Super Spin

Will hopefully keep this brief, but those of you who are used to reading my novel-length posts will know that this is rarely the case!

I was overjoyed with my girly yesterday, she had been in the field since Wednesday as I was in Ireland. The Mammy had been to check on her and see that she was alive, in fact i got a very entertaining message on saturday saying that The Mammy had visited the field and that they'd been given hay. Kika still came over to say hello (probably helped that The Mammny had carrots to increase her appeal ;-) ), however Kika did not come alone, she had a lovely hay hat on her head. Watching her for a bit afterwards my mother understood why, the silly horse did not seem content with just eating the hay infront of her like her field companions...no she insisted on sticking her head right into the bale and pulling it back up tossing hay about the place and making herself a hat. I have a strange horse, showed my friend the text message and she fell about the place laughing...choking something out about like horse-like owner, but i don't know what she could be referring to! *whistles* I am completly normal ;-)

Anyway sorry, gone completely off-track again (perhaps this i why my posts get so long! I can't stick to my story! *blushing* )

So basically besides being lunged last Wednesday evening, Kika had done nothing since i last rode her last Tuesday where we'd worked on walk-trot-halt. (As an aside I've a lot of work to do on her walk - she's lazy - and halt wherein she is inclined to stretch her neck out as we halt, pfft! not what I am aiming for horse, ;-) )
However kitted in my new polka dot blue and brown socks, chocolate jodhs and nice new blue polo shirt looking all phwoar (if i may say so - Hah! Kidding) I rocked up to the yard all set to go for a spin and see if we could implement some of the flatwork tips i'd witnessed at the George Morris Masterclass on Saturday.
As is now the norm, i popped herself into the walker for 25minutes as mentioned above I have a lot of work to do with her to improve her walk under saddle so i am currently taking the easy option to get her warm up started in the walker! This spin was also D-Day for the saddle, it was make or break time, it was the spin that was to decide whether I was going to keep this one or get a new one from the saddle fitter who is kindly trying to sell the jumping saddle i bought back in October.

My good friend L was schooling her own horse (O), then 'coaching' another friend, N with her mare A over the same fences and then L was going to school C, a lovely mare she rides for another one of the liveries at our barn (R). I asked if i could squeeze in some flatwork between her coaching and second schooling session - saying that i'd be finished before she was ready to jump as she had to prepare her second ride.
Got up to the arena with the plan of working GM's trot 6-8 strides, walk 2-3 strides into our schooling session. Depending on how K was behaving i was going to leave the decision to canter to see how we got on with the "easier" paces first (read: more controlled), keeping in mind K had done nothing since Wednesday.

Well as usual i needn't have worried!
She was an absolute star, working correctly, calmy and most improtantly controlled!! She did everything i asked of her, including working on some bending as we worked the long sides of the arena in walk and trot. We also cantered and got lovely smooth and controlled circles, no attempting to tank off or speeding up in her canter, and the best of all no bouncing of the front legs mini-rear style canters neither! *dance*

We worked on my GM knicked trot-walk/walk-trot exercise, we even got a bit of counter canter, but that was not due to my asking as we haven't progressed that far yet (read: I haven't progressed that far yet - have yet to learn how to ask for a flying change! *Serious-beetroot-blushing* ). But she did strike off on the wrong lead so we got a bit of sneaky un-requested counter canter.

I was so happy with her, deffinitely back on the I-Love-My-Horse bandwagon!

The masseuse-homeopathy lady is coming to see her this evening to make sure all is in good nick, depending on what needs tweaking she may not be able to be ridden for the next few days - so i am even more happy now that yesterdays session was so good! Silver lineing to all this, the arena we were working in had the cross-poles set up for L's schooling and for the first time in almost a year i was tempted to have a pop!!!
Perhaps the weekend watching show jumping at the RDS had an effect, well that combined with K being so good of late...so watch this space, we may be leaving the ground again in the not too distant future! :)

PS: On the saddle front, I don't think I am going to keep this one as the seat is very hard and I've a bony bum! But not just that, it is quite heavy compared to my previous saddles, the abovementioned friend N exitedly had a look at it shortly after i got it and said it was a very old make which to my mind would explain the weight of it. She was also watching us for a bit yesterday and said that it moves about on her back a lot under me when we are working. So methinks going for a newer model (other tack shop guy also sells Stubben's) and one that can be altered to suit her and me as close to 100% as any saddle can be on a horse is the right option for us! So going to ring teh Saddle Fitter who has lent me this saddle today to tell him that I won't be keeping it and that I'll bring it back to him at the weekend (can't get to him before then) and will also ring other tack shop and see when he can come to fit her for a new one.
Exciting times, but now that things are going well I'd rather have this saddle business sorted and get back to doing what I brought her here for...riding!

PPS: Gargh, as usually i have waffle don for a lot longer than i had intended...I swear this was supposed to be a short post! *blushing*
Will see if i can rope someone into tagging along to play phographer/videographer next time I'm going to ride as a reward to those diligent readers with some pictures