Update - With Pictures as promised!

Things have been great!

No things have been better than great things have been awesome!!!

I finally have a saddle. As of tonight it is trainer approved and ready to be added to the credit card tomorrow. I'm stoked! Well not about the credit card thing but about finally having something to ride in. It's been over a month since I've been able to be able to plan to go to the barn and ride because I've needed to borrow J's County which she 1. is understandably reluctant to let students use and 2. uses on some of the lesson horses when she has to. 

Here is the glorious thing.

It's a Passier Vector which I'd never heard of before and seems to be fairly rare. It has a medium tree, 17" seat, upswept panels that keep it short enough for Katai's back. It also, oddly enough, has foam panels which I'm happy about in this case since this is the only saddle that has fit and foam is soft and supposed to hold up better than wool. Of course it can't be adjusted but this is a bargain basement saddle so if/when Katai outgrows it I'm not too worried about passing it along and buying something else.

Soooooo happy!

I also had my lesson tonight and Katai, who's been behaving absolutly beautifully, had an off night. However, it was a great reminder of just how far we've come as well as just how good she is. We had a couple minor dissagreements but she never did anything dangerous and worked fairly well over all. It was dissapointing to have J see her the worst she's been in awhile but she seemed to believe me that she'd been better and she has finally approved me starting to trot her so she must have been happy overall.

I did manage to find someone to take some pictures while J was lunging and they aren't great but at least you can see Katai. I know I'm lacking in the picture department so here you go!

I love this picture! I just wish it weren't as blurry.

and an even blurrier picture but you can kind of see how nice she is moving in this one. I love the pink blur of her boots :)

Now to just get her to carry herself like that when I'm riding her!

Mashup

I have so many things to write about! I have been doing the things, just not writing about the things but I am happy to report that my pony is quickly becoming an incredible little athlete as well as a very mature and well behaved equine. I will catch everyone up on our progress soon, including pictures I promise, but for now I just want to catch up on some awesome VCBHs.

"Yay imagination time!  Well more imagination time for some of us and a tiny bit less for the rest of us. This week's blog hop is..... If you could/were so inclined to breed your horse (1.. let's not get into the issues of backyard breeding and 2.. let's pretend your horse is a mare if it's not) WHO would you breed your horse to and Why!"

Luckily enough, don't you roll your eyes, I do have a mare and while I'm sure I will never breed her I have done some "what if" thinking. Be warned that I haven't put any real thought into what Katai needs improved or if these particular stallions could make any of those improvements. Mostly this is just a case of "ooooooo pretty!"

1. Aspen Way Gala Night

To me, this is the way a horse should look. I adore every thing about him.

Plus he has dressage skillz.

2. Gladheart Linhawk

Gladheart is a 13.3 hand Morgan stallion that has been shown to PSG. 

http://youtu.be/u6I_jHgNd8g

You would think that I have a thing for black horses but actually its really not my favorite color, these two just happen to be black.

Ideally I'd want the foal to mature to 13.3-14.2 hands.

VCBH: Bit it Up

" I want to hear all about what bit you ride your current beastie in and why!"

I ride Katai in a Neue Schule Eggbutt. Its a pricy bit but it is also the only bit I could find that came not only smaller in width but also in diameter. Katai wears a 4.5" bit, and even that is fairly loose, and has a very low pallet. One of the first bits I tried on her made her extremely fussy and something seemed weird so I pulled open her lips and looked and discovered that she couldn't even get close to closing her mouth. Talk about uncomfortable! I would be fussy too. When I switched to this bit I still expected some baby gnawing but she just went completely quiet in her mouth and still is. So much so that I've never used a flash and hope to never need to.

This bit is basically the equivilent of a pony sized Sprenger and I will never use anything else. Luckily they have several different styles so hopefully if I ever need to try anything else I will be able to find it in a Neue Schule.

Katai updates to follow!

In Love with Lessons

My decision to move to this barn has been so well confirmed this week. I adore my instructor (coach would be a better word) and my pony has been quickly returning to her normal self. After my rides last weekend I wasn’t able to make it out to the barn on either Monday or Tuesday because of my social life.

I swear, I never used to have any kind of social life at all and now it feels like it’s been getting out of control. This weekend I left completely open so that I could relax and take care of normal things like dishes and laundry and focus on Katai.

At any rate, on Wednesday morning I planned on going out to the barn to ride and work with Katai but I got an email from J that she would be unavailable for my lesson on Thursday because of a show, Eventing, that she would be coaching her students at. So instead I had my lesson last night at 8:00pm. I was thinking that Katai might misbehave because of the late hour and change in her schedule but she was actually really excellent and best of all I had my first lesson riding her!

That lesson confirmed for me that J is exactly the coach that I hoped she would be. She approved of what I’ve done so far but I found several things that I would have done wrong if I had continued on my own which is exactly why I moved her when I did. Even better, while she sees and is honest about Katai’s limitations she has never questioned me for riding a nontraditional pony and being interested in dressage. She has praised Katai for her brain and said several times how cute she plus she recognizes that I’ve ridden in the past and I’m not completely incompetent but really NEED good instruction since I just haven’t had it. She is also an incredible horseman at everything from groundwork, to tack fit, and of course riding and while she is currently helping a student who rides at PSG and is schooling GP she is really good at teaching me the basics.

Last night we started out by trying some saddles. I had brought both the saddles from the previous post and it turns out that neither one actually fit. Then we also tried a dressage saddle that was at the barn as well as another close contact saddle which is what I ended up riding her in but even that one didn’t really fit. Katai was decently good standing in the arena while we messed around with her and she is figuring out how to stand still even if it still isn’t really her strong suit. I think the plan had been to do more lunging with her but with J’s close contact saddle on she asked about what I wanted and I said to ride. J was concerned about the girth, and I think about Katai since she’s only ever seen her as a little fireball on the ground and never with someone on her back. She did allow me to climb up though and after some initial corrections to the way I mount, I’ve always been pretty haphazard about it really and have gotten even sloppier recently, she gave me a pony ride around a 20 meter circle for quite awhile.

She helped Katai understand some of the concepts, like stretching into contact, that we are working on and it was wonderful to have help on the ground because it is something I’ve never had. After a few laps in each direction, and a reminder that I could hop down if needed, she finally let me go and stood back. Katai was her normal workmanlike self even if she was very forward. She listened and we had some great moments and I think that J was able to relax a little seeing that I wasn’t going to be instantly killed. Katai really has been pulling some interesting behaviors on both myself and J and has been quite the handful over the past few weeks so I can completely understand what J would have to worry about. Luckily I’ve gone slowly enough and strictly enough with her under saddle training that she really is a little doll about being ridden even if she isn’t always on the ground which is something I’ve mentioned before.

Tonight Katai just had grooming/cuddle time. I did try yet another saddle on her but again it didn't fit. I am starting to figure out where I've been going wrong though and hope to get this figured out soon. I've pretty much had every saddle from the tack shop out on trial at this point and the clerks are starting to laugh at me when I come in :/ Oh well, it will all be worth it when I finally have a saddle that fits!!

Muddy pony is muddy and very happy to have some hand grazing time with me. Next item of business is to get her used to the wash stall ;-)

Saddle Fitting Purgatory

We haven't killed each other yet. In fact things are going pretty darn well with both the crossties and training. I've had two lessons with J where we worked with Katai now and I've been extremely proud of my pony. The gaps in training that she's found are things that I guess I knew I was being lazy about and just needed a third party to remind me of. One of those is that Katai is horrible, and has been horrible, about standing still. Trying to do anything like tighten a girth, or adjust a bridle is almost impossible and frustrating and while I tried for awhile to correct that I think I finally just sort of gave up on it. I've been reinforcing that she needs to STAND still now though and it is getting better.

In our first lesson we worked on leading as a step towards properly lunging which is something I've never been taught. I just copied what I saw people doing when they lunged their horse and eventually figured it out through trial and error. J had me start by leading, while facing out, Katai around the track of the arena. Every time she tried to budge her shoulder in or leave the track she got a correction and as long as she was walking nicely on the track we left her alone. As J mentioned several times she is extremely smart and figured it out pretty quick so at my next lesson we progressed to lunging her with sidereins. Again I was so proud of my pony! J was expecting to have trouble with her but she was a little saint and did it just like I'd taught her to listening to voice commands and our body positioning.

Other than the fact that I really did need to learn this and have already seen differences in Katai since J started teaching me how to work with her correctly, I haven't been riding because J pronounced both of my saddles "hopeless, don't even try to ride in them. Put them up for sale immediately." I was pretty sure that was going to be the case so I was prepared but what I wasn't prepared for was that she said I needed to start looking at close contact saddles. It was honestly kind of a painfull thing for me to hear. I LIKE dressage saddles. They are comfortable and put you in the correct place for dressage. However, I have spent more of my time riding in a close contact saddle than a dressage saddle and I've actually been wanting one again for going out on hacks since I like to be able to get off of my horse's back when cantering and like being able to vary my position more than you can in a dressage saddle. I didn't want to have one as my main saddle. The more I thought about it though the more I realized that I'm not only lucky to have an instructor that puts Katai's comfort above all else but that she is comfortable and flexible enough to go with a close contact when a dressage saddle isn't working. Mostly I was happy to finally have someone tell me what I needed so that it wouldn't all be on my shoulders and I was looking forward to finally being out a saddle fitting purgatory.

I am so lucky to have a great local tack shop that's only about 15 minutes away from my house that has an excellent saddle trial program as well as TONS of saddles! Over the past couple of days I picked up and tried over 8 saddles to finally end up with these.

The dressage saddle at the end is one of mine that is for sale but the other three are a Collegiate Event, a Beval, and an Albion. They will be coming with to my lesson on Thursday for saddle tryouts with J. It is really very odd to see all those CCs and APs in my apartment when its normally all dressage saddles. We are going to be stylin too with our pink lined black bridle, black stirrup leathers, black stirrups and brown saddle :-)

I've riden her now in both the Albion, on Saturday, and the Beval, on Sunday, and while I prefer the Beval I do really like both of them. It is so weird to be riding in a CC again though! 

Well Tonight Sucked

I have nothing positive to say other than that we didn't kill each other.

I'm normally a really positive person and on my blog I find the sun behind the clouds or the half full glass but tonight that just isn't the case. I really did know that she wasn't going to be her normal self at the new barn, in a new environment, around new horses, in a new arena but I hoped that some smidgen of the Katai that I know and love would remain. Instead I got some sort of devil pony in her place tonight.

I think she was more scared than naughty and I treated it as such being gentle but firm but when she continued to blow through my aids on the lunge I got firmer and it barely made a difference. On top of that, and I'm aware it wasn't helping me at all, I had an audience. All things considered it was the best audience I could have had of a few of the more"rough and ready" riders that have dealt with young horses but they've been boarding there for many, many years and although nothing Katai did was any different than what any young horse might have done I still feel like it's going to be the gossip of the barn.

I stayed almost two hours late at work so that I could get to the barn late, and I easily had enough work to do to fill the time since it is retirement plan audit season, so I got there around 6:30. I ate my dinner and changed so that I was catching and tacking up closer to 7:00 and hoped the barn would be quiet and it was for a little while. I wanted nothing more than to have the place to myself the first couple of times I worked her so that I wouldn't make a scene or disturb anyone else. It did sort of work since not one of the three people that showed up rode their horse but Katai did certainly get a lot of attention. They cooed over her while I tacked her up and she wasn't great in the cross ties but not as bad as I'd feared either. Then I got her into the arena and all hell broke loose. I knew she'd look at the mirrors but what I didn't guess was that she would think that every time she saw them she was seeing a friendly herd member that immediately trotted away as soon as she went past. She was transfixed staring at them since that was the only way to keep the "friend" there and every time I got her to go past the mirror she about had a heart attack. The one thing I'm proud of, and yet still second guessing myself on, is that I rode.

After close to 30 minutes of lunging, all over the arena and in different directions, she was calming down just enough that I thought I might actually have a better shot if I were mounted. As I said at the beginning we did survive but lots of turn on the forehands later and a couple of fairly reasonable short walks in a straight line at my direction and I climbed off and called it a day. She felt like she either wanted to rear or bolt the entire time but she did listen to me and kept all four feet on the ground with some help from me.

Its tough to know if it was the right thing to do and I was evaluating the situation the entire time I was in there trying to figure out what my options were to turn the situation around. I think a whole bunch of stuff like the weather, seriously?!? 8 days of pouring rain and crazy howling winds at below 40, or the new place or the people while I tacked up hugging her and making a fuss over her certainly didn't help and I do realize they are all things that she needs to get used to and I WANT her to get used to it's just that I wanted to do my best to ease her into all of it and not have it strike at once.

I'm still trying to pick out anything positive that I can and I'm definitely not by any means giving up. I'll be out there again tomorrow to repeat the whole process. Hopefully minus that craziness.

Moving Day!

Finally, finally, finally it was time to move Katai. I woke up at 7:45am since I specifically set my alarm close to the time I needed to leave so that I wouldn't have much time to sit around and get nervous. I really don't know what it is about trailering that freaks me out but it's bad.

I got to the barn right around 8:40am after a quick stop for breakfast and to fill up my car's tank with gas. The horse's were still on the round bale and Christina, the wonderful person who had agreed to haul Katai for me, was still in the house. I grabbed Katai's halter and waded through the thick mud to catch her and bring her into the barn. I put her halter pads on and fitted her out with a cooler. I also scraped some of the muck off of her legs and then led her outside. It was windy and cool and I had changed the routine so Katai was already a little keyed up and as soon as Christina opened the trailer door you would have thought she'd opened the gates to hell. Katai started bouncing up on her hind legs and running her shoulder in to me. Yes, of course it is partially my fault for being keyed up and nervous but it's something I'm working on.

I reminded her that she needed to listen to me and not trample me and she started to obey again. Once I led her up to the trailer she climbed right in, I tied her and we were off. I led the way in my car since Christina didn't know where we were going so I didn't get any "pony in trailer" pictures but here is one from last time we moved her with the same trailer so you get the idea.

 

It was a short and uneventful trip and then we were there!!

 

I got her unloaded without a fuss and was walking her around trying to figure out how to get J involved and figure out where to put her when J herself stuck her head out the door of the indoor arena and yelled where to put her. Gotta love barn owners with mind reading capabilities!

 

 Everything is just so dry and free of mud. It's so completely wonderful not having to wear thigh high boots to survive a simple task like catching my horse. Katai was well behaved and really very quiet. She patiently waited to be led to her pen and then after briefly sniffing noses with the horse next door, a fancy and gorgeous warmblood from CA that looks twice as tall as my pony, she went and tucked into her hay. I don't blame her, that hay looks so good I'd like to eat it and she's got a pile in front of her that will last her until feeding time tomorrow. Since she is a little thin right now coming out of winter, I could say more about that but for now I'm just glad I'm at a different barn, I'm really happy that she can stuff her face.

After seeing that she was just going to calmly eat hay I went up to the barn to unpack my car and get my locker sorted out.

This is inside the heated tackroom/viewing area/grooming area looking at my locker and the one way mirror that makes up the viewing area window.

My nicely stuffed locker :-)

Looking into the grooming area, bathroom on the left and the indoor arena to the right. My locker is behind me to the right.

In the grooming area. There are three indoor grooming bays and one outdoor. This morning when I was there they were all full all the time. These pictures are from when I went back this evening to check to make sure Katai is settling in (she was). I'm so excited to have people to ride with!

Outdoor grooming space.

Finally the cross country course and some of the expansive pastures :)

So there we go. I am completely happy and relieved that it finally happened. When I went back in the evening Katai was calm and relaxed and after I scratched her for a little while and made sure she was ok I went home. Tomorrow I am going to the horse expo again with Lisa and will be there for most of the day. In the evening we are both going out to the barn to visit Katai and I'm going to stick around and work with her.

My hope is that Sunday evening will be pretty quiet so that I'll have the arena and grooming area to myself the first time or two. I'd like to give us both a couple of days of practice with cross ties and the indoor without bothering anyone else with her antics. Its really an unfounded concern since she's not bad, just a horse and no worse, or better, than any of the other horses here but she just hasn't been exposed to any of this stuff and I plan on doing my homework and not burdening anyone else with our inexperience.

VCBH: Appreciating What You Have

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Let's take a moment to appreciate the Pros of our current ponies, whether you own them or just ride them in lessons.


1. Katai is socially very adept:

Ok, so I don't know if this is a good thing or trouble but she has twice now flirted her way to the top.

 

The bay gelding standing closer to the camera is Max and he was the herd boss when Katai was first moved into this field. She immedietly started flirting with him and as soon as she became "his girl" she got to eat first, drink first, and had constant protection. (Note the other mares looking longingly from afar) The bay gelding standing further away from the camera is the current herd boss and he is so smitten with her now that he will literally clear the way for her. Like a guy putting his coat over a puddle so the girl won't get her shoes dirty. The white blob laying between them is, of course, Katai being watched over by her two men.

2. She's really bold.

Katai rarely every spooks at anything and while she does sometimes look its very relaxed and often she will even travel towards the thing that she is looking at.

3. She's not herd bond.

Right now with spring hormones she's been a little clingy and frustrating to deal with but I keep reminding myself that she's never been herd bound and once the spring heat cycle is done with I'll have my adventure loving pony back.

4. She is adorable!!

5. Her confirmation.

Is really quite good for a backyard mutt pony.

6. Her mind.

She is doing incredibly well. Today I was riding her like I've been told to ride in my lessons and guess what, it works! She was round and soft, I was able to give her the reins and have her stretch down. She is still being clingy with the boys but she listened and worked despite her misgivings about being by herself in the barn.

I am soooo proud of my little pony and we move tomorrow!!!!!!!!

Travel Restrictions Have Ended!!!!!!

Which means three very important things.

1. I can stop wearing separate clothing, boots, jacket, gloves etc. to each barn and washing them right away when I get home.

2. I can go to the MN Horse Expo on Friday and not have to worry, feel guilty that I may expose my pony to something.

3. I get to move Katai!!!!!

Our plan is proceeding as is at this point to move Katai early on Saturday morning. I feel like I've been waiting soooo long and it has been almost exactly a month since I planned on moving her. We've made good progress during that time and it makes me feel even more ready to get started with lessons on my little horse. Finally :)

We're Still Here

I promise :-)

Things have been weird lately. Crazy weather dumped 12-18 inches of snow on my area while leaving places only 20-25 miles away completely clear. Spring has hit in a big way, other than the previously mentioned snow storm, so pony mare has been NUTZ. Easter. The EHV-1 thing has been staying quiet, knock on wood, but after being put off so many times I still kind of feel like I’m stuck in limbo and was having trouble getting excited for the move plus work has been busy and I’ve got a big independent project I’m working on that I’ve been having fun with so I’ve put a lot of focus into that.

Because of all of the above I missed going to the barn from Monday-Friday last week and which made everything feel even weirder. When Thursday came around and I had my lesson I regained motivation and was pumped to get back and work with Katai. Since then I haven’t missed a day.

Friday I lunged her with side reins for the first time in a long while and had them a bit shorter than I normally do and she was excellent! I also groomed her and fed her her grain which is more necessary than it has been in awhile since I can see her ribs! Saturday I rode and made a lot of progress. I felt like I was actually retaining some stuff from my lessons and it was working the way it’s supposed to! She was more through than she’s been but she was also INCREDIBLY spooky. She just does these funny little jumps in place and then moves right on but after about 10-15 of these things it started to get funny, and a little frustrating, since I felt like even though she was listening pretty well her mind was somewhere else. Sunday I spent a couple of hours with her on Easter morning and the weather was spectacular! Warm, humid, warm, sunny, warm! I remembered what it was like to not feel like you’re just trying to survive outside. We went on a short trail ride and despite the temperature she was amped up.  She really does a good job of listening and not being overly naughty but she was right on the edge of even listening so I kept it short and positive. After we got back, in one piece, I took her out to graze and her gratitude was so clear that I actually teared up. All of the other horses, whos’ owners rarely make it to the barn, were staring at us and trying to convince me to take them out as well.

Tonight I was out again and it was rough. The hussy mare has decided that she CAN'T SURVIVE without her friends, cue sappy music. She had lost her mind, gone, poof, no mind here, and spun wildly back and forth while tied to the wall. I may not always be the smartest human but I realized pretty quickly that we weren't going to make any positive progress doing anything that involved brain cells so I brought her outside to the round pen to gallop in crazy speedy circles for awhile and finally worked on clipper and spray bottle desensitization. I am extremely proud to say that we are finally making some progress with those things and she stood fairly still for both tonight. I groomed her, rebagged her tail and let her graze and eat her grain and then put her back. 

Hopefully the hormones will calm down soon and I'll have my reasonable Katai back.

Outbreak Part II: Delayed Again

Let me start by saying that I’m so sorry for anyone who lost a horse recently due to EHV-1 and all of you who have either had a horse pass away or who are currently caring for a sick horse are in my thoughts. It would be an extremely horrible thing to go through.

 Now, with that being said, my move has been delayed again. I’m certainly not interested in risking any horses, either my own or those at the new barn, but I’m so anxious to move to the new place! Last night I had my weekly riding lesson and it went extremely well. I also have been able to continue to observe barn things and this is why I love this barn.

The farm from above. Mares to the right, geldings to the left. You can see the outdoor and indoor and the pond is surrounded by an eventing course.

1. No mud!!!!! Seriously, the place that Katai is living right now looks like one big mud pit which is quite normal with all of the snow we’ve melted and especially with how quick it’s been melting this year but sometimes I feel like my pony is living in a cesspool. The current barn owner hasn’t turned on the water to the barn yet either so there is no way to wash off mucky feet. The new place has well drained pens and gravel walkways. I was able to get my horse in my paddock boots and not get them mucky at all vs. needing to wear my waders.

2. The people. Sure there are the one or two competitive types but I like those people and respect them. I let them do their thing and just concentrate on myself. I haven’t heard any back biting or negative comments and mostly the barn is made up of eventers who seem to be a more practical lot and are the type of people I grew up around.

3. There are always people there. This may get old eventually but I ride by myself about 90% of the time right now and it gets REALLY old. A huge part of why I wanted to board, vs. keeping my horse on my own property, is so that I can be around other horse people and I will finally have that opportunity.

Viva Carlos’ Magical Blog Hop: Our Commercial Moment

After, unfortunately, having to sit out for the last few blog hops due to my impending but again delayed move (a topic for the next post) I was really excited to see another VCMBH that I could participate in!

What are you buying next? Not your "Wish I could" list but your actual practical pony shopping list. And if it’s a high ticket item you are saving for what is it and when do you expect to order/get it?

1. Sponges: Yay right!?! Well I do need them both for tack cleaning and for pony cleaning which leads me right into the next item on my list…

2. Grooming Products: All of the grooming products, all of them. I have seriously never even owned a bottle of Show Sheen that’s how sad my grooming product supply is. In fact, other than the copious amounts of Cowboy Magic I needed for Sora’s long mane, I’ve never bought much other than fly spray and maybe some fly lotion. I can count the number of times that I’ve bathed a horse that I’ve owned (over that last 16 years even) on my fingers. I seriously have some catching up to do and it’s not so much that I need to IMEDIETLY start putting products on my pony, it’s more like both of us should get used to it because of the shows I hope to do and the fact that there are actually people who know how to use grooming products at the new barn. Specifically I’ve got Cowboy Magic Green Spot Remover in my SmartPak cart and I’m looking for a good mane and tail conditioner. Does anyone have any good grooming product suggestions for a mostly white pony?

3. Brown Paddock Boots: I had a really cute and extremely comfortable pair that I found used for $5 but unfortunately after two summers of abuse the zipper in the back of one died. I’m still wearing them since they stay shut with my adorable matching $8 brown leather half chaps on but the zipper digs into the back of my heel so it’s time to find a new pair. Yes, I’m cheap.

4. Show Clothing: I will seriously be hitting up as many local thrift shops (we have lots of riders in the area), used tack swaps, and sales as possible because I need everything. I do have a couple of pairs of breeches that would work for schooling shows but that’s about it. I’m sure I won’t do anything other than schooling shows this year, and that’s if I show at all, but I’d rather not wait until the last minute to find what I need since that means I’ll spend more than I want.

5. The painful one, I may need a saddle :( I HATE saddle shopping and find it to be a miserable experience. If I had all of the money in the world and could get an adorable, custom dressage saddle in contrasting leather colors from Custom Saddlery it would be fun but saddle shopping on a budget for a tough-to-fit pony is not an enjoyable experience and it always makes me hurt in my brain and my credit card.

Luckily I don’t have any other high ticket items that I want/need right now and although I’m sure I’ll find something to spend my money on at the upcoming MN Horse Expo but I’m going to try to stick to the stuff listed above.