30 day challange, day 1: When and why you started riding

I follow this blog and have really enjoyed reading the 30 day challenge she is participating in. So I have decided to try and complete the challenge myself. I'm not sure I can do it in 30 days since I don't blog on a daily basis but I will try and write a few at a time and stay on top of this.... but warning.... it probably won't happen :-)

On to the day's question: When and why did you start riding?

Let's start with the why.... that would be because, duh, I umm LOVE horses!! No really.... since my parents can remember I have always loved horses. They have always been my favorite animal and my whole childhood revolved around them... or at  least the areas I could control, lol. The toys I played with the most were my horses, every birthday and Christmas all I wanted was a horse... although at 7 I settled for lessons twice a month (my parents thought that would solve it...lol).

So I guess you could say that I started riding at age 7... actually at age 6. My first lesson was the Monday before I turned 7 :-) But I had already been on numerous trail rides seated in front of my dad and on one of our family vacations (back when as the first born the whole world revolved around me, lol) we went to this ranch were we had a cabin right next to the horse pasture where I would go and feed them carrots throughout the day and we even rented a pony for a day.

A quick update

Well it has been a bit crazy around the lovely state of AR the past few weeks. We have had several of these...

http://theheatmag.com/live-stream-of-tornado-in-arkansas/

Which caused lots of damage, thankfully all the tornadoes went around me (although far too close for comfort).

Then we had more rain, and more rain, and even more rain. The rain started Saturday night (right after I dismounted) and didn't stop till late Monday evening... so just one week after the tornadoes went through we now had to deal with this....

http://www.nwaonline.com/news/2011/may/04/floods-congest-county-traffic-20110504/

The month of April and the first few days of May have been extremely wet... which makes it kinda hard to ride when all you have is an outdoor arena.

We did get a short break last week and Thursday evening I hopped on for a short ride as we had a lesson schedule for the next day and I wanted to remind myself what we needed to work on. Boy was that ride frustrating!!!!! So glad I hopped on... as I knew exactly what I wanted to work on in my lesson!!!

This trainer was a new one, M is over an hour away and P is only 20 min away so roomie and I decided to give her a go.

It was a great lesson. I loved it and walked away feeling very satisfied with the lesson. Since this was mine and the roomie's first lesson with P it's hard to tell how training with her over the next few months will go. M has worked with roomie for years and since she only makes it there every few months M gives several exercises to work on. P spent the whole time on one. I loved this!! Maybe that's because the exercise was for the issue that has had be so frustrated that sometimes I just give up and get off :-/

That would be flexion. In our lesson with M we worked on rhythm, as that is the first step in training a dressage horse. We have also been doing lots of work at the halt with flexing and turn-on-the-forehands.  Well over the last few months we have decent rhythm and our halt work is great. So now it is time to put the things together... but I had no clue how to do that..... insert P.

The lesson was extremely frustrating!! She had me working on a circle at the walk and as we went along I had to use outside rein and inside leg to push him out, the inside rein told him to flex to the inside. For a horse that understands this it is no big deal, but to a green horse it is frustrating.

Green horse + inexperienced-at-training-a-green-horse = extreme frustration

This exercise was hard for me as I forget that Romeo is further along then I think he is. And I also forget that my horse has a nasty side to him and also likes to play dumb. P would point out throughout the lesson that he does understand what I want he just doesn't like to do it because it is hard. So the whole lesson was a fight with some brilliance thrown in.

Thankfully Saturday the rain held off for a few hours after I got off work so I could get in a ride to reinforce the lesson. Tracking to the right (which ironically was the one that was terrible before the lesson) was great!! However, tracking to the left (previously our "good" side) was awful!! So we fought again for a little while and eventually got some good things to end on.

One thing I have to remind myself is to not get into a pulling match with him... both of us are stubborn and strong willed and sometimes I forget to remain soft (old habits die hard). But we are getting there and have both come such a long way!!! I can't wait till our first show in June!!!

Back in the saddle..... FINALLY!!

Yes, you read that correctly.... the Flying Solo is finally getting back in the saddle!!!!!!

The fields are planet.... YIPPEE!!! Now all we can do is sit back and hope it grows!!!

All the other projects left can be done slowly so a little bit of work here and there should get it done in the next few weeks. It's hard work running a farm!!!

But enough about that and on to the riding part....

Good news..... I remembered how to saddle a horse!!!

Bad news..... while my mind remembered how to ride, my body didn't really corporate. One of my problems is my problematic lower back. My hips like to get out of whack and when that happens it makes riding slightly difficult. So I need to make an appointment with my pt friend to get them even again. It is so bad right now that I can feel a drastic difference in weight on my seat bones.... I can't imagine how it feels to Romeo!!!!

Romeo was excellent!!!! He was actually somewhat quiet.... very unusual for him but I was grateful. I think part of it is that now that he is by himself he enjoys any attention I give him. Works well for me;-)

We took it really slow on Tues and will for the rest of the week. Mostly due to the fact that since I can tell my hips are off I do not think it is fair to work him really hard when it it near impossible to ride correctly. Lots of walk work and just a little of trot work. I am hoping to get everything straightened out this weekend so we can get back to some hard work next week. Roomie's b-day is over memorial day weekend so we talked to trainer M about the possibility of doing a mini clinic with her for the whole weekend!!!! That would be 2 weeks before our first show and would really kick us into high gear!!!! I really hope it works out!!!

The weather has been great this week so hopefully I will get to ride tonight, tomorrow night, and maybe even Saturday night:-)

Spring project pt 2

Ok so the spring project has turned into a HUGE project. Turns out reseeding pastures is expensive and time-consuming. There has been little to almost no riding this month:-/ most of the free-time that we have had, which hasn't been much, has been spent on tractors, pounding t-post, and running hot fence. So, so glad we are doing this in March and not in August... but still.... it is hard work and sorta depressing that we have no time to ride.

Good news is that we only have 4 horses on the property, which makes tearing up pastures easier. Blue and Gator went off to roomie's friends place, Dutch is at my parents, and it looks like JB is headed to a new career as a therapy horse (which will be fantastic for him). Looks like we will soon be down to only 3 horses!!! OMG what will we do with only 3 horses!!! The farm already looks weird with 4. Although it is still wild as Jo and Romeo like to keep their owners on their toes at all times. Ria is definitely enjoying having her own pasture away for the annoying boys, however Romeo and Jo think that this whole solo turnout thing sucks!! I will say that I very much enjoy my accident-prone horse being all by himself. It's amazing how torn up they get when turned out together.

So the pastures are all ready for planting and we have the 5 acres around the house divided up into the planned 5 paddocks. The big 5 acre lot is not yet fenced but since the whole thing is being reseeded it is not on the priority list to be fenced. We are hoping to turn the eventually 2 small 1-horse paddocks and the 1 3-horse paddock into an area for boarders (so this farm can make some money!!!) at some point, but first we need some good grass in there.

The whole not riding thing is getting pretty depressing. The weather here in AR is so unpredictable at this time of the year. Plus it rains and rains and rains which puts off fence building and tractor work and of course riding:-/

I am so ready to get back in the saddle and gear up for the up coming show season (roomie and I's season doesn't start till June because of all the farm work). Although I might not remember how to saddle up a horse... much less ride after all this time off.

Spring project

I'll start with the sad news.... Dutch is gone:-( She didn't go very far.... just down the street to live at her favorite place.... my parents backyard. She was so excited she literally jumped off the trailer and dragged me down the drive into the pasture. It makes me happy to know she was so excited to be there.... it sure is weird to not see her in the pasture with Romeo. I still see her everyday... the deal with dad is that I get free board but I do all the work. So.... I go by twice a day to feed her, which is kind of a pain but I do enjoy seeing her everyday, that sweet nicker I get every time she sees me just makes my heart smile:-)

So why did I move her? First off, my friend who has been taking lessons hasn't been coming regularly so Dutch is not longer earning her board, and it really doesn't make sense to spend that money on her when it needs to be spent on lessons for Romeo. It's part of the whole getting-your-prioritizes-straight lesson that I'm learning. So Dutch is at her retirement home for now.... :-(

As far as riding goes...... well it hasn't!!! This month has been cold and rainy which makes the arena a mess. I can't wait for the day that we can put in all weather footing!! Roomie was thinking it would be this summer however our pasture project will take all the arena footing money and then some so footing has been put off for more important things:-(

So what is the pasture project??? So glad you asked:-) We are dividing the ten acres, which currently has 1 large 5 acre pasture, 1 maybe 3 acre pasture and 3 other small pastures, into 10 small pastures. Oh and we are reseeding about 7 of the acres.

Sounds like a lot of work, doesn't it!! We are currently working on a game-plan to get it all done in a timely fashion.... we will see if it can be done!!!

Ready for lesson #2

Well fortunately the weather held up for a weeks worth of hard work right after our first lesson. Romeo is a quick learner... much quicker then I am!!! Rhythm is coming along well for both of us and Romeo is starting search for contact. It's so much fun to see just how much we have improved in the last 6 months. I am hoping that we can get another lesson real soon, although the next week looks like a nasty, no-riding, week:-/ Also roomie and I have some major spring projects planned that we have to get started on soon which will take away from our riding time.

Romeo's first lesson

Thursday evening roomie and I loaded up Romeo, Ria, and Jo and drove south for 2 hours. Roomie is good friends with trainer M so we stay at her house that night. Friday morning we all got up and fed the farm and had a leisurely morning talking about horses of course, lol.

Mid-morning roomie saddled up miss priss for the first lesson of the day. We had the video camera, but only 30 min of tape... for 3 lessons:-/ So we had to be very selective with taping the lessons. I taped the first part of the lesson and the last part. M is great at stopping and waiting for the camera to start rolling before launching into an explanation of an exercise. Since we really had no time frame the lessons went on till horse and rider were both tired... M is A-Mazing!!!! Roomie and Ria had a fantastic lesson, roomie was told that Ria is no longer a green horse (i've been telling her that) and she needs to stop riding her like one. Time to step up and have more expectations from her.

Next up were Romeo and I..... my first "official" lesson in a looooong time and Romeo's first ever lesson:-o I was a little nervous. I had no idea what to expect from him. He really is a calm traveler, and I can def tell he is starting to grow up a bit. At times he even acts like a steady QH and not like some crazy Thoroughbred (which he is not!) But he is 90% of the time hot under saddle. I got him saddled and let M know i was going to go lunge him for a bit before the lesson. Roomie and M made there way out to the arena shortly after and M took over.

I have only had a few lunging lessons and so I have never been extremely confident with it, so I was grateful for the advice. I too was told to treat my horse different;y. I've been treating him more like a baby but since he is almost 7 I need to realize that he is ready for hard work. M gave me some great exercises to turn this into a pivotal part of our training. 30 minutes later he was hot and sweaty and ready for riding... have I mentioned that it is was January and 60 degrees out?? Today is the first of February and freezing!! Arkansas has crazy weather!!

So I got on and it's amazing what that 30 min of lunging did... it was like riding a different horse. He was focused and ready to work. We didn't work on much, but the little things that we did work on have helped us tremendously. She gave me some great tips on encouraging correct flexion and listening to the leg aids. She worked on my position which with the inconsistent riding I had slipped into some old habits. Although some bad habits came back some are, hopefully, gone for good. She said I had great hands... wait, what??? Me, good hands??? Roomie and I had to pause and laugh, after all that is what a previous trainer said was horrible and "un-fixable".... I like to prove people wrong, lol!! She also said I had a great seat with good follow. Our walk work was really good.

The latter part of the lesson we did some trot work, now hands aren't quite as good as they are at the walk but they are getting there. Still have trouble consistently posting through the hands and out the knee. We worked on rhythm and more rhythm and more rhythm. Lol, the first layer of the dressage foundation. Towards the end M said, "quiet your brain!" That was it... it clicked and we slowed down, finally settling into a decent rhythm. Roomie said the trot at the end of the lesson was amazing and I got lots of great comments from M on his wonderful movement. Who says QH can't have great movement??? (lol I did before meeting Romeo)

2 hours later and both horse and rider dripping in sweat we headed back to the barn. Then we went to lunch and back for the last lesson. Roomie and Jo had an alright lesson. Jo acted up for most of it so she was pretty frustrated with him. M worked on her position a whole lot in both lessons so she still got a lot out of it.

The good news is that the last 4 days have been perfect riding weather so lesson on Friday followed by rides Sat, Sun and Mon. Romeo and I are doing fantastic!!!! Although I think we will need another lesson soon. He learns so quickly and I know so little about what to do next. With the new lunging exercises we usually end up working for at least an hour and a half. It feels great to accomplish so much in such a short amount of time. I think we will def be ready for a show come June. Maybe even a training level test at the end of the season:-)

Bad news is winter is back.... it has poured all day and the temperature is currently dropping fast:-/ Looks like no riding for the rest of the week.