A Different Horse

     I'm starting to realize that after having Mya for two years I really trained her to do a lot. We have worked through a lot of problems in the those two years. Because I have this new horse I am noticing just how much of the stuff I did with Mya I am going to have to do with this horse. Its funny that I find myself comparing the two horse. Mya is more relaxed on the ground. Lady picks up her feet better. Mya lunges better. Lady is quicker to learn backing up. I suppose the lesson I need to learn here is that each horse is different. Lady has a very different personality than Mya. I shouldn't expect Lady to act like Mya or have the same manners. She hasn't learned them yet! But I am confident she will learn them. We will just have to work on it.
     Speaking of lunging, we had an interesting experience with that. It was actually pretty funny. I'm outside doing some groundwork with Lady, and we were practicing things like backing up and leg yields. She was doing pretty good with that so I was like lets give lunging a try. Now Mya when I first got her would lunge but all she would do was gallop madly around in circles. She wouldn't lunge calmly for anything. (I have since then cured her of that and she is actually pretty good at it now.) So I wasn't exactly sure what to expect about Lady. Lady. Won't. Lunge. I tried to send her out on a circle and she didn't have a clue what to do! This horse has never been taught to lunge. So the next 20 minutes was spend just trying to get one decent circle each way. Which we did accomplish but it took awhile. I was pretty surprised that this horse had never been taught that before. But guess what she'll be learning!

Make that Two: Meet Lady!

     This past week has been a bit of an adventure. (and a little crazy!)

 I suppose the story's true beginning is about a month ago...

Back when I wrote the blog post about spending the day with my farrier I noticed that they had gotten a new horse. It was a cute smaller horse, probably a pony, that someone had given to them for free. We thought that was really neat, and my mom and I were asking about it. They said that they were going to resell it to somebody else.

Well that got us to thinking about how we might like a second horse.

I talked to the farrier about that the horse that they had just gotten and they said it probably wasn't a good match for us. (we wanted a really gentle and dead broke horse) They ended up selling that horse to someone else anyway.

 But in the process, we asked them to keep an eye out for a horse for us.

Now around a week ago I get a call from them saying they had indeed found us a horse.

I was of course very, very excited.

The people that owned the horse wanted to give it away free to a good home. They already had too many horses on their small pasture. So we called this person up who had the horse an arranged a time to come look at it.

It pretty much rained and drizzled the whole time we were looking at the horse so we didn't stay long. I didn't get much of a chance to do anything with it. Really the only things I learned from that first visit was that she would pick up her feet good and that she was a bit fat. I don't know a ton about horse shopping so I just called my farrier back and asked them what they thought of the horse. They told me that it was a great deal and that I should get the horse. They even offered to let me use their trailer to pick it up since I don't have one of my own. So trusting my farrier's judgement we called the owner back and said we would take the horse.

     The day we went out there to get it was an adventure in itself.

For one I woke up that morning feeling sick. I woke up with a migraine which is like the worst possible way to get them. But knowing me I was like I am not going to miss my first chance to pick up and trailer a horse. Not gonna happen. So I just tried to eat some food and took some tylonal and just prayed that I would survive. (I somewhat regretted my decision to go after the second time I threw up but whatever..)

After a rather, er, interesting hour long car ride we finally got there. (the things I do for horses amazes me... lol) We pulled up their driveway and parked the trailer. I was glad to see that they already had the horse out. I had never loaded a horse before so I wasn't too sure about the whole thing. We were all just hoping the horse would be easy to load. I was quite pleased to see that it did. It walked right into the trailer no problem.

The owners told us that they rode the horse in a hackamore (it was actually more like a bosal) and they gave us the horse's one. And that was about it.

We got back in the truck and drove home. The mare did great the whole drive. I was impressed.

Once we got home I just unloaded her and walked her over to my small paddock area. Its just a smaller pen which has the stall/shelter in it.

I had put Mya out in the front pasture the night before so they were separated by a pasture. I wanted to give the new horse time to settle in before I introduced the two.

So that is where it stayed for the first two days. Yesterday I let the new horse into the small pasture to the right of the paddock. It was amusing to watch her trot around it. This horse has more personality than I originally thought.

After much deliberation, we've decided to name her Lady.

Lady is a 14 year old quarter horse mare. She is shorter than Mya and fatter. I still haven't introduced them yet. I'll probably to that some time next week. For now I'm just working with Lady and trying to settle her in.

We have her on somewhat of a trial basis. The farrier told me that if we ended up not liking her that they would want her. But for now we are just getting to know her.

I am anticipating the next sunny day so that I can ride her. Its been raining every day since we got the horse.

 I am hoping that she will turn out to be a great horse. I really hope she is as dead broke as I've been told. But for now I have been having fun getting to know a new horse. I'm curious to see where this will go..

Meet Lady

Its Showtime!

I've been meaning to write up this post for a week, but until now I just hadn't gotten around to it. So here goes it.. :D
Like the title suggests I went to a show. Yep, a horse show. And not just to watch. I finally got to compete! The barn where I have taken riding lessons hosted a schooling show. I heard about it and knew I just had to do it. It was my first time competing english and only the second show I've ever done. I must say I absolutely loved doing it. I was a little nervous that morning and watching the classes before me. The show started at 11a.m but my classes didn't start until 2. But when I was finally able to go tack up Night and get on her all the nervousness went away. Once I was actually on her back I was completely relaxed. Which is a little amazing I suppose. But its true. I was just feeling relaxed and excited. I was happy to be there and couldn't wait to get into the ring. Anyways, I rode Night and we were entered into 4 classes. Walk/Trot Equitation, Walk/Trot Pleasure, Walk/Trot over Poles, and Walk/Trot Pattern. I think we did the best in Walk/Trot Equitation. That class just felt like the most consistent. Though I think we did pretty well in all our classes. In the equitation class there were about 12 riders. It was a pretty big class. Night did wonderful and I was really proud of her. I was very happy when we placed 3rd.

 Our next class was the Pleasure one. We did good in this one too. Our only thing with this one is that it had a ton of riders as well and we accidentally got stuck between some of them and had to work our way out. But we figured it out in the end and it worked. We also placed 3rd again. The next class was basically the same except that there were poles that you were supposed to do two point over at the trot. Working on doing two point over poles was relatively new for us so considering that I think we did really well. We once again placed 3rd.

 And then our last class consisted of a pattern. The pattern had you walking, trotting, and back up. With of course some lines and circles around cones in there. Kinda funny, I think this was our worst class. For some reason Night decided she wouldn't trot in a straight line, and I had a hard time getting the correct diagonal. The funny bit is that we placed 2nd. Everyone did worse than I did. lol.
So over all I ended up placing in all four of my classes, and I took home three 3rd place ribbons and one 2nd. It was an awesome day. I had so much fun. I was so proud of Night. She did really great and we worked well together. She really is a great horse. I loved being able to compete in my first english show and I don't think it will be my last.

Various Horse Things

I did quite a bit of riding the last couple of weeks. I had two great lessons and several nice rides on Mya. I hope to continue the trend and get a lot of riding in this week as well. I'll just do a summery of each of my rides. Pictures included of course!

Lesson 1:
      Like I've said before for my lessons I ride an Arabian mare named Night. I think she's Anglo Arabian or something like that. But I really like riding her. She is a sensitive and quick horse which I like. Night is also very sweet. In my lesson my instructor had me on a lunge line so we could focus on my balance and posture. We practiced two-point quite a bit. I really needed that. Doing it over poles was fun. I'm learning to find my balance, and then I can start jumping. (yay!) We also did some no stirrup work at the trot. That is always a good workout. Its always interesting trying to find your balance when you first start riding without stirrups. Especially when you're doing a small circle on a lunge line. But I think we figured it out and did pretty good. Though I was glad to pick up my stirrups again. All together it was I great lesson. I think I learned a lot. :)

 

 Lesson 2:
     For my second lesson a week later to did a similar type thing. This time though we focussed more on two point and perfecting it. We also did a lot of pole work. Night was a great horse that day. She was very responsive and laid back. I think she liked doing pole work just as much as I did. I felt like I learned a ton at this lesson and really improved.

Riding Mya:
     Then over two or three days I had several great rides on Mya. Mya acted relaxed and responsive which I really liked. Sometimes she can be a rather crazy horse to ride. One of the neat things we figured out how to do was a really nice sitting trot. That was the best sitting trot I have ever done on her. You could actually sit it!

 Coming Up:
     One week from today is a horse show that I'm doing. I am riding Night in the show and we will be doing 3 or 4 english classes. This is actually the first english horse show that I will ever have done. I am really looking forward to it! Its just a small schooling show at the barn where I take lessons. I think it will be a great experience though. I hope to be able to take Mya to some local shows later this summer and I'd love to able to take her to this same schooling show in the Fall. The barn holds it twice a year. I guess we'll just have to see how this one goes first. But I'm excited about it!

Farrier

    
     I had the neatest opportunity yesterday. I was able to ride around and shadow my farrier on his rounds. It was a great experience and I learned a ton. The first place we went didn't have a horse. Nope, it was a donkey. I confess I didn't know farriers trimmed donkey's hooves. But apparently they do! The donkey was the one that gave us the most trouble that day. I had to hold it while the farrier worked on its feet. It was quite a rascal. The second stop we made was at a small farm that had one horse. The horse was a sweet chestnut, quarter horse mare. The funny thing about this stop was that the horse lived with a herd of sheep. (and a few cows) The sheep were the strangest things. And they were very loud. They made these weird noises that just made you want to laugh. But there was one baby lamb that was really cute. I wanted to pet it but it kept running away. After that we went to a small stable that had three horses. The first was an older quarter horse. Then they had a paso fino and an arabian. The arabian was a gorgeous horse. Here the farrier taught be how to age horses by looking at their teeth. I've always wanted to learn this but had never been able to figure out how. But now I could tell you whether a horse is under 5, under 10 over 10, or over 20. Pretty cool! After that stop we headed over to a place that had a couple of paint horses. We only trimmed one of them. The interesting thing about thing horse is that it had foundered. I was able to see the difference between a horse that had foundered and a horse that hadn't. Like I said I learned a ton! But the horses at that place were both really pretty.

 That was our last stop for clients. Then we headed back to the farriers house, and this is the neatest bit, he let me work on one of his horses. Yes, he actually taught me how to shoe a horse! I nailed a shoe on and everything. (with a lot of help and guidance of course) It was a super cool thing to be able to do. Random fact, but do you want to guess how old this horse is? This is the horse I worked on and his name is Ed.

 

He is 38 years old. Yes, you read that correctly! Thirty-eight! Crazy, I know. He is just a really well taken care of horse and he is just naturally healthy. Still that is the oldest horse I have ever seen. His pasture buddy is also pretty old coming in at 35.

But anyway, I really enjoyed my day hanging out with the farrier. I learned so much. I think everyone should do it!

Night

 

I have been really busy lately. So I hadn't been able to ride Night in several weeks. But a couple days ago I was able to. We rode in the outdoor arena that day. I was impressed with Night. I had thought that she would be pretty spooky, but she wasn't. Actually she behaved better than she had the last time I rode her. Needless to say I was pleased, and we had a good ride. I am doing a show with her in a little over a month. So we have started preparing for that. I am excited about it. This will be the first English horse show I have done. And also my first show with Night. I am really looking forward to it. I think it will be a lot of fun.              

Dover Saddlery

     I was recently on the Dover Saddlery website looking at various things to order when I remembered another person had told me that they actually have stores. I looked it up and sure enough there are a few stores all over the country that you can visit. And about a week ago we happened to be in the area of one so I was like we have to go. It was a little bit of an adventure finding it. (We had never been in that area before and there was a lot of traffic.) But we found it eventually! That has to be the coolest store I have ever been in. I could have spent hours in there! It was full of all kinds of horse tack, and it was all english. I saw these really cute bran mash mixes and got a couple for Mya. I've always wanted to make a bran mash for her as a treat but I've never had the time to go shopping for the right ingredients. So the mix was a really neat idea. Just add water and stir. So, yes, my visit to Dover Saddlery was a fun success.
     I am really loving Mya's new bridle and bit. Each time we use it I think our ride goes a little better. The idea of using a full cheek snaffle was great. I think that bit really works well for my horse. Our last ride we took a break. We went on a trail ride out in a field. Mya enjoyed the change of scenery. And it was good to have a break in the routine.