lists

This morning I lunged Moo; a little canter and lots of stretchy trot. Lots of clicks and treats and he responded very well....the hard work will help in the battle of his bulge!

Chapiro and I tried the mats again to start off and I just tidied up the earlier work so he understands that he has to have two feet fully on the mat to get the click and that he has to approach it at the speed I set rather than push through me and race to it. He was very attentive and so we took it down to taking single steps between the mats and some yielding of the shoulder when he threw his shoulder into me. If he raced ahead I asked halt and a step back which worked well. To finish (before lunging) we worked on some trot between the mats and for the first time ever in the trot liberty work he wasn't trying to get ahead of me all the time. I still don't have a plan and this is organically forming itself which I'm not entirely happy about, I think I'm supposed to have a list!

This was George (son of Chapsi) when newly born. According to the go-between he is already over 15hh at 2yo so he'll be quite a bit bigger than mum or dad.


Today all the boys worked well, including Peanut the pocket rocket who seems to have discovered fun with Lydia.

Chapiro wore the Barefoot for the first time and it sat very well, he worked at liberty (with saddle) for some mat work and then we lunged a short while to check out the saddle before I got on. I just worked on having good transitions from the halt to walk and then asked for him to walk to the mat...WOW I couldn't believe how he upped his energy and strode over to it, he was absolutely on cue until we got almost on the mat at which point he was a little unsure (I'm usually stood at the mat with him). I cued the mat again and he caught it with one foot so clicked and then we walked off on a circle and I gave the cue again and he was much more confident this time and we had two feet on the mat. I called it a day on this positive note as I had only really got on to check the saddle, which felt great.

Moo continued in the same vein as the last few sessions and was amazingly soft and stretching, it really is a lovely feeling to be able to vibrate a rein and get a relaxed stretch. The transitions up are soft but we're working on downwards with the help of clicker and some strategically placed poles.
Silly me thought he was so chilled that we'd have a little canter...cue mega-excitement but I guess well have to work on it.