Out Riding

On Saturday morning I didn't necessarily wake up early and go out with the horses after homecoming like I would have liked.... :) I was tired!

But by afternoon I had Cocoa all saddled up and ready to go, Dixie played with, and we were off! (I played with Dixers in the round pen and she was hilarious! We just did some review...Figure 8 around the barrels, backing by tail, sideways towards. She had one RB moment during the circling game when I asked for a change of direction. She got bracy and was pulling backwards so I just drifted with her and then when she stopped licked and chewed I asked her to circle again and then change of direction went just fine! I put part of an apple on the barrel when we were playing 'Put your nose on it' and boy was she surprised when she found it! Then we moved on and played with a little liberty! I'm so proud of my baby...she figures things out SO fast. Just did a little 'Stick to me', backing, and 'Follow a feel'. Dixie totally gets 'Stick to me' she even pays more attention to the most subtle things I do than Cocoa does! I'll put one foot back and she'll put the same one..That about summed up our session..I let her go eat in the yard with Cocoa and then we headed out!)

Dixie is still having a hard time walking on the gravel road...she has flat feet like Chy did but not quite as extreme as when Chy first came to my house. So having Cocoa who loves to walk super fast and Dixie who is straggling behind makes it somewhat hard to pony! Cocoa is doing great though with finding a gait within a gait and that there is diff. speeds of the walk! We're getting a lot of vertical flexion in one these rides and that is great for her. Dixie just plugs along but for the most part stays right beside us.. I was just going to go down to the Tree Grove and have them graze but it was crawling with hunters so we just went and hit the trails. It took a little of reminding before Dixie remembered to stay on her side of the trail but once she got it we were able to canter a little bit! :)

We were out from like 12:30 to 4:30! Poor Dixie was pooped! We ran into two other riders and horses on the trails. One, ironically was the lady, Karen who I'm doing the painting of her horse for her! So we rode with them a little bit on the way home then continued our seperate ways. Dixie got to the point where we got to one hill and she just took a look at it and went 'no way' and Cocoa and I had to rest with her before we continued on our merry way! Stopped at Jess's and visited Cocoa's best bud Roxy. Then finally made it home. The horses rolled and took a long nap after that ride. It was SO much fun! Getting Cocoa and Dixie in shape at the same time!