Is anybody there?!

Why no ponies? Well I will tell you.....

I have been rather preoccupied....

with this.

Oh, and this...

And you can't forget this!

MEXICAN CRUISE! HECK YES!

A lovely cruise ship, Cabo San Lucas, and Puerto Vallarta....ahh, makes for a very nice spring break. :)

Picture Update

Got this pictures from my friend that was with me that day. These pics belong to a couple posts ago. This is me ground driving Beary in her harness.

So Long, Rain!

Well I drove home today with Allie, the new dachshund pup. I got to ride and work Gypsy a little, and it was amazing! She again decided to shock and awe me with her willingness, quietness, and responsiveness. I went out to the arena (that also now houses a boat in the corner....bah) with Allie. The pup thought it might be fun to chase Gypsy around while I lunged. Gypsy was a saintly little pony and was trying to step around and avoid Allie, but the dumb dog ran right in front and got stepped on. Fabulous, lets crunch the tiny paw with a thousand pounds of horse. So Allie is limping around like tripod-dog, but I don't feel all that bad. She's got to figure out somehow that it's not okay to chase the horses. I think she will be fine later, it's probably just real sore right now.
But I hopped on Gypsy and she was great! Being super sensitive to me asking her to lower her head and neck. I got her to loosen up and walk out a little (she gets so 'stuck' at the walk and has a hard time relaxing into it). We did some two-trackey, side pass type stuff, then trotted around so very nicely. And of course, when my dad poked his head into the barn, Gypsy got all distracted and a teensy bit naughty when dad was watching. But she was actually really easy to get re-focused again. Yay! Then I rode her outside, bareback and all, and down the road a little. She was great! Who ever said horses had to be crazy with months of no riding? It is doing Gypsy a WORLD of good!
And now its vacation time! Tonight me, my mom, and sister are getting on a plane to California, and then tomorrow we are hopping on a cruiseship! I am spending my spring break jetting around Mexico on a luxurious awesome cruise ship. YAY! So very excited.

Baby Tsunami!

They named the new baby at the school barn Tsumani! For the big tsunami and earthquake that happened in Japan the day he was born! People are leaning towards him turning out a palomino, so everybody should cross their fingers for that! Anyways, I couldn't resist taking another picture of him yesterday, he looked so darn cute!

In other news, rode Oscar yesterday but he was kind of being a brat. Ah well. Only one more ride on him I think, for my 'final'. Or am I supposed to ride him through finals week too? I have no idea. I was leaning towards no. But maybe I should throw one more ride on him before that final ride, to make sure he isn't a loony.

This friday I am headed back home, so I get to see my Gypsy pony! I miss her a little. So I am heading back to have enough time to play with her some, maybe ride her around a little. And then its off to the airport for vacation-time!! It is spring break, and my mom, sister, and I are heading to a mexican cruise! Our ship will hit Cabo and Puerto Vallarta. So I'm rather excited for that- my brain could use a little vacation time too. I will post pictures of pretty pretty Mexico, even though this is a horsey blog. Ha.

Random Things

Well there was baby born at the School barn!! It is totally adorable, a little colt who looks like he might turn out a palomino! I got to see him the day he was born, and watch him get turned out in the arena with mama for the first time! Let it be the beginning of the parade of babies I will get to see over Spring term in my breeding class. I took a video of the owner putting his little halter on for the first time, but my computer is having minor seizures. No really you should see it, it's terrible. Theres three or four windows on my toolbar that are frozen and just won't go away... Sigh.

Also rode Cheyenne yesterday- she was actually really good. Wore some little nubby spurs and made a heck of a difference. Then we tried walking up to this ball and she was terrified of it. Had to get off and show her, and then I could push it right into her. Silly mare. We were working on her walk-canter transitions since she hates them so much, and gets pretty lousy at them. She did great :) Here is a picture of her licking said ball.

End of Term

Well it is week 10 of Winter term, next week is finals week, oh noes. This also means I only have two weeks left of riding Mr Oscar! I will be sad, but at the same time it will be a nice break. He is a fun horse, but it gets a little boring riding the same circles three times a week. So this morning my coach/teacher gave me a little jumping lesson on Oscar! YAY! Very much fun. I didn't feel like I was doing super well, but she said I did good. We weren't jumping high, but were working on my form. I think I have a hard time with staying with him- I was anticipating the jump and getting into two-point too soon. So we were working on not doing that and keeping my shoulders up. I think I am getting a little bit better about the shoulders- it didn't feel like I REALLY fell through this time. Could always be better though. Also worked on getting straight to the jump, no drunken sailor cantering. And so it was my first time going over a pair of jumps- instead of jumping one fence and stopping! I had to canter out of the corner straight to the first jump, then turn and come diagonally out of the other corner to a little narrow jump. I'll just say right now, it is so much harder than it looks! That jump was so little! It is hard to get straight to it. But I sort of managed, Ha. Oscar is such a good boy- truly the perfect horse to learn jumping on. He doesn't take advantage of you, and will mostly jump from anywhere. He doesn't ever refuse a jump, and will take off long or short if need be. Which happened kind of a lot today, ha....I was having a hard time getting the right distance- we kept getting to the jump too long or too short. How do you get it right? Is it just a pace thing? Just getting to it at the right speed? Um.. That would have been a good question for my coach, ha. But anyways, I wish I had a video of my last jump- it felt really good! Got the right distances on both jumps and was a lot straighter, and had to throw in a flying lead change! Maybe sometime this week I will set up a little tiny crossbar to jump on my own, and bring my boy to take a video! Then the world can laugh at my mediocre lack of jumping skills! But it could also help me...I can look and see what I'm doing wrong. After all, I'm still just beginning to learn and everybody has to start somewhere!