Ahhhh... if only every day could be a Tuesday!
We got up early for the dentist. We went ahead and did Dan even though it's only been 6 months, but this way he's now on the same schedule as the girls. Plus, with the weird tongue thing he did the other day... I wanted to make sure! He was fine. But that's fine because now they can get all the things in March - vaccines, dentals, adequan... although I guess coggins are in August or something. Doh! Oh well.
Anyways, I gave him a few hours to recover and then we headed to Ashland. I decided to sign up for the Ashland show and am going to do the WE test for practice but also a western dressage test. I looked at them and figured we might as well try for 1-1. Which, I'm assuming is equating to first level. But it has a fun leg yield and a reinback and some canter. Not a lot of canter, but a circle each way. So yay! So, we got to Ashland and I put the halter on him with my reins instead of the bit. Partly because he had his teeth done but mostly because I feel like he's not happy in the western bit. I broke down and ordered another (cheap) bosal because I still don't have any idea when I'm getting his good one. And I need it in time for the Ashland show and would like to be able to practice before then too! And it's already shipped and should arrive in 1-3 days! YAY! In the meantime, we'll ride in the the halter.
So we got on and took a warm up lap around the little lake. Then we headed to the arena. We warmed up briefly and then just went straight into the test. (Or what I thought was the test... I didn't realize it wasn't a three loop serpentine so much as a three loop quarter line to quarter line serpentine). But he nailed it. My version anyways. He was super and sooooo much happier in the halter. He was softer in his neck and not braced and just more lifted in his back. So yep.. definitely going to stick to this or the bosal. We played around with some other things... did more canter... more leg yields, some shoulder ins, some lengthens, some stretches, and some centerline to halts. And practiced the reinback. And we had fun. He was super good so we didn't stay in the arena too terribly long.
We headed out to cross country and I let him go in the water complex. He wanted to paw but it was so shallow and I didn't want him making holes. So we trotted a circle but it was so shallow it wasn't really worth it. And he kept trying to stop and paw. So I gave up and took him to the lake. On the way there we trotted a log or two and the upbank. On landing of the up bank he put his head down like he was going to buck, but he didn't. Phew!
We headed to the lake and had a lovely splash fest! He quite enjoyed himself. Then we opted to go down racoon loop, cross the bridge and then he picked sideways. Good boy... I was aiming for some hills. We then came back out to the narnia crossing into the XC field and trotted the ditch and then up the hill. Then I wanted one more canter so we trotted back down and then cantered back up. Good pony!
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