*dusts off cobwebs*

We are alive. And doing things. School and work and squeezing the pony in there, so yeah.

Been battling some skin fungus, that got to his back, so no riding for the past couple of weeks, however we have been working on online and liberty. Did circling game at w/t/c sitting on the ground last week, and did some epic figure 8′s and we sideways the entire roundpen in each direction and backed the entire round pen in each direction.

 

That is all for now. I do believe we could film level 3 online soon.

I feel as if after the very savvy weekend I had, I should probably post..

Most of the barn people went on an expedition to Lexington, VA to the Parelli Across America first tour stop. Hannah and I went separately on Friday because we decided to volunteer. Two hours of sleep and four hours of sleep later, we arrived at the Lexington Horse Center. We met a lot of cool people and set up the arena. You never know how much it takes until you’re there to do it yourself. They also fed us lunch, which was a variety of awesome pizza. Around 5:30, after wrestling with vests and jackets and other merchandise, we were assigned sections. I ended up at retail with Laura and five other nice ladies. Hannah was at Savvy Club booth with Susie.  We met up with Lonnie, Ben, and Christy for dinner, and then, after some tribulations, the hotel. Only briefly saw our crew, and went to bed. Six am wake up, at the center at 7. The day starts off with out computers down, and tons of people coming in to buy. Luckily, our awesome IT guy got things up and running not too long after 8AM, and we finally had computers. I was busy every break that day for the entire time solidly, and met a lot of interesting people. The demos were awesome too, watching Linda ride Remmer and the Mastery Students with Pat. I also signed up to do a TweetUp, almost unintentionally, and I got three live celebration DVDs and got to take a tour of the barn and meet the horses with Sam.Then that night we met with our barn peoples and had a nice dinner.

Another early night, early morning. McDonalds for breakfast (gross) and another long day. Awesome lessons with Pat and Linda, I got a lot out of them. Less busy, down in retail, because it was savvyclub sunday. End of the day, we did breakdown quite quickly. Hannah was being crazy, and I told her I’d throw her out the car if she fidgeted the entire time, and when she tried to get Dancin’ Pete to defend her, but instead they tried to shrink wrap her, but instead, he chased her around a figure 8 pattern. Dinner at 7:40 (CHOP CHOP!) Swiss men keep their knives very sharp I def miss Alain, Laura, Suize and the whole crew.

Horrible ride home in the crap weather. After Friday I will post about the pony.

on top!

LIFETIME GOALS:
MY lifetime goal is to be a doctor of Physical therapy, and a horse-woman. I want to be able to communicate with horses on a higher level, even though that will not be my profession, it will be my passion. I would like to be able to use the natural horsemanship and my physical therapy training to help disabled people regain freedom of movement.

My goal in CHARLIE’S lifetime is to be able to compete in cross country/jumping/ and competitive trail riding events. I would like us to successfully be able to jump a picnic table bareback and bridleless. Teach him tricks like levade/rear, spanish walk, lay down, hand me items off the ground. Mount while he is laying down.

YEAR GOAL :
By 2011 I would like to be done with level 3. I would like us to be jumping 2 feet and have a course of jumps, natural and/or stadium (whatever we can get our hands on).

Month goal:
I would like to have him doing 6/7 trot laps with relaxation and rhythm, and 3 canter laps with relaxation and rhythm. Be able to do trot/walk transitions with just my energy. Be definitively clear on my cues. Problem solve figure-8 pattern.

Week- To get three laps to the right at the trot, and a half lap at the canter.

Wednesday – To be able to skip and jump onto his back while he is calm.

Tryin’ to throw your arms around the world.

I’ll post about Saturday and today….
Saturday was a miserable day weather-wise, but Juliana and I made the most of it. I kept Rhap in and she had Charlie, and we played in the rain, running through the mud. We’re troopers, haha. Rhap did pretty good, no complains really. That seems so long ago I dont really remember.

Today I went out with what I thought was a lot of energy, but after two hours of running around on the ground, I was exhausted, and had a massive headache. I had a plan though, and he was awesome on the ground. Today the figure-8 was executed the best we’d ever done it before. I had a plan when I hopped on bareback, but fought and braced the entire time, and I got frustrated quick, and the headache was making me sick, so I gave up before I made things worse. He did really good for me all morning, so I called it a day. Let him out, cleaned up a few things, and left. I have work this evening, then I’ll drive to the barn and stay the night. Kathy, Randy and Tom are leaving to retrieve Elise, Hannah, Tai, and Mochachee tomorrow, so I’m going to see Lexi off in the morning and help Maryann with feed-up. Saturday morning I have an exam, but then to the barn in the evening to feed. Soon, this week will be over, and I will be glad.

hangin’ by a moment here with you

I’m tired, so this won’t be a long post, but I want to get it out there that, my pride makes me grudeningly admit, thanks to Hannah, I am out of my rut. Nothing against Hannah, I just have a hard time taking advice from her, because I am pig-headed I just went out and expected everything, accepted anything, and rewarded often. We were hopping and skipping about, playing, having fun. A very nice ride, only a half hour long because I ran out of things to do. I think I ended well, I wanted to keep going but knew that would ruin it. I then took him to the pond area to graze, and watched while all the other boys were laying down napping in the back pasture. Very calming.  But it was a good day, and we are fixed, for now

slow down my beating heart

…this girl. This girl was FUN. I only did a quick 40 minute ground session with her at the end of the day, but it’s refreshing to play with a slightly different horsenality. I’ve never dealt with a RBE/LBE type. She was mostly LBE, and fun. Hannah has done good things with her – we could sideways and back up everywhere. Very responsive.

There was something in the corner that I couldn’t see, but when we went over there the first time she ripped out of my hands and took off. I wasn’t prepared so I just let her run until I could get her back. I turned my back and she ended up trotting back to me, she really wanted me to calm her down. So we backed and sideways over more things, and she is back on earth, doing good. I decided to slowly investigate this corner the next time – I couldn’t see anything, but she did, and took off again – but I was prepared and interrupted the pattern in seconds and she didn’t get away and we all lived, and that was my success for the day with her. I just drove her around the arena from zone four for a couple more minutes, looking and touching all the toys we have out there, and then it was dinner time.  Interesting day to say the least.

Only fly for freedom….walk on.

So….this boy. THIS BOY. Is going to be the death of me, it’s official. My poor heart can only take so much. I realized today I have much more emotional fitness when it comes to working with horses other than Charles, but honestly, it’s not as fufilling or fun.  I had to give up on him again today, and take Rhap out. But the entire time I was out with Rhap, Charlie watched me. And when I put Rhap out, Charlie just tried to eat and annoy Rhap.

I just watched him play with the other boys when I could. It made me happy just to watch him play and be happy.  Too much emotion wrapped into one horse? Maybe. But he’s what makes me happy. Even when he’s making me miserable. I’ve been doing everything I can think of to get him to want to be with me. He came up to me in the field multiple times, but as soon as the halter was near his face he turned and left. That was a no-go for him. I don’t know when this became the dealbreaker, but it is. I just want to be able to fix it. I just don’t know what is broken.

I’m just trying to find a decent melody…

This little fool lucked out into being played with today. Charlie wanted nothing to do with me, and while I was playing catching game with Charlie, Rhap followed me around like a puppy, so I gave up and took him.

This horse….this horse DRIVES ME NUTS. He knows how to push every, single, little, itty button I have. He’s fun, and I can stay pretty unemotional until about 40 minutes in, then I finally fell apart and had to leave him because I was too frustrated. After collecting myself a bit, we finished up saddling and such. He was pretty good, nothing terribly atrocious. He doesn’t want to canter – it’s annoying how dull he can be when he wants, and I kept trying to find a new provacative way to phase four him – I’ve been trying to get him right under his flank, but that just makes him buck and trot faster. The canter is elusive. I did get it for a couple strides in each direction, but it took A LOT of persuasion. Something to work on I suppose. We managed to get over a barrel in one direction, and then I should have stopped, but didn’t. Oh well, I’ll fix that next time. When I got on him and we just stood there for two minutes, he just yawned like crazy. We did lateral flexion and a little bit of pushing passenger – he managed to go from a stand still to a walk with just a thigh squeze by the end of the session. I’m still not 100% better from my illness, and was exhausted after running around.

I’m out of control….

Okay, I played with Chuck on Tuesday – two things.
He spins like a champ.

He can canter sideways, and fly over jumps. This playing on the ground thing has become rather interesting.

That is all

i was on the outide, when you said you needed me, i was blind, i could not see…

This weekend was intense to say the least, at the Level 3 Clinic with Kristi Smith. I don’t know what to say about it, I don’t know how to express my gratitude to everyone. It was emotional experience for me, not just a learning one.  I guess who I have to thank the most is Charlie, because he was fantastic. I felt guilty most of the trip, him sitting in the little pen all weekend – definitly not something he enjoys at all. Trailering went flawlessly though, which was a plus. Then I have to thank Elise, who gave me this opportunity, Kathy of course, becaue he is her horse, Tom, Hannah, and Juliana who did all the grunt work for the weekend, as much as I didn’t want them to. Of course Beth, too, who came up from Charlotte and did the clinic with Linus. The weather failed us a bit, raining somewhat Saturday, then freezing rain and wind on Sunday.

I always, ALWAYS knew I needed to play harder with Charlie – but I was afriad to. I didn’t want to offend him, really. You spend all this time making a rapport with them, and don’t want to break it. When Kristi played with Charlie and I saw how excited she got and how she had to play a little harder, because he likes playing a little harder. I will never, ever, feel bad about jumping this boy, because he has springs in his feet – when Kristi sent him over the barrels, he jumped about 4 feet. He was so excited – and not offended in the least, because he was riveted on Kristi. His canter has improved dramatically with the play, so apparently he just was never in the mood to canter? It’s not like he’s doing laps now or anything, but it’s better. My ride was amazing even though it was only at a walk. I had an energetic, impulsed, engaged horse under me. I usually have a hard time keeping him going – he didn’t want to stop! His direct/indirect rein were a lot softer in just a couple of attempts on Saturday.When we met in the center and dismounted, and talked, Charlie was behind me the entire time, licking, chewing, and yawning. This was a crazy expereince for him too.

Sunday was a bit of a washout. We started early at 8 because of Daylight Savings, and did manage to play and ride until 11. I got Charlie played-out a bit quicker, and was on another energetic, impulsed horse! It was amazing. We did 10 walk stride/4 trot stride transitions, which we need to work on at home, because now my horse has impulsion, he doesn’t ever want to walk! But it was good to see that, to feel that!

The rest of the afternoon was spent in the house, talking about everything Parelli and some theory. Was quite riveting, though I felt bad because I see Charlie in his pen, bored and antsy. I’m sure he is glad to be home in his big field again. I definitly cannot wait til Krisit comes back, because I WILL be there!