Of 2pointober, Shenanigans, and Prison Breaks

I rode!  Both ponies!  Saturday was gorgeous and as soon as the kid went down for his morning nap, I chucked the monitor at my husband and told him I was going riding.

First up was the mare.  It was windy, so we started in the paddock just walking.  Then some short trotting. She was doing well, so we moved to my sectioned off portion of the pasture near the paddock.  We did some more walking, tripped in some high grass, but kept going. I had her doing reasonable straight lines and got some times in for 2pointober.  My max time was 16 seconds, which is big improvement over my initial time of 5 seconds.  I attribute it to our ability to walk mostly straight. I should note that I'm still doing all this bareback.

On high alert in the pasture. Don't know why.

Then I got real brave.  I hopped off to move the "gate" (a step in post), hopped back on and we wandered into the pasture.  She was very looky and alert, so we just did wide slow circles, serpentines and wobbly lines near the pasture. Then slowly worked our way out. We rode around half the pasture, but stayed away from the road. Something kept getting her attention in one corner we couldn't see. Since I was bareback and didn't want her to learn Max's spin and bolt tricks, I didn't take her that far.  At one point we were able to see Max locked in the barn and they hollered at each other, but Maggie really didn't try to get back to the barn like I expected her to. Good mare.

I finally got off and left her in the pasture.  Last time I put her in the barn and rode Max, she tried to break the door down. This time she just ate grass where she could see Max and me.  I just rode Max in the paddock for a bit. We did walking, trotting and stopping.  Nothing exciting to report other than he was very good.  I hopped off and thought I was done until I spying the extra crib mattress in the barn. I had gotten this thing used when I bought a crib at a garage sale. I refuse to buy anything like that used that can't go in the washer, so it sat in our garage for a while. I've been wanting to use it for desensitization/obstacles, but haven't gotten around to it, until Saturday.  I think the pictures tell the whole story.

The hard part is making him stand. He wants to keep following me.

On the teeter-totter bridge.

No halter, never been exposed to the thing before today...why the hell not?  Shortly after this the mattress fell off. He just wanted his cookie.

This morning, we had a bit of a shock.  It's dark outside when I leave for work.  I get up, let the dogs out, and go back inside.  All is quiet.  Go back outside to put things in my car for the day, still quiet. Finally, head out the door with the kid to leave, while my husband goes down to feed and what do we hear?  Thundering hooves coming right for me from the opposite direction of the barn.  Those shits had broken down the fence and were gorging themselves on grass.  We couldn't see them until they were nearer the barn, so I don't know how far they had wandered.  I hope they stuck to our yard and didn't venture into the neighbors garden or worse, the road.  I know it was the mare.  Max is too lazy to try to break anything down.  Thankfully Cinderella stayed in the paddock and there weren't any noticeable injuries, though I will have to have a closer look after work. I'm just thankful they didn't get hit and are so greedy for food.

I did....something....

It's getting hot and humid and is expected to remain this way until mid September. We are supposed to go camping and riding (not taking Max) down in Brown County this weekend, and I'll admit, I'm a little apprehensive about the heat, bugs, and just my general state right now. The husband and I are only staying over one night, thankfully, so that will ease some of the potential pain.  You see, it seems like something bad happens, mostly to me, every time we go down to this park.  One year it was a crazy storm that hit while we were driving up the hills to go into town. There were huge tree branches falling everywhere to the point we had to stop and couldn't get around them in either direction.  Then last year was the horse flies. One attacked a horse I was holding and he spooked onto my foot, which remained extremely painful for the rest of the trip and several days after. Oh, and being attacked by bees while riding. I forget what happened in previous years. Maybe that's a good thing.

Anyways, I did what I said and worked with Max a bit before putting him out to graze.  I pulled that bridge I built in the spring into his paddock. He really had no problems with it. Then I put a pole under it to make it into a teeter totter. After trying to go around once, because I was walking next to, not on it, he got the idea and calmly walked over.  No spooking. Good boy!  We only worked on this for about 10 minutes because I had enough of the sun and heat.

On the teeter-totter. "Can we go out now?"

Tuesday, I did some more. I got him to stand on the fulcrum and was able to get him to shift his weight enough that he could tip it forwards or backwards without moving a foot. Next up will be riding him over the bridge.

We also worked a bit on personal space.  Apparently this is now a huge issue. He was very pushy and letting me know he wanted to go out to the pasture. I think as long as he gets what he wants, he's willing to behave, but when I ask for something different, he gets pushy. I'm going to try to continue working on things every day for a few minutes. Especially the pushy.