The title of this post sounds rather grim, when really I'm feeling anything but :) I had a GREAT lesson today on the lunge line, and holy mother of God am I sore. I'm not talking any easy ol' lunge lesson, I'm talking 50 minutes of nearly constant WTC work in the dressage saddle, sans stirrups. The title of my post of course refers to my recent decision to take the stirrups off of my dressage saddle indefinitely. To kick off this time of torture, I texted G a few days ago and her actual response was, "sure, I'll torture you." Not only was today the warmest day we've had this year, but the weather has been so crazy that it went from low 30s early last week to 85 today... not enough time for my body to adjust and Limerick used it as an excuse to be lazier than usual!
However, the warm weather makes me soooooo happy. Limerick is now shedding his wooly mammoth coat, it's warm enough to hose him off after a ride if necessary, and I can now ride until 8:00 if I feel like it :) I don't have much else to update other than we have another lesson on Saturday with S! I've been riding consistently and had a great conditioning ride on Monday, involving an hour or so of work out in the expansive fields behind the barn. Limerick was once again lazy, but we cantered and cantered and cantered around the uneven terrain, which allowed me to practice slightly leaning back as we went downhill, something that used to terrify me. I'll update after my lesson and will hopefully have some videos or pictures to share, as my parents and sister are coming to visit/watch!
Here are the videos from today (if you only have time to watch one, watch the last one... you'll see why):
IT'S HERE!!! My dressage saddle finally came in today and it's awesome :) It seems to fit Limerick well and is very comfy. I didn't get to have an extensive ride in it because I had a jump lesson beforehand, but I think it might just work for us! Here are some pictures of it on Limerick's back, please let me know what you think:
Like I said, I also had a jump lesson with S at Gail's farm. I didn't know what to expect going in because last time we lessoned there, Limerick was crazy. That was in our reindeer phase where his back was really bothering him, but I had yet to figure out what the heck was going on. Needless to say, he was 100x better today and quite the gentleman :) We started out with a warm-up of a small cross rail, which was quickly moved up to a 2-ish foot vertical, which we trotted back and forth over. He was good, so we upped the ante and slowly increased to a full-blown course.
He was awesome, even with little kids screaming at the neighbor's house and dogs running around. Combine that with G's rather ghetto jumps, and he was practically a saint. No refusals or run outs, the worst he did was bring back the reindeer move, which I got hilarious video of this time!! If you watch nothing else, please at least watch Limerick's sweet reindeer skillz, they are too funny. He whipped them out for a rather innocuous little white vertical, which just so happened to have a horse eating flower box underneath, clearly worthy of clearing by three extra feet (he easily jumped the height of the standards). Today was my first time riding and experiencing the reindeer for myself, and I actually laughed out loud at how it feels...
Well, at least we know the boy can jump...
LOL
Other than that absurdity, the lesson was luckily uneventful. He did do some serious peaking at some of the other scarier jumps (black barrels, green gate, blue vertical), but he was never dirty and jumped everything, even with some less than decisive riding on my part. What a good guy!!
Sorry for the lack of posts this week, I've been drowning in homework and general college-life busyness :( Monday I had a Genetics test and Wednesday was Organic chemistry...... SUCKS. I finally got both of those behind me right in time for Limerick to get adjusted on Wednesday (boo). So, poor pony isn't rideable until tomorrow, just in time for me to go home, which means no riding until Sunday at the earliest. However, I decided to update because I have some exciting news. This pretty is currently on its way to me!!!!!!!!!!!!
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I finally found a used County that I reallllllyyyyyyyy hope will work for us! It should get here no later than Monday, and I'll have it on trial for a week, during which time my County rep will come out to evaluate and hopefully reflock :) Since I'm going home this weekend, I'm going to ride Huer in Hillary's new dressage saddle, which coincidentally is very similar to mine. YAY for seeing Hillary, Hue, my family, dogs, and Rue <3
