Winter Music

 lesson. BRRRRR. 9:30 am and windchill of 19. but not too bad in arena. tacked up quick and hacked along edge of XC to get to arena. wanted longer walk warm up but didn't get up early enough. did a lot of stretchy trot on the buckle once in arena. she started out sluggish and bracey and lost her hind end at least 6 times. Hard!! Like made divots in the arena hard. cantered her and she got better and only lost her hind end once (after we jumped the grid a time or two). felt more forward and happy after we cantered.  rule outs: muscle myopathy, cold and tight, tight in general, KS, stifle stuff but seems more neuro than stifle, neuro, ?? then did canter poles and was game to reach for them. then slowly raised small jumps. talked with jacel. Jumping off hind end... really sitting and pushing. jumping straight. jumping out of stride. So... not inclined to think hind end, despite the falling out. and odd that she gets better with work and jumping, which again... doesn't lend toward...

 Long hack day, galloped, 28 mph. not that fast. but felt fast! felt pretty good but did stop with LH in the air for a few seconds first starting out. much more forward and marching but forging like crazy, walk and trot today. w/t/c in xc field. no arenas today.  had to sponge her off! And like her in the memory foam girth too

 Day off. kind of off on her own.  happy to eat carrots and apples, but... ?? looks more nike swooshed in her back again.  hoping to trail ride tomorrow and maybe do a little flat work to see

Quick lunge christmas eve with equiband good girl, sound, but still fairly short strided. did reach out and stretch over raised trot poles, so that's encouraging. and i think she was lunging better while I wasn't videoing. but still concerning... photos: christmas eve lunge video

  Ooof... I think I'm hormonal! I was extra sad about Flecky today. And... spiraling about the horses. I'm trying not to, but... I am. She didn't run from me when I caught her, even after I had to throw the halter at Dan because he was being an ass about the cookies. But then on the whole trailer ride to Ashland she  I rode Funny this morning and then when I got home, Mike was about to take a nap so I took the opportunity to turn back around and go back to Ashland with Lyric. I really wanted to ride her but felt like a nice hack was our best choice since we lunged yesterday and I didn't want to push her. So that's what I did.  She didn't run from me when I caught her, even after I had to throw the halter at Dan because he was being an ass about the cookies. But then on the whole trailer ride to Ashland she was biting at the chest bar and then licking and chewing. Sigh.. I don't know what that means?? It looks like a self mutilation thing...maybe it's cri...

  At least on the lunge... on previcox.  Today I finally had time to get Lyric lunged. We hiked up to the arena and I noticed that she was forging hard core walking. And I think mostly only one foot, but I didn't think to look and figure out which foot. Doh! So, we got to the arena, which was emptied (thanks Anderson and Jean's other intern!) and did a lap or two of pillar work. Then we did some leg yields in hand. Then I put her on the circle and lunged her. She was a bit of a slowpoke.  She wants to just putz around like a western pleasure horse. I was able to encourage her to move out a little bit without having to work too hard, but I was definitely working harder than I should have. Although she also really didn't want to do her downwards either. We played with it and I did a few trot walk trot transitions and some trot almost walk trot transitions. And then I got after her a bit and made her move out a little bit more. I didn't notice any lameness either way. And ...

 Now we wait. and hope. and pray

Ooof... what an emotional lesson... but I didn't let myself really dwell on it, because... no crying!! There's no crying in horseback riding. Sigh... ha!  I knew she might be lame but... Jacel is so good at "investigations" and working around things that it was worth a try. Like Liz.. maybe we could ride her sound. So... I tacked her up and we headed to the arena. We got on and started walking around and she was a slug. Like... She was not wanting to go. I should have grabbed my whip. Jacel showed up pretty quickly and we were chatting but Lyric was just dragging. I told Jacel that she had been lame and what my thoughts on the matter were. I mentioned that I really didn't think it was foot and thought it was her cervicothoracic area but you know.. who am I to think I'm right and two really smart vets are wrong. Although Jacel made a good point... they can only see what is right in front of them... I've got the whole story. So... we figured we'd see wha...

  Noooooo. :( Sadness. She's lame again.    The weather was crappy today. It was that misting rain all morning.... and cold. It finally quit enough and the radar looked like my best option was to ride at Ashland after lunch. The big giant radar cloud looked like it was going to be skirting around the house but was too far south to be at Ashland. Then it looked like later in the afternoon, it would be much more likely to be dryer at home. So... I opted to take Lyric to Ashland. She's next in line for a hack again. Plus... as sassy as she was yesterday I figured a nice long hack warm up would be smart before we did some ring work.    So we headed out and braved the cold. And Brrrr.. it was cold. I felt bad pulling her blanket. She got a good rigorous currying and then we tacked up quick. And her bridle was in the truck so her bit wasn't cold. Cause I'm a nice mom. :) We headed out and hit the trails and it wasn't too bad once we got going. I was glad I kept my jac...