Weekend roundup

Hampton

Indiana was kind enough to give us 80+ degree weather all weekend. :) I rode Hampton on Saturday and magically the Demon in the Corner was gone! He never even batted an eye at the same corner he insisted would eat him on Thursday. Nothing had changed. Guess Thursday was just one of those rare days when Hampton actually did act his age.

Our ride proceeded to be quite wonderful, despite the heat and the fact that were were both sweaty pretty quickly. We worked on counter canter (check!), shoulder-in (very nice!) and more transitions - keeping the poll up and the balance uphill. Sunday was even warmer so I took him on a bareback trail ride for about a half hour - as a reward for being a good boy the day before. :)

Noah
I actually got on Noah on Saturday. He is still learning about lunging, but seemed pretty stable when I jumped around him, put weight on the stirrups, leaned over, etc. So I threw a leg over. Things were going ok ... and then out of nowhere he head shot straight up and he started scooting. Thankfully my awesome ground person had a hold of him and he scooted around in circles for a minute before finally stopping. I jumped off, and then started over. The second time he was fine, no issues. I dunno?

The others

Saturday I rode a new mare named Marisol. She has done nothing but polo her entire life and was recently a polo pony for the polo team of the area university. She has a wonderful attitude - so calm and willing - but is an obvious burnout from being treated rather hard by the polo team. She is VERY defensive about her mouth and her back, so I do nothing but ride her on  very little contact and ask her to stretch. I think she'll come around. I also took Baxter trail riding on Sunday (yes, I rode him with a saddle - I 'm not that dumb). He tried his bolting sideways gig once out in the open field but with some cussing I got him stopped. He proceeded to jog back to the barn, where I then made him keep trotting. Then we went on ANOTHER trail ride in the other direction and the booger walked this time. heh heh.

So busy weekend but I loved every minute!