Soft Coat!

Wow, it's been a while. I have not been going to the horses' lately. Too much homework, bad weather, and not being home accounts for most of that.
Seriously though Minnesota is drunk. It's been raining/snowing off and on the past two weeks. It got cold and then it was semi nice. Two days ago we got a blizzard and four inches of snow. Thursday it rained all day and then froze. Fun times. This next weekend we're going to get around 70 degree weather. So it went from around 25 to 75 in a week. I have a love/hate relationship with Minnesota weather. The upside? The lakes are back to normal levels! I was walking across the bridge and it was all the way up to the bank. These last few years it's been really low. It made me happy to see the water that high.... wow. I am such a retard.
Aleythia and I went to Terry's today though! It was great! It was mostly warm, so I took my coat off when I got there. When Terry asked us what we had for plans, we told him, "Not much. I was thinking about working with Dash on desensitizing. I've been working on a theory." I'll get to the theory in a minute.
Terry moved the flatbed trailer, the tractor, and the manure spreader out of the barn so that there was more room and I worked with Dash.
My theory:
I was laying in bed late one night and I was just thinking about Dash and her problem with the plastic bag. All the sudden a thought randomly popped into my head. Maybe I need to try to desensitize to other objects before I go to the plastic bag again. Reason?
It's like this. Remember that story were we moved the fillies back to Terry's from his brother's place? And I couldn't get Toffy to go into the trailer? I thought maybe if I gave her a little confidence then she might go in. So, I lead her into the barn over there. The barn actually has a little cement step, and then goes down a little bit, and it was dark. So I got her to go into the barn after not too long, and then I led her back to the trailer. It worked. After a little urging she walked into the trailer.
I'm thinking Dash might need a similar technique. I want to give her some confidence about being desensitized with something that isn't quite so scary. If I can get her trusting that something that happens to her isn't always going to be bad then maybe when I go back to the plastic bag she'll be more ready to accept it. Just a thought.
So that's what I'm doing.
I took a towel and desensitized her to a flapping towel, all over. I even threw it in the air as hard as I could. After that I desensitized her to a blanket, and put that on her. She was very good about it.
And then we just sat there and watched Aleythia work with Frosty. She did loneging. It was very cool to see because Frosty is very responsive. She is just really light. She doesn't hang on the halter, she listens to what you ask. You can basically just look at her hindquarters, and she'll swing them out. They did cantering too. It was with a saddle too.
Wow. I think I missed a little step with training the fillies. Cantering with a saddle. Geez. I can't believe I forgot that.

I just wanna say the fillies are so cute! Believe me I do not use "cute". Ever. And their fur is so soft too.
We were actually at the horses' Monday too. We didn't do anything, because it was raining out. I think there was a little bit of hail too. But we hadn't been over there in a while and Dash would not let us come up to her. So we spent almost an hour just working on that. Actually it was probably less, but whatev. I'll say it's an hour. Makes it a little more entertaining. Though Terry dewormed and vaccinated them that morning, so that might have something to do with it. He said they were very good though.
Terry was telling us that he had something to show us, and that we would be proud.
He said he started feeding the fillies in the trailer. They would just walk in behind him and he would have to hurry up and walk faster so that he could close the dividers, after each horse got in, quickly enough. They just walk right in and are totally fine with the dividers. It's really funny watching them.
So that's what I did yesterday. I had to put it off until today because  I went to church last night and didn't get a chance to finish it yesterday. Talking about church I have some very sad news.
My youth pastor and his family left today. So my youth group and I had a crying fest yesterday. I went by their house today and just looking at it, and thinking about them not being in it, made me really sad. But they are going on to where God wants them and touching the lives of everyone they meet, just like they touched my life and the lives of my church.

So I never posted this. This was from Monday and Wednesday