Busy Bee

I have been a bad horse-momma again and didn't manage to take advantage of having my sister visit to help me gather media so that I can try to start correcting my many faults.
Oh well c'est la view & sometimes that is just the way the cookie crumbles.

The welcoming committee Monday evening

I did get to the yard Monday evening & had an enlightening spin on Kika. The new treadmill i posted a pic of a few posts back is positioned beside my fav arena to ride K in. So we both got first hand exposure to the noise of it Monday evening; as two horses used it while we were in the ring. Thankfully the first person came to the arena door to alert me to the fact she was going to introduce her horse to the treadmill, so I hopped off Kika to deal with any fall out from the ground and hand-walked her to get an idea of what might occur ;-)

"Can I haz treat?"
Asks Kika as i hand a bribe to my sister

She loves to surprise me and although a little worried, she gave the noise a good hairy eyeball but she never tried to get away from me; so i was able to hop back up and do some nice if distracted work on a 20 meter circle at the opposite end of the arena to the commotion. She hadn't been particularly concentrated prior to the hoopla so it was pretty much business as usual with a distracted Kika.

Treat?!

My sister was with me as she'd hoped to get a spin on Miss K and she did get up to walk her around to cool down, but Kika was too distracted for me to be comfortable letting anyone else ride her. Not that I think myself a particularly good rider in any shape or form, but after all this time i feel I know her and can get through to her when things start to go pear shaped.

TREATZ!!!!!

It was quite warm and her winter coat is starting to come in, so combine those facts with the low stress level surrounding our spin made for a rather sweatier horse than I wanted to turnout with temps dropping now at night. So K got extra spoiled by spending some time under the heat lamps of the solarium - hence the photos accompanying this post & yes I spoil my horses rotten; ref name of the blog *pampered ponies* ☺

Gratuitous Nancy shot from Sunday
so she doesn't feel left out

I sadly didn't have enough time to ride Nancy on Monday, but she had been so good for the two extra riders she'd had on Sunday; that Monday off for her was no big deal. Due to some unforeseen dinner plans with an old friend Tuesday evening, a birthday dinner/last supper for my sis before she went to Edinburgh on Wednesday evening & a treat for my mam from me this evening of a cinema outing has meant that I haven't seen my beloved ponies since Monday.

She knows where the treats really come from
 - the suck up

Hopefully I can right this tomorrow and over the weekend; although to be fair I reckon they are none to sad when I don't show up to harass them with tack lolz

Mostly Mute Monday

My baby sister and her friend came to the barn yesterday so I got some snaps of me on the girls and they both got a spin in on Nancy.

Kika looking good, eurgh -
me leaning = bad & again my hands grrrr!

I have poker arms but Nancy is looking good

Yikes - you could drive a bus through my hands -
 I really didn't realise I had them so far apart!

Nancy be stridin'

Not too shabby N, pity about the jockey

Little sister playing with Nancy & the hose, isn't N so patient?!

Nancy minding my baby sister

Missing Motivation

My apologies for the blog silence this week, but for some reason my motivation to ride took a serious nosedive and I'm not sure why. I guess I feel a little stuck and don't feel like I'm improving which is totally ridiculous. Of course I can't improve if i don't ride! /end rant at self for stupidity.

Watching over me as i had a sit down

I am hoping I can organise a week off work in either October or November (more likely) for lesson bootcamp if the new trainer can take me for two lessons a day & ride each girl once with tuition for a whole week...we'll a working week, so 5 days.

In the mean time I hope to be able to schedule a lesson every two weeks so that I (a) have something to look forward to & (b) have something to work on & (c) someone to hold me accountable.

My extra curricular activities

I only got back into the saddle Friday evening after Mondays adventures and rode Nancy last night. We worked on walk & trot, but i think i only managed to confuse and annoy her as she curled in on herself - so i worked hard today not to harass her and was rewarded with no curling & a fab spin on a lovely adjustable pony. Now if only I knew what exactly it is that I am doing wrong & what i did differently today - maybe I could get somewhere more conducive to riding better.

Little Miss Innocent swears she doesn't know where scabs on her neck came from ...
 I knew all along, she is such a Scallywag with her patented butter-wouldn't-melt look

Kika and i got reacquainted saddle wise today and she was super. All three of us were well sweaty after our adventures so both girls got hosed off and by consequence i got nicely (*sarcasm*) refreshed also. Turned them both out and snapped the photos accompanying this post as i got to work on my equine extra curricular activity ;-)
My "baby" sister is back until Wednesday so hopefully we can coordinate a couple of outings so she can get some media of me in the tack so that I can see what other nasty habits i need to work on ☺

Worry Warts

Sorry no photos from today, just some leftover field/grazing ones from Saturday. Yep I'm a bad pony mama for not taking new photos today.

Kika stepped out of frame just as i snapped the pic

A section of the main road i walk up & cross to get to the barn has been closed for works. So all the traffic is being diverted down the street that I have to lead the horses along to get them to the yard - now normally my girls don't mind cars passing them...we'll unless it's Kika's kryptonite, a big rattling construction truck or Nancy's motorbikes - one of the few things that upsets her. However today with the day off (and not realising about the roadworks till I had to walk around them myself on the way to the stable) i was considerably earlier riding then I normally would be on a week day - this meant bringing in the horses; thankfully one by one; during the busy after-work window of time.

Both girls were as nervy as I've ever led them along the stretch of road as drivers are idiots who speed up to overtake the horses on the footpath!! Morons who can't or won't heed my hand waving to slow down while simultaneously trying to keep the animal beside me calm. I've rarely seen poor Nancy that distraught - my fault for the time of day she was coming in. I WON'T be making that mistake again poor pet.

In saying all that I still got two lovely spins in after some grooming & bribing with cookies to relax - not that either of them needed much bribing, yet neither refused the treats either #pamperedponies. 

Nancy was very good sharing the main arena with 3 to 4 others, including a girl lessoning - i always find it awkward to know where the lessonee is going to go next as they are concentrating on listening to the trainer through a headset - so i have no idea what instructions are being relayed.

We struggled again with our bad side canter strike off the second time, my fault for not helping her bend to the inside. And again she tried to evade walk work by curling in on herself - darn her friesian headset. I shall work on helping her relax and let go of the tension in her neck - however relaxing the reins to her made little difference as it wasn't my holding the reins that was curling her in so when I let them out to her her nose stayed near her chest...I need to work more with my legs and seat i think without her moving up to trot work.

Kika was lucky & although a little flighty coming in, she had a lot less traffic to deal with than little Nancy. She also had no arena traffic to deal with as we had the ring to ourselves. We actually got some pretty nice work if i say so myself. Nothing spectacular by any means, but no tantrums, tears or tension - so i was super happy considering she has done so little this summer and was only lunged on Saturday with a quick bareback stroll to cool her out.

I got tagged to do the ice bucket challenge yesterday & it poured on and off for the day so I left the girlies alone knowing I had today to play with them. I'm hoping to go back over my August goals post & see where I'm at with tomorrow's spins, all things considered today I didn't ask too many questions so I'll see tomorrow where we are with the tasks I set myself. 

Gosh sorry!

This is after getting longer than I thought it would be considering I am not actually saying much...silly word vomit!

*blush*