Fencing YEAH!

So with the help of Dew and my grandfather...We got the first paddock put up yesterday! in a few days (when dew is home again) we will put up the second paddock. I plan on cleaning out the barn as well as I can to put in some stalls for the ponies. I finally have secured a friend for Jonza, his name is Cheif, an older stdbred, from Jaye. She is a mutual friend of mine and glos. She took in Cheif from an abusive situation (husband on wife), and needed to find him a forever home. So he's coming to me :).

Jaye was gracious enough to trailer him and jonza up here for me for free! all i have to do is pay for the gas. Which is just awesome, so it will cost me probably about $150 to ship them up instead of $375!! now thats a good chunk of change to be saving!!! Once the paddocks and stalls are finished, i'll take pictures. As of right now I have about 2 weeks to work on the barn to fix it. I was thinking of doing some of it today...but its raining bah! I may go out and work on it anyways so I can get out of the house!

So exciting!

Wonderful connection.....

So considering this mare has been mine for about two weeks, and she has only been in training since september, she has been wonderfully connected for not knowing too much. Yesterday (pictures posted below) she threw a few fits...typical redhead...but was pretty good as far as the *spookiness* has been. She went in and out of the indoor into the outdoor without a problem, so that was great.

As usual we worked on a lot of walking, haults and bending. When she finally *felt* ready to trot she was wonderful. Unfortunately we didn't get any pictures of when she was doing just awesome. She started throwing a temper when one of the other mares left the arena, and so the pictures were of the after thought.

Today was very good too. It was super SUPER windy...the whole arena was flapping like crazy. My mare being the super sensitive spooky one was not impressed and was jumping around like a bunny. But she did good, she settled down after lots of walking and serpantines and haults and such. (as usual ha!) I figure I want the walk/hault and serpantine routine to be her calming routine, so when I know she's stressing I have a failsafe that settles her down and lets her feel good about accomplishing something she knows she can do :). So we basically walked for over a half hour, bending, stopping, left, right, little circle BIG circle, etc. When I did start trotting her around, she was clipping her feet a bit...she hasn't done this before so we shall see if this continues, I am thinking of buying her some boots just in case. But she was a very good girl, she didnt feel as connected today as yesterday, but we are still learning each other, and it was a very scarey day for her.

I'm sad....Its going to be a long two weeks before I can see her again! :(

Such a good girl!

Bending

Today was my birthday, so I did what I enjoy doing, spent a good 2 hours at the barn (maybe a bit more!). Everyone was at the driving clinic, so I had the farm to myself. It was so quiet and nice. I am very tired from our 8 hour driving trip yesterday to the lurecoursing field, so I decided that I wouldn't focus on trot work today. So I did some walk, hault, walk transitions. Jonza was doing what I say, but she was a bit unfocused. So I did some trotting circles to loosen her up a bit. We did this for about 5 minutes or so, then began working on walking again, and bending!!!!!!!! We did lots of loops of serpentines, and worked on bending, bending, and MORE bending.

So thats what we did today, I think she did really good :) She doesn't like to move her body like that, and fights against it. So by the end it was good. Although she was throwing a fit halfway through each serpentine down the arena...and I wouldn't let her quit until we did a whole arena length without her freaking out halfway through. But she did a great job overall :).

Whata YOU lookin at?

Outdoor is ready :)

Today me and Jonza explored the outdoor arena....She needed some encouragement to leave the indoor to explore the new scarey world of the outdoor. She was obviously very nervous...and she got all rilled up and didnt want to go over the last bit of snow that was in the shadows of the indoor. She also got a little spooky over some jump standards that were laying on the ground in the corner. She did a jump twirl sort of thing, no big deal. Overall I think she did a VERY good job :) Here are a few pictures of her *first* few steps in the outdoor:

Then after she was comfortable with all the new things to see, there was an obvious change in her overall demeanor:

She is such a sweet and willing girl. I've decided that we will be working on mostly walk, hault and trot for the next month or two. I want her to be very comfortable with these movements before even considering the canter. She has only actually cantered under the lounge line, or if she takes a misstep. I want to make sure that she is happy and confident before we move on. I think that is the best thing. So for now, we've been working on walk/hault for the first 15-20 minutes of our ride. It has been working very well to calm her nerves with all the *new* stuff popping up. When we hault, I make her stay until she settles, then we walk on. After she is being very calm in each hault, and walking forward but not rushing, I ask for the trot. If she immediately starts rushing or even feels frantic, we walk some more.

This process has been working very well, and because of it in the Outdoor she was very calm within 5 minutes of walking around and exploring. Once I have her good and relaxed with only a few minutes of walking warmup, then we will be working on more connection with the trot, bending, and such. She is such a quick learning I bet by the end of the summer I would be able to do a decent training level test with her :) That is the goal.

Oh i'm so excited :)

Running free

What a pretty little Standardbred cater :).
She's such a good girl. Today we did some work on having her settle into the trot, and it was really nice towards the end. She seemed to be very rushy today, so tomorrow when I ride her, I'm going to walk and walk and walk until she calms down and just trots....when she feels calm and relaxed I will ask for the trot, if its choppy and rushed, i'll walk again....walk walk walk...then ask for the trot again....etc

Glo used this method with her boy Will to help him relax and focus on the work at hand. I think this will be a great thing to get Jonza used to doing. I want her to be happy to be with me. She's just a wonderful mare. I'm so happy to have a horse FINALLY its been too long. Now I just need to someone find her a horsey companion.

I finally have a horse

and her name is Jonza....which I love. Pronounced John-zaaaa. Isnt she just SOOO cute...Can you guess what kind she is??