Poor Danimal... he's getting segwayed (how the heck do you spell that word?) into Uncledom. And he's not necessarily thrilled about it. Or cooperative. Ha! It's hard to think of him like I think of Fleck. He's not really "old".... but he's the oldest and most mature and most .... ha.. I was going to write dependable, but.. is he though? Maybe yeah...
Anyways... I miss Fleck. A lot. But... we carry on. I've been wanting to do some more long trotting with Lyric but I am way too out of shape and I hate to keep lunging her in circles. So I thought... let's go back to ponying. Except, we can't go to Ashland now because then Funny is home alone. So... I decided to try it today at home. I didn't have a ton of time because of my neuro appt, so... I got home at 5ish and grabbed two halters, the bareback pad, and my helmet! I was at least smart enough to grab my helmet!
I did a little bit of bodywork and groundwith with Lyric first and then I tied her to the fence and grabbed Dan. I put the bareback pad and the sidepull halter on him. I found it while I was cleaning my trailer for the show and was like "oh yeah.. this is easier than the halter". Then I grabbed Lyric and took them both outside of the arena and climbed on Dan. We walked off and all was well. I asked for a trot and it started okay but rapidly escalated!! I suppose I should have known better... Dan in a halter... ponying Lyric... on a cold and windy day (not as bad as yesterday but still not a great day for this).... Lyric having had a week off.. and Funny loose in the pasture. Not to mention Jean's two yearlings were already semi-feral in her pasture. We tried to trot a few times but Funny came galloping up, Dan tried to put his head down and buck, Lyric reared straight up and tried to bolt off.... I managed to stay on (almost didn't once!) and get Dan back under control and got Lyric under control all but once (let go but caught her again without having to get off) and get us all back to a walk in our multiple attempts to trot. I finally realized the effort was futile and gave up. I got off and walked them to the arena. I was tempted to just ride Dan or just work Lyric but then I thought... nope, we'll just do boring laps in the arena instead.
So that's what we did. We went in the arena and everyone was civilized then. Well, mostly. There was some chomp attempts but in general, nothing worse than faces. We trotted laps about 6 times each way and did some crossing the diagonal a few times. We did a few walk breaks. And Lyric was a bit up at times but she was forward and marching. And she got quite soft in the neck a few times too. As did Dan! Yay! Dan felt pretty energetic also, which was nice. No western pleasure jog today. But he wasn't so quick and on the forehand that I coudn't sit it either. Yay! Interstingly, I felt short on him next to Lyric! Like.. he felt small! I'm not sure if she's grown.. or if it's just that her head is so big compared to his... or she carries her head higher than him.. but she felt huge next to him! hee hee.
So, I think it helped Lyric and I think it was nice for Dan to do a little bit of work without me focusing on his frame. And he was in the halter which made him happy. And he did good! He was a good pony horse.
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