Showing Progress

Thank you all for your comments on my last post. It means a lot knowing that so many of you are following along and supporting me and Katai :)

Running in the background this whole summer has been a really stressful few months at work. Two tough trips out west weren't the whole of it and things haven't really gotten any quieter. I never really got a chance to de-stress when I got back from my last two week trip and it's wearing on me. My mom showed up for a surprise visit yesterday just to stop by and initially because I wasn't expecting her and just wanted to crash on the couch in my pjs and maybe have a glass of wine or do some whining I wasn't very nice. To all of you who are parents I commend you for all the crap you put up with from your kids. My mom just stuck around, I apologized and got a hug and some time to talk through what was going on. I've told other people about it but there's nothing like having a good cry with my mom to make me feel better. It surprised me how much lighter I felt after especially since all she did was listen but it did help so much.

After that it was back to show prep and I finished cleaning my tack and assembled my bridle to show by adding the throat latch and plain browband.

While I was cleaning my boots I also got a reminder of how much my position has improved. I'm sure some of you remember my rouge right foot.

If not, here's a picture for reference and this was a good day.

This was one of the first things that Jane tackled and while that leg is still a work in progress since I have a tough time sinking weight into my heel, Jane no longer has to tell me to turn my toe/knee in.

Picture from this winter, also a good day and not very consistent

However, I hadn't really realized how far I've come until I saw the wear marks on my boots. Previously the left boot had a wear mark fairly far back on the upper calf and the right boot had no wear marks since it was the back of my calf that I most often had contact with against Katai's side.

Now they look like this :)

Left boot, the wear mark toward the front is completely new

Right boot, not as much wear towards the back since
I skipped to more wear toward the middle/front

I'm really happy with how even they are! Also happy that I'm riding enough to cause this much wear to my boots. Those fancy boots may be closer than I think haha.

But back to show prep!

I got the majority of my stuff packed, located my coggins paperwork (whew!), and have a shopping list of stuff to pick up tonight/on the way to the barn tomorrow morning. Unfortunately the forecast has continued to show all day rain so it looks like we'll be getting wet. I'm still glad that it's going to be chilly and wet rather than extremely hot and humid but we'll see how quickly I start complaining tomorrow ;)

Two in One: Lesson Recaps 10/18 & 10/25

I had a great lesson today and since I never did a lesson recap for last week I'll talk about both lessons in one. For the last couple of lessons we haven't been introducing anything new, just firming up what we have. Last week this was trotting and cantering 20 meter circles, staying straight, working on canter departs and doing some spirals in and out. This week we mixed things up a bit by riding in the outdoor arena which gave us the opportunity to work on a couple of pony behaviors that we avoid in the indoor arena. 

Katai was diving for the gate out of the arena since thats the way her friend left. This meant lots of working on outside leg aids for me as well as working on appropriate timing. L wants me to start to be more proactive and we talked about how when I start to get proactive I also start to get aggressive and let Katai pick fights. If course that's not good and something I need to work on so that's my homework for this week. 

At one point we had this really nice, forward trot and she said it was almost a lengthening! It felt really good and Katai's balance is getting to the point where I can influence her in various different frames. I'm able to stretch her forward without her just taking off, although today in the outdoor that was way tougher! 

L had also been to the Jennifer Truett clinic and so some of what we worked on in my lesson were things that Jennifer talked about at the clinic. We also, in keeping with the theme of it being me that needs more work at this point then Katai, worked on my elbows and keeping my hands more stable in the trot so that Katai can feel good about stretching forward into the contact. It made a huge difference! I had seen some of the floppiness in the video I posted but wasn't quite sure what I needed to change to fix it. When L said I needed to fix my elbows to my sides that did it :-)

I'm really quite proud of how we're looking as a team and how much more stable my position is! Photo evidence below :-)

Spring 2015 (Aprilish?)

Summer 2015 (Juneish?)

Summer 2015 (Augustish?)

Today :-)

Thanks to P who just recently moved to my new barn and who I boarded with at J's barn for the photos