Ride #2

After sitting on Stitch for the first time I had a bit of a busy week during which I didn't really do anything with him other than hand-walking. I am now freshly re-certified in first aid, but please - don't trust that I can do anything other than call 911 for you!

This weekend I started my final vacation week of the year, so it's officially time to get Stitch going!

Ride #2 was on Saturday. 

I had someone lead us around for a couple of circles each direction, with some walk/halt transitions mixed in. Then we were unclipped and let loose!

We were on the left rein first, which is Stitch's least favorite side. When loose in the arena he always wants to go right, his left lead is the trickier one, and steering left when ground driving has been the side with the stickier turns. (Sadly, this is also my tougher side, so that's gonna suck.)

He got a bit sticky about going forward along the wall opposite the gate on the left rein, stopped a couple of times after a couple of steps, but nothing abnormal for a first time.

He started off a bit stuck on the open part of the circle on the right rein, but once we got along the wall he relaxed, and across the short side he dropped his head, lengthen his neck, and just marched along. Totally felt like an "I got this" moment.

Was it heading towards the gate? Most definitely.  Did I care? Nope, I'll take what I can get. Did I hop off right after that and shovel cookies in his mouth? You betcha!

Total saddle time was about 10 minutes. Again, there was a Pivo fail right at the end when he gave me the great walk. I really must put it in a different spot next time.

I'm On!

I did it! I got on my baby horse!

On Saturday I finagled one of the barn rats to hold Stitch for me while I again put weight in the saddle, and hopefully swung a leg over. Just like last time, he was far more concerned about the speed at which the cookies were being doled out than what was happening on his back.

The first time that my butt sat in the saddle he kind of went "huh... that's new... where's my cookie?". So we just walked a couple of steps to clear the mounting block and I slid off. 

The next time we walked about 10 steps before I got off, and the third time we did about 1/3 of a circle with a couple of walk/halt transitions.

I was led the whole time and did my best to just stay balanced and relaxed in the saddle. I have no impression as to how he feels other than narrow and wobbly - the baby horse is going to take a bit to get used to!

We did some ground driving the day before and he did a pretty good job of steering - just not very good about straight lines. I guess he can't always be perfect.

Now we're really ready for work to start next week!

Getting Closer...

The plan is to start riding Stitch on my next week of vacation - which starts next Friday. We still have some prep to do before I think he's ready.

On Monday, we did our second attempt at ground driving off the bit. This time we used the full arena, which had some construction going on at the time. Stitch stopped a couple of times to stare, but I just let him have a moment and then asked him to walk again so there was no drama.

He did really well with the steering, mostly staying soft. There were a bunch of ground poles scattered around, and they gave us something to steer over and around.

I noticed that he was a wee bit harder to turn to the left. Whenever I let him loose in the arena he wants to spend 95% of the time tracking right. So, I'm guessing that left will be his tougher side, which sucks because that is also my tougher side.

On Wednesday I enlisted the friend who is going to help me with Stitch's first few days under saddle to hold him while I put full weight in the saddle. I've leant over his back lots, but when I tried to put my full weight over him without a saddle last week he kept stepping away from the mounting block. I'm too short (too fat, too stiff, too chicken) to not use the mounting block, so I waited until I could have a helper to try again.

I did the whole build up from just putting a little bit of weight in a stirrup to full weight in the stirrup to lying on my stomach across his back. Stitch was super about all of it, and was far more concerned about when the next treat was going to appear than what was happening on his back. The first time we asked him to take a few steps he was a little tentative, totally to be expected, the next time he took 6 or 7 steps that felt forward and confident so that's where I left him.

One day I'll figure out how to set up my new Pivo properly.

I'm sure I could have slid my leg over and he would have been fine with it, but I'm in no rush. The plan is to do it again on Friday, and if all goes well I might try it that day.

Over the next ten or so days I want to do more ground driving to make sure the steering is good, some lunging to make sure the voice aid to trot is prompt (it mostly is), and some ground work that will have him move away from my hand when it's where my leg will be. Then I will be much more confident when it's time to be let loose.

What We Did Last Week

How last week went:

Monday - I took Stitch into the round pen to try ground driving off the bit for the first time. We just walked, and he was very good and softly turned when asked - once I picked up a whip and got his ass in gear. This horse definitely has more whoa than go.

One problem with the lack of throatlatch on the PS of Sweden bridle - no where to twist your reins out of the way when lunging (or ground driving ).

Tuesday - Stitch wore his rainsheet overnight as the forecast was for a bunch of wind and rain. This is the same rainsheet that I made adjustments to to fit him back in May. He's grown enough over the last couple of months that I had to let the chest straps out by a couple of holes and it fits perfectly at the butt end. He still doesn't have enough cleavage that I can let out the darts I put in the neckline though.

Wednesday - we went for another walk down the road. This time, he was able to ignore the neighbours guard boulders, and only briefly glanced at the screaming stud pony.

Captured in the evening sun.

Thursday - Stitch went for a car ride.

He was a little bit sweaty so there were some nerves.

It was his first time being done up in my straight-load trailer. Getting him locked in was no problem, getting him out took a few minutes as he kept sitting on the butt bar and I couldn't get it dropped. I ended up putting the lead rope around the front of the head divider to give me a way to pull him forward while I was at his butt, and that helped. He wasn't being panicky about it, he just didn't understand that he didn't need to step back when I was back there. We'll work on it this fall. (Still way better than Cisco ever was.)

Saturday - I swear that anytime I skip a day this horse grows. Took his blanket off and it looks like his withers have popped up and his front is almost level with his back. I measured him at 15.1hh at the withers. He can stop getting taller anytime - he better not hit 16hh! My short little legs will have problems reaching that high to get on!