herd bound

Two more rides in on Ms. Kiki and she is progressing nicely. We have been working on leg aids to help improve her balance and bending. She's still really stiff tracking right, but it's getting MUCH better. I know that these posts seem a bit trite and boring, but training a young horse is tough, so small moments of progress, like standing still for mounting, or not needing to be long-lined are huge. Thursday she was completely over stimulated by the activity at the barn. There were 4 lessons back to back, including one with some of her herd mates. She was acting pretty nuts by the time I brought her in and we had to play musical stalls for a bit before I could start grooming her. I helped out around the barn to get things organized and finally got on her after 2 hours! She nearly ran me over when I was moving her to a different stall to get to a little grey filly from her herd. She was stomping and pawing the ground and I swore she must be heading into heat. She settled and I took her in to get on and she was a champ...walking off and getting right to work. L left us alone and shut the two of us in the indoor ALONE...dun, dun, dunnnn... she whinnied, she spooked, she looked out the window, she snorted, she refused to move forward...it was a bit terrifying. Then, one of the students wanted to come in and grab the mount block, so she parked her mare just out of Kiki's sight, and she freaked out. I mean, she never did anything that would get me off, she just acted crazy, like at any minute she could explode. I tried my best to keep her moving and focused but it was really hard and unnerving. We ended things on a good note, I hopped off and un-tacked her only to have her remind me of her alpha status when I turned her out...she bolted and reared with me at the end of the lead rope...ugh.

Saturday's ride was uneventful, but I had to tack her up quickly and get on because L was leaving for work and there was only one other person on the property riding. She was so calm I thought about getting on without L holding her, but I waited anyway...there's no point in getting too brave. We had a nice, short ride, lots of leg yields and trot work.

After my ride Thursday, L gave me a little pep talk to reassure me of our progress together. He told me that initially, he wasn't sure if it was going to be worth the effort to get this mare back in to work, but now he sees real progress and that he hopes we can get to the bottom of her and go from there. We decided it would be best to make sure she has company when I am riding her and they are going to start weaning her off the herd. Fingers crossed!

Her new martingale, saddle pad and leathers arrived Friday and I can't wait to see how they fit!