Winter Music

 Footwork.. not neuro, just clueless side passed over pole. straddled pole. serpentined pole. did trot poles. missing diagonal shoes (again) so not much trotting and no cantering good girl!

 Big Cheese show at ashland.  did starter... wise choice. Fun course didn't plan ahead well... but am exhausted mentally .. and physically. then had gut issues so running a hair late but mostly just poor planning. tacked up and did our pillar work and a quick circle or two of in hand lunging before getting on. went to dressage warm up and she was feral. Throwing her shoulders out... running... cantering... finally just left warm up for the benefit of the others and was able to warm up in arena at top... still feral.. did figure 8's repeatedly and eventually got her slightly settled. went in and did the test. went remarkably well considering how feral she was, but I rode so delicately. just direction and gait really... no attempt at roundness, suppleness, etc... scored accordingly ...37. But did score an 8.5 on our free walk! Which was glorious. But we survived.  got off rather than trying to "fix" it. hung out... left at trailer and walked her around some. watched sta...

 Saddle fitting: Kelli's black baroque fits her the best... tasida approves of jump saddle too but wishes it had more room around spinalis. definitely not on the brown baroque and definitely not on the panamera. panels are too flat.  Sitting on my wall with her front feet scissored out. Sigh... like.. she made a muffin top with her butt cheek she was sitting so hard on it. WHY???  NPA? back? KS? Then rode in arena in black baroque. Walked in hand up to arena and did thoracic sling work. Then got on. Fussy again and a little bit more inverted. But worked nicely and managed to keep her mostly round and lifted in her back. I think.. I hope.. only lost her hind end once. good canter.  still wants to bend right... never left. Even tracking left. BUT... if I close my right thigh, she goes much more evenly into the contact and more straight. Also if I use my outside leg, bumping her. Give the heavy and ride to the light?? Riding the outside more forward into the contact as ...

  Poor Lyric. I didn't plan this as well as I should have. We had our XC lesson Thursday and she got yesterday off. Then today was Beths' cavaletti clinic day. I was expecting to do grids... with jumps. But, because it was just me... we just did small courses. In retrospect, I should have just flatted but I didn't think it through. Especially since I'll probably have a lesson on Tuesday too. But maybe I can do a flat lesson on Tuesday instead of jumping. Whoops. Oh well... at least the jumps were tiny today.      I tacked her up and we went to the arena in hand to do our pillar work, thoracic sling work, and trot stretch to warm up. It was quick, but.. it seems to help, even when it's quick. Then we got on and headed to the arena. I trotted and cantered to warm up and Beth said she looked great. She felt good too!    Then we started jumping. We warmed up over a cross rail at the trot and then the canter. And then we did some small courses. Basically the the...

I'm so proud of Lyric!!! And I think she had a blast today!   We had Nancy come out this morning and check saddles. And I'm even more confused now. Sigh... But, basically... she said that the brown baroque seemed like it would work if I either had it flocked up or shimmed the front of it. She said that the black baroque was a better fit because it was "overstuffed". So.. at least I can maybe try riding in those again. And then she looked at the other jump saddle and said it needed to be deflocked a bit but it would work to try it on her as the tree and size were correct. But she also had a polyflex tree she left me to try. But, she also mentioned that the used custom fleur de lis she had left me was the same as the other jump saddle in the tree but had a different seat and that it was meant to keep a rider in the back seat. Oh.....!!! I need that!! So.. I'm still not sure how I feel about the dressage saddles, but.. I figured I'd ride in the fleur for my lesso...

You have to tell me when it bothers you... but not like funny. but she did... told me she didn't like the brown baroque, so good to know. swapped back to jump and much happier decent short ride good pony photos: talking softly

 Farrier day: changed to less of a wedge and back to full frog support vs mcclains... patrick agreed. maybe will help with the stringhalt. Had a weird narcoleptic/collapse in the front end episode while patrick was nailing on her left front. had fly mask on so couldn't tell but suspect more stay apparatus failure hauled to ashland... lovely hack. solo ride. a bit nervous but good. crossed two creeks. first one hesitated and thought she was going to launch but politely walked through, second one didn't even hesitate. saw the baby geese again. popped over a few starter XC jumps. brave and out of stride except she stopped and ran out at the "white" log. also another horse in the field on a lunge line was screaming at us. let her sniff it and she jumped it fine. did water treadmill. Very good pony went straight to vet appt. stringhalt still there but jogged pretty darn sound. took neck films. arthritis in C7-T1 facet and a little bit C5-C6-C7 also. injected C6-C7-T1 with ...