Days 3-5: Life In The Pen

I realized after going through my pictures that Sophie's life currently consists of moving from one round pen to another. She's got two to choose from right now for turnout, simply because it's the safer fencing to introduce her to her new neighbours over. Poor thing, her recent adventures also consisted of me taking her down the road to yet another round pen. We'll let her out of jail soon, I promise :)

Life in the pen

Anyway, I thought I'd make notes for each of the next 90 days. Kind of as if she was at a real trainer's.

Days 1 and 2 I've already recapped and consisted of trailering and settling in, plus a walk down to the show grounds and a visit to the round pen.

Day 3: Day off.
 I had to travel down the coast and pretend to be an office worker for a couple of days (I self identify as a professional equestrian, however I am not good at riding and horses have sadly has never paid me a dime, so my resume says GIS Analyst,  lol) By all accounts, Sophie was a good girl in my absence.

So many ferry rides

Day 4: Eat your vegetables, Sophie.
 I got the ferry  home in time for a late dinner, and it became apparent fussy pony has been simply dumping her dinner bucket and not eating it. Do I mix it differently than the boarding barn? One of life's mysteries, I guess. She's a super picky eater, defying all the normal pony stereotypes. I was short on time so I wanted to just quickly run the rasp over her feet and she was an absolute monster about it. We had a discussion, I picked up the most offensive foot without drama, and called it a day. The farrier is booked for the weekend and Sophie better not get us fired.

Day 5: "Do you want a chain for that thing?" - the barn owner.
Someone was not on her best behaviour as I was leading her out the driveway. I've got zero time for that so by the time we got out to the road she was minding her manners again and I didn't need to take up the barn owner's offer. Sophie found a few things to be spooky at on our walk, but was generally quite brave. Once at the club area, I thought now or never as far as teaching her to longe. She exceeded all my expectations and tried her little heart out. Walk/trot/whoa both directions were pretty solid! A couple of little bobbles as she tried to figure it out but she was listening and calm and genuine, so what more can you ask for. We'll leave canter for another day - I was extra pleased with her given the fact it's a huge open space in there and the park was pretty busy with distractions. When we got home she ate her dinner with zero hesitation. Guess it tasted better today?

No actual pics of her longeing because I don't have enough hands.

I'm off now for a 4 day weekend, and have hopes of reintroducing her saddle and firming up the longeing concept. I'd also like to get her out on the trail by ponying her off Bridget. I'm really enjoying having a plan and some goals to work towards again.