Preparing for Lysts on the Lake 2012

Well, it's getting to be that time again. Time to start preparing for "Lysts on the Lake 2012". This year Lysts will be held Friday, Saturday and Sunday, May 4,5 & 6, 2012. There are rumors that there will be a Chivalric Martial Arts International (CMAI) Syposium the week before "Lysts on the Lake" where experienced competitors can hone their skills, and those with little to no experience can learn the basics and compete against each other in a mini-tournament.

Since I am wife to one of the jousters who will be competing and am good friends with many of the other jousters, ground crew and participants, I can't help but become involved with it all. Not that I mind. I love the all the excitement and spectacle of contemporary competitive jousting. I feel honored to play my own small part in the largest competitive jousting tournament in the modern world.

Preparation has actually been going on for some time now. Planning for and participating in an annual event of this sort usually begins as soon as one finishes recovering from last year's event. Jousting, like many sports is not an on again, off again sport. You pretty much have to practice it year round. However, our group of friends began jousting practices specifically aimed at preparing for competing in Lysts 2012 a little over two weeks ago.

Unfortunately, two days before that first jousting practice, I tripped and fell while trying to move around some welded wire fence panels and broke my knee. Just a hairline fracture, but it's still causing me problems. I also did an unknown amount of damage to the soft tissues (muscles and ligaments) in my leg. So, although I attended that first practice at DASH's arena on January 8, I really wasn't paying much attention to what anyone was doing, and I did not get any pictures.

I did notice that my horse, Shadowfax, despite having not been seriously ridden in over a year, did pretty well. Hubby's horse, Ziggy, is 25 years old and although he is still very healthy in most ways, he's just getting a little too old for all the rigors of a competitive jousting tournament, so hubby has decided to see if he can train Shadowfax to joust. After this first practice, things seem promising.

Fortunately, JJ and her husband were at this joust practice. They took pictures and JJ wrote up a nice account of the practice on her blog, Wyvern Oaks: "A Fabulous Weekend of Riding" The first part of the post talks about a jumping lesson, but the latter part of the post discusses the jousting practice.

SG on Saga makes a pass at the quintain.(Thanks to JJ for the picture)

The next weekend, Jan 15, some other friends held a jousting practice to prepare for Lysts in Katy, Texas. I didn't make it to that one in any way shape or form. However, my hubby Foxfire drove down with SH in order to participate. Because Shadowfax had developed abscesses in both front feet, hubby decided not to take him, and instead helped SH train DA's horse Moose. You can see pictures of that practice in Fred Facker's Zenfolio album "Jousting Practice".

My next post will deal with the jousting practice on January 22 at DASH's arena.

Riding Red in a Jousting Saddle

This past Sunday, there was another jousting practice at DASH's arena. DA was kind enough to trailer Ziggy over so that Foxfire could could get some work in on him. (We really need to get a truck of our own.) I went along to watch and be social. However, I ended up helping train SH's new jousting horse, Tinkerbell, by standing at the end of the jousting lane and giving her baby carrots when she would come to me and stop instead of continuing to run around the arena. Tinkerbell is a huge Frisian/Percheron cross, and I have to admit, it was a little scary to see her coming at me. But she always stopped, or at least slowed down enough so that all I had to do was take one step to the side and she would end up beside me instead of in front of me. She was trying to stop, she just mis-judged her distance a little.

I also got up on Red and rode around the arena a little at a walk. Red was wearing his jousting saddle which I had never ridden in before and I hope to never ride in again. The saddle seams are in exactly the wrong place for me and really dug into my inner thighs. Ouch. Also, the stirrup leathers which were sized for SG were way too long for me, so I had to ride without stirrups. Not really a big deal, since all I was going to do was walk. But it was really nice for JJ (and SG who is actually the one who rides Red for jousting) to let me ride him, so I shouldn't complain. I'm not sure exactly how long I rode. Maybe 20 minutes? The saddle was hurting my thighs and, I have to admit, it really is rather boring to just walk around an arena. But I need to get more time in the saddle at a walk before I'll be able to do anything else. Sadly, my tailbone still hurts when I put pressure on it, so I'm a little leery of trying to trot yet, even on as sweet a horse as Red.

Ah well, one step at a time.

Lunging Shadowfax

Well, I finally felt well enough (and brave enough) to try and lunge Shadowfax. Not that he's bad to lunge. When he is lunged consistently, he does just fine. But he hasn't been lunged consistently since we bought him. (I know that's bad, but first there was knee deep mud and then I was injured and Foxfire doesn't really know how to lunge since his horse was never trained to do it.) I don't know why I decided to lunge Shadowfax today. Foxfire was actually out of town with SH doing SCA equestrian stuff. And you would think that I would want to do it when he was around. If for nothing else than the fact that he could take pictures. (I still don't have any pictures of me with my horse. Sigh.) But for some reason, I felt like doing it for the first time this afternoon, and so I did.

Now, I don't exactly have much experience lunging horses. Back when Cash was still sound, JJ showed me how to lunge him a couple of times. But that was well over a year ago, and Cash was extremely well trained. All I really had to do was hold the lunge line and speak the cues and Cash did what I said with absolutely no fuss. A few months ago, at the jousting clinic, JJ had demonstrated lunging Shadowfax to me, though, because of my injuries, I couldn't actually lunge him myself. Shadowfax is not quite as well-trained or willing as Cash. With some consistent work, he probably could be, but he's not there right now. Even with JJ lunging him, there were quite a few fireworks. So, I knew there were probably going to be some problems when I started lunging him. And there were. But they weren't that bad. And by the end of the relatively short session, he was actually doing pretty well. So here's a brief summary of how things went.

Now, since I had treats in my pocket, the minute I walked out into the pasture, Shadowfax came up to me. How he knows I have treats in my pockets, I don't know. I only have treats about one in ten times I go into the pasture, but, I swear, the horse is psychic, because he always seems to know when I have treats. When I don't have treats, he'll look up at me, but he doesn't come over unless I call to him. If I have treats, I don't have to call, he just comes. Smart horse. I haltered him and led him to the trailer which is where we keep the lunging equipment.

The flies were bothering him, so I decided to spray him, which I knew he wouldn't like, but he needs to get used to it. I pulled out the fly spray and when he saw the bottle, he stepped back just a little and looked nervous. I held the fly spray in the same hand the I held the lead rope in, and with my other hand, I pulled out a carrot stick. I held the carrot stick up next to the fly spray where he could see it. After a moment he stepped forward and reached for the carrot. I made sure that he had to rub his nose against the side of the bottle in order to get the carrot. Then as he was munching the carrot, I slowly sprayed his front legs. He sidled away a little bit in a semi-circle on the lead rope, and I followed him until he was against the side of the trailer and couldn't sidle any more. I again sprayed his front legs and he sort of shifted a bit, but couldn't really go anywhere. I sprayed his leg again and he finally just stood there, so I gave him another carrot stick. As he was munching the carrot stick, I moved to his side to spray his side, back and belly. He moved forward and got away from the trailer, so I moved him around in a circle again, until he was against the trailer again. I rustled the pocket with the treats in it and then sprayed his side again. He twitched a little, but basically stood still, so he got another carrot stick. Then I sprayed his back leg. We went in a circle again and he ended up back against the trailer. Etc... We repeated the pattern several times until I had gotten him to stand still while I sprayed him all over. Then I held up the bottle in front of him again and when he sniffed it, gave him another carrot stick. (The carrot sticks are pretty small, so I can feed him a lot of them.) I put the fly spray away and got out the lunge line and whip, and led him over to a clear flat area.

Now when I started all of this the donkeys and Ziggy were way on the other side of the pasture, but when I started to walk Shadowfax in a circle, they ALL had to come over and see what I was doing. Ziggy actually stayed far enough away not to be a problem, but Kanny and Tessla managed to actually get between Shadowfax and me just ahead of the lunge line, they kept walking and I actually let them lunge with us for about half a circle because it was really sort of cute. But after half a circle, I stopped because I figured sooner or later someone was going to get out of sync and cause problems and I truly did not want that. I locked the donkeys in the goat pen and started Shadowfax walking in circles again. He actually did really well walking at the end of the lunge and after about 5 or so circles, I asked him to trot. He didn't trot right away and I had to ask more forcefully and flip the whip a little bit to actually get him to trot, but he trotted eventually. When I asked him to go back to walk, he did so promptly. When I asked for trot again, he did a little better and he was always willing to slow to walk.

However, when I asked him to canter, there were some fireworks. He wouldn't go from just the voice cue, so I had to flick the whip at him several times. I finally actually touched his rump with the whip, not forcefully, just enough for him to feel it and he bucked and kicked out. I yelled, "NO!!" and he immediately went into a hell bent for leather canter. It wasn't exactly what I wanted, but it was a canter and he wasn't pulling on the lunge line or anything. I let him run around about five times, then tried to slow him to a trot. At first, he just kept running. I tried different things to slow him and finally figured out that speaking extreeeeeemmmmmmmllllllyyyy slowly and letting my voice drop in pitch and volume was the way to get him to slow down. He gradually slowed down and finally dropped into a trot. I trotted him two circles, then asked for a walk, and he slowed to a walk. And then I asked him to stop.

Sadly, he doesn't seem to understand "Ho" at all. The only way to get him to stop is to pull the lunge line shorter and shorter and he'll eventually stop. It's a bit frustrating, but I suppose there are worse things. I'll ask JJ what I can do to teach him to stop when I say "Ho".

I switched which side the lunge line was attached to and started him walking in the opposite direction. This time when I asked for trot, I got it a bit more easily, I still had to make tsk, tsk noises at him, but I didn't have to flip the whip. I walked, trotted, walked several times, then I asked for canter. Again there were fireworks, but a loud "NO!!" was all it took to make him canter instead of buck and kick out. (He only did one buck and one kick before he went into the canter on each side and I sort of wonder if he would have gone into the canter after expressing his displeasure even I hadn't yelled. Who knows.) Anyway, he did hell bent for leather canter again and I let him go for several circles then I started slowing him down. I asked for a slower canter, by saying "canter" in a slow drawn out way on a descending scale, and he actually slowed into a nice controlled canter. After a couple of more circles, I asked for a trot and got it immediately. I asked for walk and got it fairly quickly and then I had to pull him in to get him to stop.

I switched directions again and asked for walk, trot, walk, trot, canter, trot, walk, and got everything I asked for reasonably quickly and with NO fireworks. I tried asking for stop again, and again had to pull him in closer to finally get him to stop, but he did stop a bit more easily than before. I decided that that was a really good positive note to end on and didn't lunge him in the other direction again. Maybe the lunging was a bit uneven in numbers of circles in each direction, but I wanted to stop on a positive note and wasn't sure it would go as well in the other direction. I gave him a carrot stick and told him that he'd been a very good boy.

I led him back to the trailer, switched the lunge line for the lead line and held the fly spray bottle out to him again. At first he pulled his head back, but then seemed to remember the carrots and nosed the bottle. I gave him another carrot stick. I closed everything back up in the trailer, led him over to the gate to the backyard, took his halter off, gave him another carrot stick and petted him a few times. I let the donkeys out of the goat pen, petted them, petted Shadowfax again and came inside.

It wasn't a very long lunging session, and it certainly wasn't perfect, but I am very happy that it went as well as it did. And even though my arms and shoulders are a little tired, my ribs and tailbone don't hurt any more than usual, so obviously it didn't strain my injuries. Now that I know that I can lunge Shadowfax, I will try to do so several times a week. Hopefully, he and I will both improve our lunging abilities, and it will strengthen our relationship.

What's Blooming -- Late March

This past March, my friend JJ posted some pictures of the wildflowers blooming near her new house and asked her readers to post pictures of the flowers near their houses. I grabbed my husband's fancy camera and started taking pictures and a new hobby was born. Turns out I really like taking pictures of flowers. I've always liked taking pictures to some extent, but it was mainly during vacations and at special events. I had never really thought much about taking pictures of ordinary flowers. Of course part of my enjoyment comes from having such a nice camera to use. I can take really close up pictures of teeny tiny flowers and blow them up nice and big so that they can be seen without having to crawl around on your hands and knees with a magnifying glass. I like taking pictures of larger flowers as well, but my real joy comes from discovering the itty bitty flowers that would normally be overlooked and making them prominent in the picture.

At first I tried to look up and identify all the flowers that I didn't know the name of, but that turned out to be very time consuming. I eventually gave up and just gave simple descriptive names to the flowers I couldn't identify. BTW, if you know what any of the unknown flowers are, or if I have mis-labeled any of the flowers, please let me know in the comments section. You can see some of my better pictures in my What's Blooming -- Late March photo album. But here are some of my favorite pictures and pictures of some of the unknown wildflowers that I would like to identify. All of these wildflowers bloomed in the Texas Hill Country in late March. (I know... I know. These pictures are from March and it's now May. I'm behind on my posts. Sorry.)

The ever popular Texas Bluebonnet.

An intact Dandelion puff.

An unknown itty bitty blue flower.

Showing exactly how small the itty bitty blue flower is, less than a quarter of an inch in diameter.

A peach blossom.

An Old Blush rosebud.

A Lady Banks White rose.

Unknown tiny white flowers, about a quarter of an inch in diameter.

Unknown very small white flowers, about a third of an inch in diameter.

Unknown grass bloom.

Unknown narrow petaled yellow flower.

Unknown small pink flower, less than half an inch in diameter.

Unknown tiny pink and purple flowers, less than a quarter inch in diameter.

Purple Prairie Verbena

Wild Allium

Unknown yellow flowers

A pretty lavender blue Anemone

White anemones

Bladderpod. An unattractive name for a cute little (about 1/2 inch) flower. You can see one of the pods behind the flowers.

A white Iris

A mulberry bloom

Pear blossoms

Sherardia Arvensis, tiny lavender flowers, less than a quarter inch in diameter, but very prolific.

Tiny Yellow Clover. It's actually called "Tiny Yellow Clover", that's not my description.

Spiderwort

Ok, so I posted a lot of pictures. I actually took hundreds, so I've edited the selection down a good bit. I hope you enjoyed looking at ones I posted. If you want to see more, check out my What's Blooming -- Late March photo album. The names of the flowers (known and unknown descriptions) are at the end of the direct link if you are curious. Feel free to make comments and/or tell me the names of flowers.

Second trail ride

A few days ago, Foxfire and I went for a second trail ride around the neighborhood. The pasture was (and is) still too muddy for riding, and also, Ziggy seems more accepting of Shadowfax when they are away from the donkeys. Shadowfax did quite well again. Still very looky, but paying more attention to me. There was only one time when he had a little problem. Foxfire had ridden Ziggy fairly far ahead and turned a corner. Once Ziggy was out of sight, Shadowfax got somewhat nervous and started prancing. I tried to calm him back down to a walk, but he wouldn't calm very easily. I tried letting the reins out just a little to let him trot to catch up, but he gathered himself like he was going to go into a canter, so I pulled him back. (I do not want him cantering over asphalt.) I thought about just working through it, but we were coming up on a section of the road that slopes somewhat steeply down to a bridge and I didn't want him to be prancing down that slope. Shadowfax apparently doesn't have much experience with going up and down hills and I was afraid he might lose his balance or something, so I called Foxfire to bring Ziggy back. As soon as Ziggy was back in sight and relatively close, Shadowfax calmed right down and went back to walking.

We finished the ride back in our front yard, and I let Foxfire ride Shadowfax for the first time. He walked, trotted and very briefly cantered him up and down the long side of our property (we live on a corner). Shadow did do a little buck when Foxfire asked him to canter, but otherwise did pretty well. However, I think he really is the kind of horse that would prefer to have just one person riding him. He seems to behave better for me than for either Foxfire or JJ. (JJ said so herself when she went with me to evaluate him before buying him. And she is not the type to say things she doesn't mean.)

Anyway, that's all for now. Foxfire lost a very close friend today and I'm trying to help him deal with the pain. Right now, he's sitting next to me on his computer chatting with other friends, so I figured I would simply write a short post so that I had a reason to sit next to him. I hope that I can give him what he needs.

I GOT A HORSE!!! I GOT A HORSE!!! I GOT A HORSE!!!

After searching for over a year, I actually found and was able to buy (barely) my dream horse. He's an eight year old, 16.2 hand, dapple gray Andalusian gelding.

JJ kindly agreed to give Shadowfax a test ride when I asked for her opinion before buying him. I didn't have anyone to take pictures when I was riding him, but JJ said that I looked good on him.

I can't believe that I actually found an Andalusian that I could afford that was healthy, sound and sane. He even has dressage training. Okay, he doesn't have the best conformation, and he has a little arthritis in his hocks, and yes, he is young to already have arthritic changes. But he is still sound enough for what I want to do according to the vet, and should remain that way for many years with proper maintenance. He is also still somewhat inexperienced since after being started under saddle and ridden for a couple of years, he was then put out to pasture and had nothing done with him for about two years. But after being back under saddle for only a little over a month, he was easy and comfortable for me to ride. He's a little lazy, but that might get better with more consistent riding. I didn't have any trouble getting him to trot and canter, though I did have a little trouble keeping him cantering. But just a little extra push with my outside leg and inside hip kept him going. Considering that I'm still learning how to canter myself and that I am just coming back from several months off of riding because of my surgery, it's a pretty good sign that I was able to ride him that easily.

His registered name is Mi Romeo, but neither Foxfire nor I really wanted to call him Romeo so I was trying to come up with another name for him. I was out in the pasture with him and suddenly realized that I had just called him Shadow. So I asked, "Is Shadow your name?" and he walked toward me. Of course any time he hears my voice, he walks toward me(Yes, he already comes to me any time I go out in the pasture. He really WAS meant for me.) But Foxfire liked the name Shadow, so we tentatively started calling him Shadow. However, we already have a cat named Shadow and I also wanted a name with a little more distinction for my horse, so after thinking about it for a while, I decided that I would call him Shadowfax. I know it's a bit presumptuous to name him after Gandalf's stallion in Lord of the Rings, but he is an Andalusian, which is the breed of horse they used for Shadowfax in the movie. And it just seems like the right name for him.

I admit that I'm still a little nervous about having spent so much on a horse. But even though he is not perfect (no horse is), I think he is the right horse for me. I'm still sort of getting used to the idea of having my own horse. I don't think it's really sunk in yet. Maybe once I get a chance to ride him here it will finally sink in. I haven't been able to ride him at home yet because my husband's very mild mannered horse, Ziggy, has turned into a fire-breathing herd protector. Ziggy will not let Shadowfax anywhere near HIS donkeys. The problem is the donkeys (and Ziggy to some extent) are used to coming up to me anytime I go into the pasture in order to get petted and scritched. So anytime I go out in the pasture to try and spend time with Shadowfax, the donkeys and Ziggy come over and chase Shadowfax away. I can't put Ziggy in his stall because when we tried to do that, Ziggy went absolutely balistic and started charging his stall door. We were afraid that he'd hurt himself (and destroy the stall) so we had to let him out.

Foxfire and I have tried several different things to get Ziggy to accept Shadowfax. It's not like we just turned everyone loose in the pasture together. When we brought Shadowfax home, we had Ziggy in his stall and the donkeys and goats in the goat pen. We led Shadowfax around the property and let him see and smell everything. (BTW, Shadowfax behaved very well throughout everything. He was curious and looking around, but not nervous or aggressive.) Then I led Shadowfax up to Ziggy's stall to let them sniff noses. And that's when the drama began. Ziggy took one sniff then snapped at Shadowfax. Shadowfax naturally stepped back, but that's all he did. He didn't snap back or get excited, he just got out of reach of Ziggy. I waited a few seconds and let Ziggy just look at Shadowfax and when he seemed calmer, I led Shadowfax up to him again. Again Ziggy snapped at him. So I decided to leave Ziggy alone for a bit and led Shadowfax over to the goat pen and let him sniff noses with the donkeys through the fence. Tessla, of course, immediately came over and said, "Hi". After seeing Tessla interacting safely with the big gray horse, Kanny and eventually Marie came over and they all sniffed noses. Shadowfax actually seemed to like the donkeys. Maybe he just appreciated that they weren't pinning their ears and snapping at him.

When Shadowfax seemed to lose interest in sniffing the donkeys, I let him wander around a bit on his own. I was still holding his lead rope, but I let him go where he wanted to. He soon found the water trough and took a long drink. After that I decided to try Ziggy again. Same result. Foxfire thought that maybe Ziggy would be friendlier if he weren't stuck in his stall, so I led Shadowfax a good distance away, and Foxfire haltered Ziggy and led him out. We carefully led the two horses closer to let them sniff noses again. This time Ziggy not only snapped at Shadowfax, he reared up a little and sort of thrashed his front hooves at him, accidentally racking Foxfire in the process. Foxfire was okay, just not real happy. Shadowfax remained surprisingly calm and just stepped back out of reach. Foxfire backed Ziggy up and I kept Shadowfax at a bit of a distance and we just let the horses look at each other for a while. Then very carefully we again let them get closer. Again Ziggy displayed very aggressive behavior. Ziggy wasn't actually biting or kicking Shadowfax, but he was putting on one hell of a threat display. We, Foxfire, the previous owner, her trainer and I, finally decided that the two horses would have to just work it out themselves. So I took Shadowfax to one end of the pasture and Foxfire took Ziggy to the other end and we turned them loose.

Shadowfax immediately trotted towards Ziggy who was standing by the goat pen with the donkeys in it. Ziggy charged at Shadowfax and chased him away. As soon as Shadowfax was a good distance away from the donkeys in the goat pen, Ziggy stopped chasing him and went back to the donkeys. This pattern repeated itself several times during which we figured out that Ziggy apparently saw Shadowfax as a threat to his herd (the donkeys). Poor Shadowfax just wanted to join the herd, but Ziggy absolutely refused to let him near. Since Ziggy was behaving so aggressively, we decided to just leave the donkeys and the goats in the pen for a while and see if in a few hours things had calmed down. Watching Ziggy behaving so aggressively was actually pretty frightening. He'd always been such a non-dominant horse before, but now his behavior was really scary. I'll repeat that neither Ziggy when he was attacking nor Shadowfax when he defended himself actually bit or kicked the other horse. It was just a lot of really aggressive display. But even though no one was actually getting hurt. It was distressing to watch.

Unfortunately, even hours later, Ziggy was still chasing Shadowfax away from the goat pen any time he came near. However, both horses were completely lathered and probably exhausted, and the chases were getting shorter and less intense, so we decided to try feeding everyone since it was about time for their evening meal. Shadowfax was quite willing to go into his new stall to get fed and enthusiastically gobbled up his grain. Ziggy had to be haltered and led into his stall and after taking only a few bites started pacing his stall, pinning his ears at Shadowfax in the stall next to him, snaking his head around the stall wall and snapping at Shadowfax. He even started charging his stall gate. At this point, because we were afraid that Ziggy would hurt himself, we had to let him out of his stall. He ran over and checked on the donkeys, then started charging at Shadowfax's stall. Foxfire and I would clap and yell at him and make him turn away, but it was still frightening Shadowfax. For the first time, Shadowfax started displaying nervous behavior. Completely understandably. Foxfire managed to chase Ziggy far enough off so that I could let Shadowfax out of his stall. Once Shadowfax was out of his stall he calmed down. However, Ziggy would still chase him away any time he came near his little herd. Poor Shadowfax.

Once it got completely dark, things seemed to settle down a bit. Every once in a while, Shadowfax would ease up toward the herd and Ziggy would chase him away, but things weren't nearly as dramatic. Since Ziggy hadn't finished his grain which is a very bad thing because he has a history of ulcers, I led Shadowfax into the goat pen and stayed with him so that Foxfire could bring Ziggy's feed bucket to where he was standing with the donkeys and encourage him to eat. Ziggy eventually finished most of his grain, and I let Shadowfax back out. Foxfire and I finally got our own dinner and settled down to watch some tv. But we would go outside every once in a while to check on everyone. Ziggy still wouldn't let Shadowfax join his herd, but at least there were no more big dramatic chases.

Anyway, that was the first day of having my new horse. Which was Sunday, by the way, I'm a little behind in posting this entry. I'll try to post what went on on Monday and today either later tonight or more likely tomorrow.

My first buck (from before the surgery)

The week before my surgery, JJ let me come out to the barn and ride Saga after her lesson on him. She was riding FuzzyPony's horse Taran in a lesson immediately following her lesson on Saga and so she needed someone to walk Saga cool and untack him and such. Since I hadn't ridden in a while it was a good chance for me to get a little riding in.

Everything went fine at first. JJ's lesson was at the end of the arena closest to the stalls and so I walked Saga around at the end of the arena closest to the pasture. Now it had been raining a lot lately, so most of the horses at the barn had been kept in their stalls for a week or more, but the barn owner apparently decided that the ground had dried out enough to let the horses back out into the pasture. The horses were understandably excited about finally getting out and being able to run around and stuff. Most of them took off running in their pastures, chasing each other and playing around. When they first started letting the horses out, I worried a little bit about Saga getting excited by the other horses running around, but even though he obviously noticed them, it didn't seem to bother him. He was still paying attention to me and would just occasionally look over at the pasture. I'd wriggle the reins and he would switch his attention back to me. No problem.

However... suddenly two(or possibly more) of the horses decided to get into a squealing fight not far from the arena. That was just too much for Saga. He bucked. (I don't think it was that much of a buck because I actually stayed on him.) First his front end went up and then down and as his front end went down, his back end came up and threw me forward. I experienced a VIVID demonstration of why you want heels on your boots as my feet shot forward in the stirrups until my heels caught. He only did the one buck, but then he really wanted to run. Fortunately, I still had control of the reins and although he sort of jigged forward in this REALLY BOUNCY trot, he didn't actually run off with me. I had to pull and release the reins and say "whoaaaa" three times, but after the third time he actually stopped. (GOOD HORSE!) His body was still sort of quivering beneath me, and I suspected that if I moved at all, he probably would take off. So I sat VERY STILL, making soothing sounds and waiting for him to stop quivering.

About this time JJ, who had apparently had some trouble with Taran acting up at the same time and had not seen my masterful (HA! :sarcasm:) handling of Saga's buck, suggested that it would be a good idea for me to get off Saga since the other horses were making such a fuss that they might cause Saga to act up. I sort of quietly yelled back to her(I didn't want to make any startling noises, but for her to hear me on the other side of the arena I had to be pretty loud) that as soon as Saga finished quieting down, I would get off of him. He did quiet down fairly quickly, but with horses still being let out to pasture nearby, I was a little worried about starting to dismount, getting halfway off and having something set Saga off again. So I asked a couple who were standing near the arena hand grazing a horse if one of them would mind coming and holding the reins while I dismounted. The girl headed my way, but she was rather hesitant and I could tell that she was a little scared of Saga. I tried to reassure her that he really was a sweetie that it was just the other horses making him excited. I don't know if that really reassured her, but she did come and hold my reins and I dismounted without any problem. I thanked her and led Saga back to the barn to untack and wash him down.

So anyway, that was the first buck I ever rode. Like I said, it probably wasn't much of a buck. He wasn't really trying to get me off his back. He wasn't angry or scared, just excited. But it was still a memorable experience for me.

Time to catch up a bit

I obviously haven't been posting much lately. It's taking me a while to recover from surgery and I really haven't been doing much besides laying on the couch and reading. There wasn't really much to write about. However, this weekend I finally got out of the house and did a couple of things. And there is a ride I had on Saga before the surgery that I should write about. I'll do that in a separate post.

Anyway, on Saturday, I persuaded Foxfire to drive me out to our property in Liberty Hill(which we call SpiderFox Ranch in the hope that in the not too distant future, we will be able to build a house out there and have our own little ranch), and I managed to walk around the property a little. I love going out there. It's so peaceful. I love looking at the trees and making my way through the trails between them. And at this time of the year there are thousands of little yellow flowers blooming everywhere. There were also some white daisy-like flowers and some little purple flowers. And a great big jack rabbit ran past us. Since it had been raining so much, our tank was full and there was even a little rivulet going across the lowest part of our property. There were hundreds of dragon flies hovering around the tank, mating and chasing smaller insects. Unfortunately, we couldn't stay very long. I still get tired really easily, and we had to get back to town to go to our friend JJ's birthday party.

For her birthday, JJ had a singer perform an informal concert at her house for her friends and family. The singer was Heather Dale. I really enjoyed listening to her. Not only does she have a lovely voice, she tells fascinating stories about the songs she sings. Some of the songs are classics, others have been written by people she knows and a fair amount she wrote herself. She has a website where you can listen to samples of her songs and download complete songs or albums. You can also buy actual compact discs to be shipped to you.

During intermission, an extremely tasty birthday cake was served (carrot cake, yum!) and there were other munchies. I also got to socialize a bit with friends that I hadn't seen in over a month which was really nice. Although I am a bit of a hermit, not seeing anyone but my husband and my doctor for almost a month is rather boring and lonely even for me. Unfortunately, I was REALLY tired and in some pain by the end of the concert so I couldn't stay to socialize very long after it. But at least I did get out of the house and was able to interact with people for a little while. Thanks for inviting me to your birthday, JJ!

Pictures from Fourth Lesson...

I realized that I never posted the pictures that Foxfire took during my fourth lesson with Christine. Here is a link to the lesson 4 album which has a fair number of the numerous pics my sweetie took.

From looking at the pictures, I realized that I tend to lean a bit forward at the posting trot:

And that I lean a bit backwards during the sitting trot:

Also that my hands are just about always too high (Though at least I'm not leaning forward or backward in this pic):

Also, in most pictures, my legs are too far forward and I need to tuck my elbows in. And in every picture my knees and feet are turned way too far out. Tucking my elbows in shouldn't take too much work(I hope), but from my discussion with Christine, getting my legs back will just take time. My feet will probably always point a little out since I am duck toed, but I can work on getting my knees/legs to go forward rather than out.

As for when I was cantering, I look pretty awkward in most of the pics. Not too surprising since it was my first time cantering off a lunge line. But according to JJ, I actually look pretty decent in this pic:

Anyway, feel free to look at the other pictures and give me feedback if you so desire.

Second Lesson with Christine

My second lesson with Christine was a longe lesson on Will, her 16 hand bay appendix. We mainly worked on the sitting trot and repeated some of our work on downward transitions using just your seat. Near the end, we also did a tiny bit of canter. I still need a lot of work on cantering before I'm ready to do it off of the longe line.

She also worked on correcting my basic form on the horse. She kept telling me to look up. Keep my head up. I have a tendency to stare at my horse's ears as if the instructions were written there. It's a fairly common problem. But I really need to keep my head up to keep everything in balanced alignment over my stirrups. Your head is pretty heavy and if it's not kept in proper balance over your neck and body, it can pull the rest of your body off balance. Another thing she told me is that I need to wrap my legs lightly around the horse, like a wet towel would drape around him, rather than letting my legs just hang away from his body. And, of course, there were the occasional statements to,"keep your heels down."

She also talked about how the horse I was riding would let his outside shoulder fall out when we were going counter clockwise and told me to press a little with my outside leg and turn my head and shoulders towards the inside more. I did what she said, and she said,"there, see, he's got it right now" or something like that. But honestly, I couldn't tell any difference. I should have asked her to explain what falling out was and how exactly I fixed it, but I was sort of embarrassed to do so.

Later, when I was talking with JJ about the lesson, she explained what falling out was and that helped me to understand how what I did fixed the problem. Falling out (sometimes called popping out) is basically when the horse's head and neck are turning with the rein, but his body is still going straight. It's probably a bit more complicated than that, but that's how I understood it. And by using your outside leg and turning your head and shoulders in the direction you want his body to turn, you make his body flex in the direction that you're turning rather than remaining straight. JJ also mentioned keeping a firm outside rein, which Christine didn't talk about. Probably because it was a longe lesson and I wasn't really using the reins.

Overall, I believe the lesson went well. I think I made some improvement on my sitting trot and downward transitions. I got at least a taste of the canter. I worked on my basic form, and I was prompted to learn what "falling out" means. I'm really glad that I found Christine (and that I have JJ as a friend), and I'm looking forward to my next lesson.

Trip to Pine Hill & Blueberry Picking

Friday evening, immediately after my first lesson with Christine, JJ, Foxfire and I loaded up and headed out to Pine Hill, an eventing facility in Bellville, TX. (They really need to spruce up their website.) JJ's two dogs Elias and Reba came with us because JJ's usual dog-sitter wasn't available. Fortunately, both dogs are VERY well behaved. In fact, Reba is actually in training to be a service dog. After a fortunately uneventful 2 & 1/2 hour drive, we arrived at Pine Hill. We unloaded the horses, set up their stalls, put the horses in their stalls, plugged in JJ's pickup bed camper and crashed for the night.

Early the next morning, we got up, ate a quick breakfast and got ready for JJ and Foxfire's lesson. Basically, JJ and Foxfire tacked up and I stood around with the camera bag over my shoulder waiting to take pictures. Since I wasn't riding (I'm not even close to being able to jump yet), I had volunteered to take pictures. As JJ and Foxfire were getting ready, the trainer, Toni, showed up and introduced herself. Once everyone was tacked up, she suggested a warm up in the stadium jumping arena. I checked the direction of the sun and took a few pictures of JJ and Foxfire warming up on the flat.

JJ at the trot.


Foxfire at the canter.

After a brief warm up in the arena, Toni led Foxfire and JJ out onto the cross country course. I did my best to follow and get good pictures. Now, I'm not a real photographer. I've never had any training or anything. But I've picked up a few things about lighting and angles just from watching other photographers and a bit of my own experience. So as I followed them around, I tried to guess which jump they were going over (because I was trying to get good angles on the jumps, I wasn't always close enough to hear what the trainer was saying) and tried to make sure that the sun was behind me and not behind the horse. I didn't always succeed. Sometimes because they were going over a different jump than I thought that they were going over. Sometimes because, even if I knew which jump they were aiming for, they were moving a lot faster than I and I simply couldn't get to the best angle in time and simply had to take whatever shot I could get from wherever I was when they approached the jump. And some jumps simply didn't have any place that you could take a good picture from(my husband's favorite jump into the woods). Anyway, it was a fun experience, and I think I got some good shots. You can see most of the decent pictures in my Pine Hill May 2009 album, but here are a few of my favorites.

JJ and Saga in a massive jump over a little coop.


Foxfire and Ziggy going over a rolltop.


JJ and Saga at the top of the beginner novice bank up.

Saga almost ran me over immediately after I took this shot. He'd always come out of his jumps straight before, so I wasn't expecting him to swerve to his right. Fortunately, I darted left, and JJ straightened him out before he got too close to me. But it makes for a nice shot with Saga looking almost directly into the camera.

JJ and Saga going up the novice bank up.

JJ liked this picture so much, she asked me to make it into the title pic for her blog, The Saga Chronicles. I must admit that it made me feel really good that she liked my picture that much.

Foxfire and Ziggy taking the beginner novice bank up.


Foxfire and Ziggy finishing the beginner novice bank up.


JJ and Saga cantering through the water.


Foxfire washing Ziggy off. (Ziggy's smiling for the camera. :-) )


JJ cooling Saga off.

I feel sort of bad that I got more really good shots of JJ than I did of my husband. But I suppose that's just the way it goes sometimes.

After we got the horses cooled down, we put them in their stalls, and we went to pick blueberries at Chmielewski's Blueberry Farm in Hockley. Neither Foxfire nor I had ever been blueberry picking (or any kind of picking) before, so it was a new experience for us. Even though the bushes had already been pretty well picked over, we managed to find a fair amount of berries and had a really good time. Afterwards we went to a great little diner aptly called Must Be Heaven. JJ and I each had a fabulous french dip sandwich. Foxfire had a succulent salmon sandwich, and we all had a slice of REAL key lime pie. JJ also bought a slice of sawdust pie to go. We waddled out of the diner, drove back to Pine Hill, packed up everything, loaded the horses and headed home.

All in all, it was a fantastically fun day, and I look forward to doing it again.

My First Lesson with Christine

Well... Due to my other activities this weekend, it's been several days since my lesson, so I'll start out by saying that I'm not entirely sure how much I'm going to remember or how accurately. But I'll do my best.

I arrived a little early for my lesson, and Christine was finishing up a training session with a young mare. She said that she would just be a few more minutes. I watched for a while, then went over to the fence where her lesson horses were kept and petted Meshack(sp?) through the fence. He's the little gray arab I mentioned in the previous post. And I mean LITTLE. He's only 14.1 hands. She told me that I could go ahead and get him out. So I did. I brought him over to where she was leading the mare to be untacked, and she untacked while I started grooming Meshack. She did his feet since I'm still rather scared of dealing with horse's feet and I'd only just met Meshack. (When I was in junior high, a friend of mine was killed by being kicked in the head by a horse.) However, Christine told me that as I became familiar with her horses that I would have to do it myself. No real surprise there. I know that it's something that I need to deal with. Meshack's regular saddle is a 17" Wintec Isabell which is rather fortunate for me. I would be a bit more comfortable in a 17.5", but it's still a saddle that I really like.

Once Meshack was tacked up, I led him over to the mounting block and mounted. After adjusting the stirrups a little longer, she grabbed my legs and PUT them where they are supposed to go. I found it a little disconcerting when she did it. But after getting over my initial surprise, I appreciated knowing exactly where my legs were supposed to be, and having the physical sensation of them being there to help me remember where to hold them in the future. Then she spent about 5 - 10 minutes talking to me about proper positioning and how we really should be controlling our horse's basic movements with our seat and legs. That the reins are more useful if you can save them to give more varied and subtle commands. This made a lot of sense to me. And I was glad that I was going to be learning more about directing the horse with my seat. It was something that I'd been wanting to work more on ever since my friend, JJ, had explained some of it to me. Meshack was very patient and stood quietly through all of this talk.

After, she finished the lecture part of the lesson, Christine told me to bring Mesack into the arena and just walk in circles around her. She told me to get him to move in circles by turning my shoulders in the direction that I wanted to go and by putting more weight in my inside stirrup. It worked like a charm. I didn't have to use my reins at all to direct him. And he was very responsive to the amount of weight that I would put in my inside stirrup. The more weight, the tighter the turn. We worked on spiraling into a smaller circle, then spiraling back out to a larger circle for a while. I would occasionally have trouble with where my shoulders were facing. I kept wanting to keep them straight rather than turning them in when I was spiraling in. Spiraling out was easier because I really wasn't turning them out, more just straightening them to allow the circle to become bigger.

Then we worked on halting using just our seat. I'd worked on this before with The Oracle, the trainer who comes up from Mexico every few months, but I still needed work on it. Christine explained it a little differently than The Oracle had. (Don't ask me for exactly how her explanation was different, I'm afraid I don't remember.) I seemed to understand Christine's explanation a little better because I was able to stop Meshack with my seat fairly consistently.

Christine then asked me to do some circles in a "rising trot". I'd never heard of a "rising trot", so I asked if a "rising trot" was the same as a "posting trot". And apparently they are just different terms for the same thing. So I did a couple of circles at the posting trot and worked on asking for a downward transition into a walk using just my seat. We only did this maybe twice and she didn't say much. So either I was getting it right, or I was so awful that she just couldn't think of anything to say. Meshack was dropping into a walk when I asked, so I hope that I was getting it right.

She then asked me to do circles at sitting trot. Now I had worked on sitting trot a few times before, back when I was still riding Cash. But I had never really gotten the hang of it back then, and I haven't worked on it since. But I gave it a try. Fortunately, Meshack's trot isn't huge, so although I felt like I was bouncing around all over the place, Christine didn't mention anything about my ability to sit the trot, she just had me working on asking for a downward transition with my seat. This time, Meshack wasn't immediately dropping into a walk when I asked. Probably because I was too busy bouncing around to ask properly. He would transition down, but it took some time. At this point, Christine said that I was "whispering" the cue to slow down, rather than clearly stating it. So even though Meshack was willing to listen to my "whisper", I still need to work on being firmer and/or clearer when giving that cue. I tried several times more to get it right. Then, out of frustration, I finally asked how keep from bouncing around so much when sitting the trot. Christine was surprised that I didn't already know how to sit the trot. Then said that I had actually been doing well at it for not knowing how to do it. We immediately stopped working at downward transitions from the sitting trot and went back to stopping from the walk. We did that for a little longer, then it was the end of the lesson.

Christine said that my next lesson will probably be a longe lesson where we will work on the sitting trot. Not much of a surprise. And that we will use her other lesson horse (whose name I can't remember) because he is better at giving longe lessons than Meshack. I'm actually looking forward to my next lesson.

BTW, for those of you who don't already know, I suffer from a fairly extreme anxiety disorder with depression on the side. (Foxfire actually left work early so that he could be at my first lesson to give me moral support. He's such a GOOD husband!) I'd told Christine about it and she wasn't bothered by it. I don't know if she treated me any differently than she treats her other students, but although I was extremely nervous when we first started the lesson(I actually tried to put my half chaps on the wrong legs), I was considerably calmer by the time we finished. So the fact that I'm actually looking forward to taking another lesson is a real testament to her ability to work with me and all of my emotional problems. I am very glad that I found her and that she is willing to teach me. I hope to take many more lessons from her.

A Weekend to Remember... Hopefully...

I'm too tired to write a full post tonight, but I'll just mention that I had a very busy weekend. On Friday, I had my first lesson with Christine Bergeron of Cadence Ranch. It went very well and I am looking forward to taking more lessons with her. Friday evening, JJ, Foxfire and I drove out to Pine Hill, an eventing facility. We spent the night in JJ's pickup bed camper which was surprisingly nice. In the morning, JJ and Foxfire took a cross country jumping lesson and I followed them around taking pictures(you can see some of the pictures in my Pine Hill May 2009 album). That afternoon, we went blueberry picking at a "pick your own" farm in Hockley. Then we had lunch in a fantastic diner called "Must be Heaven" in Brenham. Finally, we went back to Pine Hill, picked the horses up and headed home. Sunday, Foxfire and I went to Dripping Springs to see a horse that I was interested in(that story is too complicated to summarize here). I'll try to write a blog for each day when I'm not so tired. I hope that I can remember everything.

Meanwhile, here's a picture of Foxfire taking a bank up with Ziggy, while JJ on Saga waits her turn.

Finding the right trainer

I've been taking dressage lessons off and on for about two years now. More off than on, especially since the horse that I first started lessons on, Cash, had to be retired. I got along really well with Cash and actually made fairly good progress while I was riding him. Unfortunately, after he retired, there wasn't really another horse that I felt as comfortable riding. So I pretty much just stopped riding, though I would still ride occasionally, and take lessons from The Oracle(one of my friend's early teachers) when she would come up to Texas from Mexico once every three or four months. I knew that I needed to take lessons more regularly, but not only did I not have a horse that I really wanted to ride, I also didn't get along all that well with the local instructor that my husband and friends take lessons from. Well, I recently had a breakthrough on how to ride my friend DA's horse, Sonata. And my other friend, JJ, just recently acquired a horse, Saga, that I really like. I'm also getting pretty serious about finding my own horse. So I figured that it was time to find a local trainer that I got along with so that I could take lessons regularly instead of just when The Oracle was in town.

I did some research online and came across Christine Bergeron of Cadence Ranch. I called and spoke with her several times over the phone, and I really liked what she had to say about teaching students and training horses. I also just enjoyed talking with her. I'm somewhat of a hermit and don't really enjoy talking to very many people, so I thought that it was very promising that I actually liked talking to her. I asked around and everyone who knew her said that she was a very good trainer. Even the instructor that my husband and friends take lessons from said that she thought that Christine would probably be a better teacher for me than she herself would be. My farrier was also very enthusiastic about her. So I decided to go and observe one of her lessons, and if I liked what I saw, then I would arrange to take a trial lesson with her.

I was being sort of lackadaisical about actually scheduling a visit, but my friend JJ encouraged me (vigorously) to start the process as soon as possible. So last night around 6pm, I called and left a message on Christine's voicemail asking if she was teaching that night and if she was, would she mind me and my husband coming over to watch. She called me back about 6:30 and said that her last lesson started at 7:15 and that we were welcome to come and watch. I very much appreciated that she was willing to let us come on such short notice. (I meant to thank her when we got there, but totally forgot to do so. :smacks head:) I hurried to feed our critters while waiting for Foxfire to get home, and, of course, that was the one time that the critters didn't follow their routine and it took twice as long to get everyone fed as it should have. I also discovered that one of my goats had finally given birth, to twins no less, and that slowed me down a bit more. But finally Foxfire and I made it out the door.

We got to Christine's about 7:30, so the lesson had already started. We watched for a few minutes and when Christine came to a breaking point in the lesson she waved us over and we all introduced ourselves. She continued the lesson, occasionally speaking to us when the student was resting her mare. And I must say that I was VERY impressed with her. She was very clear in her instructions to her student. Praised her when she did something right, pushed her when she wasn't doing it quite good enough, but was never harsh. From comments she made to us, it was clear that she knew both the student's and the horse's abilities and limitations and was balancing her instructions to match both. And she was not just teaching the student to ride, she was also, to a certain extent, teaching the student how to train her horse as well. She would tell the student to reward the mare when she at least attempted to do what she was asked to do, and in case the student couldn't tell when the mare was at least attempting to comply, Christine would state clearly when the mare was doing her best and when she was slacking off. When the mare actually accomplished what was being asked, Christine would tell the student to reward her even more thoroughly. She also kept a close eye on the mare's condition and would tell the student to walk her when she needed to take a break.

During these breaks, Christine would talk to us. When I asked her about one of the exercises she'd been working with the student on, she explained exactly what she was doing and how it benefited both rider and horse. She also talked about working within the horse's abilities and working gradually to build up the horse's strength, stamina and agility in order to achieve proper balance and movement rather than trying to force a certain "look" on a horse that wasn't physically ready for that level of performance. As I'd been watching the student ride, I'd been thinking that she was one of those girls who'd been riding for years. She was doing things that seemed fairly advanced and doing them pretty well. Not perfectly of course, but doing a very good job. It turns out that she had only been taking lessons for two years. Now she may be one of those people with a natural talent, but I think that at least part of her ability was due to good training.

Christine continued to talk with us after the lesson was over and one thing that she said really impressed both Foxfire and I. I don't remember her exact words, but it went something like this,"Headset! Headset! Everyone is so concerned about proper headset. First you've got to get the rest of the body working properly, then the head will naturally fall into place." Foxfire said that at that point, he decided that if I didn't set up a lesson, then he was going to.

She also introduced us to her lesson horses and a few of her other horses as well. They all looked very healthy and well cared for. And they all responded very positively to Christine and to us, most of them coming up to be rubbed and scratched on. Of the two lesson horses that she had, I really liked her little gray arab, Meshack. He had a lot of personality and showed a lot of interest in me. Her other horse, Will, a tall bay appendix, seemed nice enough, but just didn't have as much personality and was more interested in grazing than in interacting with us humans. But I think that I would be comfortable riding either one.

And in case you're wondering... Yes, I did set up a lesson. I'll be riding this Friday at 3pm. I'm really excited, but also pretty nervous. Since it's during the day, Foxfire won't be able to come with me, and I'm going to feel sort of anxious without anyone there for moral support. But hopefully, things will all go well.