Hello everybodies, how are you? I am super-fantastic. I am not being big headed, Cyd told me so. I was SO GOOD today, you would think I was a real grown up pony. On our whole pony ride (about three hours) Cyd never had to get off me, not once. This has never happened on our solo pony rides, we always find something for her to get off me for. Today I wore my new martingale from Aunt-E at Hooves'N'Whiskers. Cyd could have put it on me for the last two pony rides, but for various reasons it didn't happen. Today she forgot the reins with the rings on, so drove home to fetch them after me not behaving appropriately yesterday. This is me in my new gear:
It is slidey kind, so you don't compromise your steering, and bad-at-stopping ponies can be one-rein-stopped if need be. I don't need that, and Cyd doesn't like using one-rein stops, but slidey is still a good option. We like it. I started to do my head tossing when I was a bit excited, and got confused cos the martingale made me stop putting my head in the sky. I dropped it low, then slowly slowly stretched my head up to see how far I could go. Cyd laughed at me for being silly, then I put my head back where it should be and off we went. I did this a few more times, but it definitely made a good impression on my head-shaking and giraffing from yesterday.
Our first challenge today was getting me through some puddles. Cyd knew this might be a problem, cos for me hating puddles. The first one wasn't so big as she thought it might be - usually after rain it covers the whole trail. She was pleased to see there was a two foot gap to one side, so I could go around it. I totally surprised her by walking right up to the puddle itself, put my nose in and wiggled it in the muds, did some splashing, and walked right THROUGH the puddle. She gave me lots of pats and told me how amazing I was, and off we went to my next puddle. I only went straight up to that one, too! I didn't go through, this one was much deeper, and there was more trail than puddle anyway, but I went to check it out without being encouraged, totally loose rein, could go where I please.
We're practicing me stopping for snacks ready for when I do enduring. I'm really good at stopping for snacks, but I think I get to choose when, and Cyd thinks she gets to choose when. Today we practiced stopping at mutually appropriate places where it's delicious but I don't snatch the reins to get there cos that is RUDE (or so I'm told). The next bit of trail was actually kinda hard, sometimes Cyd had to lie flat on my neck to get under stuff, and we had to push through a bush where I nearly got stuck but didn't, and I pushed a fallen tree out of the way, and it was slippery but Cyd gave me my head cos I was behaving and told me to figure it out and I did. I put my head down, and stepped super carefully, and didn't get scared if I slipped a little bit, and remembered to leave Cyd's knees room around the trees cos she sticks out farther than I do. We had to go over some stuff too, and I didn't hesitate, or get confused as to the best place to go over. It was really dark in there so we didn't take pictures, plus Cyd had to do concentrating and we know how hard that is for her. Eventually we were back in the open. I had to go over more waters on the ground, but I did really good, just needed a little boomp boomp every now and again as a reminder that I can look at stuff, but not hang out for no reason. Once it was dry we practiced my trotting, and I did a polite big trot like grown ups do. I nearly got to 10mph, which is really quite fast, and it was super smooth and not too hard for me. We practiced switching between slow trot and fast trot, and how to appropriately adjust our speed for bumpy grounds. I was pretty happy when it got to snack time!
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| Snack |
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| Itch |
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| Yawn |
We had a very uneventful ride back to my main loop, except for another tree crossing. It wasn't eventful, but I did really good considering it covered my whole trail, and was the fluffy kind with loads of branches. We went up the big rocky hill. I was doing so good today, Cyd didn't want to jinx us with trying to go across my ditch. I should really wear my booties to go up here, and usually if it's part of our ride we go down so Cyd can get off and lead me, but we went on the side where it's softer. No issues going past my puddles again, I drank from the deep one, and chose to go through rather than around the other one again. We were doing trottings practice when suddenly out of nowhere.... BIRD! Well, I can't be amazing all the time, right? It wasn't even a big bird, but I did spooking jumps to the left, right into a pampas grass bush thing. That spooked me again, so we flew back to the right. I didn't know what to do with myself, so I just jumped in the sky. Cyd can officially report that my new saddle is pretty spook proof, she didn't come close to falling off me, though the spook didn't feel super comfy on her back. We took a minute for me to breathe, and then went on our way to finish our pony ride. I was very well behaved the rest of the time, and barely did stopping in the spot I usually do stopping on the way home. (Cyd took me to the road so I couldn't get on the grass - if I get on the grass I act up. But then a car came way super fast and we had to skedaddle out the way onto the grass, but a little bit of naughtiness is better than any deadness so s'ok.)
All in all a very successful pony ride. Tomorrow I get a day off and a thorough grooming and some pony massage :)
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