Survived!

I was braver last night then I thought I would be after only two spins on Sunday and Monday... The Guru was due to be about but we hadn't arranged for a lesson or anything so I was just going to work away on my own! I know I have been banging on about wanting to only ride supervised, but I also don't want to be making a nuissance of myself since The Guru voluntarily helps me out, so don't want to be always relying on her to ride. I needs to be able to work on my own even if Kika and I work better under supervision!
It was no Prix St George or anything but I was happy with some of our work - what can i say when it comes to myself and my capabilities I can be quite the pessimist - but i figure this is already blatantly obvious from previous posts.
So started off by lungeing Miss Kika and all went well even if she wasn't really lengthening her stride like i would have liked, she still did all her transitions as requested and I did manage to get fits of nice lunge work. Have to say her ADD was acting up and keeping her concentrated on what I was asking was a bit of a no-go yesterday evening.
Just as I was getting up a fellow livery asked if it'd be ok for her to lunge her young horse while i rode - which of course I didn't object to, Kika does go better when there are other horses in the arena with her (just not too many, or she tries to keep tabs on them all and twists herself into knots!   )
Only thing i was slightly wary of is that the young horse would be all sorts of silly on the lunge and drive Kika  bananas, as it really doesn't take much for Kika's messing side to re-surface and take the mick...Not really what I was hoping for when trying to ride on my own again. But as usual when i over-think things i needn't have worried.
Typically Kika was worse behaved when on her own in the arena (probably due to the fact I was anticipating the other livery's arrival and not giving Kika my full attention) then when the younger horse was lungeing in the lower half of the arena.
Try as i might i couldn't get a nice calm feeling trot out of her, and her head was up in front of me making contributing to the choppy short strides in trot - so much for working on that in the two previous rides and on the lunge! Things improved when the equine company arrived and while far from perfect I managed to get her to lengthen her stride and not be so uptight in her shoulders/neck area. As I said still nowhere near Grand Prix, but better then when we started. I think had i not been distracted myself and anticipating the impending arrival of abovementioned young horse I'd have been better able to settle her on my own.

While the other livery was lungeing we worked on a circle in the upper half of the arena. I even braved some cantering! Got my @$$ out of the saddle and worked as The Guru had me doing earlier in the week. She settled better after this in fact, and when the lungeing livery departed again I had a much happier in her work Kika and we were able to work in some seprentines with a volts as we hit the track - although the volts were rather higgeldy-piggeldy and not perfect, but not once we did we run into a disagreement!
Phew!
We also incorperated some calm cantering using the whole arena and circling at either end, with me still off her back.
Have a lady coming this evening to give her the once over and hope to contact the saddler also to get him to come and check the saddle as it was August when i bought it and figure a bit of maintenace probably won't go astray - considering how uppidy Kika get's about her back!

I should prbably also try and get some new photos to smarten up the blog...Might try and get on to that at the weekend. It will depend on what masseuse says this evening as to how much work she'll have to do on Kika and whether or not she'll be getting a few more days rest to recover. Who knows whether photo ops will present themselves or not
Shall hopefully update again sooner ratehr than later with news after Kika's visit this evening!
Have a great weekend all!