Equestrian Team Day 16

Ugh. I got stuck with Jimmy again.
But we did make progress. I pretty much got him to canter within 10 strides. Not perfect, but an improvement from last week where he wouldn't canter at all on the right track around the arena.

One thing that really bugs me, though, is that while NU has a lesson going on, there's another girl with the other instructor in the ring getting a semi-private with our group. Not cool. Especially when we have to watch out for her while we're all doing one thing and her instructor is telling her to do another.

And the thing that bothers me the most about a horse is when he yanks his head forward and pulls you. It's my pet peeve.

So my last IHSA show for 2010 is this weekend. It really bums me out that we only have four shows a year. It kind of really sucks unless you place high and get points. My goal for this weekend is to place at least 4th. I will not take any crap from these school horses simply because as school horses, they shouldn't give you any.

As much as I'll want to continue showing, I can't wait to get back to jumping. I've been working on the flat for the past month because I wanted to improve my chances for placing at these shows.

Oh and one more thing: I relearned diagonals again! It's so hard to get used to them, especially after coming from Pasos who don't trot. Wish me luck this weekend!

Equestrian Team Day 15

Guess who I got paired with? Yeah, Jimmy, again.

He was actually better this time. I rarely had to actually kick him rather than just heeling him. It was nice. The ring was super crowded though --- it's good that I decided to stick with splitting up the 7pm group. It's such a tiny ring and it doesn't help that there are a bunch of jumps in the middle, especially when you're trying to pass someone on the rail.

So Jimmy yesterday was a success. It was the most successful Jimmy-ride I've had so far and I'm proud of it! He didn't want to canter to the right, but we'll get there. I was actually looking forward to riding Dutchess and was bummed when I didn't get her. Oh well. Maybe next week.

If there is a next week. I might quit soon. I'm thinking of possibly buying my own jumper (or maybe even a Warmblood...forsake jumping as a whole and try dressage for a while) and moving to this absolutely gorgeous barn for lessons with said new jumper/dressage horse. It's like 15 minutes away from where I am now. Gorgeous, I tell you, gorgeous. Like the Taj Mahal.

I'm super jealous of this one girl on the team --- she has her own car and gets to go ride her horses 5 days a week, plus do lessons with us! If only, if only...maybe I should quit lessons and just start saving money for a car again, give up the semi-annual sale fund and turn it back into the F150 fund.

Equestrian Team Day 13 - Last Lesson of the 09-10 School Year

What an interesting day.
Best news: Our directions from last week work perfectly!! We even found an alternate this week (a happy mistake) by getting off the highway at the wrong point. Excellent! Definitely emailing those to the team next year. I don't know what route they take, but we know for a fact that this one works and is TomTom GPS approved!
Really though, I don't understand why they didn't have directions for a route that worked on the website.

I got to ride my favorite horse today, Cameo. *love* All I could think of while I was riding her was one word:

GLORIOUS!

A fantastic ride. I love the smoothness of her trot and the quickstep in her canter. I'm in love with that horse. I'm also happy to announce that my jumping courses are getting more complex! Ha, and complex meaning I get to jump two jumps instead of one. Last week I jumped two in a row; this week she had me do a little pattern.
Oh Cameo. Wonderful flat horse, but she loves to test what she can get away with on the course. No problem for me. I've lived through Brie, there was no way I was letting this horse get away with anything.
Yeah okay. She refused the first time I wanted to trot over the tiny X jump. So I already had it in my brain to make her go back and do it again multiple times before Nell told me to do that. She was perfect after that. I, on the other hand, didn't get comfortable jumping over with her until the last one, which felt amazing. Note to self: Don't look at the floor! It throws off your balance as you jump!

So as a "present" to us before we left, Nell let us ride an extra horse. Yay! Until I found out I had to ride Jimmy. Oh Jimmy. Remember when I was learning how to use a crop? I used it with Jimmy because he's so damn slow! I tried to go into this being confidant, talked to him as I tacked up telling him that he was not allowed to pull any crap on me while I was riding my final ride there fore the summer. In response he tried to bite me. No worries. I was determined to make this horse trot without kicking him and by simply pressing my heels into his side.

Well I accomplished that! It kind of went downhill from there. It was drizzling and while Jimmy and Kara's horse were fine, the filly in the pasture was extremely happy and started galloping and bucking around. This excited Jimmy. As we trotted past, he jumped up in the air. In my brain, it looked something like this:
I'm sure it was actually a buck. I wouldn't know: I've never been bucked before. Point is, I didn't fall off and wanted to walk back around to try to tell him that bucking in that corner was not acceptable.

Didn't happen. Instead:
I didn't fall off thought! Yessss.
Yeah. I figured at that point that training this old coot to stop bucking at the sight of a filly bucking was not my problem: I wasn't being hired to train, wasn't concerned with training this horse, and wasn't about to risk paralysis for a 20 minute "treat ride". After all, it was such a longer fall than from a Paso Fino. So I just walked the upper, non-pasture half of the arena while Kara rode her horse around quite pleasantly.

I hope I never have to ride Jimmy again. We don't mesh well and I don't think it's worth it for me to deal with a "difficult horse" when in the long run, if I end up doing anything with horses, it'll be as a Paso trainer who will never have to kick my horse unless I'm asking for a death wish. I know how to handle difficult horses. I just wish that Nell would understand that I'm not a complete horse idiot and when I say I train Pasos, I don't mean I sit on them and listen to a trainer telling me what to do. I train them. Straight up.

Summer's so close, I can taste it. Maybe this summer when I get a job, it will go towards a special "Lexa's future Nissan Altima/Ford F-150" fund. If I save from this summer and next summer, I should be able to buy it by junior year when I live off campus. That way I can drive out and visit Brie, Nina, and Harry whenever I want to!

Equestrian Team Day 9

I had such a good ride today!
I was a little (okay, a lot) bummed when I showed up and found out that I had to ride the same horse as I rode last week, the half dead one, remember? Dreading having to use my crop, I just talked to him as I tacked up. "Please be good, Jimmy," I begged. "I don't want to have to use the crop on you, it's so mean. I don't want to have to kick the hell out of you either, I know you're old and I'm sorry about it. It's only an hour and I can't even do the high jumps yet. Pleeeease." It must have gotten to him because he rubbed his head on my stomach multiple times before the lesson.

We got to ride outside, too. It was light enough and only got dark at the end of the lesson. So I learned how to carry a crop the right way and didn't even have to use it! I didn't even have to kick Jimmy! (Maybe I'm an animal communicator in training as well?) We had some good jumps, getting a little better at figuring out what the WRONG diagonal is, which is progress. I only had one problem that was entirely my fault: I wanted to canter but my foot slipped in the stirrup so instead of being sensible and stopping, adjusting, and restarting, I just kept up holding on for dear life as I tried to get my foot back and make him canter at the same time.

I feel like such an idiot sometimes when I'm in that lesson. It's disgusting.

Anyways, can't wait for my ride this weekend. Hopefully it's not too mucky outside. I really do wish I was in Tennessee though. Actually. No, I don't. It's even worse storms down there.

Happy riding!

Equestrian Team Day 8

I FINALLY JUMPED!

To sum it up in one word: AMAZING.

The only bad part was I had a pain of a horse who would NOT trot unless you smacked him on the butt. Ugh. I never had to deal with a horse that DIDN'T want to run away, so naturally, that was a bit of a difference.

I am a little ticked off with the trainer though (again with trainers). She treats me like I don't know the horse's butt from his head. Hello, I believe I stated I was a trainer. Just because I'm with the gaited breeds doesn't mean I'm a complete alien/idiot.

Anyways.
My birthday's in three days and I can't wait to ride this weekend! I hope it's nice out again.

Awards! & Equestrian Team Day 6

First off, let me say:

THANK YOU KYLE FOR THIS AWARD!

I'm so excited! This is the first award I've gotten for this blog (which I didn't even think people actually read, by the way) and it makes me super happy. Now, onto the rules.

Here are the rules!
Rules:

1. Thank the person who gave you this award.
2. Share 7 things about yourself.
3. Pass the award along to 15 bloggers who you have recently discovered and who you think are fantastic!
4. Contact the bloggers you've picked and let them know about the award.

Step 1? check.
Step 2? Here it goes!

1. I love my horses to death! (if you couldn't tell)
2. I hate the favoritism in the show circuit, but I guess it's the same in any sport. You pay your dues.
3. I've been "training" since about 8 months after we bought Brie because that's when Andre we moved from that horrid place that we were at so it was easier for him to get to work. We've pretty much been on our own since!
4. I'm starting to really not trust trainers as much as others do. Not really a bad thing.
5. I feel really bad/upset when I see people who keep training and training their horses and never actually learn how to do anything by themselves. Waste of money.
6. I want to have my own horse farm one day, just for private use probably. I'd just love to see my horses out back in the mornings as I ate breakfast.
7. I want to start to branch out of the Paso world!

Step 3? Okay, I definitely don't have 15 horse blogs I follow, so let's see who I come up with.

• Suzie and Echo @ Diary of a Young Horse
  
• SillyPony @ Diary of the Overanxious Horse Owner
• Sianc18 @ Riding and Training a Young Horse
• Michelle @ Michelle's Blog

I absolutely adore all of you and can't tell you enough how much I look forward to reading your posts. =]


Step 4? I'll do that after I post.

Now! Onto the real post!

Now I know I haven't been updating about my adventures on the Equestrian Team. I haven't posted for like a month about this. But I was so excited today that I just had to tell the world!
Basically for the past 4 lessons I've been getting my diagonals easily confused (I can't help it! I just can't see it and can't feel it for that matter). So I get a little bummed out after lessons. Especially after last week on an especially bumpy and difficult *ahemCROPcough* ride on Jimmy so I wasn't to thrilled about sharing that. But then this week =] Oh this week. Today as a matter of fact, I had a very good ride. I cantered around a bunch of times and it felt fantastic! I definitely built up my confidence in staying on a humongous horse (compared to a Paso!) while cantering around. Even better? Our instructor, Nell, promised me that if I'm that good cantering on a couple more horses I'll start jumping!

*happy dance*

I can't wait! If I get the next three months of school we have left with jumping and then the entire summer with my mom's friend? I'll be super ready to kick butt at shows in the fall.
And guess what? I'm also making friends =] with girls on top of that! I pretty much don't get along with girls at all, so I'm super happy to be making friends with them, it's nice. Today was such a good day, and now I can't wait for Saturday and Sunday to start FINALLY working with Nina, because I pretty much have been banned from riding her since she began under saddle *glareTRAINERglare* and then I'm also really eager to work more on increasing Harry's flexibility and overall making Brie happy. I'm a little bummed it's going to be cold this weekend, I was hoping that this warm weather would carry over and I could ride outside.. =/ But we'll make it work.