I've been meaning to post, but I always get busy/distracted/run out of time. Such is life, I suppose... but the guilt's been laying in & with the big events of today I figured I'd better just make time. Who needs to study for chem anyway?
So first piece of neat news- I may have my first paid riding gig. We'll see. Its just one of the horses I ride every now and again, & the owner says that she can feel such a big difference every time I ride her mare, so she's hoping to work out a weekly thing. I could use the extra cash right now... more on that later.
Second piece of news- Arty (my old pony) is now a super dressage show pony. I took him in a show just for the heck of it, and he got 1st and 1st (out of 1 ;P) with scores of high 50's on the first test, and low 60's on the second. Pretty damn good for a horse that's been in an indoor arena all of twice. I liked the judge- she was critical, but I thought her critiquing was fair. She explained where we'd lost points pretty well, and it gave me some things to think about. Plus, she was more than happy to dock marks for him being overbent! Not something you see often enough.
On the Cadence front, everything (save today... I'll explain in a minute) has been going fantastically. Her dressage is feeling fantastic! We've started doing some collection of her gaits (and some extension, but that still needs work) and she feels so lovely. Its like floating- she's so light and responsive, and pleasant! Her extensions are coming along, but her straightness issues tend to come through and to the left, I sometimes lose the right shoulder. Straightness wise she's come along way. The overbending (to ensure suppleness throughout the body, and especially neck/poll area & shoulders as those are the areas she likes to stiffen) to the right in the corners in the warm-up is perfect, so we're just doing occasional checks in with that to double check our suppleness, and are now acheiving a beautiful even bend. On the jumping front, she's been one hot Tamale! In our last jumping lesson (we've had 2 lessons and one individual school which ended with me free lunging her and her running for 20 minutes & jumping some of the stuff by herself) we achieved some form of calm and relaxation. She just gets so excited! At first I was worried it was nerves, but she quelled those suspicions for me when she free jumped herself.
In the not so good news department, Cadence came up REALLY sore in her back today. I noticed it first when putting her saddle on- she tensed and kind of pinned her ears which I attributed to her being in heat. She doesn't really pin her ears though, so I found that odd. Then, when I was hopping on she pinned her ears again. This time I attributed it to her being territorial and opinionated, as another horse was walking near us. However, when she pinned her ears while we were trotting I nkew something was up. She never ever pins her ears under saddle. EVER. She's always happy & while her ears generally face her rider, she never pins them or even puts them back. Sure enough, when I palpated her back she was extremely sore in her loin area (near the cantle area of the saddle) on both sides of her back. I'd been attempting to delay a saddle fitting, but it looks like it can wait no more. So in the interum one of our boarders partner is a massage therapist so I'm attempting to get a hold of her so she can take a look at the Mare. Massage therapy + saddle fitting? Bring on the bills!
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