Another Day, Another Dobbin

I had a nice day today, playing with two very different horses and doing quite different things with them. I started off with Dove. When she and Journey first went out on the track, I started putting up barriers at either end of the morning feed area, just to make it easier to catch them. Journey is simple to catch now, but Dove is still pretty elusive. Today I decided to set myself the challenge of catching her without the barriers. She must have realized that she was supposed to move on the the next phase, because she let me halter her without any problems. 

I decided that it was time to groom her tail, which I have never done since she came here. I figured it might be a challenge if she was feeling defensive about Zone 5, what with the recent vet exam and all. It took a bit of time to work my way back there, but once I did, she let me work with her tail at liberty, and only walked around a couple of times, and never flinched at the detangler spray, during what turned out to be a very long session. One reason I hadn't groomed the tail was that it's fairly thin and wispy (at least by Fell pony standards!) so I thought it would be easy to zip through when I had a moment. No. When I had a proper look, I found a solid round mat the size of a baseball near the end of her dock. Eek! No wonder I always felt there was something odd about the way her tail hung. It took about an hour to get it all combed out, and it was all live hair - so Miss Dove has a much prettier tail now!

I can't get over the feeling that Dove is blown away by all the positive attention, and patient handling. I can see her processing it, and almost feel her wonder, sometimes. She has her moments of being stuck or even stubborn, but I feel that she is becoming sold on the new lifestyle. I brushed her body down. She is starting to shed out her winter coat. She enjoyed that, and let me go absolutely everywhere. Nice. I wanted to do something different with her today, so we went for a Zone 3 Driving walk across the pasture and to the far side of the track. She had a little trouble with the concept of  going away from the herd. I had to disengage her a couple of times, but as my focus on where we were going got better, her confidence did, too. If that's as bad as she would be ridden, it would be pretty mild. If only I could have the same level of confidence ridden that I have on line!

We collected the empty haynets, and I shook old hay out of some of them. She enjoyed picking at it and relaxed as I got busy with my work. Once I had them all collected, I decided to see it she would carry them for me. I figured they were a nice familiar thing. She had no problem with that at all, and packed them all the way back to the yard for me. We finished up with a bit of Shiatsu back in her pen, which she enjoyed once she understood what I was up to.

All this time, Bruce had been patiently chilling in the pen next door. I'm sure he was ready to play, but his tail also desperately needed attention, so I got my comb out and resigned myself to another long session. We finally made it out of the pen and I took him for a drink. Yes, he needed to play! He got a drink then played with the feed buckets that were waiting to be washed. Then another drink. Then played with the buckets, etc. He went back and forth about five times, and each time he held the last gulp of water in his mouth in case he got a chance to dump it on me. That's quite a fun game, because of people's reactions. I let him have his fun with the buckets, but I made sure I stayed dry.

I put his bareback pad on and took him to the arena for a short play. We concentrated on some Level 3 Sideways games. I started on the fence, sending him in half circles. It took a few changes of direction before he woke up and then he got really bouncy. Great! I rewarded "bouncy" and tried for some fast sideways along the fence. We finished with him cantering sideways. We also did some sideways over a low jump, and other variations on a theme. One of the interesting things about loaning a pony out to other students is being able to say "I wonder if he knows.....Sideways Towards?" and finding out that he does! It needs a lot of polishing, but he knows what it is.

That seemed like enough. We headed out for a ride around the track. Some discussions about eating as we began were probably more to do with leaving the herd than anything. Once we turned along the dreaded east side I was very proud of him, because I could see that he was really trying for me. I'm still a bit nervous riding Bruce sometimes. Just not enough hours together, I guess. I got off once.  There was a gate coming up, anyway. Dratted hotwire gates! You can't really work them from horseback safely, and I never remember to turn the fence off. Once through that, I got back on and decided that if he needed to hurry back, I could probably ride it. However, he surprised me by taking his time, and not blasting through any thresholds. We did lots of walk/trot transitions. Bless him, when we got to the west side, where the neighbor has just put a herd of cows out, he whinnied at them. Well, they're mostly black. I guess there might be a Fell pony hiding there somewhere! (One of the calves sure seemed to think Bruce might be his mama. I was glad he didn't come through the fence.) Iona was waiting to welcome us as we pulled into the yard.

Journey Update

Journey loaded up easily for her vet appointment on Thursday. He sedated her pretty heavily and put her in a squeeze chute for her exam. It didn't appear to be traumatic in the least. Boy was she snoring! And SHE'S NOT PREGNANT!! Happy days! The vet is in the nearest town where any significant shopping can be done, and we had a few errands, so Journey got to visit a few parking lots and an outdoor eatery on the way home, all of which she took in her stride. She is a very cool girl.

Mark played with her for a couple of hours today, including trailer loading, just to make sure she's forgiven us. No problems and he says they had a blast. She seems to be the kind of horse you can play with all day, and she just comes back asking what the next activity is. 

Well, once again I apologize, as I feel this blog must be a little boring right now. Not much problem solving going on, what with all the horses doing as they're told. I wonder whether it has anything to do with the increase in undemanding time I'm spending with them.....

Great Girls

Journey

I had another little session with Journey yesterday. It started well, but having at first made a little more progress, things seemed to slip backwards. I'm really not sure why. I came away with the feeling that I should have kept the session much shorter and quit after the first bit of progress. However, as I thought about it in the evening, I also came to the conclusion that because she has such a pattern of evasion, it might be much more effective to get a rope on her. I was kind of expecting this to turn into a rodeo event. We even watched a video of Pat halter breaking a mustang after supper to get in the mood.

This morning, as I was mentally preparing for the day, I really tried to put myself in Journey's place and feel what she feels. My impression was "No, I mustn't give in...but what if is isn't so bad?" I had a strong sense of Journey's need to learn to become a "horse-man" in order to get along in life and have a bright future - maybe even some fun. But first we had to pick up a load of hay for the cows, and unload last week's horse hay. Then I played with Dove, which I'll tell you about shortly. 

By this time it was late enough in the afternoon that I felt I could reasonably not bother with Journey. I admit I was having some doubts. I checked the footing in the round pen. It was okay. I got my 45' line and played a bit in the small part of Journey's pen. I could see that it wouldn't be too hard to get a loop over her head. So I set up the barriers that allow her to go from her pen to the round pen. Last time, I had to push her quite a bit to get her there, but today she surprised me by just calmly walking out of her pen and around the corner and into the round pen. 

I made a couple of tentative attempts at getting the loop on. Mark was watching and declared that he could get the job done. She really is his horse, so I said "Go for it!". He took his time rubbing her head and showing her the loop, and sending her around the pen if she wouldn't let him progress, or decided to leave. His timing was really good. I know that we were both wondering what the heck was going to happen when she finally felt the pressure of that loop. Well finally Mark made his move, but so did she, and the rope ended up behind her jaw but in front of her ears. Eek! She was surprisingly calm about this (and the light began to dawn on us...) and let him put it back over her ears. We were still waiting for the explosion that never came. Instead she gave us the classic "Oh, well, you've caught me now" look, of the horse who hates to be caught but accepts the halter perfectly well once it's on. So in spite of the guy we bought her from thinking she hadn't been halter broken, it appears that she was. 

I then played a LOT of Friendly Games with her. She was very tense. I rubbed her with a carrot stick. and then my hands. It wasn't too hard to get into the zones behind the drive line. I spent a lot of time rubbing her crest, as her head was very high and he neck tense. She began to relax when I rhythmically rocked her crest from side to side. I took a halter, and using the 45' as a safety net, I haltered and unhaltered her a few times. Taking it slow, trying to make it pleasurable. Giving her a treat every time I put it on. She got more and more relaxed and we began to see lots of headshaking, yawning and licking. Pretty soon, she was doing this over every little thing I offered her. We played some Porcupine Game. More yawning. She made huge changes. We finished up by seeing how she felt about Mark slipping a rope over her head again (pretty relaxed) and then me asking her to lower her head and give me some lateral flexion. I led her back to her pen and unhaltered her. I stroked her back and face, just like I'd been doing with the halter on.

We're hoping that we've made a big breakthrough with her. We'd really like to turn her out, but only if we feel she's catchable. At least catchable in a small area. Fingers crossed for tomorrow.

Dove

This morning's session with Dove was just awesome! As usual, I had a bit of trouble catching her, but then she decided to let me. I hope she will be catching me, soon, but for now this is okay. I left her in a pen while we moved hay around, and even though it was a small pen it took me a couple of minutes to catch her again. Off we went to the arena, where she was pretty skittish and it took us awhile to get out Friendly Game going. However, once we did, it was pretty solid, but I knew it was more toleration than true acceptance. Until I found her itchy spot. That changed everything. Wow! There it was, just behind her jaw. The change was very quick. I almost couldn't believe it. Suddenly I saw the soft eyes and sweet, relaxed face that caught my eye the day we bought her. You could just about hear her thinking. "This is nice. These people are nice. I'm enjoying myself" I felt so happy to be able to give her that.

The Porcupine Game was pretty easy after that, and we also did some basic Zone 2 driving between various obstacles. I then played around with jumping up and down next to her. That freaked her out a bit, so I got to skip and sing and jump around for awhile. It got better. I stepped up onto the pedestal. and that scared her a bit because I grew so tall! However, I was able to rub her and lean over her and stuff and have her stay calm. I had no intention of mounting her, but I thought it'd be good for both of us to have the experience.

I finished up with lowering her head and took her back to her pen. I really like this horse. There is something very sweet about her, and for awhile there I thought it was lost, but we've found it again.

Secret Life of the Herd

This morning Dove was standing on the track, halfway up the drive, while the rest of the herd were eating in the grazing cell. "Poor thing," I thought. "I'd better go help her." So I grabbed a halter, with a plan to put her back in with Journey until the weather gets better. Of course, she was having none of it - didn't want to be caught. So I walked her back to the pasture, instead. Then I had a look at the tracks in the snow. It seemed like the whole herd had last been along that stretch in the early part of the night, but then Journey had ventured out for a drink of water in the morning and was simply stopping to eat weeds. Maybe she's not so helpless after all.

After breakfast I headed out to the pasture to bring them in for feed and to close the gate, with a plan to move them to the next grazing cell after they got their buckets. Bruce and Iona came easily, I shut the gate and took Hunter out next, but Dove was not up for it. Catching Game in a 10 acre field in 6 inches of snow. "Oh, boy!" An hour in, it wasn't getting much better. (I realised that I wasn't being entirely consistent with my body language and responses, though, which was a useful revelation that I'll come back to in a moment.) I stuck with it, and fortunately Mark saw my problem from where he was working and hatched a plan. He drove to the pasture gate and got out of his car, which kind of drew her that way. I'm sure she was looking for a change of pattern. (I know I was!) I helped her out the gate and we corralled the four of them in the feeding area. I was finally able to get her haltered in this smaller area. 

What I could see was that she was frightened of the other horses, particularly the Fells. I don't think she likes being in close quarters with them at feeding time. Naturally their energy is a little high. I have made sure that she gets to eat in safety, but there have probably been some skirmishes at the water tank. The best I could do was to make sure I kept her safe while she ate her feed. She relaxed quickly when she saw that I would defend her space, and that the others respect me. I hope I got some leadership points, but I expect that it will be tricky to catch her off and on for awhile. 

The new grazing cell gate opens almost directly onto the water and feeding area, so at least we won't have horses missing the gate when the herd leaves without them this month. Perhaps we can establish some more positive patterns.

Mark and I drove out on the track, to connect the temporary fence of the new cell to the main live fence. What a story the tracks in the snow told. It seems that the horses left the loafing shed while the storm was still blowing last night. They probably stopped off in the pasture for awhile, and then they headed on up the track! They went quite a ways along the north side, maybe to shelter from the north wind in some trees. They emptied two of their five haynets on the way back to the pasture in the morning, where they lay down in the snow and went to sleep. 

I was surprised at how much they had moved around. The track doesn't currently make a complete loop, as we've had to close a section. I have had the impression that they haven't been using the north part of the track at all. But last night's activity made me wonder whether they move around a lot more at night than we realise. Or was last night different because of the storm? We only know what they did last night because of their tracks in the snow. Hmmm.

So back to that revelation. I realised that my Catching Game was wavering between putting pressure on Zone 5 and retreating when I got two eyes, and just plain trying to catch the darn horse! OMG! When did that creep into my habits? Who knows! But I think I understand now why things got stuck with Journey, too. Wish me luck!

Game 1, Game 2 ...

Dove's progress

It only took a couple of minutes to get Dove haltered today. Out of curiosity, I tried just walking up to her. That wasn't welcome, so I started sending her around. Ha ha! That wasn't welcome either. I could hardly get her to trot. She was doing stuff like going along the fence and stopping at her water bucket and looking at me like "Can't go any further. This is in my way." At that point I did throw the line at her and get her to trot a couple of laps. Halter on! I think we could be looking at a serious LBI (Lazy and Bone Idle). Interesting, since her pedigree is full of winning race horses. We'll see.

Friendly game continued. I introduced the Carrot Stick. That was no problem. I doubt that she's ever seen a whip, so it was just a "thing" to her. Rubbed her all over. A few slightly iffy spots, but nothing dramatic. Got all four feet picked up. Good, as the trimmer's coming in a couple of days. Moved on to the Porcupine Game. Surprise, surprise - the rear end was light and the front end was heavy. I decided to see if I could make the right thing a little easier, by backing her up first, to lighten her front end, and then staying in rhythm while asking the front feet to move across. I learned this technique from Adrian Heinen, and have used it on more advanced horses, but never tried it on a horse just learning this. I think it did make it easier for her to move, although I'll still need to isolate it later. My idea was that if I make it easier for her to comply at this stage, she might have a more positive feeling about it. 

I fed her a bunch of treats and petted and scratched her and let her go. I can see her taking in these new experiences with amazement and starting to relax a little. It's nice to watch. I'm wondering  whether we might get as far as backing her a little if the weather holds for awhile. I know that if we don't do it soon, we will probably have a long wait while she is heavily pregnant and then looking after a foal. Something tells me not to go too slow with this horse, but we'll see!

Track adjustments

The other horses are now using a grazing cell which is close to the house, loafing shed and water, so in order to keep them moving I've been putting a bit of hay out on the track during the day. They don't really need it, but they do need motivation to move. I've mainly been hanging the nets on a convenient row of electric poles that run along the west side, however they are too far apart, and Hunter is not getting to eat any hay. The Fells go from pole to pole sharing a net while Hunter stands and politely watches them dine. He's just too dependent on them to go all the way to the next pole and eat by himself. It's not a great situation since of the three horses, Hunter is the only one who isn't fat. So today Mark and I collected a bunch of tires from the east side of the track (which we've had to close for awhile due to fencing issues) and tomorrow I'll place them near the poles, ready to have hay nets tied to them. I'll let you know how that works out. 

Catching Dove

Dove and Journey

Two weeks ago Mark and I went to a farm auction. The owner was selling up. He was a breeder of Appaloosas and Quarter Horses of quite good quality and we came home with two mares. A nine year old gray whom I named Dove, and a three year old bay that Mark has named Journey. Dove is halter broken and probably had two or three rides put on her as a youngster.  She has been used as a broodmare. Journey probably isn't halter broken, and we don't think she's been ridden. Both are probably in foal.

So far they are fairly timid or skeptical about people. Dove will tolerate being touched, but obviously doesn't enjoy it, although she's not really that scared, I'd say. Just cautious. Journey is more curious about us, but at the same time more timid. I have only touched her nose and face, so far. Mark has gotten slightly further. Journey also makes a lot of grumpy faces and occasional threats. So far she hasn't followed through, but I'm sure she could. Her eyes are always the first thing people comment on. The whites show a lot of the time. This seems to be partly conformational, but she also has that habit of arching her "eyebrows" when she's worried, which is a lot of the time. She's going to be quite a challenge, we suspect. 

I've spent some time just sitting in their pen reading, and stuff like that. They do come and check me out. One day I put a haynet under my chair, which made me a lot more interesting, and that day I got to touch Dove a lot more. Then I got busy and haven't done much for a few days. However, this morning as Mark and I were standing looking at them I felt the moment was right to do a little more with Dove. I took a halter and lead rope and played an informal and low key Catching Game. 

It went much as I expected. She didn't get scared, but there was no magical moment when I suddenly got lots of draw or she decided to "join up". The pen is an odd shape with lots of corners, plus a run-in area. Luckily they didn't want to be in the run-in with me (too trappy) and it was pretty easy to keep them circling. I say "them" because of course Journey is in the pen, too, and had to come along for the ride. She likes to stick close to Dove for security, and at times seemed to be trying to cut me off from her. Dove pretty much ignores Journey's insecurity, and didn't try to hide behind her at all. I tried not to put too much pressure on them, and stuck to walk and trot. Canter might have been a more effective gait, but Journey is pretty reactive, while it would have taken quite a bit to get Dove going, I think. We are in a tape pen, the ground is hard, their feet aren't that great, and they're pregnant. Lot's of good reasons to keep is low key.

How it went was that I would send her around for awhile, and she would begin to show signs of relaxing and/or locking onto me a bit, or wanting to stop at a favorite spot. I didn't have draw, so I would experiment with going over and letting her sniff me and/or trying to pet her. Sometimes I could, sometimes I couldn't. I tried to time sending her off again to her offering to leave. If she didn't offer then I would walk away and chat to Mark for a moment or two. I did feel we were reaching a stalemate at one point, and by this time Journey was getting used to the proceedings, and figuring out that this was just not about her, so I was able to up the pressure a bit and throw the line out at Dove.  I got to where I could pet her and she would stand for longer, then actually rub her with the halter and rope. I walked away. 

Pretty quickly after that there was a very clear change, and she let me put the halter on with no rush, no sneaking, and I felt she accepted it. We had a walk around the pen. I was very careful not to let Journey get between me and Dove with that halter on, as I feared that could turn into a wreck. I then had a look at how she felt about being touched in more provocative areas, and hand fed her some hay for awhile, and let her go. The hardest thing resisting the urge to try to touch her again before I walked away, but I knew it was the wrong thing!

If I did a good job today, tomorrow it will take half the time.

and Brucie

After this incredible feat of horse whispering, thank goodness Bruce was around to help return me to humility. I thought I  might just give him a nice grooming and a bit of attention, but it was obvious that he wanted to do more. As soon as I tied him up he had to play with everything, and clown around. So we did the grooming thing and I put his bareback pad on. We headed for the arena. I thought we might work on some Figure 8s. 

I started On Line. The 22' is too heavy for my wrist, so we were limited to the 12'. He pulled on me a couple of times and I decided that was a no-no, so we went in the roundpen, where we had a pretty good session recently. He did some nice transitions, but perhaps not quite as nice as last time. (Hmmm. I'd better monitor myself, or I'm going to allow him to get dull.) Then I tried some changes of direction between two cones, but he was doubtful about that. Because I know he can get a little unconfident with that I was trying it at a walk. I had no draw! It actually went better a little later when he was trotting and cantering. 

Things seemed to be improving, so I tried some Stick to Me outside the pen. That was great so I hopped on. I had no lateral flexion ot the right (my bad hand). It really took some getting, and when I finally got it, I gave him a treat. I'm not sure it was the right strategy. He did one or two nice things, but I spent most of the ride dragging him away from obstacles I had not asked him to visit. Aaarggghhh! It was pretty messy and although you simply can't out-muscle Bruce anyway. having a weak hand didn't help. My little pony turned out to be too much horse for me, so I found a good note to finish on and bailed out. Probably the most harmonious note of the session was me sitting down on the ground and inviting him to roll. I'm sure it was his favorite part!

Bruce is Back - First Session

Livia returned Bruce to me, safe and sound, a couple of weeks ago. She and I spent an enjoyable few days together, playing with him, riding, and talking about some of the things she learned during her time as an extern at the Parelli ranch in Pagosa Springs. During one session, I watched her ride Bruce in the Cradle Bridle. I think both Livia and Bruce were tired, and the session wasn't great. It really got me thinking, yet again, about where I stand on bits, on so-called collection, etc.



Like a lot of Parelli students, I would prefer to ride without a bit. I'm not vehemently against them, but they aren't my ideal, either. However, I'm curions, and recently experimented a little with Iona in the Cradle, and found it pretty easy to get a "soft feel" that might just develop into something we could both enjoy. The conclusion that I've come to is that most of us don't have our Porcupine Game in Zone 1 anywhere near good enough to be messing around with contact with a bit. For sure, Bruce's Zone 1 stuff has never been very good at all. When I first started riding him, I couldn't steer him at all in a hackamore. Of course, I thought that just because we could play the 7 Games fairly well that it was time to get on and start riding him. And when that was difficult, I just fought with him as best I could.

I haven't ridden him in the hackamore since he came back from the ISC, so I don't know yet what may have changed. It is a testament to Livia that she managed some good sessions with him in the Cradle. However, I've made up my mind to make a big effort to get all our horses soft, soft, soft in all their Zone 1 yields, and to explore whether we can even make some steps into contact and collection in the hackamore before we use bits for these things.

All this is really just a prelude to telling you about my session with Brucie today, as I didn't want to interrup the flow of the description explaining all this.

The first things I played with today was yielding the forehand with finger pressure just in front of the girth. Bruce was doing well with this previously, but found it trick to keep his feet still for a complete 360 degree turn. He can do that now, and is lighter and more confident with it than before. Yay!! I also played with lowering his head, backing him up with my fingers on his nose, lateral flexion with my hand on his muzzle, etc. These things felt really good. He need a little more friendly game in his mouth, I think, and then I might try some lead by the lip.

I am still working my way through the tasks I planned with the trailer (see I Have a Plan) so I thought we'd go do that next. My plan was to play the games On Line inside the trailer. We headed to the trailer, which I keep in a roped off area. However, I didn't think I'd need to close the gate! Well, it seems that Bruce has a few concerns about the trailer. Whether he doesn't want to take a six hour trip only to find himself away from home for three months, or just didn't like the hunks of bark and stuff that were decorating the trailer floor (Mark hauled some firewood) I really don't know. I got him in on the first couple of sends, did something he didn't like, so he came out. No big deal. I re-sent him and he just left. Went to talk to the cows about borrowing some alfalfa. Okay, so he still knows how to leave. Not surprised!

Back at the trailer again, I shut the gate this time and tried a few hard sends on a circle, but of course he's too smart for that. Back to trailer loading, then. He wasn't enthusiastic, but it didn't take much to get him going in the trailer easily. He was more sceptical about me coming in, though, so we played with that, and with me playing a bit of Friendly Game with the back door of the trailer, too. In the end, we did manage to play the games inside, although I'd say there were some reactions amongst the responses. It wasn't easy enough to get him to lower his head, for one thing. However, I decided to keep things light and not make the session too long, so I wound things up, and will come back to it later. 

Our last task today was circles. My goal was 5 laps of trot on the 22' line. We did this in the arena, in the corner nearest to the loafing shed. I fully expected to have trouble hanging onto him, but he never left. When we started the session my plan was to get first one lap, then three, and then five. He started off constantly breaking gait and leaning on the rope. I decided to fix the leaning first, so I asked for walk. The moment he put slack in the rope I brought him in for a rest. The next time I waited about 12 strides, after he put the slack in, and the next time he managed a full circle. It doesn't take him long to figure things out! (I was proud of myself for remembering my goal of lightness in Zone 1.)

We moved on to trot, and it really didn't take much to reach my goal of 1, 3 and 5 laps. He didn't have a lot of impulsion, and on the five laps, he leaned on the rope sometimes. But I never stopped while he was leaning! We will sort those things out, but at least he maintained gait in this simple task, and understood that slack in the rope is important.

Impulsion

How it's been going...

My recent sessions with Iona have not been brilliant. Rapport, Respect, Impulsion and Flexion have all been wobbly. I seem to break one component trying to fix another. I've been doing my best to do lots of different activities and spend undemanding time, and well as trying to progress tasks I would like to improve with her. So mostly the rapport is pretty good. She will often follow me around or volunteer to help with herd movement at liberty - stuff like that. I see her acting like a partner. But we are still snarled up with respect and impulsion, and so naturally some forms of flexion (like ribs) are not happening either.

Last week I got Mark to video me. I played with some circles (lots of grumpy faces, etc) and also did some riding. Just a basic session of Point to Point. When I asked for trot there was the usual kicking out and little bucks, etc. I have sent these to 5* instructor David Lichman, to see what input he will give me.

When I sat down to write him a note to send with the DVD I realised that my approach to PNH has always been about learning stuff to further my horsemanship skills. Perhaps I have prioritised this over actually focussing on Iona's journey. I'm so interested in experiencing every task and technique from every possible angle that I sometimes fail to consider how Iona feels about that, and hold back a more linear form of progress that we need as a team. That was a huge realisation! So now I need to make some adjustments to myself to get us out of this.

And then today...

We started with some Friendly Game with the "clippers" which was actually a battery powered shaver thingy of Mark's. Well, it buzzes and it's what I have. We've had a few sessions with this before. Very sporadic and haven't made a lot of progress. My observation is that she is not much more "afraid" of it whether it is turned on and buzzing or turned off. Iona just doesn't like small unfamiliar objects, and it's easy to increase her scepticism rather than decrease it, by making too big a deal out of it.

If I were to rate her "fear" on a 1-10 scale, I would say that today we started at a 2 or 3. Probably she was only a 5-6 or something at the first session. However, with Iona it's sometimes a case of  "I am sceptical. Why should I mess with that? If you ask me to then I will act agressive, or maybe shut down. I don't DO curiousity!" So it's difficult to get her to follow an object, for example. I have tried things like just leaving the shaver running beside the grooming kit while we groom or play, leaving it running beside a pile of hay. trying to play Touch It with it, rubbing her all over with it. It's often been difficult to find a good note to end on, however, the two or three sessions we've done have probably chipped away at the scepticism a little.

Today my intuition told me that a slightly more direct approach might work better. Denise was also watching us, and strangely, the fact that I was giving her a commentary on what I was doing and how I was reading Iona, actually helped my focus and assertiveness, and my flow. As usual, it was hard to get her to follow the shaver in my hand, even turned off. She just leans on the rope, so I had to keep turning and turning to unstick her feet. We weren't progressing. So I was bolder and just started rubbing her with it. As usual she's fine behind the drive line, but has trouble in front of it, especially along her crest or toward her poll and ears. This brought on some threatening me with her ribs and shoulder, but I just bumped her hard, with rhythm, in the ribs with my elbow until that softened.

At this point I was able to play approach and retreat with the areas of her neck she was okay with and expand them. She had some mildly RBI moments, but I felt that they were mild, and she wasn't going to explode, so I quietly hung in there until she would blink or breathe, and encouraged her to do things like lower her head. So the "retreat" was more like a change in my energy, rather than removing the stimulus. It worked, and I felt we made a lot of progress in a fairly short session.

We went out to the playground to do some circley things. I'm now pretty happy with the trot laps and trying to progress to more canter laps. How to make it her idea? I sent her out and she took off at a slow walk. So I decided to just leave her out there walking for quite a few laps. It doesn't require much effort from her, but there is no release/reward, either. Eventually, I asked her to trot a little, then canter a few strides and brought her in. We did that a couple of times. If it was good, I threw in a treat. Then we did a few transitions and changes of direction, but always ending with canter before I disengaged her. Her attitude was pretty positive and I was careful to look for a good canter with enthusiasm to finish with. I then unclipped the line and wandered over to help Denise with Dakota for a little while.

On the new Levels DVDs - in L2 there is a wonderful segment on 7 Games with an Obstacle, where Pat introduces the Figure 8 to a new horse. He starts with the horse just circling both markers; then he sends the horse out between the markers, but still just circles both; next he adds in a change of direction through the markers, but still it's just circling; then finally he moves from a circle to a couple of full Figure 8s and back to a circle. I knew Iona would love this, and she did. Of course, as soon as she saw the markers she started trying to do Figure 8. "I know this! I don't like it very much, either. Hey! What are you doing? Huh! You're messing it all up. I like it better this way. Look, I'm gonna do some proper ones now, okay?" It really blew her mind. She could see that I was being very particular about her going out and around those markers, but where was the Figure 8??? We really had a lot of FUN with this.

After another break we also tried mixing up Figure 8 and Weave, which is on the same DVD chapter. That wasn't as great, but I can see how it will help our success in another session.

By now I had the bareback pad on and took her out to a large odd shaped area of the pasture that is currently fenced off, to do Follow the Rail. It's 15 or 20 acres and has about 6 or 7 corners, so I figured it would be more stimulating than the playground. It also has some grass! Our last few FTR sessions have been all about bucking and throwing a tantrum. However, I decided that the bareback pad was a good choice anyway. I know I am "softer" in it, because I don't want to get chucked off! I did decide not to ride with my carrot stick, though, because if she's bucking and I'm trying to push and maybe steer or keep her head up, I just don't have enough hands. My plan was to make it a bit of a corners game, and just walk, then ask for trot shortly before each corner, then reward her with a rest. The first "side" was quite short, and she immediately saw my plan. (Smartie!) She liked the plan! Same with the next side. The third side was almost 1/4 mile long. Her impulsion was great, so I decided to play around with walk/trot/back-up transitions. No problem. We got to the 3rd corner with hardly a correction, in canter, not trot! The whole thing went like that. The only thing she wasn't up for was direct rein turns in trot. I'm pretty sure that she sensed that these would lead on to Bow Tie type simple changes in canter, which she has objected to lately. Today was not the day to pick a fight with her, when her impulsion was otherwise fabulous! If I can get the impulsion established more dependably, then we will re-establish picking up canter leads, I'm sure.

I hopped off, and we had quite a long walk back to the tack room door. I took the pad off and brushed her, gave her a drink. She just wanted to hang out there with me. I had a little sit down on a bench while she just stood by me. Eventually I suggested that I might turn her out. I don't think she really cared one way or the other.  

Fun-demanding Time

MUD. After the demo we had more snow. First we had the wet, rainy kind, then the drier powdery kind. With the ground already pretty well saturated, we ended up with really terrible mud. Yech! Except for one day when it had just snowed, I haven't been able to do much with the ponies. That one day was glorious, though. The powder snow was fun to play in, so I took Bruce and Iona into the playground and took turns with them - first doing a task with one and then a task with the other. I ended up getting some nice Liberty Figure 8s with Iona, and some great clowning around from Bruce. (I was encouraging him to clown around. Sometimes it's better to ask the question he wants to hear!)

Oh, yes, and they've been helping with the chores. The first week of each month is Sand Clear week. Bruce would rather not eat this, and not only tips his own bucket over, but then tips everybody's bucket over checking to see if anybody didn't get some. Tiresome. So he has to be brought into a pen and fed from a special untippable bucket which fits in a tire, which sits on a piece of plywood, so that if her throws the food around I can pick it up. Apparantly Sand Clear tastes better this way, as he then eats it up!

I have been finding this such an extra hassle at feeding time. and more so with the mud, as it just means another potentially muddy rope. So I decided it was time to see whether we could do this at Liberty, since he can see what needs to happen. That was no problem, so I was very pleased with that bit of progress.

I've been putting a few hay nets out on the track the past month or so, to encourage the herd to move (I change their locations around each day). With the mud, there is no way I would want to go out in a vehicle, as even if it didn't get stuck it would tear the ground up. However, seven sections of hay is heavy, so since Bruce was in the yard every morning anyway, I decided to get him to carry them. He's done this before, so it's no big deal. The first day he decided to bolt for home with the nets, about halfway across the pasture. Something in the distance had worried him. I must have had those nets balanced just right, as not a single one fell off. I think this deflated him a little, so I easily got him to come to me and we set off again. The second day he realised that once we got to the feeding station he was going to get to stand and stuff himself with hay, so he became quite motivated. Iona's taken a turn on some days, too, now. This is one job they definitely see a purpose to!

Today, I couldn't stand it any longer. The weather has been quite nice (hence the mud) and I really needed a pony fix! So I grabbed Iona's halter and line, and a stick, and walked out to where the herd were loafing under some trees. We messed around a little - I squeezed her through a puddle and over a log, then decided to get on and just hang out. I figured that it would get boring pretty quick, but the herd decided to go for a walk, so I got a half mile or so ride. Just being a passenger. The mud is pretty slippery, so being a great passenger was the thing to focus on. Iona has a tendency to trail her hindquarters and then have them slide out behind her, so I experimented with what I could do to get her to step under herself more.

I also played with whether I could get her to do lateral flexion just by thinking about it. No reins or stick. Amazingly, she did it several times. I just kind of looked down at my foot and thought about what I would do with the reins to ask for this, if I was using them. It was enough for her to feel, obviously. Gee, do you think I'm probably "shouting" at her most of the time, if she responded to that?

I did pick up the reins when we went down a small muddy bank. I watched the other horses. Petra's horses ran down it, jumping a suspicious looking patch of snow. Bruce kinda slid down it sideways. All he needed was a snowboard - he's such a goofball! I didn't really want to  try either method bareback, so I asked her to line up and "do it properly" which she did.

We got to a place where there was grass to pick at. It was very interesting being part of the herd. A couple of times I saw Hunter or JB suddenly do a snappy departure for a new location and I wondered what had prompted that. Observing more closely, I realised that their movements were totally directed by Bruce. His phase one was so subtle I had missed it. It was about the equivalant of a human raising an eyebrow without even looking up at the other party. Boy, his phase four must be pretty memorable if his phase one is that effective and light! And the others have to really be paying attention to him, even though they're searching for a nibble, to notice it. I guess they must consider his thoughts to be pretty interesting! I gotta think about how to be like that.

Eventually, everybody started to turn around. I knew they hadn't been up that way for awhile, and that once they got that unfamiliar ground behind them they would probably start galloping. With the mud, I decided I would save that joy for another day, so I hopped off and let Iona go just in time to see the Browns take off with Hunter and Dakota in hot pursuit, and Bruce at the back, galloping for a bit, then stopping to do a handstand now and again. Iona soon caught up. 

All the latest news

More weather, and mayhem.

It's been an interesting couple of weeks.The very cold spell threw up a few problems in the form of horses going nuts and destroying fences. Most of this seems to have been due to a change in the behaviour of the coyotes, coupled with moving the horses to a new grazing cell, which turned out the be Rabbit Central (and therefore Coyote Central) after the horses had destroyed the fence of the grazing cell we intended to keep them in until the end of December. We think that the extreme weather caused the coyotes to run in a big pack all together, and with all the rabbits it probably just got too frenetic for the horses, who bailed out of there without bothering to look for the open gate. All in all, we lost the best part of 1/2 mile of temporary fences, and some horses had to be kept in because of minor injuries while the rest got fed on the track for a few days. We now know that plastic poly posts don't cope well with extreme cold. They just shattered, so we will try replacing them with some new fiberglass step ins. Oh, yes. We're still learning....

After the incredibly cold spell we moved to a warm spell. They say today was the end of that - and it was spectacular. Around 57F. Somewhere in there we also had a morning of incredible fog that lifted to leave the most beautiful frost. I took a few picture while still in clogs and bathrobe. Thank goodness nobody was taking pictures of me!

Hunter's Successes

So once the weather warmed up I was keen to play and ride. I had a great session with Hunter in which we cracked not only 7 Games outside the trailer, but also managed to get the front feet consistently on a low pedestal. And he accepted me playing helecopter Friendly Games with the rope, too!! For some reason, the key to that seemed to be to do it first with the Carrot Stick and string. I find this a much easier tool to helecopter, and perhaps I was too awkward with the 22' line. If you've done this, you'll know that the line gets twisted after a number of revolutions, which means you need to pause and/or reverse directions. Also, I was able to be a little further away from him with the stick. Anyway, it was easy to transfer his confidence to the rope, once we had it with the stick.

We also worked on some circles on the 22' line for the first time. This seemed to bring out some nervousness about the herd being far away. Interesting, how moving the feet faster brings up his emotions, but then he doesn't turn into a horse who doesn't want to stop or disengage. He tends to stop before I ask. I ended up getting fairly firm to get 4 laps of trot, even though the trot he offered was fast and tense, he didn't maintain it.

Bruce

When it was Bruce's turn for a ride the other day, I thought I'd bring Iona along on line. I warmed them up a little in the roundpen. That went okay, and I didn't stay there too long. Then I hopped on Bruce and tried to do a few things with Iona in the arena. It wasn't great, but I decided I would just head out anyway. We had to go through a couple of awkward gates to get out to the pasture where I intended to ride. I was leading the two of them, and even getting through the gates and to the mounting block was a hassle. Iona kept giving me these meaningful looks. I got on the mounting block and they just would not cooperate. Finally, I got the message. Neither one of them wanted to do this. And, you know, I decided to take their advice. I popped Iona back out on the track and Bruce and I had a nice little ride. Even my ponies know that they need prior and proper preparation!

Iona

With the great weather, I especially wanted to set time aside to do things with Iona. She is still my closest partner, by far, and I love spending time with her. I have also been feeling very keen to progress with my Levels, recently, so I need to put in the time. As well as doing tasks and Patterns and things, we have been just going out riding around, checking fences and doing Point to Point, lots of transitions and stuff. I'm not sure that I am being particular enough, though, with myself or Iona. We are an undisciplined pair! However, although these rides usually start off with her saying "No way!" an awful lot, they usually finish much more harmoniously, so I must be doing something right. I think we are both getting bored just riding around the farm, but as a lot of the stuff at the start of the ride is herdbound behaviour, I don't know that heading down the road would be a great idea. Iona on roads is never that great an idea anyway! Come March, we are supposed to be getting riding access to our neighbour's zillion acre pasture. That will brighten things up for us!

Thursday I was well caught up on fence repairs and other jobs, so I had it set aside for a full day with Iona. I spent a lot of time the night before thinking about lightness and how important it is, and also about not getting too direct line about things, so I was really looking forward to our day. I was thinking about the importance of causing something to be the horse's idea vs causing the horse to just do something. However, while I was riding Bruce in with the herd in the morning something spooked him without warning (well, I didn't see the warnng LOL!) and I fell off. No big deal, I'm fine, but I twisted my knee a bit so it really hurt for a minute and I didn't stand straight back up. Just knelt on all fours saying a few choice words. To be fair, Bruce stopped dead, which was great, and stood there looking puzzled. Iona came straight over to see what was wrong and told the rest of the herd, and the darn dog who was jumping all over me, to stay back! She then wanted to walk with me, because I was limping a bit. Cash and Dakota looked at me the rest of the week like "Yeah, I was lame last week. It sucks."

We did manage to spend the whole afternoon together, although I have to say I enjoyed the ridden portion most! It was easier on my knee. That little clipper simulation task is one I have been avoiding, but I took one of Mark's electric shavers, and tried to play Friendly Game with it. Typical Iona, she was scared of it before I even turned it on. For once I decided not to come on too strong, so I turned it on and put in on the barrel where I lay my grooming box, and we played squeeze game and Almost-Touch-It (that's a new Pattern I invented) and finished on a good note. Hooray for the new not-so-direct-line me!

We went on out to the playground to work on our Figure 8s. I decided to change from our usual blocks of wood to a couple of barrels on their sides. Well, apparantly the barrels were for jumping! So that was interesting. And then she offered sideways over them. And then she offered to RUN AWAY!! I just hung in there, and eventually she managed to channel some of her silliness into actually doing Figure 8s with some reasonable drop to trot lead changes. We tried a little Weave, but I think I need to stop doing these two tasks back to back, as it always leads to her going "Sheesh! Not again!"

My next plan was Follow the Rail. I opted for the bareback pad, as she can get really tense and punchy sometimes when we are totally bareback, and stirrups were a no-no because of the knee. I have watched this segment on the Patterns DVD over and over. There is so much in it! To my amazement, we had an elegant and exuberant session. When did Iona decide that she can follow a rail without a million corrections? Why wasn't I told? It was fab! But we need to work on our right leads....   We finished up with a few Liberty tasks and both smiling.

In the bit

Fuelled by my success on Thursday, I decided to try riding in a bit on Sunday. Could I really be light enough? Would it really aid communication in some magical way? Only one way to find out. I chose the Jeremiah Watt snaffle and slobber straps with mecate reins. I haven't got my cradle bit organised onto a bridle yet. Iona wasn't overjoyed when she saw me get it out, but kind of relented and stuck her head through the reins. (Hmmm...was that want or make?) Our plan was simple. I had a backpack with lunch in it. We would ride along the path across the pasture, through the gate onto the track, then all the way around the track to where Mark was cutting wood. I'd leave the tack in his car, Iona could go back to her buddies, Mark and I would eat our sandwiches and then I'd help him for the afternoon. On the way, we'd do simple familiar things like transitions, direct and indirect rein turns, etc.

How'd it go? As usual, there was some complaining about going away from the herd. Lot's of refusing, a bit of bucking, blah, blah, blah. I was pleased to note that I am now able to deal with this stuff and stay out of her mouth, and we even had a nice canter once the tantrum was over. Got through the gate and onto the track. Now we were going toward the herd, so life was good. Lots of transitions, and most of them were really good. Except backup. She seemed to resent the bit. I was careful to use phases and only one rein at a time. It got a little better, but I wasn't impressed. In the hackamore her backup is usually great.

Of course once we passed the herd, she got sticky again. However, not as bad as I expected her to until we got up near Coyote Central. I decided to get off and walk for a bit, as I felt she was trying. Mounted up again and things went okay. Once or twice she thought about turning around. She can be very fast at this, and I know I caught her a little sharply with that bit. Interestingly, that kind of knocked that idea on the head. I saw her look of surprise. (And I didn't catch her that hard, you know, just wasn't as light as I would have liked.) That really set me thinking, though. I occasionally hear Linda Parelli mentioning the value of the snaffle bit for control. I have never liked that concept. Isn't this mechanics and maybe even intimidation? But then maybe it's better than a thousand pulling matches with the hackamore.

Anyway, I have decided to ride in the JW snaffle more often. Then once I can really see how it's working, I will change to the Cradle, and maybe I will be able to make some meaningful comparison. I will also keep using the hackamore about half the time. Just avoiding the questions is silly. I have no real experience to base my feeling on until I go out and seek the experience.

Anthropomorphic?

The day after I fell off Bruce, Mark took pity on me and drove me out to bring the horses out of the night grazing. That was great, but actually just upset the routine from the horses' point of view. Some of them never made it to the yard and I ended up taking feed buckets out in the truck and hunting them down. So I decided to get back to the routine. I also noticed that Bruce was avoiding me and looking quite down. Call me anthropomorphic, but that's sure what it looked like. I got them outof the grazing cell and stood on the mounting block. Usually, Bruce will come over and put his nose in the halter if I hold it out, but he just looked away and kept walking. No, I'd better not. I dropped you last time. But Iona walked straight over and lined up for me to hop on. Wow! The next day, I made a point of putting the halter on Bruce and riding him with lots of reassurance. He was sooo careful, especially when we got to the place where he had shied the other day. Call me anthropomorphic, but that's sure what it looked like to me!

Progress

Let's see if I can start this thing off again with a couple of happy stories. The first one doesn't start off sounding that happy. A few weeks ago something was bothering me about Iona. She looked really grumpy. In my usual busy-busy state it took a few days for the penny to drop that she wasn't actually grumpy, her ears were just wonky. She looked like a flop eared mule. "Oh, no" I thought, "she must have some kind of bugs or maybe an infection." Really bad news, as she is pretty funny about her ears - particularly the right one.

I know, I know - as a diligent Parelli student I should have been dealing with this! To be fair to myself, I have tried. Spent lots of time touching them with hands (okay 'til I get too invasive), carrot sticks (string okay, handle okay, tip okay, orange part NOT OKAY!!!!...unless your hand is touching the same part of the orange part that is touching her ear - go figure!) plastic bag/flag also seriously not okay. Spent over an hour on this with an instructor a few years ago, and it still wasn't okay. Aaaargh. So I just got on with life, y'know?

The day of reckoning was now upon me. Iona is a lovely pony and I love her dearly, but she is very dominant, and when she gets scared or simply doesn't want to accept something she can get defensive, pushy and dangerous in an up-close situation. However, now I really couldn't put this off. I was pretty sure it was only something like gnats, and anyway, there was no way I was going to inflict a vet on her, or her on a vet, for that matter! That seemed like a recipe for a fight or a setback.

The thing that was in our favour to sort this out, however, was the sheer amount of PNH we have under our belts as a partneship. I know about approach and retreat, and so does Iona. I know how to time the release when the horse pauses in it's resistance, and Iona has learned to look for and recognise that release. That was something that the Hold the Tongue task really taught us, and I am grateful for that task and the help I had from an instructor when I was struggling with it. Quitting when the horse gives a little is such a powerful teaching tool.

Day 1 - I kept Iona in a pen near the house, which she seems to enjoy, and went out for several sessions. I made a little progress, and think I avoided being too direct line, but I still felt a long way from actually getting my finger in her ear. She always managed to either evade me or got agressive. This was mostly trying to bite, and I must have dealt with it right - backing her up and also making her soften her ribs and pushing her shoulder away very firmly when she tried to barge at me. I began to see that she was only half serious, and I think she knew I saw it. That realisation might have been the biggest breakthrough of the day. It subtly changed my attitude, and Iona's response. I wish I could explain this part better, but it's probably more down to knowing the horse. I finished each session on a good note and hoped that I would be able to get into her ears before it turned into something really nasty. Poor girl, she looked really uncomfortable.

I spent some time thinking about how often Iona has turned out to be a bit of a paper tiger, as far as her agressive behaviour is concerned. I know that she has scared me more than once when she wasn't really serious. I know that this is an important piece of information that I need to hang onto!
Day 2 looked like being a bit easier, but I was struggling with the timing of my release. It wasn't easy to quit at the right moment, and only at the right moment, while she was throwing her head in the air one minute and swinging it like a baseball bat at me the next. I thought back to learning the Hold the Tongue task, where I was taught to hold onto the halter - not to control to movement of the head, but in order to make it easier to follow the movement.

The way Iona's halter fits, there is quite a bit of spare rope hanging from the knot, so I wrapped that around my hand. That worked great on the left side, and before I knew it I was in and out of her ear, just because I could stay with her when she moved, and release when she relaxed. She even discovered that it might feel nice getting a scratch way down in there. Okay, so the left ear was the easier one, anyway, but at least it was a start. Unfortunately, I couldn't find a way to get hold of the halter on the right side and got a bit stuck. Finished on a good note on the left ear and went away to think. Aha!! Tied a piece of heavy twine to the right side of her halter, and we got the right ear, too.

It wasn't long untl I could get her ears doctored after that, and did it a couple of times over the next days. The problem turned out to be a minor one, but I'm thinking about what I learned. Pat says "I never saw it take longer than 2 days." I could whine and say "But it took me 12 years!!" but actually it only took 2 days. Two days of having the right attitude, savvy, imagination, tools, taking the time, etc. Should I beat myself up for not having all those things in place before. Heck no!

The other happy story is a short one. I easily trailer loaded Iona several times recently from the fender. That means I just stood back by the fender and casually sent her in. No big deal.
It used to be a huge deal to get her in a trailer at all. Those days are mostly gone, I'm sure, but I sure was proud!

The Mask Task

Ducky and Dakota have been getting their pink noses sunburnt recently, and they aren't too keen on the old sunscreen. "It tastes awful!" So Linda popped over last night with some very stylish masks for them.

This morning I brought the Fells in for their feed, and took "The Boy's" food out to the track. Hmmm. Dakota had lost his mask. Wonder if it was an accident?

I spent some time grooming Bruce in the new shady hangout. He trimmed the big elm tree for me a bit. A job that surely needs doing! We had a nice time just chatting about life and discussing whether it's okay or possibly disrespectful for a pony to put his head down to eat weeds when someone is grooming his mane.

Got Iona and groomed her, too. Tomorrow is hoof trimming day, and as I was picking out her feet I was thinking about this. I'm not really happy with the way the ponies behave when they get their feet trimmed. It's not that bad, and the trimmer says it's fine, but I feel that rather than being progressively better it's just messy. They play around and take their feet back when they feel like it, and because it's not that bad we just let it go. So, tomorrow I hope I will feel like I can talk to John and Sara (the trimmers) about this and maybe we can work on it a little. I know it's not up to them to train my horses, on the other hand, I'm not sure whether anyone other than them can get them ponies to be more respectful toward them. They seem like great people, but like all busy professionals I find it a little hard to talk to them about anything that's out of the ordinary. So I guess this will be a test of my people skills.

Iona and I then worked on some sideways tasks. She's really good at these, always has been, really. The only thing I am struggling with is sideways towards. No doubt we will have a breakthrough pretty soon! I've also been wanting to work on circling on the 45' line, but once again it was just too hot. If I didn't have the energy to stand there and send her, I could hardly expect her to run around! As I've been working through the tasks on the self assessment checklists I realise that I've probably been looking for way too much "perfection" as opposed to excellence. It's a hard call to make, sometimes, but when I look at the standard that Pat is finding acceptable on the audition videos that people post on YouTube, then I think I can judge things a little better. So I've been trying to be more progressive. It doesn't matter if it takes us a few tries, (or more often for me to have a few tries at setting things up better!) I'm beginning to see that often we should just move on.

I mounted up with the bareback pad, and we headed out to look for Dakota's mask. I thought we'd start by riding the rail of the grazing cell they were in last night. Just over halfway around we found it. Next problem: Iona was pretty scared of it! And since my plan was to pick it up with my carrot stick without getting off we had some work to do.

We circled it until she could put her foot on it - both directions. Then we sidepassed over it both ways, too, just for good measure. I then realised that it was fine on the ground, but that picking it up was probably still going to be a bit dangerous. I prodded it with my carrot stick and it moved!!!! Okay, so ,,, pushing position and let's work on our independent seat. We played the spooky game for 5 or 10 minutes with the mask on the ground. Next step, do it all again with the mask in the air, dangling from the end of the stick. Lot's of fun!

Now I just had to get the thing closer to her, and she's never great with things like this in zone 2.

The best thing was that I knew I had all the time I needed to take. And the time I've spent with the umbrella and the flag recently really paid off, too. I was pleased that getting it up onto her withers and tucking it into the handle of the pad was pretty easy. I was very careful to keep watching her to make sure she hadn't checked out into LaLa Land, though. It's not easy to see her expression from her back, sometimes, with all that hair. So we did it, and had a little victory lap on the way back with our prize! Hooray!