March 1 2011
Ruffian and I had a good Online session today. We played with a lot. We started with yo-yo's and circles in the corral. I was really impressed with how well Ruffian did on the circles. He was very relaxed and connected. He was cutting in a little bit on the one side so I made sure to pay extra attention to that through out our session. I asked Ruffian to trot 4 laps each direction and we played with game "Don't make me pick up the stick" he really started getting snappier on his departures after a couple sends :)
Then we headed up to the riding ring. It was still icy, even under all the snow we got yesterday, so we stayed at the walk and trot. We did traveling circles and then played with getting a real circle. This took a while but once Ruffian got it figured out he was able to catch on quickly on the other side also.
Up next we did backing up by the nose. Ruffian was looking at something over in the bushes so he wasn't thinking at all about me and what I was asking. So it took a while to get him thinking "back up" but eventually he started paying more attention to what I was asking and that was when we got more lightness, speed and distance in our porcupine back up.
We then went over to a barrel and I got on it and played some friendly game from up there. After that I got down we and did some lateral flexions on both sides getting Ruffian to be able to hold them longer.
After that we ended and just hung out for a bit before we headed down to the corral. I definitely see how playing with Ruffian more often, even if in shorter sessions, will really help.
Naturally,
~Keri
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