Winter Music

  Hee hee. She's sneaky today! In excellent ways and hilarious ways! Okay girl... way to make me eat my words. I'm really feeling guilty that I've said "she's just average" on multiple instances. Because... way to up your game girly! :)    I opted to pay for the covered today because it was hot and we wanted to ride and Lyric sweats soooo much. So we did. And oh my gosh, I forgot how lovely this covered really is. Like.. man! It's shaded... there's a good breeze... the footing is good... the mirrors are so helpful... and it's at Ashland! Ahhhh. I wish I didn't have to pay $25 each time to use it because I would do so many more rides in it if I could afford to. Especially in the summer! So much in the summer.    We tacked up and did a nice long warm up to get to the covered arena. It was sad seeing the barns empty and the pastures being taken down, but... the covered still looks great. We had a nice warm up walk and a tiny bit of trot to get the...

  Ooof, I thought it was a bit less muggy this morning! I woke up around 7 am but then was so exhausted I decided to go back to bed for an hour or so. This heat and humidity is doing me in. When I fed it was bearable... not nearly so steamy as it has been so I was optimistic. I had plans to ride with friends at 2 pm, so... I decided to ride the girls at home. I figured it would be quicker and give me time to do both. I decided to ride Lyric first because she sweats so much! She has so much body mass... poor girl. Except, I think she probably ended up having the most humid ride of the day, so not sure it did us any good. I feel like Funny had a breeze for her ride. And Dan had some rain and a good breeze. Sorry girly! I tried!   We tacked up and I walked to the arena. Twice.. ha ha.. Somehow I dropped a glove on the way and missed it when we backtracked, so I looked in the trailer... no glove.. So we headed back up and then I found it. Doh. Oh well. We did a little turn on the ...

Ooof, that was a bad idea. It was still super hot today, but then a storm popped up and we got a little bit of rain. It dropped the temps dramatically, and was like... 87 degrees instead of 97. And there was a bit of a breeze and not quite so miserably humid. But, by the time I decided to actually ride and got Lyric and got tacked up... the humidity snuck back in and it was steamy and miserable. Ugh.... And I didn't even put a bra back on and my shirt was still soaking wet.  But we were already tacked up, so I figured we'd keep it short. We hiked up there and did a tiny bit of in hand work. I tried the turn on the haunches left and kept her in left bend and she actually did it, so... that's good. I need to practice that more without me on her to help her realize she can do it. Then I hopped on. And realized I had forgotten the darn half pad again. Whooops! Sigh. Oh well. It actually didn't feel like it was sitting that low today.. maybe I had moved the saddle farther ba...

  photos: 6-26 steamy lesson took lyric to barbara's for a lesson with laura. in raging heat and wanted to snuggle with smarty, who was not interested. ;)  so hot. a little lazy at the walk but trotted and cantered and warmed up nice. then did ground poles to practice... some single instead of jumps and some with two poles.. some with flower boxes. trotted a course of ground poles. overjumped the flower box the first time. ha ha. then every other ground pole got set to a small jump. trotted through them.. trot them all. no cantering other than allowing her to land in a canter on the back side but then bring her back down immediately. Went better than expected.  course originally was outside line, to two jumps on a circle arc, then short s curve to short s curve to short s curve. Then flipped it and did it backwards. So... course was long and easy and flowing, to tight and turning... or vice versa. Lyric did great! I was rusty and jumped up her neck some. but she was jumpi...

  Well.. those new shoes Patrick put on behind might have done the trick! Lyric only bottomed out once or twice today and not that bad. Whoo hooo! Fingers crossed.  We had lessons with Kelly Eaton today.  Since Dan had hacked Friday with Sharon I decided to ride him first so that I could hack after my second lesson with Lyric and give her more time in the woods. And then I might have had more time to warm her up too. Since the first lesson was at 7:45 am. ;) So Dan went first. Even though both of them were snoozing when I got up to feed. After his lesson I came and got Lyric and she is in raging heat so she came running back to greet Dan. Handy... now she's right there for me to catch. :) I did hose her off before we hauled because I didn't want her to get sweaty in the trailer. Even though she wasn't sweaty yet. She was dry when we got to Ashland though!   I tacked up and took her for a warm up hack around Heron Lake. We had plenty of time so then I also went around...

 rode at home.  gorgeous day although a bit sweaty in the arena. not as much breeze there.  good girl. trying hard. Lost her hind end really hard (like rolled a fetlock) twice and then fairly hard another 3 times or so. mostly tracking left but not every time. had a nice stretchy warm up and then "held" her but got some really nice self carriage where I could soften and i think she stayed pretty uphill. the canter departs are getting so much smoother and easier and quicker... and our downwards too. the canter was quite nice today! The trot had moments. She is hanging on the left rein and I can't get her into the right, both directions. she's stiff bending left unless i overbend her... and ride small circles, but then I could open her back up and she'd hold a nice "frame". did some nice leg yields.  overall, quite nice. just... struggling with the right rein contact. hard to ride to the light and give to the heavy, especially alone. I don't like when ...