Twosox: Transitions, jumping, and Touch it.

This afternoon I played with Twosox. We played around more with the catching game. Twosox is started to understand it better. He knows to turn and face but it is the coming to me that we need to play with. Today I was able to get him mentally connected even before he came to me so that when I took a couple steps back he came right to me. So it is progressing even if it is slowly :)

After I haltered him we played a little bit in the corral before going up to the riding ring. I askedTwosox to put all four feet on the one pedestal. For the last couple play sessions I have been asking him to put his front two feet on the one pedestal and his back to feet on the other one so he offered that first, which was fine! But then I asked him to back up onto the back pedestal. Twosox used to have a lot of trouble with that but he has gotten a lot more confident and was able to keep his back feet on the pedestal and then put his front feet on there too. So that was neat! Twosox was really relaxed and fell asleep standing on the pedestal. After that I stood on one pedestal and asked Twosox to back off the one he was on and then back out the gate and tp the end of the 22ft line. He took it slowly but once he got there he had a big lick and chew about it.

We then did sideways all the way down the path to the point where you turn off to go up the hill to the riding ring. On our way up the hill I would send Twosox around trees and then see if he could figure out the puzzle. He did really well. Once we were up in the riding ring we did some Touch it and then Figure eights. Twosox gave me two really nice Figure eights at the trot so we stopped there. After that we did circles with Transitions and Change of directions. Both are getting much better. Our change of directions are getting really smooth! At the end Twosox trotted a couple! So that was really cool! We had to do quite a few transitions before Twosox was mentally connected to me. But it was a lot of fun! At the end Twosox was really in tune with me and I only had to use my rope as a back up a couple times, the rest of the time he just responded to my carrot stick.

I then decided to see if Twosox would jump the barrels when they were standing on end. The first time he half jumped it but that was okay. The next time he jumped it from a stand still and knocked the one barrel over and got a little bit scared. So I think that was why he wasn't to sure if he wanted to jump it again. So we played with it and even though he still knocked the barrel over on the last one he did much better.

After that I sat on the tire near the fence and set Twosox over to the pedestal and asked him to put all four feet on it. It was about 20ft away from me. Twosox did really well and did exactly what I wanted! After that I brought him over and asked him to come sideways towards me so I could take his halter off. Twosox did really well and even after I took the halter off he didn't leave, he just stayed with me until I left. It was nice! The sun had gone away so it was really rather cold... I think I am ready for spring :)

Naturally,
~Keri