WE'RE BACK!! (and we need lots of work)

We are officially back from the show. Izzy is even moved back to the barn from my friend's house. I'm not sure what I think about all that, but we'll get to it later.

First, the good news: Izzy traveled like a pro. She loaded quietly, was great on the trailer, and was a total doll at the show. I was worried about how she'd do with the stabling arrangement--12' x 12' panels with horses on three sides. I shouldn't have worried. She was great. Quiet, friendly, sweet.

I don't think I mentioned that there was a Karen O'Connor clinic on Friday and Saturday. (I'm really hitting all the big names this year... might see Ian Stark later on.) That was nothing short of incredible. She's tough but fun, fair, and incredibly knowledgeable. I'll definitely be cheering for her (from afar) at the WEG. Izzy and I didn't ride with Karen (because I'm poor and out of practice), but we did ride with Stephanie Goodman of Wasatch Sport Horses. She worked for Karen for several years, is an incredible rider, and is an awesome teacher. We are so, so lucky to have her anywhere close.

Here are some pictures:
This is Izzy in her new nylon sheet in her stall at her first-ever overnight show. She'd be looking at the camera, but supper is way more interesting.
Izzy and I having a lesson with Stephanie Goodman. I'm not quite sure what Steph is explaining, but it looks like Izzy wants me paying attention. (Notice that she's standing still. Yep, that's how relaxed the pony mare was.)
Ok, so box jump is kind of scary to me. As we discovered, it scared me a lot more than it scared her. Once I got that worked out, Izzy was totally fine jumping it.
Like that. YAY A JUMPING PICTURE!!!
Stephanie had us jump through this grid multiple times. It was great because it let Izzy work out her job while I figured out my position and aids. We weren't perfect at the end, but I learned a ton. (And I'm so setting a grid at home. We need practice and I'm going to learn to trot in if it kills me.)
I know. Those of you who know about jumping know this has problems. HOWEVER, I feel like I now have the tools to start making some progress. I've been realizing that as great as Cathy is for us with dressage, she's just too far away from jumping to help us with it in a substantial way. That was really disheartening until I realized that we also need oodles of dressage.

Stephanie talked about shortening my stirrups so I can actually use my body to stay with Izzy. She helped me understand my center of gravity and it's relation to my horse, so that I can raise and lower it to say in motion with her instead of getting behind and then throwing myself to keep up. I need to keep my body still to allow Izzy to use hers. I need to push my heels down and my feet ever so slightly forward to put me in a safer position over fences.

Also, I need to be more definite in telling Izzy what to do. Instead of letting her haphazardly negotiate the grid and then stretch afterwards, I need to give her directions, eg "Trot in, jump, canter ONE STRIDE, jump, canter out. I need to use my reins together to keep her from pushing out one shoulder. I need to give her a steady contact to go into and not worry about where her head is. I need to carry my hands up and my chin up to be more effective and I need to worry more about her hind legs than her nose.

See? Definitely enough to work on for at least a month.
We'll finish with a picture of Irie and his mom in their lesson. Who knew the pony could fly?

PS If you're on facebook, I have more photos here.

Same Bat Time, Same Bat Channel

Today we were scheduled to be picked up by Irie and his mom and go on a nice, long trail ride in the nearby foothills. It was supposed to be fabulous.

As you may have figured out by now, it also didn't happen.

I had the morning chores done on time. The trailer pulled in on time. I loaded my tack into the tack room, then went and got my pony. I didn't anticipate trouble, since she's been great lately and she's always been fine in the trailer. I led her up to it, and she flat-out refused to go in.

Huh. Unusual.

Fortunately, all it takes to get her in is Irie's mom waving a lead rope at her from about 15 feet away. Ok. We're in. Izzy's supposed to be in the middle stall, as usual, because she's the biggest. I started to tie her to the thingy and all of a sudden, she just has a cow. She's pawing and throwing herself around and pinning her ears and I know she's going to go right over the top of me, so I turn her around and she takes a flying leap out of the trailer.

Time to reconsider.

I turned Izzy out in the arena to run around and get anything out that she needed out. She did run for a while, so maybe that was a problem. While she ran, I took the time to gather myself so I wasn't angry with her or anticipating failure or misbehavior.

Ok... take two.

We unloaded Irie to minimize the distractions for my stupid cow pony. I walked Izzy in. She was ok. I turned her around to face out and halted her. She was impatient, but we made it out without jumping. I walked her in again. She was fine. I tied her up. She was fine. I closed the divider. Still fine. I got off the trailer thinking, "Ok, we'll just let her stand for a minute and then load up Irie and go."

Ha. In my dreams.

As soon as I stepped off the trailer, she pretty much exploded. She started pawing, kicking, and throwing herself around and generally acting crazy.

Irie's mom and I stop to evaluate. First off, I can not unload her now. With the fir that she's throwing, especially in an enclosed area, that would be just plain dangerous. Second off, this is a horse who has trailered plenty of times before in that exact same stall in the exact same trailer. Nothing is different. Thirdly, it's a steel trailer with triple wall construction and Irie's mom is all about letting horses just work things out on their own.

Thank god for her. I think she would have been totally justified in just letting my unload my psycho mare and going trail riding with someone calmer. That wouldn't have helped Izzy, but Izzy isn't really her problem.

Instead of taking the easy way out, we decided just to let Izzy cope. We closed the trailer door so if she went down, she couldn't roll out and hurt herself, and then we waited. We stood by the trailer and caught up on things we had wanted to talk about. We commented on Izzy's recent psychosis. We put on a good show of ignoring her. Every once in a while she would stand quietly, and then I'd go feed her some weeds or something.

She seemed ok with the trailer, but every time Irie looked at her, she started going nuts again. Weird.

Finally, she quieted down for about 5 minutes. I walked to the back of the trailer to unload her. When I opened the door and looked at her, the whole fit started again. She wanted out, now, and she didn't want to wait. I thought, "No way am I getting near Ms. Psycho." I left the door open and walked back to Irie's mom. Finally, we decided to give up on the trail ride. I closed the trailer door, leaving Izzy inside, and tacked up Cassie instead.

We had a fun time riding around the arena and jumping little jumps. Izzy finally settled down, more or less. By the time we were down, she was pretty quiet. I put Cassie away and opened the trailer door before Irie came back. Izzy nickered at me. She was finally standing quietly. I got her out of the trailer and took her to the round pen.

I was thinking about a section out of a Mark Rashid book about horses dealing with trauma of any sort. Sometimes, they just need to run. If that's what Izzy needed after being in the trailer, that was fine with me. She rolled in the deep sand, then spent a while running and trotting around. I left her alone to work it out.

After about 15 minutes, she seemed to settle down. I walked towards her. She nickered at me. She was as quiet and sweet as could be on the way back to her pen.

Time expended: 2.5 hours. Injuries received: 0. Pony brains reclaimed: 1.

Mon dieu! C'est stupide!

Izzy and I had another jumping day. I got Irie's mom to help me set a barrel jump, and off we went.

Izzy warmed up really well. We had to do a little work with halting and backing to remind her that going forward did not mean hollow and run, but then she softened and listened nicely. She's getting more comfortable in the new arena, so she's not nearly as forward as she was yesterday. However, we did get some nice work on galloping and coming back in and she seems to do it pretty well. With her big stride and her speed, gallop is amazing to ride.

Then we jumped. She warmed up really well over the crossrail and then we headed for the barrels. (I had let her look at them earlier.) She came in, cantered a stride or two out, then launched herself over the jump. I managed to grab mane and stay on. As she cantered away, I petted her and told her what a good girl she was. We did the same thing again, with her launching and me grabbing mane, and then...

Nothing. We'd come in and stop. I'd make her stand in front of the jump, and then try again. Still nothing. I remembered what Cathy said about not making it scary and not making a fuss, so I didn't get after her. Irie's mom was there, but she's not a real experienced jumper, so while she pointed out that IZzy was backing off way in front of the fence, she didn't know how to fix it. Hm... Izzy is normally pretty bold and she had already jumped it twice. She wasn't off, she wasn't in pain, and she wasn't really in a mood, so I knew the problem had to be me, but I didn't know how to fix it. I also didn't want to quit without jumping it again.

Irie's mom was riding a jumping schoolmaster, so she gave us a lead over it. Izzy went forward pretty boldly, but then tried to rush the fence. She ignored my body half halt so I went to my hands... and got in her face... and she stopped... Oh. I had Irie's mom give us another lead, determined not to get in Izzy's face this time. Unfortunately, Mr. Schoolmaster decided to piddle over the jumps, so I had to pull Izzy out (well in advance) to avoid running over the top of him.

We circled around at the canter. I haven't cantered many jumps with Izzy because that means the jumps come up faster and I don't want to scare her. (Also, if she threw in a sliding stop, the canter would be harder to ride. Irrational, but true.) This time, I determined to let her do what she wanted and I would just sit still. We cantered in. Then she trotted. Then she cantered. I put my leg on and stayed in halt seat, determined to be out of her face.

She took one massive leap and we were over and galloping away.

That was easy.

Lesson learned: when the mare wants to canter, let her canter, you nitwit. They're her legs. She'll take care of them.

As I was driving away, I realized that a Pippa Funnell book I read about training young horses discussed this phenomenon. She mentioned what a challenge it is to jump younger horses because they don't have the strength for a slow collected canter, so they have to go more forward than you're comfortable with.

And at the core of this problem appears to be my confidence issues. If I trusted Izzy more, I probably could have avoided five refusals this morning. Live and learn.

Trail Ride!!

Yep. Irie's mom brought out balloons. This one is shiny and plays a song when it makes contact with anything. Izzy quickly overcame her fear of it when it was tied above her breakfast. She even played with it a little bit. I'd say it needs more work, but it's definitely a good start.

Also, Irie's mom just got her fancy Ansur KonKlusion. It's way newer and nicer than mine and she loves it very much. Yeah... I'm super jealous. I'm thrilled that we were able to get a jumping saddle at all, but someday, I want a pretty, new-ish one. Still, hers has way bigger knee blocks and some thigh blocks. I keep telling myself that I wouldn't like that. I haven't sat in it because I'm not allowing myself to like it. I can't afford to.
Note: This is not our trailer in the picture. This is the trailhead we went to today. It's in the foothills just outside of Boise and it's pretty cool. The hills are great for the horses. They develop muscles going up and down them and they learn where to put their feet and how to balance themselves. Also, it's pretty awesome.

Izzy did ok for her first time out this year. She definitely remembered some of the stuff she learned last year (like about not running down hills, thank god). She also forgot some things, like how this is fun. We were up on top of a ridge and came across a mud puddle. Irie's mom was making him go through it, so we waited for her. I didn't bother trying to get Izzy through it; there was lots of space to go around and I wasn't ready for a fight the first time out. Izzy had a mini meltdown because she didn't want to stand still. I made her walk away from Irie, and that was pretty terrifying too. Fortunately, we resolved the problem by Irie going through the puddle and rejoining us.

The trail seemed to be going on forever, so we found a short cut back (on an actual trail; it's ok). It went down a pretty steep hill and Izzy didn't think she could do it. I'd try to ask her to go down and she'd just freeze up. Finally, she realized that Irie and his mom were doing cutbacks across the hill, which is what I was asking her to do. Oh. She can do that. So we did.

My favorite moment had to be when a whole group (covey?) of sage grouse EXPLODED under neath Irie and directly in front of Izzy. He bolted forward, but Izzy just froze up. She's really not a spooker. I like that about her.

We met a fellow eventer out exercising her horse, which was fun . I'll have to watch for her at shows (and maybe look her up on facebook--does that seem creepy?). We stuck to walking this time out because Izzy was on edge and I didn't want to tempt fate. Next time we'll go out the sandy way and do some trot and canter. It should be awesome.
Faithful trail buddies. Only they can't stand next to each other because Izzy tries to kick him.

Last year, Izzy was fine on trails as long as I just stuck her nose in Irie's tail. Today, I guess she thought he was walking too slowly, because she kept trying to nip his bum as he went along. Poor pony boy. I managed to stop her most of the time...
A close up of Izzy pretending to be a trail horse. The eventer lady thought Izzy was a thoroughbred. Yay! (I think.) She looked super cute with her bridle (minus a cavesson) on over the top of her rope halter. I'll have to get a picture of the whole getup next time.

All in all, a very good day.

Jumping Pony Strikes Again! (and random pictures)

We had another lesson this morning. When I set jumps, I put a (scary) white plank in one of the fences and Irie's mom, who was helping, left the ground poles out a little far, so it was like a midget oxer.

Needless to say, Izzy refused. In yet another example of why I love Cathy, she had us walk up to it and stand there, to get Izzy relaxed. Then we trotted in again. As instructed, I was supportive, but not pushy. I wasn't going to force Izzy to jump; I just wanted her to go to it. And she did; removing the pressure made her much happier. The third time we trotted in and Izzy LEAPED over the scary white plank. It was only about 18" off the ground, but we made at least 2'6" over it just to be sure.

After that, the plank was fine.

On a slightly different note, here are some pictures from the show last Friday. This is Cathy and her mare Shasha warming up for their class.
I don't know who this is, but I'd never seen a Multibridle in person before. Very interesting.
Cathy and Shasha, 2nd Level Test 4. As you can tell, it was a schooling show and it was cold, so we weren't super formal.
Irie the Halfie and his mom. You can say it. A Halfie in dressage tack is the cutest thing ever.

After my lesson this morning, Irie's mom and I played with our horses and scary things.
Izzy isn't scared of ponchos.
Irie isn't too sure about balloons.
Neither is Izzy.
Umbrellas are nice.
Aww. Sweet pony.
Irie wears the poncho.
Irie does the tissue paper.
Izzy has more pizazz with tissue paper.
And Izzy takes a poncho high fashion. You wish you could wear it this well. (Also doubles as a super hero cape).

A Glimmer of Hope

The vaunted trail ride was today. Izzy was wonderful. We went with Star, a cute paint who wouldn't be fazed if a train came out of no where and was headed straight for him. He'd just calmly step out of the way. Also along was Iree, a darling little Haflinger pony who apparently doesn't mind when mares bounce off his rear end. Needless to say, their respective riders accompanied us.

I was pretty happy with how Izzy did. She had never seen the foothills before to my knowledge, but while she was a little looky, she didn't get too worried. She was a bit strong (more on this later), but never bucked or spooked or did anything untoward. Because she's never lived in the mountains, her technique was kind of lacking. She thought it was just of good of an idea to trot down a steep hill as to sit back and walk. Fortunately, I just stuck her nose in Iree's tail, and we'd bounce off him all the way down. If I ever become a full time trail rider, I'm totally getting a bombproof gelding like the two boys we went with.

She was perhaps not surprisingly much more forward than she had been in the past few days. In one flat sandy spot, we all cantered. Izzy was trailing a little bit at that point, so she kicked her speed up a notch and we almost blew through the calm boys. That reassures me as to her ability to one day do cross country. I certainly didn't want to have to force every stride around a course, and today she showed that there is a forward gear. Good.

So... I don't know where that leaves us. She was forward today. I've at least temporarily ruled out ulcers because she doesn't get too upset about anything (feeding time or otherwise) and she hasn't really exhibited behavior change in anything other than not wanting to go forward under saddle. She also lives out 24.7 with a friend, so I think she's ok. She does go forward nicely on a lunge line and, obviously, on trails. There could be a chiropractic type problem that I aggravate by riding her. She could be cranky about the weather, since it's been dramatically colder the past few days. She was good today and she had her blanket on last night. Are the two related? I don't know.

Any other ideas?

I'm thinking she'll get tomorrow off, since the trail was pretty hilly and she's not used to that sort of exercise. Besides, I'm teaching a lesson and letting someone else try my saddle. It will be a full day.