Eh, what a crap week this has been. I think I'm fighting this god-awful flu that is going around NC. I thought I was going to miss it because I've been avoiding public places but I feel its snuck up on me through a crack in the door.....

So I havent' ridden at all yet this week. Maybe tomorrow though its supposed to be freezing rain, which is not fun to ride in. Especially on a half crazy horse. Okay, she's not really half crazy.... She's a sweetie. :)

Since I have nothing new to post I'm going to make this one short and sweet. Off to the kitchen to make some chicken soup.

:)

***begging for spring***

Well, we had an intersting ride yesterday. :) LOVELY weather for February. I think we reached around 65-67! I'm SOOOO wanting Spring to get here.

The Cat was feeling good and enjoying the weather. Blankets off!! Woohooo!

I started in the arena and was planning to work over some Xrails again, I do a little each time I ride to make it boring for her. Well that's the plan anyway. So we started out w/t/c and she just wanted to keep going.   We walked over all the ground poles that are laying around. She's much better there, used to walk up and then leap over them! lol.    So after that we usually move to trotting over them. She's getting better about trotting up and over them without leaping but yesterday was not a good day for this. She trots quietly up and FLYS over at the last second. If I hadn't been prepared I'm sure I would have rolled off her backside... ah crazy horses. Anyway, after twenty mins of this she just isn't settling down so I decide no jumping today, let's go for a walk.

We went out to the big XC field and down to the bottom side, she was feeling good so I say, let's have a nice little canter along the bottom of the field. Yeah, right. How bout a nice fast GALLOP along the bottom of the field, three huge bucks when the morning doves fly up in our faces, turn to the right and fly up the hill bucking at all the doves, wrens, meadowlarks, crows and assorted birds that happened to be feeding in that area. Oh WHAT FUN. So, what do I do? Top of the hill, slow to a walk, nice walk along the top and down the side and then..... LETS DO IT AGAIN!  There is something so exhilirating about letting a horse gallop in a field on a beautiful day.   sigh.....

This time when we got to the top, the 4yr old WB decides to come see what happens and we end up doing a sort of piaffe/passage thing along the fence line together: him on one side checking out my girl and her down the drive showing off! It was pretty funny to watch I'm sure!

Anyway, took today off because it has decided to be February weather again. Misty, rainy and cold. Plus no one else at the barn and I'm not quite ready to ride her with no safety team in earshot. ;) although I don't really expect she'll do anything stupid with a young horse better safe than sorry!

One day I'll wrangle someone to come take some pictures of her.... that's usually my job but hard to do if you're riding!

So until next time, Happy trails & have a great ride!

Sadly not much happening! I did get out and ride the Cat (as I call her) a few times this week. She is improving although I know that I need to go ride EVERY day til she gets settled back into a working frame of mind, lol.

Her jumping is improving. We are only doing one or two xrails at a time to build her confidence. She gets excited and wants to FLY through the gymnastic. It can be a bit nerve wracking at first. But she settles in once she realizes the thing isn't going to eat her on the way over. I don't know why she is so skittery about the poles... she's been over them before in her life and has never had a wreck or anything. Maybe its just excitement to be getting back to work?

I'll have to get some pics of her to put on the site. She's cute. :) I had a few but they were lost when my laptop crashed and went to laptop h***. (no it didn't deserve to go to laptop heaven)

So til next time, have a great ride!

Well, I'm not much on blogging... new to it still I guess, but my home page looks sad with not much going on. So i'll give it a shot.

A bit about me: I'm happily married going on 14 yrs in May. Wow. Doesn't seem that long. We have no children except our four-legged ones. Currently that includes one cat, two indoor dogs, two horses and a goat.

Since this is HORSE city, lets talk about the ponies. :) Like I said, I have two. Sort of. My horse is a Paint/TB X mare named Cheyenne. I call her Indiana Sundance if we are competing. She was given to me in 06 by my Uncle that lives in Indiana. (see the connection?) She's pretty sweet and will jump the moon on good days.... but she would really just like to spend her time in the pasture or just trail riding. I am working with her still to do some low level eventing maybe. If she just completely hates the dressage aspect of it I may end up trying to sell her as a good solid trail horse.

The other horse I am riding is a TB mare named Catty Cat. She's registered with the Jockey Club but never raced. My BO bought her and her half sister as two-year olds from a training farm in Ocala that was selling off all their stock. She was in training but never raced. :) She'll be 8 on Feb 19th. Anyway, they rode her a bit and then the BO got pregnant and quit riding her. She's been ridden off and on but never for any great length of time. My friend bought her in July of last year and started riding and taking lessons with her. She has since started back to school and is making a career change. Sooooo I am riding her with the thought that we can hopefully sell her in the spring either as a hunter prospect or event prospect. I want to event so that's my main goal in my training with her.

We had a lesson last week that was pretty wild. She had some down time over the first of the month so was ... excited? to be doing something. I am riding/training her as if she is a 3 or 4 yr old since that is about where she is training wise.

I'm guessing that my blog will pretty much become a training journal for her and Cheyenne.... Especially since that's pretty much the main thing I'm doing right now other than planning my spring garden and wishing spring would GET HERE!!!

I guess we'll update in a day or so, heading to the barn in the morning for a ride! Til next time.........