Back on Can Do This Week!

Started off on Can Do's week today! She picked up where we left off. We left off with a trip to Lucy's where we had a private clinic on loping, lol! Lucy, Nancy, and Mary parked their horses in the middle of a large circle and had me lope or try to lope Can Do around the cones. At first it was like a joke. Can Do had my number and knew exactly what she could get away with. Not for long though, because I had Coach Lucy on my side. She made me Can Do's leader. It was awesome! After that, I had a new concept to work with at home. I really felt like I walked away with some leadership that day. In the end, Can Do was loping from a walk. I felt proud. The session today went pretty good although couldn't get the left lead. The longest we loped was one lap of arena. I will start from there and try and extend her cardio workout. Million transitions went pretty well. I'm not sure why, but I do a lot of this pattern. I like the fact that my horses go or whoa with my seat. It works in the arena anyway! She backed better than Gizmo, but her head was elevated somewhat. We will practice that this week. Supposed to be going to the beach on Wednesday, yeah! Can Do didn't seem to have issues with going to the other end of the arena today. Also, She straddled the pole fairly quickly online before we started. We had been having a little problem with moving the hind end over the pole the last couple of times.

Carrot Stick Riding

Played with Gizmo a little before riding and he got straddling the pole almost instantly. We did it on a small pole first because I haven't done it in a while, then we progressed to the telephone pole size log. Got it, we moved on to figure eight. Online first, then I took off the lead rope to see what I had. He have me 3 revolutions at the trot at liberty. Not bad, huh? Very proud of that. Our liberty really doesn't exist because I have no round pen. Sometimes I play with it in the pasture. His sideways with speed along a fence would have probably made Pat Parelli fuss me. We rode with carrot stick today because I don't do enough of it. I'm always doing the pattern follow the rail and million transitions. It seems to me that I do that an awful lot and we still don't have it, ha! Gizmo was introverted today. It is funny to me how he changes. We did indirect turns that led to direct turns. He did very nice but very slow. He went into the canter from the trot, but I asked for it while we were walking. More practice on that! Lately I've been asking him to lope for longer periods, like one full lap around the arena, today we went one and a half and I cut through the middle and kept him in the smaller circle. He didn't have any problems with it. He didn't turn with my body today like I thought. I had to go to the phase 4 of the carrot stick almost everytime. I'm figuring he was so introverted today because I saw him and Can Do in the pasture for about 30 min playing dominance games. They were doing a lot of cutting up and running. He was probably whooped from that. Who knows!

Respect

We reviewed what it means to respect me. He remembered farely quickly, ha! Rode freestyle and patterns and when he was responding I quit. He is picking up the lope from the trot very well. He has trouble maintaining gait though. Both of my Parelli horses have no stamina. Whats up with that? I will start building distance of the lope gradually with both of them starting with a half of a lap. They should be able to do that. His backing got more responsive with the mecate going back and forth on his shoulders. Wake up, I say! Gizmo is just like my youngest son. After riding Can Do lately, Gizmo's lope is very comfortable

Cantering

My week riding Can Do has turned into about 3 weeks, not riding everyday though. Since I've decided to bring her to my next clinic, I've been trying to get her in shape. She really is looking nice right now and not like Ms. Piggy! I brought her to a friends barn yesterday and we worked on cantering. At first it wasn't pretty. Maintain direction and fast trotting were the result. My friend, who is an experienced rider, was in the middle of the arena coaching me the entire time. She was hard on me and I needed it. In the end, Can Do was picking up the canter from a walk. I am trilled and couldn't sleep last night because of this accomplishment. I have it in me to be really good, I just need private coaching, lol! Maintaining the canter is my next mountain. Can Do hasn't been ridden much in ten years and doesn't have much stamina. I am going to get her in shape and we are going to be great together. I am going to start cantering in my millions of transitions program and start to ask for longer distances slowly. I can also do this online! Yesterday I had a BFO about how much our horses dominate us in the minute things that they do that I never really paid much mind to. For example, moving one more step after you ask for the halt, or getting in my personnal space when on the ground. If I am ever to be the leader, I need to start paying attention to these little things, the little things that I never even noticed before yesterday. Do not get me wrong, my horses are not running me over or anything, I'm talking about the little step backs that I do on a regular basis and things like that. You don't know what you don't know, but now I'm starting to have conscience competience. Yeah me! I also learned to keep Can Do out in the circle. While we were loping (cantering) she would try and turn into the middle of the circle where all of my friends were. They were all mounted on their horses and watching the 'big show'. She would also break down into the trot. My coach, Lucy, fussed me and told me to lift my inside rein and use my inside leg to push her back out. DO NOT LET HER TROT! Yes ma'm! What I was doing, which wasn't effective, was using a direct rein, the outside one, to pull her out. Hello, doesn't Pat say not to pull your horses? He says to push them, so that is what I did. And it worked!