About a month ago (phew, blogging has taken a back seat...) I opted to meet Cortney at her house for some physically distant socializing on horseback. The weather promised to be fantastic. She has access to a TON of private mileage directly from her house so we would be able to circumvent state and national park closures in Washington and still get some riding in. I also wanted to get some video of a ridiculous project for "A Group Where we Roast our Horses for being Dumb and Useless". It was worth it for the backdrop.
The last trail ride I had done in Washington before we moved to Michigan, was on these same trails and Cortney has since mapped out more of the logging roads and trails and linked them and figured out the best views. She lives right by Mount Si, which is famous for being featured in the original Twin Peaks tv show.
The day was cool and sunny. A rare kind of early April day, usually. It had just snowed in the upper elevations the night before which really lent a pretty frosted look to the mountains.
Cortney and I were riding with another endurance rider in the region. She was nice and we chatted the whole time. Part of the purpose we were out here was for a digital EDRA challenge in the age of COVID-19.
I made face masks the night before and passed them around so folks could use them.
I also wanted to make a video for "A group where we roast our horses for being dumb and useless". One of the mods was making a video project and as I'm a former World of Warcraft player, from the ages of MORE DOTS and 40 man raids, I REALLY wanted to participate. Cortney video'd me from the other end, but I did record on my gopro.
LEEEEEROOOOOOY JEENNNKINS
We have started to determine that Reign does not like Gwyn. I'm not sure why. I have very anthropomorphic theories however, lol. Mainly because all of Reign's pasturemates (Splendid, Amira and now Saffron) all lived with Gwyn beforeReign. So I think there was some nasty talk.
Given that Reign is still baby-ish (5 yo) she still has her moments that I think just perplex Gwyn, who genuinely just tries to exist.
But also, check out the size of that road gravel! These are logging areas so things aren't always hoof friendly. It's a testament to the hoof armor, boots and my hoof trimmer that Gwyn no longer minces her steps over giant rocks like this. She's come so far and her feet have improved significantly from just two years ago.
We brought Saffron out for a reunion.
Amira also remembered Gwyn. But Amira also is more like a stallion than a mare. She and Gwyn flirt with each other all the time.
I've got a ton of posts brewing that are waiting on video editing because go pro and I just haven't had time to sit down and pick out neat clips and put them together in a relevant way.
But I did a quick photo-shoot with Gwyn on Sunday so I could have some perfect birthday photos.
Happy 14 years old Gwyn! And her original arrival date in Washington, when she became mine is May 12. This time of year is ripe with anniversaries of arrivals!
I'm so pleased with her right now. Even if I don't ever compete at high levels with her, she's become such a solid citizen. She's a horse that loves to be out on the trails, is game to hop on the trailer and see where we go, and will work hard and give me everything I ask for in the ring. We have our moments, all horses do, but I can't imagine being here with a horse other than her right now.
She climbs mountains for me and I would move them for her.
And because I am extra, I ordered a rose gold sparkly birthday sash (it comes with a bejeweled safety pin!) and matching tiara for her birthday pictures.
Waaait wait wait, we can't pose in front of trailers when there's beautifuil forest to use as a backdrop!
And of course, a very happy princess eating her alfalfa soup after a climbing intensive 13 miles in our unseasonal heat.
She is beauty, she is grace, she has alfalfa mash on her face
Our barn is thankfully small enough that with the minimal number of boarders, we can have some strict visiting policies but still have time to get out to see our ponies. We coordinate through a group chat on Facebook. The barn owner has a rule of only 2 people out at a time. We wipe down cross ties, gate latches and door handles after touching them. I use a completely different halter and lead rope to handle Gwyn that I keep in my tack locker. It seems to be going well.
Last weekend I was able to get out for 2 hours and ride and see if I could replicate the amazing feeling I got after the lesson from weeks ago.
I could! It seems that how Trainer E phrased things definitely helped me piece things together from a "me" point of view. I can still feel that the way I'm sitting isn't as deep as I managed to get in the lesson but that's something to work on. For now, I'm consistently getting a non-giraffed horse in the walk and that's fucking miles beyond what we used to be. I'm still super uncoordinated when we start trotting and do better if I'm in sitting trot, so I think that's a strength issue on my end.
I think she misses me. She was super cuddly and content to just snuggle in the sun.
Boop this, get treatz?
On tuesday I was doing a hybrid work from home/work on site day. Gwyn was scheduled for a trim, so I planned to ride before, then head into work directly after the trim. Best decision considering it hailed that evening but I got sun for my noontime ride.
We toodled in the sidepull and I just wanted to aim for stretching and warming up muscles. Corrie, her trimmer, noted that she was having trouble in her hind end when trying to balance on the hoof stand and I was ABOUT to call in my fav body worker when she posted on social media she was voluntarily quarantining (before the state locked down officially) as she was newly pregnant. Phooey. Good for her, being proactive, I don't resent it in the slightest, just the worst timing ever for me, haha.
It seems getting her stretching and moving did the trick. She had no issues with her trim and stood quietly without yanking her foot away. It's a good tool to know I need in my pocket. And only reinforces the things Denny Emerson says about walking. Because that's basically all we did. Lots of loops and changes of direction, asking for bend. Some lateral movement and backing up to get her back warm. The tiniest amount of trot.
Instead of fighting to balance, she was falling asleep in the sun.
And for some non-horsey things.
What I wear during part of my job.
My temperature has been wonky. But nothing else. I'm beginning to suspect equipment malfunction. I did get tested and was negative at that time while the temp was being weird
One of my favorite artists, Crystal Sully, released lineart for people to color in themselves. I transfered it to watercolor paper and I'm planning to paint it this weekend.
I'm excited to share this downloadable coloring page free for everyone, brought to you by the support from my wonderful patrons! Coloring can be so relaxing during stressful times so I hope this helps. ❤️
I feel weirdly guilty about this, but I had a lesson with a new trainer last night. With everything going on, I am exhausted by the thought of getting out of work to rush to the barn to load up and drive 40 minutes away for a lesson where Cortney and I can meet centrally. Especially since daylight only recently extended into the evening hours, thanks time change.
I had briefly audited a lesson the previous week to see if I was going to work well with this new person, E. I'm still not sure I prefer her to Jim, but at the moment, she comes to the barn, so my time spent away from my family is minimized, which has become a priority recently. Ugh, I'm justifying, but also my lessons have been on Fridays, and after this recent fall, my hip and back are utterly worn out by Friday evening with all of the clean room gowning I have to do over and over during the week for my job. That gowning requires balance and lots of bending, very similar muscle groups to riding, so my still healing back just doesn't have the strength.
Anyway. New lesson person E. I got out of work yesterday and got the barn actually quite early. I ended up being able to take my time with my shedding beast, really get all the shavings out of her tail (remnant bedhead), restock her supplement cups in the feed room, lunge and have about 15 minutes to warm up and get my head in the game before E arrived.
It was right before sunset so we had beautiful light and I rode in the outdoor. Gwyn was a little sassy on the lunge line, but showing some decent strength in being willing to canter and not be totally out of control but actually balanced.
In my warm up with her I focused on transitions, mostly. Things that I work on with Jim. When E arrived I introduced myself and Gwyn, told her what our weaknesses were and what I wanted to focus on. She immediately picked up on the weakness Gwyn has stepping under herself with the left hind. I wanted to get Jean out to do bodywork but she's on self quarantine due to pregnancy and announced that RIGHT before I was about to message her.
What I did really like about the lesson was that E got a concept/trick through to me that Jim has been trying to do for a while. Usually, Jim ends up getting on Gwyn, doing that hard work and then I get on and have a compliant mare. E gave me the toolkit item.
I have a few problems and bad habits:
1. When applying inside leg/outside rein, I've never given Gwyn time to find the correct answer. I just ask. And ask. And ask. And never stop to listen or wait for a response. To this end, E had me apply inside leg, and ask with a little bit of inside rein for two beats and release and wait. Then ask again for two beats.
Suddenly I had a horse underneath me who was carrying herself.
2. Throwing her head away. For a while Jim and I were working on getting Gwyn to not have such a high/upside down head set. So we'd ask her to stretch out and down. Trouble is, she's a smart cookie and now she asks for that a LOT and ends up snatching my reins away. So I need to break the habit of letting the reins slip through my fingers. Yes, she can stretch within what I allow ONLY. Solution? Bridge my reins to fix me. And remember that contact with her mouth is not evil. The curse of bad habits from riding alone for years.
3. My seat is not anchoring me well enough so if she does try and stretch, it's pulling me forward. So E had me adjust my pelvis slightly and I became a lot more secure in the saddle.
4. Leg weakness. I can maintain a lot of this at the walk. And I'm going to need to practice it a LOT more so it becomes my new normal because I lost it when we tried it at the trot. Totally fell apart. And she definitely picked up on my asymmetry in strength. Now that Gwyn is strong enough to canter, I keep my left leg on too much, while my right is weak and so when she's hopping like she's in a canter transition it's because of me(hello, there's that ducking right issue we have too). So I need to work on my right leg being stronger in stability.
4a. But also regarding that ducking right, I need to utilize my thigh more as a block, and not just my calf. My thigh connects to the shoulder while calf is the hind, at least that's what it felt like last night. Since Gwyn so helpfully demonstrated that she thought leaving the arena was a grand plan while we were going left, I practiced using my thigh to block that.
I ended the lesson with a horse that was carrying herself while I steered from seat and legs only. She felt AMAZING underneath me and I'm so so excited to get back on and practice this. I woke up super sore this morning, but also motivated to figure out what I can do to strengthen that right leg of mine when I'm off the horse. I think maybe using an exercise ball and being on my side, right leg on the upper side and squeezing in? That should target the right muscles.
I'm signed up for a clinic day with E on Sunday, so I'll be riding again in less than a week.
I have had a week. I haven't really talked about my new job on this blog, but suffice to say that things just went heads over heels this past week and I ended up being at work for 12 hours on Friday and still wasn't able to get everything done on top of the emergency stuff that popped up.
So I was beyond ready to social distance myself in the woods on the back of a horse on Saturday. And that's just what I did.
Cortney messaged me part way through last week wondering if I was free on Saturday. Gosh. I was! She was originally planning to do a introductory endurance conditioning ride with someone in the area who was interested in getting into endurance. I was more than happy to join. The new person ended up cancelling (apparently she didn't even have a saddle...?) so it was just Cortney and I after all.
This has taken forever to get up, mainly because of photo editing and me waffling on whether I want to include every single rider who passed my fence and that would be... quite a lot.
So here's some of them, with names/countries/horses if I could make out their rider number. For the riders I had the most name recognition on (realizing that I did not have an order of go in front of me) and awareness that they were next, usually thanks to spectators, I tried to get video. That's going to be a different post, I think, as video editing for me takes a LONG time and just focus while on the computer and I don't have that presently.
And actually, this has been sitting in drafts for a year and a half now... Have the pictures I managed to get through and edit. Maybe I'll finish this one day...
Last week I went out to the barn to ride and practice some of my dressage tests for the show this weekend. I want to make sure that I was passingly familiar with them. There was also a grid set up in the outdoor arena and it was so sunny and temptingly nice that after we'd gotten some solid flatwork in (Gwyn's canter is getting progressively stronger!) that we went to play with the very low grid.
Skeptical...
It was all great until the very end when I decided "one more" for the video and we crashed and burned. I fell hard and it hurt SO much. My low back/tailbone was immediately on fire. I could barely bend over to buckle Hazel into her car seat.
Kid hugs
Anything requiring suspension of my upper body without support from my arms has been impossible. I've been gimpy all this week, which is problematic since I move a LOT for my new job.
She was reasonably amped on this day. And feeling VERY good.
And warm enough I was in short sleeves.
But thankfully all the walking I do at work helped start loosen up what the hell I did to aggravate my body. Plus constant advil/tylenol and liniment. By Friday I was feeling optimistic for the horse show. LOL.
Not me going through, but the gymnastics grid in question. Gwyn went left after botching the bounce and getting flustered and I did not follow...
Then this showed up in my facebook feed and it became my mantra for the week. HAHAHA
So Friday rolls around and I'm feeling reasonably sure I won't reinjure myself if Gwyn decides to be an ass so I leave work a bit early, pack my things up at home, have dinner with the family, then drive out to the barn to load up. I'd already paid for overnight stalling and just didn't want to be rushed in the morning. Gwyn loaded right up and then it was 90 minutes south to Donida Farm.
Lights make loading in the dark SUPER easy.
I dropped her off, thankfully finding our assigned stall in the first barn I looked through with my phone flashlight. Got her set up with hay and water and headed back north to Cortney's. I got there around 11pm and was greeted enthusiastically by her dogs and pretty much crashed immediately in the guest bed. I got up when she did and it was nice to only have to get myself ready because all my stuff was at the show already. Cortney's mom came too and they left together to go pick up a third person.
This is Rio. He was rearing so he could see over the top. It was hilarious.
My first dressage test wasn't until 11am, which left me a lot of time to chill. I grabbed breakfast from the cookshack (they let me open a tab with a blank check!) and then headed out to watch Cortney and J ride their first tests.
Cortney and Reign in Intro A
While Reign is still a baby, she came out with a 'been there done that' sort of attitude. Nothing super phases her, which is good, since Cortney intends for her to be a husband horse! They did really well.
J and Rio in Intro A
Rio is an 18 year old Arab gelding and this was his very first dressage show. He'd never been in a dressage court before and he did REALLY well when you take all that into account.
Once they finished, it was time to go back and get me ready to ride!
Horse Trailer Parking was on the racetrack
Gwyn kept stealing hay from her neighbor's hay bag while I tacked her up.
As I was walking her out to the warm up she was high like a kite and VERY light on her front end. I needed Cortney to hold her so I could mount up. After that the mere suggestion of walking was like a foreign language. My goal was to get her to relax and stretch. I tried incorporating the thing we'd been working on in lessons, like lots of walk/halt/back up transitions. Asking for a back definitely caused front end liftage and I abandoned that until she was a little less sensitive to the aids.
She was so sensitive, in fact, that we were half-passing every where. Leg pressure definitely was working and I had no spurs!
To my amazement, she immediately stretched down when we walked through the copious puddles. So that became my plan. Stay in the puddles and reward a relaxed frame and snorts. I did lots of small circles and figure 8s in the puddles and slowly, S L O W L Y her brain rebooted.
I didn't dare canter her since my low back kept catching when I would stay with her forward movement. The plan pretty much became don't canter in my test (Beg Nov B eventing test) and take the points hit just to have a controllable horse. My main goal, given the past couple of dressage tests I've done, was stay in the court
So then it was time. Gwyn actually felt pretty focused on me once we entered the arena. She was pretty forward and rather giraffey but we had good moments. Enough so that when the test called for our 20m canter circle, I cued for canter. And you guys... she cantered. And we completed a 20m circle without leaving the court.
Counter canter when it's not called for... but also not blowing through my outside aid.
We continued to have more good moments. Like when I remembered Jim's voice in my head and slowed my posting and breathing and her head dropped and her pace slowed, for just a couple steps. On our second canter circle she counter cantered the whole damn thing but actually did a whole circle again. As we started the stretchy free walk, I did get an error bell, apparently I did my canter circles wrong? I'm gonna need someone to chime in here because I don't understand the judge here.
For step 3 and 4, then 8 and 9, I originally rode it like the diagram below. I picked up my canter between the center line and E, then did a full circle ending at E and going straight. The judge had me stop and do it the way I have it diagrammed on the right. I didn't argue in the test, I understood what she was asking me to do though I don't agree.
Can anyone weigh in on how the test reads? I really loved this judge and she was exceedingly kind about the whole thing.
So I repeated the canter circle, getting the correct lead this time though Gwyn thought it was all bullshit so she did end up running through my outside aid on this go round. But... did not leave the arena. I recovered and we finished and she was very proud. I thanked the judge profusely, who I think was just plain enjoying that it was a schooling show. She scored very generously.
We all took a break for lunch, then it was time to get ready for USDF Intro B. This time Cortney, J and I were all basically riding back to back. This time, Gwyn latched herself onto Reign and was a hot mess unless we were next to Reign. Ugh... Gwyn... if we can't show with friends....
My Intro B test was a hot mess. Gwyn didn't want to do the initial halt/salute and given how light on her front end she was starting to get, I took what I could get and saluted when all four feet were stationary, despite her body being at a 45degree angle off the center line.
One of my trot circles also exhibited a total loss of outside aids but I didn't leave the court (notice a theme?) and we survived. That judge? Super SUPER stingy with points. I got a 49% and we'll thank our stars there's no video of that one.
"Lack of cooperation on steeds part mars today's test" Thanks? I couldn't tell.... -.-
I had signed up for a third test, Intro C, and it wasn't for another 3 hours. And when I mounted for this second time I super wrenched my back and it took me forever to feel effective as a rider in that warm up. Gwyn still wasn't being polite for mounting. And Cortney and Company were leaving since J had to catch a plane THAT EVENING. I was tired and I couldn't face the idea of having to pack all my stuff up without help on top of trying to get on a horse that was losing her damn mind for a third time AND fully memorize the test (Trudy was reading for us). I just wanted to be home and snuggle with my kids.
So I scratched. Instead of doing the one more, like the day I had fallen off, I decided to just call it there. We had a good day. Even if the only people listed after us were the scratches and no-shows, we accomplished the goal of staying in the dressage court. We even cantered and stayed in and that's a lesson I want to enforce with this mare.
I'd like to think it would have been a different show day if I wasn't protecting my back the whole time. But maybe it was a good day because I was being very careful in the warmup. Because it was raining the whole day (though miraculously never heavily during our ride times).
I got to go show with friends. I got to have a show Mom (I love Trudy). I got to have a horse who cantered without a ton of theatrics (all that work has been paying off!) I had a horse who listened to my seat aids in the middle of the dressage test and I remembered all those lessons and applied them, even if we couldn't maintain the effect. There is improvement. And for that I am grateful.
