Happenings

While I’m confused/miffed at Cambox for doing whatever it is they are doing, life is still pretty darn good and chugging along.

Eeyore has been on his best behavior for all rides post the FGF HT debacle, so maybe he has learned a thing or two about not being a turd to start and conserving energy.

The number one goal right now is finding that line between him hanging on my hands and backing out of the contact altogether. Trainer gave me some awesome tips, starting with sit the frick up and stop letting him pull me down with him. Shocking I know. I’ve been really working hard at this and it has made a huge difference in his response to me.

It’s still a work in progress as now he is taking to using any contact as an excuse to stop moving his feet and curl his chin to his chest. Lots of leg is needed to keep him moving when he gets bunched up like that but I think we are making some headway.

I also didn’t break his pleasure in jumping as I feared I did. We’ve been working on a mix of dressage stuff and then a few jumps then back to dressage to break it up. I need to jump more often to get the muscle memory of my flow with him and to keep my confidence up. It seems like every fence grows 3’ when I haven’t jumped in a while.

I don’t want to over do it though and this combination of back and forth is working for both of us at the moment. The real reason I got so many blocks and poles is to build an easy to put up/take down dressage arena inside my jump one. Dusty wracked his brain for a way to make this possible without spending 3k on a true arena. He came up with using jump blocks to elevate poles off the ground, calculated how many we’d need for each side and then ordered letters that stick in the ground as well. The theory is that I can build the dressage court when I want it and take it apart to set up jumps when I don’t. It won’t be perfectly 20m x 60m, I think it’s a foot or so off on each side but it will be close enough. It was an awesome, thoughtful and creative gift that gives me a lot of exercise possibilities. No excuses now for bad geometry.

Trainer has been off having a life in another state for the holidays and I am not so patiently awaiting her return so I can get back under her expert eye. The Pessoa bit she wants me to try is still on back order, ugh the story of my life right now, but as soon as that comes in I’m excited to try it and see if it helps bring him up in the front end. Or at least prevents him dropping down so much in front of a jump.

Nothing else super exciting to report. I’m trying to see if I can get Trainer to ride him at Windridge in Feb. Originally I was going to be out of town that weekend, but the place was booked and I had to postpone the trip a couple weeks. This frees up Windridge though and Dusty is off so fingers crossed Trainer isn’t busy that weekend and can get Eeyore some confidence boosting show miles for me.

I hope everyone is enjoying the holiday season and the ever so slightly longer days if you squint real hard.