Cob Jockey

This is what I saw when I got to the barn for my lesson last night:

The grass is actually greener on the other side of the drylot fence.  Also, I hope the fact that the BO doesn't have to weedeat there makes up for the fact that Connor's popped three bottom boards off already...

After taking that picture, I got out of the car and yelled, "Hey!  Pony Yoga! Knock that off!" and I kid you not, he stood up and flipped his upper lip at me twice (which sadly I missed taking a picture of by a second):

"I was just weedeating, really."

The thing that makes my trainer so great, and the only reason I have had this much success with a green horse, is that she feels what she sees as if she's the one riding, and can then instruct me verbally as if she was in the saddle.  Yesterday, she said it's helping her such to have ridden him so often lately, because she can feel every little thing he's doing to me in the saddle.

And it's working.  That lesson was amazing  For the first time, she liked something I was doing in my warmup so much she carried it on into and throughout the lesson (small figure 8 circles along the rail with lots of changes of bend).

I explained the pelvis theory to her, and that I have been using that exercise a lot on my own after figuring that out, and she thought about it for a while before agreeing with me and pointing it out to me when I was doing it throughout the lesson.

I gave him a sea salt and vinegar peanut and he liked it.

We spent most of the lesson at a great quality canter, going from walk pirouette to canter over and over, doing large figure 8 circles with quick and controlled transitions in between leads.  He was so on my aids, you could have lit a bomb underneath him and he would have still been focused on me.  She even asked me to "think half pass" down the long side in right canter to prevent him from swinging out laterally, and we actually kept the bend and moved from the rail to the centerline, so...success?

After an amazing lesson, we popped a gymnastic a few times as a reward for us both, and as I was in the air over it, she started giggling.  So I started giggling at her giggling at us and totally failed to ride after the fence.  "Did you feel that?  Did you feel the way he patted the ground and kept his chest up?!  But next time you really need to ride after the fence."  Of course.

Tired pony.

Trainer ride tomorrow, XC schooling on Sunday either at Twin Towers or Masterson, trainer ride Wednesday, lesson Thursday, packing up and heading to Penny Oaks on Friday!