Memory Lane Monday

Well sort of, the photos decorating this post will be the "memories" from July 2013 (I'm not sure I shared them here...apologies if you have already seen them); my verbal vomit will be from today - apologies in advance....but here's a photo to start us off on the right foot.

Kika was lucky today and got a schooling spin from the Guru before I arrived. L said she was very good in the newly resurfaced arena; which is deep & most people are avoiding for the moment. Which I am secretly delighted about as it's the arena with a full wall of mirrors and is usually the busiest. So I'm thrilled people are shunning it & I get to play in there to my hearts content - plus it keeps my spins on the girls short & sweet...it really is very deep and I don't want to push them so hard that they do themselves a mischief.

I got another spin in on Nancy, it was one of the best spins I have had on her in a while. A few posts back is evident as to how down on myself I've been about my inability to gel with N in arena setting. Now there has been no magical miracles, we are still very much a work in progress,  but with the Guru's tips in mind and a game plan to walk/trot and then tackle our canter issues before we both got too tired. The canter itself isn't the issue as such although it too is a work in progress; we struggle with the downward transition & N being slightly wired and running rather than calmy resuming a nice balanced trot.

I think the deeper footing possibly also worked in my favour to keep Nancy's speed in check when transitioning down. However I did have to remind myself to release her head and if she didn't slow once pressure left the reins after a couple of strides I brought her back to walk; attempted to defuse the situation/de-stress us both; ask a different question and then once I had her concentrated again re-asked for the canter.
Oddly I got it perfectly on our normally bad side first go...probably because she wasn't expecting it as such. Then our typically better side took a lot of stop/starting and re-phrasing the question as we were getting our signals crossed and she'd strike off on the wrong lead or start right but throw herself about playing in the deeper footing that she ended up wrong and we had to go back to square one & defuse the situation.

"Whatcha doin'?!"

She did give me a nice big buck and some more prancing/dancing but as she was on the correct lead we weathered the "storm" and came back to trot/walk then tried again and finished with another lovely correct lead canter.

In total I was only in the saddle for 30mins as the footing is so deep and she'd been really good (the buck & leaping weren't malicious). I was super happy with the pair of us after our less than stellar saddle time logged of late.

Kika then covered me in pollen as
she had to devour all the things near me!

I got two lovely compliments yesterday & today. First was an elderly lady who has a young (same age as Nancy I think) Iberian mare, I want to say Lusitanien but I'm just not sure. Kika & I shared the arena with her yesterday and when I was finished (after her) and rejoined her in the grooming bay; she said she really liked how I warmed K up in walk first and then eased her into trot/canter work. She said she has seen a lot of people go straight into demanding trot work (with draw reins or the like) without warming the horse up properly. She said she would have no qualms in asking me to ride her mare for her if she couldn't make it one day...now I'm not sure I would accept if that ever does happen as I don't think I'm a good enough rider for her young horse. I'm happy to tinker with my girls, make mistakes & learn from them...I don't think I'd be good enough to school someone else's young impressionable horse!
The second compliment was this evening & less for me as for Nancy.  She has won herself another admirer. A lovely French guy, who is a fab rider & has had some of the most rotten luck with his super horse being more or less out of work for the two years he has been at the yard...but when they have been able to work, man are they like poetry!
He was full of praise for my Nancy & really liked what he saw - even though it was me in the saddle! I think, he like a lot of people initially dismissed her as heavy or plain due to her breeding/looks but man can she fair float when ridden properly...not that she often looks lile that with me. *blush* but sometimes we can coordinate wnough for it to look kind of nice ;-)
I wasn't talking to him myself, but L was while N and I attempted to work at the other end of the arena and she relayed the message to me afterwards. Apparently he was excited, yet surprised at the thought I'd let him ride her. I'm only too happy for better riders than myself who want to try my girls, seeing how others ride them & how the girls react can only be educational for them and me.
Does that make me weird?

Right enough waffle out of me, thanks to whoever has read this post to the end! All pbotos were taken the 19th of July as the girls supervised my poo-picking of their field ;-)