Baby Steps

So.... the weather has been icky today and looked like it was going to be tough to get in a ride. BUT.... I woke up and there was no rain and it looked like it wouldn't hit til 11:30 or so... and then would be pretty much all day. So... I texted Marian and she replied with "Come on"!, so... I did. We beat the rain! Mostly. ;) We got a tiny bit wet at the end and it downpoured while we were driving home, but... we got in a ride. :) 

It was a pretty good ride. Nothing earth shattering and nothing too big or impressive, but... still... progress. Baby steps. I'm trying VERY HARD to embrace the taking a step back and fixing the holes. And there are so many holes! 

We started off with a tiny bit of flat work... shoulder in.... more shoulder in.. and more shoulder in. Which is hard. And it's hard to keep him straight in the mouth... not turn it into a renvers... keep him square in the shoulders... We also did lots of transitions. Walk to trot to walk to trot to walk to trot to canter to trot to canter to trot, etc. Marian made a good point. He NEEDS to be soft and connected through the transitions. (And yes... I realize that I have had multiple people tell me this and multiple times I have done this... you would THINK I would have burned this into my brain by now... but clearly I'm a super slow learner... or a not at all learner... sigh). But her point was that I'm either training or untraining him. Which, again, duh... But yeah... so no more transitions without him being on the bit and staying supple. This means I may have to squeeze the rains. NOT seesaw or wiggle or KNIT. ;) But using my hands on the reins in a "fist" creates soft elbows but uses my triceps muscles. So yeah... there's that to work on...

Then we started jumping. She set up a very small cross rail and had us trot it. But we were working on straightness, so... she put up four cones and had us jump between the two cones in, and land between the two cones out. It started out awful! I mean, we were straight... but barely. And.. for some reason he was tripping... and couldn't get his distance and was lurching at the fence. I was throwing myself at it because it felt like he was going to take off and then he would chip. Ugh... We finally managed to get in sync a little bit better. Then Marian had us do different lines... as we came around the turn she would say "go to the left of the orange cone and land to the right of the yellow"... Or "go straight and land to the left of the blue". It's hard man!! And hard to concentrate on that along with keeping my heels down and keeping my hands down and keeping my back up... But.. it got a smidge better. Then she set it up to a vertical and let us canter it. Which made it WAY easier. But then he was getting really on the forehand so I had to do some transitions and rock him back. Ride the corner like my dressage corners. Use it to set him up and rock him back, then ride forward through the turn. (Again, I've heard all this before... WHY CAN I NOT RETAIN!?!?!? sigh...). So that helped a lot. 


Then we did a grid, which was bounce, bounce, vertical, bounce, bounce. I think. It started out with us getting it, but being a little wiggly and him having to reach towards the last fence. They were sooo small too. So.. I got him a little more fired up and I think he actually figured out on his own that it was easier to do this grid if he was more forward and opened up his stride. Which.. is awesome that he's figuring it out on his own some! And sure, I'm helping, but not a ton. :) So we had a few tries over that and finished with two really good goes. And... I upped my stirrups two holes and it seemed to make it a little better/easier for me. :) YAY. I also managed to keep my hands down. Phew!

Marian said she thought we had made a lot of good positive progress in a short time, so that was helpful. :)

Then Dan got a massage/fascial work from Amanda. :) He was goofy. Afterwards we were talking and he was in his stall. He hung his head out and was lipping my face... giving me kisses. No teeth!! I love him!