Crazy Mare Chronicles

OK-I’m just about over the show!  We’re getting our act back together before the next one.  I WANT to get my second qualifier!  Even if I get it at the next one, I will probably still do another show before the finals, so it really won’t effect how much I show this year, but I’d really like to get it out of the way so I don’t have that hanging over my head the rest of the time. 

I was out at the stable yesterday and today, and Daisy looks like she’s a little off on her back leg again.  I think it was probably just too much work for her the past days before, so she had both yesterday and today off.  I lunged her outside both days, though-just to get some of the spunk out of her.  She looked better today than yesterday, though, so we did canter a little to the left to see if we could pick up that lead without a rider.  She did it every time except one time she picked up a cross canter (for non-horse people, that’s where they take different leads on the front and back sets of legs-it’s never acceptable at any time.)  So anyway, it was just for a few strides then I brought her down and fixed her.  She took the wrong lead in the back, so I’m thinking it’s her back leg that bothers her-that just sort of confirms it.  Other than that one time, she took the correct lead every single time, so I know it’s not TOO bad.  We can fix this.  I’ll probably have a lesson tomorrow, so as long as she’s sound, we’ll have an interesting time, I’m sure….

I guess Daisy is pretty attached to me.  She kind of looks out for me in some situations, but she asserts herself to make sure that I “know who’s boss” between the two of us.  That never goes well.  I always win-it has to be that way.  If she ever was to win one of those little brat moments she has, she would consider herself boss all the time and it wouldn’t be easy to deal with her anymore.  Anyway, after we lunged today, I took her over for a little grass, then I went in a turn out pasture with her for a few minutes.  She played for a few, then she started eating grass, so I left to go put her supplements in her feed dish.  Once she figured out I was gone, she started whinnying for me to come back.  I walked out and she stared at me like “where the heck did you go??  I was worried!”  I brought her out of the pasture and led her back to her stall.  Along the way she tried to assert herself and get in front again, so we had to stop a few times and reassure her that she is NOT the boss and that she needs to use the manners that she so desperately tries to forget all the time.  We made it back to the stall and I started talking to one of the grooms.  After a few minutes I gave her some peppermints.  I made her bow and gave her another and she took my finger with it!  OUCH!  She let go right away and crunched on her peppermint, but you could tell she was upset that she did that to me.  I went to give her one more before I left and she almost didn’t take it!  I really think she didn’t want to hurt me again!  What a good girl (sometimes).

One of the things that tells me that she really is attached happened a while back at the old stable.  I got out there early one day and her halter was off her in the pasture.  One of the other mares must have taken it off.  I went in there with all the horses and went to look for it.  As I was walking in there, she came up to me and followed every move I made.  She stayed right by my side, only keeping behind me a little ways once in a while.  At one point, two of the mares decided that they didn’t like me in the pasture so they approached from the front, one of them with her ears back in a semi-threatening position.  As I was getting ready to shoo her away, Daisy came rushing up alongside me with her ears back and teeth bared and chased away the other mares!  She then came back and looked at me to see if I was alright-I patted her and told her how good she was.  We eventually found the halter (the LAST portion of the pasture when I had been all over the rest of it), we went out, and she got some grass for being so protective of her Mommy.

What a weekend.  Diane and I took off yesterday because our boss was out of town anyway, so that helped out our situation a little bit.  We were going to be owed a paid holiday, anyway, since the 4th of July falls on a Saturday this year.  So we went out and picked up Lucky first thing yesterday-he loaded up and we drove to the new place.  Daisy FLIPPED.  She missed him so much!  She bounced around in her stall back and forth along the wall-he was in the next stall and there are only bars separating them.  She peed and peed and peed-it was like her bladder was exploding.  Pretty gross.  I guess she loves him     So after she freaked out for a while, whinnying and carrying on, we let her get a little grass.  We had the lesson I talked about yesterday after that.  The refrigerator thing.  The incorrect leads.  She carried on about how she didn’t want to canter, Diane rode her, we both ended up with blisters on our hands from the reins.  It was harsh. 

The show was today-we came out, primped the horses, braided, cleaned up the ick from last night, then loaded up and went.  It took us about 45 minutes to get out there-seemed like forever.  We unloaded and let them graze for a few minutes.  It was HOT-about 85 or 86 and humid.  I tacked up Daisy and hopped on-I was pretty sure that she wouldn’t take her leads, so I was just upset from the start about this show.  We walked around the grassy fields to warm up and she was very good.  No spooking or anything funny.  It’s so nice to walk around in fields with my horse-it’s very relaxing and much more natural feeling than just running around in circles in an arena.  We did some leg yields and small circles to limber her up-she was being a very good girl.  Since it was so hot and the show was running late by at least half and hour if not more, we didn’t trot very much for the warm up.  She was sweating just walking around (so was I!!) 

Lucky got tacked and we headed over by the arenas.  We had a small chance to stand in the shade for a few minutes while the two people before me were finishing up, then we went in the arena.  It was at this point that Daisy noticed that Lucky was not following up into the arena.  She called to him frantically-he called back, fueling the fire.  She called to him, he called to her.  Over and over and over again.  She was stumbling over her feet because she was so upset.  I tried to do some trot-walk transitions to get her mind off it, but that wasn’t cutting it.  The whistle was blown and we entered the ring at A at a working trot with the horse whinnying and perking her head up as high as she could get it, looking outside the arena by the side.  Diane, in an effort to get Daisy to stop, walked Lucky away from the arena.  That just made it worse.  Her boyfriend was leaving!!  “Lucky!  Where are you going??” she screamed.  “Get back over here or I’m coming out there and beating you when we get done!!!”  “I can’t,” yelled Lucky.  “My Mom is threatening me with a whip!”  This went on through the test.  I tried half halting, I tried an elstic rein technique that usually works for her where I pull back slowly a few inches on the inside rein in the corner and leg yield her into the corner.  Nothing.  She kept crying and carrying on.  I was doing everything I could to get her head down.  She picked up her lead because she was so flustered!  LOL!  She forgot to not take that lead.  We finished the test, Daisy whinnied at X, I bowed and patted her, just thankful to be done. 

We walked out of the arena and waited for our next ride which was only 5 minutes after our first ride, so I didn’t have time to get off and settle her down.  We went back in.  I did more transitions and she was actually starting to get her act together by the time we got into the ring.  Training 4-I have NEVER done this test before!  I had it read to me during a lesson once, then I had Teri and Sarah read it to me one other time.  I had it pretty well memorized, but there are a lot of twists and turns in it, so it was fairly confusing.  Now that she was settling down a little, i was able to keep her head down a bit more.  She was tired and hot now, and so was I -sweating like nuts under that jacket and gloves!  (The leather boots don’t help any either!!)  Her head was still up, looking for her man, but she didn’t call to him and he wasn’t calling for her either, so it was a bit more controlled.  Her trot was ok, the halts were nice (although I’m being told they were early-the judge didn’t seem to notice because he didn’t comment on it and he gave me 6’s for all my halts).  The canter was a little strung out, but it was ok.  She missed her lead to the left, but I just went with it-honestly I didn’t even notice.  She’s so balanced on her counter canter that it feels better than the correct lead now.  She sped up more and more around the corner-we were heading towards A, where the entrance/exit was and if she leaves the arena, we’re disqualified.  We flew towards A at the canter on the wrong lead, so the corner felt like one of those barrel racers going around a barrel.  I held her in the arena and we screeched into a trot at A.  Finished the test, saluted, and got the HELL out of there.  (I’m told that the judge himself let out a “whoa!” as I rounded that corner and came down to the trot-THAT’S how bad it was.) 

Lucky was next-he did OK.  He was tired and wasn’t cooperating like he usually does, so he ended up doing pretty crappy on Level 1 Test 1, too.  I got my scores-not good…..  LOL!!  To put it in prespective, I did better my first year on Intro A with an elderly horse that was so tired by the time he got in the ring that I COULDN’T make him trot.  He walked 90% of the test and I begged in my mind for the test to PLEASE be over as I banged my legs against him as hard as I could.  (He was such a good boy, though!  Just SOOOO tired!!  He went right to sleep as soon as we put him in his stall after that LOL!!)  The good news is that I did BETTER on my second test-Training 4, even with the incorrect lead!  I did get a comment that I should try to make sure that I do my movements on the correct lead and I should incorporate half halts to try to slow the horse.  Ugh.  Thanks, Einstein….  OK-that’s not fair.  I would have said the same thing if I was judging….  LOL!!!  We gathered our crappy scores, I picked up my two blue ribbons-The other person in my first test was eliminated by some stroke of luck, and I was the only rider in Training test 4.  Oh well.  It’s better than getting second place in a test where you’re the only rider or getting notes on the bottom of your test like, “try tennis.” 

We got back to the trailer, laughing, I untacked Daisy and she peed about 4 gallons (I guess that might be why she missed that other lead!  Dang it!!)  We loaded them up and headed home.  Next show is in 3 weeks.  Maybe we can get Daisy’s left side a little more accepting of that canter lead by then!!

We had our lesson this morning and we had the SAME thing happen again.  The walk and trot went very well, but that canter on the left lead just wasn’t happening.  We tried about six times or so and we got it once.  Diane finally got on her and tried-Daisy picked up the right lead twice out of another 10 times they tried, too.  I’m starting to think it’s a physical problem-it only happens when she’s in season (which is like twice a month, so it’s a problem), and she always has to pee after we work-whether she peed before we worked or not.  I’m going to give the vet a call and see if we can figure something out.  We were all drenched in sweat by the time the lesson was over-Daisy’s saddle pad was soaked, too!  It was pretty bad.  I have to say, though, the balance on her trot and her counter canter were great.  Too bad the counter canter isn’t what I was looking for!!  I’m nervous again about the show tomorrow-it’s almost not worth going if she’s not going to take that lead.  There’s pretty much no way we can qualify if she won’t take it. 

She was good otherwise, though-some people were moving an old refrigerator out of the viewing room and putting a new one in during our lesson.  They backed a truck into the front area of the arena, p-u-l-l-e-d a big old refrigerator off the truck, creaked it up into the room-taking the door jamb off in the process, removing the old one and putting that ON the truck then strating it up and pulling out.  It took about 15 to 20 minutes for the whole process and she only spooked once!  It wasn’t even that bad.  Good girl, Dais!

Our show is coming up on Saturday and I’m still not happy with that left lead canter.  We aren’t 100% on it.  The right lead is never a problem, but that left lead is not always taken correctly.  On the other hand, I rode tonight by myself and we went all the way around the big arena in the heat and she felt wonderful!  It was light and easy to ride-not the same choppy up and down that it used to be.  It was fluid, sweet, and slow.  Very balanced!  I guess this is a give and take thing, so at least we’re progressing little by little! 

We have a lesson tomorrow morning before the heat kicks in.  I’m a little nervous about it since it’s going to be our last before the show!  Hopefully it goes well.  We have to go pick up the trailer, go get Lucky from the other stable, then bring him back to the new stable.  I hope he can be boarded next to Daisy!  That would just be great-she’ll be so happy   I think he’s going to stay permanently after the show.  We almost have the whole group back over to the new stable now.

One more quick note-RIP, Michael Jackson.  Ok, so we always made fun of you and your antics, if that’s what we should call them, but you were definitely a legend in your time!

My show pictures finally showed up online, so I copied a few of the proofs to show off.  These were someof my favorites:

Here's my favorite-she was so nice and square-even with that big butt

I liked this canter picture

Pretty nice trot picture

Overall, I was happy with this show.  It would be nice if we could get a higher score, though!  According to Diane, I had my “best lesson yet” this week on Sunday, so hopefully we can transfer that to the show on Saturday.  The show on Saturday will be a quickie-I guess I ride at 11:22 and 11:32, then Diane rides at 11:37 and we’re done.  It’s likely we’ll be warming up more than we’ll be showing or hanging around waiting for anything. 

I was going to practice today, but it was in the 90’s today and HUMID!  I got to the stable and Daisy was just drenched in sweat.  I hosed her off and washed her mane to get a head start on cleaning up for this weekend.  I hope to ride some tomorrow, but I think it’s supposed to be just as hot or hotter, so I may not after all.  I’ll be wiped out after doing to lawn!