Exciting Times

Car got fixed yesterday and I was off on an adventure! Which is to say, I was having a very busy Wednesday, but the ever-lovely Gingham shipped me a jumping saddle to try and forget what was supposed to do, we were going to try it.

As I was driving up to the barn, the BO stopped me with some news about the little hussy.

Yes, this hussy. The one with the messy morning after forelock who's making her sexy face.

Apparently, she was still in a flaming heat on Tuesday and persuaded the gelding in her field that he was a stud... with predictable results...

Sigh. They were going at it in the field along the road, providing the neighbors with lots of entertainment.

Izzy is now on a double dose of Mare Magic for the foreseeable future. We'll see how it goes.

Anyways. Saddle. It's an Ainsley, like the one that totally ruined me. It's wider, but I was trying not to get my hopes up too high in case it didn't work out.

Hm. Look at it. Hm.... I know it looks very similar to the one we tried before with no success, but it's ever so slight different.

You might even say it sits a little low in front, which would be a problem if someone's mare didn't WANT her saddle that way.

I was intruiged. I pulled out our old trusting front-lift foam pad, but it was a little too small for the saddle and I thought lifted it just a hair too much.

Fortunately, we now have plan B. I grabbed the thinline pad which I have 1 front shim in and that goes beautifully with our dressage saddle, VOILA!! it looks great.

Please pardon my dusty saddle pad that doesn't fit the saddle. :-/

As you can see, I girthed it up without incident. Izzy didn't make nasty faces and I didn't feel the need to obsess about anything. I had spinal clearance all the way through and everything looked to be sitting right.

Unfortunately, due to a certain incident of a gelding mounting Izzy, her back was a bit sore, so I didn't want to ride her. (Note: she has apparently ovulated and come out of heat, since we escaped the vast gallons of pee she was dumping for all to see before.)

I just lunged her in the round pen to see what we had.

As you can see, she's going along happily, looking around. Her ears aren't locked on the saddle and she isn't making grumpy faces.

Canter is relaxed and comfortable.

This one is a little harder to see in this size, but look how well she's using her shoulders and neck... I had trouble keeping her hind quarters engaged and lunging and taking pictures, so this maybe isn't the best sampling.

Yeah. She was lovely. It was great. I'm going out this afternoon to ride and check on it. Cross your gingers for us. If all goes well, I'll be selling my Collegiate and buying this lovely thing.

Sure is a good thing I took pictures of it last time a cleaned it, huh?