What a day!

Wow! Today was a really good but busy day! I trimmed Twosox this morning. He was almost perfect! I was so proud of him. It took me less than 2 hours to trim him. On average about 20 mins a foot.

After a late lunch I went back and to play with Prince. I told myself that the next warmer day I wanted to saddle Prince for the first time this winter. I didn't expect it to be above freezing though! It was wonderful. It took me a while to catch Prince... he decided to run all the way to the back field.. I am not sure why exactly he did it. It could have been a number of reasons but either way it happened. On our way back we did traveling circles, sideways, and we backed part way down the hill. It was fun!

Once we were back in the corral I saddled Prince and we went up to the riding ring. I switched to the 45ft line and we did some Stick to me w/t/c, circles [close range, spiraling in etc], change of directions and transitions. Prince did really well with them all. He didn't even buck! Which for him is good because in the summer if I didn't saddle him every couple days he would become a bucking bronco. We did a couple other things like Touch it, sideways and at one point I stood about 35ft away from a barrel and I sent Prince over to it then asked him to jump it! It wasn't the most beautiful jump ever but he did really well! We also did some drawing in towards me a the trot! 

One thing I discovered is that he has put on weight..... not something I want to own to but I guess it is a LBI think... ;)

We played just long enough for me to feel confident that Prince was ready to ride. So then I mounted up. Since I have been riding bareback for the last 2 months I wasn't sure how it would feel to ride in a saddle again. But my wonderful saddle was... well... wonderful! It was nice to ride in it again. We started off with some Follow the rail then we did some Sideways, 9 step back up, direct and indirect rein, point to point and some other stuff. Prince really wanted to move so I decided to switch from Follow the rail to the A Million Transitions pattern. It was SO much fun! While we were doing the pattern we played around with trot departures and then trot to halt transitions. At first Prince wasn't to happy about having to leave at a trot but once he realised what pattern we were doing he got REALLY interested and REALLY in tune with me. Everything was at a phase one maybe a phase two but most of the time it was really soft.

Riding bareback so much has helped my riding. Especially in the sitting trot department. It was a lot easier to sit Prince's trot in a saddle. Another thing we did was we played around with transitions in the trot. Prince wanted to faster so we would trot fast for a couple steps then slow down to a nice slow trot then a faster trot etc. It was fun!

We ended with riding some circles... well about 4 to be exact. Prince and I being left brain don't like circles to much. We started out with circling around the pedestal but we kept running into tires and things that were buried under the snow. So then we went over to a pile of manure and did about 3 circles at a trot around that. That was much easier. Then we went to the center of the circle and rested there. When I took the saddle off there were NO rub marks or ruffled hair. I was happy!

After I unhaltered Prince we played at Liberty for a bit. We did some Stick to me, Touch it, then I put my savvy string just behind Prince's ears and asked him to follow the feel. Prince was amazing! Once I opened the gate Prince didn't want to leave me either!! I was a little surprised considering how the beginning of our play time went but it was a nice surprise! Prince just kept following me! It was a really nice way to end our play time! When mom and I came down from the riding ring Prince came over to me again and stayed with me until I left. He is so sweet! :)

~Keri