Plans

So it was extremely cold yesterday... and I still went riding. I went over to HM's place and rode one of her three horses. It was windy and cold. But lucky for us she has an indoor arena. When I own my own place I'm going to have an indoor arena. It would be sooo nice.
So I rode HM's Thoroughbred Ollie and aleythia rode Tea. Not sure if it's tea or just plain T. I'll just do Tea. She had me put a bridle on Ollie so that I could practice using contact. We'd asked about it before. I wanted to get a feel for what it should feel like when I try it with Misstack or any of my other horses. The hardest thing to do was to keep contact on an upward transition to the canter. It was fun. And then I wanted to see what it felt like when I didn't collect him so I let go of all contact and that was fun! HM asked me if I was more comfortable that way. Definitely. I'm more relaxed and move easier with the horse. I suppose it's because I've never had to ride a horse with contact and not letting my arms relax throws me off a little bit.
Aleythia was having problems riding Tea's canter. Like she wasn't quite with the horse. I would describe it as being behind the horse's action. Like she was leaning back to far. HM suggested that she bring her shoulders forward so that they were centered over her hips. That definitely helped. She was more balanced and it looked a lot more smoother. I've told her that she needs to bring her upper body forward before, but that made it seem more simple. Sometimes it helps to have someone rephrase it. That's how I was with learning how to sit Ana's trot. I was reading in a magazine and it said just relax your lower back. All the sudden I had a light bulb moment. That totally made sense. I could do that. Aleythia always told me to relax, but that doesn't sound easy. Like relax what! When I had a small thing that I could focus on to relax it worked much better and I learned how to sit Ana's trot.

I asked S more about her horse Patches that I'm going to help her train. I wanted to know exactly how much he really knows. She said he can be caught and he leads, but not real well. He has been longed before. She said that when her dad put her on him he followed him just fine. Patches is going to be S's dad's new Possy horse and that just means that they help out with local events on horses. The horses need to know how to complete a trail class. So, like side passing, getting on and off pulling stuff, opening and closing gates, going over logs, used to strange noises, backing up, and all that other stuff. S said that she almost didn't want to train Patches cause then her dad told her that he would just get another horse and she kinda wants another horse, but then he said that he would sell all the other horses to do it. So, we're training Patches. I'm thinking that if we get out there often enough we'll be riding him within a month.

I can't wait till it starts warming up. First because it's a lot more enjoyable to ride when it's warm and school will be almost over. Yes. I'm dreaming of summer already. Second because I am going to help a friend train a horse! We'll call my friend S. S has a four year old gelding that has had very little training. From what I gathered she has sat on him once. He's an Appaloosa and his name is Patches. He's taller than you would expect an appaloosa to be and S says that he's stubborn. He doesn't want to do anything you ask. I am siked! I know a four year old that's not had much training. S was complaining about not training him because she doesn't have enough time. I told her not to wait too long to start because the longer you wait the harder he'll be to train because he'll get stronger and more stuck in his ways. A four year old isn't too bad though. I'll be teaching S how to train a horse too. And with four fillies under training and learning what needes to be done I will be well prepared. It will probably go more quickly than the fillies though because I won't have to worry about how young he is. If we can get out there often enough it should get along really well.

I learned something today. I was sitting at a table at pancake breakfast that an organization called Youth For Christ(YFC) puts on at my high school and a girl I know that owns horses and has like seventeen horses where she lives (not S) comes to my table. We get to talking about horses... of course... Turns out her mom is a horse trainer. Hence why she has seventeen horses. She is training four perchons in driving and the rest are mostly quarter horses that she trains in barrel racing. I think I should get a hold of her and see if we can work something out.
That would be great for me. I learned barrel racing from riding. I've never had a teacher and I really wish I did. Unless you count my horse as a teacher. And learning how to train a barrel horse from an actual teacher would also be a bonus.