Prince: More flying lead changes... these are fun!

April 15, 2011

 So Prince and I kept things short today as I was looking after Ruffian plus I had to go to work. All morning I didn't feel emotionally prepared enough to play with the horses so I spent the time with Ruffian and we worked our way from where he was in the bush to the riding ring. Ruffian can't walk forward but he can backup, and move both his hindquarters and forequarters fairly easily. So we ended up backing 90% of the way to the riding ring and then Ruffian was able to walk forward the rest as it was mostly down hill.

Thanks to Parelli we had no problems navigating our way through the many rocks, trees and hills. Ruffian took it all in stride and we made it to the riding ring alright. I was so proud of how well Ruffian handled it all and how he trusted me to guide him. I love this horse so much! 

Being able to do that with Ruffian and seeing that at least he could walk a little ways helped me to feel better and be able to play with Prince, who had been following me everywhere when I was up there, then look at me with his head hanging over the fence when ever I walked away :) 

So I ended up playing with him before I went to work. We had a lot of fun and played a bit with rhythm, relaxation and connection at the canter on the circle and then did some Figure eights at the trot and seeing as they went so well we took it up to the canter. Prince was still having a hard time getting that one lead so I decided to do circles and see if he would have an easier time getting the leads that way. He did. The first couple times he would canter through the change but he wasn't able to maintain the canter on the other lead so we kept playing with it and after a couple tries Prince got two beautiful flying lead changes in both directions!!! 

We took a long rest and then called it a day. Prince is trying so hard and I think he actually likes it just as much as I do!! I am also excited because this means we are one step closer to being able to do our Level 4 Auditions!!! Flying lead changes were really the last major thing that we need to accomplish. The rest is just refining the stuff we can already do, which we have been playing with already. It is all so exciting!!!

Naturally,

~Keri