Chaotic and crazy, but... fun day
Bless it.. today was a bit wild!
I had plans with friends to trail ride at noon, after a friends lesson. Her lesson was at 11, so.. I had planned on riding from 11ish to noon and then hitting the trails. I got to Ashland a little later than I had planned, but it was still good timing. I decided to try the Horrobin back on Lyric and see if it made a difference now that she was a few days into ulcer meds and I had added another thin layer of shims to it. It seemed to fit her okay. I wasn't horrified by anything so.. I put the stirrups on and headed to the arena.
She was a bit amped up but settled and we did our Jacel homework. I also added a little shoulder fore both ways and a tiny bit of leg yielding again. Mostly because Alli and Kelli had decided to do their bit fitting at Ashland and join me and Sandra on the trail ride so I was sharing the arena with them and had to do some maneuvering. :) Which was fine. It was really not a big deal having three of us in the lower arena. Although I do think that they were giving me berth, which was kind. But unnecessary. Lyric was pretty good. It felt more fussy than in our lesson, but not any worse than the ride the other day. I gave her some good stretch breaks and we did have some good moments. So, I'll take it. She was trying. We finished a good 15 minutes earlier than Sandra, so I sat and let Lyric eat grass in the shade while I chatted with Kelli and watched her ride for a few. Then she headed back to check with Alli and it sounded like maybe they were going to do the bit fitting while they were waiting on Sandra. Which... was fine, except, it was almost noon so I was a little confused. I figured that instead of just standing there, I would take Lyric down to the XC field and do some hills, especially because we would be avoiding hills for Marvin's sake (sore suspensories), and Lyric still needs to be doing her fitness stuff.
So we headed out there. We walked up the hill 3 times and I also went in and out of the water and did the banks in the water. Then we walked the ditches a few times. She was a little squirrely about the down bank into water the first time or two and the first ditch. But.. this is exactly why we are walking things everytime. Until it's no big deal! So.. then, I was getting bored and they still hadn't showed up, so I thought... why not let Lyric have a big canter in the field. She felt a little mincy in the arena so I thought maybe a good canter would help. Except... ha ha. She turned it into a gallop. I kind of figured she might so I had a tight rein and kept my hands a bit high since she went on the bucking spree last time. And it was fun, but it was a little scary. She definitely dropped it into the gallop, which I haven't even done on her yet! And then she was almost bolting. It wasn't quite a real fully stretched out gallop because I was afraid to let go of her face and I was in dressage tack. But we were definitely in a gallop and not a canter. It took me about 1/3 of the cross country field to get her back. I started asking her to come back 2/3 of the way up the hill and it took the rest of the way up the hill and alongside the woods about until we got back to the usual starting box place. Whoops! I'm super glad they weren't all heading out on the trail right then!
So we went back to walking hills and then not too terribly long later, they all showed up. It was a goofy group. Carra was hot and having to do circles as she was power walking and being silly. Marvin was a slug and hanging way back. And then the pony Alli was riding was jigging and being silly. Lyric was good, but.. confused. Our trail ride was a bit broken up as Carra and Lyric kept getting way ahead and then once, Alli and Kelli had to stop and fix Alli's saddle so we did a small extra loop without them. I kept the trail ride fairly short since everyone was struggling. But it was still fun. It was still a beautiful day and the ponies all eventually settled and were good.
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