle for the last few lessons, and we do an exercise that involved having the lead rope across the seat of the saddle and working on lateral flexion.  I remember the first time we introduced this exercise, my trainer told me to stand back while she tried it because some horses can get very fussy about it, but Jazz was a superstar!  Once she really had a handle on the flexion, we worked on flexion with a little pressure where the leg goes asking her to move her shoulders, and she was pretty good with that as well.  We also did an exercise with putting the rope around the far side of her body and around the hocks and asking her to calmly turn around to the pressure and come back to face me with no theatrics, just calmly turned back and then waited in her own space.

She's been just awesome for the last while, although not without a few small exceptions.  The occasional warning nip still comes out when she isn't pleased with me, and last week one day and I was working her on the lunge when she started rearing again, but not to worry, I just stuck with her and corrected, and she gave up on it pretty quick and went back to trotting quietly until I was done with her.

But on her good days she has been much better! I've even ridden again a few times, and started up on bridle work again, including breaking at the poll to contact (a noted weak point of hers, but we'll get there).  Just very short rides at a walk, but she seems like she is very nearly back to her old self (with even a few notable improvements to boot).  Onwards and Upwards from here!

Help Wanted

You just can't win them all.

I arrived at the farm today to a very cute and furry horse.

Seriously, just look at that winter beard. 

So, I caught her and brought her into the barn for a quick groom.  She was a bit.. unsettled.  (That is, she was squirming around and thrashing her head and generally not being her most co-operative self).  I settled for being able to pick up her feet with her standing, which took convincing.  Then I took her into the arena, and started lunging her a bit.  She started off okay; something spooked her and she reeled off and took off the other way before stopping planted, breathing like a dragon.  On the bright side, it was significantly better than the last time she spooked in a similar situation and charged directly through me.  She kept a nice distance.  

Of course most of the good ends there.  She just became a bit of a head case on the lunge, and I was having a hard time correcting her, and she was just escalating and escalating.  That is, she escalated until she... escalated.

Something like this.  Remember when her rearing was just a tiny pop of the front legs?

And I, of course didn't take it all that well.  I was not in the right place, literally or metaphorically to deal with it at all. I did a little bit of piddly groundwork just to move her around a bit and not to end on her getting away with that sort of behavior (although she did sort of get away with it. Sigh.), and chucked her back in her pasture.  

We've made leeway in the last two months.  I had a lesson again this week and did groundwork with Jazz in the saddle (and she was very good at standing for being tacked up, didn't even move a muscle), and did some more new groundwork exercises.  My trainer said something at the end of the lesson about how Jazz was doing well with her re-start.  I hadn't thought of it in those terms, but I guess that is what we have been doing. There are a lot of things that have been consistently getting better, and that's great, but it's frustrating how I rarely feel like I can handle my horse on my own.  She is quite honestly dangerous sometimes, and I am doing everything I can to sort her out, but there has been more than one day that I've taken her in and thrown her right back out again shortly after because I just wasn't equipped to deal with her safely in that moment.   I think that that is a root of a lot of our roadblocks together.  Sometimes I think It would have been better if I'd just followed the books, green and green make black and blue.  

Of course, that is an incredibly rare thought.  I wouldn't trade her for the world. 

So for now we truck on through, thankful that when I simply don't know how to work out my problems with Jazz, I know someone who does.

New Tactics

Well, I've been avoiding this post for a couple days.

I'm still kind of avoiding it honestly.

I've been a little... shaken? I think that's the closest word I can find.  I just think I've lost some of my confidence.

Where to start?

Good news.  That's always a good place to start.  I think it's about time I started riding again.  I really think I'm getting close.  I've missed it a lot.  It's been much too long.

This is the part where I put the less good news.  I just feel like I've screwed up.  In reality, probably not really.  In my mind, a lot.  I just think I've been pushing too hard at the wrong things.  I've been working on some things lately that are hard for Jazz, and I think I've just been forgetting that too often.   She has a really hard time backing a) straight and b) sometimes just in general, and I've been putting a fair amount of pressure on her to do so lately.  I just think I've been putting too much pressure on her, asking too much without enough reward for doing what I'm asking.

Jazz is a sensitive horse.  She can really easily get overloaded, and I just don't like the idea that I've been overloading her.  On the bright side, (okay this next part may sound a bit counter-intuitive, but just hear me out) Jazz is a really expressive horse.  This means that if she is not pleased with something, she will make that fact very clear to me.  Those of you who have been reading a little while will recognize these objections as head tossing, rearing, blasting forward through her shoulders and most recently, biting.  Believe it or not, as much as I don't love these behaviors, I find them a million times more preferable than the alternative.  There are a lot of horses who simply aren't comfortable expressing themselves in this way, so they just trudge along quietly disapproving until eventually something sets them off and they have a huge blowout.  Comparatively, Jazz has the easier of the two problems to work out.  She's not a horse that lacks confidence in herself, all she needs is a little structure and direction to channel her into doing productive work.

So I think It's time for a little re-evaluation on my part.  I stopped riding because Jazz wasn't being safe and respectful on the ground.  Now she's getting closer and closer to safe, and quite honestly the biting only comes out when I'm really pushing her to back, so why aren't I riding yet? She is a thousand times better about respecting my space and listening to me on the ground.  She's not perfect, but has any horse ever been perfect, really? I think I need to discuss a new strategy with my trainer, but at least I know that now.  Better to try a new direction than to keep pushing against a wall.

Thing to work on # 5
Knowing when I'm just not heading in the right direction and when to reevaluate

Surprise!

So this weekend was supposed to be pretty Full of non- horse - related stuff but Much to my surprise and delight,  my out of town weekend lines up perfectly with the Saskatchewan equine expo! 

I was able to catch the last day of the expo today and arrived in time to watch the exciting tail end of one of the sessions of the trainer's challenge. For anyone who isn't familiar with them,  the trainers challenges are 3 day events where 3 professional trainers are given young horses that are essentially untouched. I believe they're halter broke but I think that's the extent of what they know. Anyway,  the three trainers draw a 'colt ' (they call them all colts even though at most of the trainers challenges I've seen its been all fillies) and get one hour to with with the horse each day for three days and at the end of the third day, there's a final competition in which the trainers demonstrate various compulsory skills that they have hopefully taught their horse over the three days.

I arrived for the last twenty minutes or so of one of the trainers' final sessions with his horse, a beautiful palomino filly. He was riding her walk/trot/lope and working on backing. After a few minutes of that he hopped off and started swinging a rope around (one of the final compulsories is swinging a rope and dragging a log), before untacking and jumping on bareback. He rode around about a minute and then the horse reared and bucked in quite an exciting fashion. The trainer actually stayed on pretty well until he didn't. He would have given anyone a run for their money if it had been a bareback bronc riding competition and not a trainer's challenge. Nonetheless, in the true cowboy spirit,  he just grinned and said that was the most fun he'd had in a long time and jumped right back up just so he could end his session on a good note.

A truly horrendous phone picture of the trainer's challenge 

Much to my delight,  there was also a clinic from one of my favorite trainers,  Jonathan Fields. He was giving a clinic on bend and balance and I learned a ton of new stuff that will be really useful once I start riding again.

Jonathan Fields, not that you can really tell from the picture 

Plus I got a new halter and some English riding clothes for super cheap at the trade show. Just what i needed after these last couple weeks, shopping! 

Dizzy (I'm trying to get better at titles, I swear)

Well, there's no denying winter, especially not on a -20゜C day like this one.

Sorry for the crappy pictures hastily taken on the trip out.  

Hoarfrost

At least it's pretty

There's no view quite like snow covered bales with the Rockies in the Background.  I guess the winter's not all bad.

Even the halter on the fence had hoarfrost.

Jazz was a little reluctant to leave her hay, but with a little convincing she came in no problem.  The other horses in her pasture have also been giving me a little more space.  I'm not sure if it's because they haven't been getting treats anymore or if they just gave up on coming after me since I always push them away to a respectful distance.

I think you've been snuffling around in the snow Princess Frostyface.

Yet another good groundwork lesson (what else is new? What can I say? I have a great horse and a great trainer).

I took Jazz in on Saturday and she was kind of... off.  Not in any way I could pinpoint... she wasn't especially sassy or unwilling to work, she didn't seem physically ill (she did cough a couple times, and she was moving kind of weird in the deep sand, but I think she was just being lazy and not picking up her feet properly, so probably nothing to be concerned with).  Also a milestone that really shouldn't be exciting, but to me it is, just a little: Jazz didn't rear.  Not once.  This was the first time I've brought her in to work in the last few weeks that she hasn't reared.  Not to say that she was doing big rears, striking out and screaming like a stallion, it was more like a slight pop onto her hind legs that is her choice avoidance maneuver of late.

So anyway, I brought her in for my lesson today, and she was a little sassy, but not too bad.    I started with a short lunge/drive as per usual, then did some yo-yo backing that she was not pleased with today.  She kept blasting off to the side and forwards, and popping her head up whenever I tapped her chest with the rope.  She did rear once, but I just switched to a hind end yield until she softened with no further theatrics...or, no more except one.  She spooked a few minutes later at who-knows-what, and in approximately one millisecond went from standing calmly to storming past me at mach 8, grazing me with her shoulder, which is somewhat concerning, but I don't really know I can do much about it besides what I've already been working on with enforcing and re-enforcing space. When we got her listening a little, we went back to shoulder yielding, which was okay today.  Not perfect, but willing enough.  Baby steps.

Here comes the dizzy part.  My homework for the week is a hind end yielding exercise.  It involves moving her hip until she softens and bends around me on the ground (Jazz is about as straight as a board, as will become very clear very fast once I start doing riding lessons again, so softening and bending is a big theme with us), and once she is nice and soft, taking one step back and changing her eye, ideally moving her shoulder over and transitioning smoothly to yielding her other hip.  It took a lot of jabs and taps on the shoulder today to move her off a little, but it could be worse.  I was definitely a bit dizzy and very done with the exercise in the maximum of ten minutes we spent on it today; my trainer told me she's worked just this exercise with horses for an hour before, so I can't imagine how dizzy I would have been after that.

I'll be away for the long weekend, so there won't be a lesson next week, but if I have anything worthwhile to report on this week, I will.  Maybe I'll do more backstory if I can think of something good.  I guess we'll find out.

Sunday lesson

Another awesome groundwork lesson today with Jazz. I got there a bit early for my lesson and she seemed pretty quiet, so I Started doing her yo-yo backing exercise. She was a bit sticky, and wasn't too keen on the going backwards part of it, so she reared, naturally.  So, I sent her off and did more of the lunging my trainer had taught me on Wednesday, and it definitely helped.  Just after I'd gotten her to think a little and come in to me, my trainer arrived, and she had me lunge her again both ways.  After Jazz had calmed back down on the circle, we worked on the yo-yo exercise a little, and my trainer corrected my body language a little.  Then we worked more on her shoulders, and it. was. great. 

As I mentioned previously, on Wednesday my trainer showed me a different method of asking for jazz to move her shoulders, and it has been working so much better.  I started on her left side, and I got a perfect step right off the bat.  I kept going and rewarding until I got three perfect crossing steps with her front feet in a row.  I swapped sides and she had a little harder time on the right, but I got a couple of good single steps and went back to her left.  I got several perfect steps without even having to tap her with the rope, and got four in a row.  She was really starting to get the idea, especially on the left.  I did get a few more good steps on her bad side, and even got two in a row, and by then my lesson time was done and Jazz was completely chilled out and was standing like a champion.  

My trainer even commented that I had good timing with the shoulder yielding because I've been backing her first to help lighten her forehand,  and I had a really good sense on when to switch from backing to asking for lateral movement. Also Jazz was backing well just based off of body language with no pressure from the halter or the end of the rope. 

Which brings me to thing I'm getting better at with horses #2

Developing a feel. I'm in no way there, but I'm feeling really good about how it's progressing. 

Once my lesson time was up, I brought Jazz from the arena to the barn and gave her some minerals, where I snapped a few pictures up close. Lucky horse even got a couple of crunchies.

  

Food!

Fooood!

FOOOOOOOD!

 I played a bit with my newfound moving the shoulders button turning her in the barn aisle and navigating around the gate to the pasture.  She even came back once I'd let her go and closed the gate behind me.  It's amazing even the little changes in this horse over the last month or so.  At the beginning of the new year, she would sometimes come back to the gate and get petted, but she would be rooting around in our hands and pockets for treats, and when we tried to push her out of our space she would just give up and wander away to her friends.  Today, though, she stood a good distance away, with all of her well behind the gate (not like she used to with her whole chest pushing on it and her head digging around in pockets), and being very respectful and sweet.  She stayed there a long time after I walked away too.  She was still there when I drove off.

I can't wait for our next lesson!

Catch-up

Sorry that I missed the scheduled weekly post, but better late than never.  Here's what we've been up to in the last week or so

Lesson on the 23rd:

I had a groundwork lesson with my awesome trainer, and we worked towards moving Jazz's feet meaningfully and with respect.  There's not much really to tell.  I really like my instructor because she has some different exercises than anyone else I've worked with, and she has a way of being really positive about issues.  She won't criticize what I've been doing so far, she just suggests a way to do things better or fix issues very nicely.


I spent most of last weekend at a friend's farm.  They don't have indoor facilities, so all their horses get the winter off to eat hay and try to keep warm.  I helped them with chores and went to see their other herd at their far pasture.  They raise Curly horses and warmbloods, so pretty much all their horses look like giants compared to all the quarter horses and weanlings I'm used to seeing at my boarding facility and the horse rescue.  Some of us also went to watch some friends in a hunter schooling show, which was fun since I knew absolutely nothing about hunter jumper.

I also made a trip to the rescue with C and it was just us and the owner.  It was a beautiful sunny day, and the owner let us help her with halterbreaking some of their 12 weanlings (all of whom are so cute I could just take them all home with me, but of course I probably shouldn't on account of how I've been dealing a lot lately with what happens about four years after that).   It was a really nice, restful, horse filled weekend.


Lesson on the 29th:

Jazz was all sass and energy when I brought her in for another groundwork lesson this Wednesday.  I have never seen her so utterly unwilling to stand still.  It wasn't altogether too dissimilar to her fidgety, charge-y behavior lately, but with more prancing and angry tail swishing.  At the beginning of the lesson, my trainer lunged some of the crazy out of her and tried to get her to use her brain.

I regretfully could not find photo credits for this photo so hopefully it's okay to use, but this is pretty much what Jazz looked like for the first five minutes

Then she showed me what she was doing and passed her over to me.  It was so helpful because I've never known any good, safe ways to get her feet moving when she's so sassy like that, and regular lunging isn't really much of an option when she's so wound up.  She had me doing a quick correction that kept her moving and kept me in a good position, and at one point Jazz turned to me and tried to go the other way, but I just got back into position and got her moving forwards again no problem.  Once she had quieted some and started thinking, I worked on a backing exercise which involves standing in front of Jazz with hands up at around shoulder height to keep both her eyes and moving her back and forward in a sort of yo-yo fashion.  Once that was going well, we started working on moving Jazz's shoulders, which is really tough for her and one of her worst sticky spots.  She was sort of getting it, she was charging forward quite a bit, which isn't all that surprising, but we did get a couple of true steps in either direction.  I also learned a new way to do shoulder yields which is much easier than the way I had been previously taught, which required a lot of specificity. I never really grasped the old way, so I had never really worked on it much.  

There has been a bit of a change in my trainer's schedule, so I have switched my lessons to Sundays for February, so I will hopefully have an update very soon about my next lesson.