Anyway, major breakthroughs recently. Since I've been driving and able to get down everyday, I've been able to spend a lot more undemanding time. The weather easing also helped with that. Our liberty went from being non existent to just beautiful! The smallest area I can work in is the 60x20m school. If I wasn't so lazy, I could fence off a section with some jumps but unfortunately I'm not very strong, and would be puffed out after such strenuous work :P Anyway, all of a sudden everythings come together and Olivia's been doing circles around me, like SMALL circles! As I watch her I can see her consider pissing off, but I've had to exert MASSIVE control, and 'trust her to respond, but be ready to correct'. I think getting handy with the 45ft line has helped a lot in that respect, because now I can coil and through pretty quickly, Olivia is thinking 'daaym. Now she can get me from 45ft away? RESPECT!!' So thats my theory on why its come together anyway.
I also had fun running around with her cantering after me, doing sudden stops and changes of direction, and started a bit of the cutting. The expression on her face is just like, 'wow, who knew Jo could be so much fun!?'. It's awesome.
My fore-mentioned laziness also means that taking Olivia (and her field mate - we aren't allowed to leave a horse in a field on its own) up to the yard, saddling her up, taking her back down to the school, doing my thing, taking her back up to the yard to unsaddle and bring her horsemate back down to the field is just too much! Instead, I've used it as an opportunity to improve my bareback riding, and there have been massive changes. From being bounced all over the place, I can now sit to her canter (woopee!!!). It's not as great as my seat in the saddle (I don't want to brag, but my independant seat in the saddle is pretty solid) but it's getting there. I find that so many things are revealed when I ride bareback, such as my right leg tends to tense up and shorten a lot. I think this is why people always talk about my stirrups being so uneven. A couple of years ago I was hit by a car on my right side, and I never went through the physio to get the muscle working again, so that leg just got weaker and weaker while my left leg got stronger. Unfortunately, this isn't helped by Olivia also having uneven muscle; with her left side being much stronger. So we really have to work together to bring our right sides up to the same level as our left sides.
Loong post today, sorry about that! There's just so much to say!! Anyway, tomorrow I have a lesson with a classical dressage trainer as part of a clinic my yard is organising. I am so excited - I've designated my mum as photo taker and video maker. So hopefully loads of pictures to come. Until then - here's a couple recent ones of Olivia.
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| From Jo and Olivia |
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| From Jo and Olivia |
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