Slowing It Down

 I know, I know...I’m already the most boring blogger out there. How can things possibly move even slower? :)

Since my last post, Sophie’s had a few rides, I’ve had a week’s vacation and Bridget’s continued to live her best life.

Very efficient lawn mowing

When we left off, things were going swimmingly with Sophie, but then we hit a bit of a roadblock with canter. She has been bucking a bit and kicking at the leg and of course finds the whole cantering on a lead and not just swapping around as she feels like it a bit difficult. I know the bucking is fairly normal while they figure out balance and where their feet are, and I sort of had a few suspicions that she might take offence to my leg touching her at certain times in her heat cycle (poor thing is pretty darn mare-ish) So, all in all, not a big deal, but I started to notice she was getting tense and anxious about it so figured slowing it down and taking a step back might be appropriate. 

Gorgeous vacation camp site

The past week, someone set up a trail course in the main arena, so we rode through that and practiced bending and moving her body in walk in an effort to mix it up a bit and take the canter stress away. She’s hilarious in that the trail course itself, including bridge, was fine, but those same objects stacked outside the area are pony eating monsters. I then went off camping for three days and just left her out in the field to chill. This weekend I revisited longeing and felt like I was quite successful in reestablishing a nice relaxed neck and back. She’s also started stepping nicely into canter again and holding a nice relaxed rhythm there, often even on the correct lead, lol. (for the record, I’m not at all worried about leads right now, I just want forward and for her to focus on that. Consistent relaxed forward will solve most of the bouncing around and random leg flinging and lead changes)

I think I’m ready to pop back on and try a bit of canter from the saddle again. Wish me luck sticking in there, lol.

In other news, we’ve got not just one, but THREE lessons scheduled for September. My coach EC is coming for a visit and is going to give me a lesson too, which is wonderful, and then the lovely lady who travelled here in a July is coming back to give us two lessons later in the month.

We’ve been having a heat wave, so the ponies are back in their forest paddock. 

I’m really excited (and nervous) for EC to see Sophie. The last time she saw her in person was the day we picked her up from the states and Sophie was still a baby then! I know she’ll give me tons of valuable feedback and homework. One of the good/bad things about having a history with her is that I know she’s going to be completely honest and hold me accountable for myself and my goals. I’ll probably hear some things that will no doubt be accurate and necessary, but that I won’t like hearing. Pony is perfect, of course, and still an upper level dressage prospect, and months of being left to my own devices hasn’t messed anything up, right? 😁 Still, it’s exciting, because I trust her opinion and ability to give us reasonable homework to reach our goals. A little scary too because it  means this is really happening now!