This one was meant to be a semi-private, but skye wasn't feeling up to riding and I was (it nearly seemed like it might go the other way since I've have a cold recently), so I headed out.
I got there about 10 minutes early and found and said hello to Cypress. He was acting a little strange, I gave him his cookie and he started investigating me for further treats (that's not the strange part), then he was bucking his head around and withdrawing from my scratches, it was a sign of what was to come.
Met the owner of the property, he seemed quite nice and helpful, pointed me to enough grooming gear that I took Cypress out of his stall, into the cross-tie, and started working on him until Catherine showed up. Cypress was shaking his head around and moving side to side a lot, had to look out for his hooves more than usual. Catherine thought he might be excited because other horses were getting their hay, I'm not sure.
I took him out to the arena and tried to get on him with the mounting stool, but the butthead really enjoys swinging his backside around just as you place the stool in the right spot. Once Catherine joined me we got that out of the way and started working on the western trot again. He was being thick but I got him to do mostly what I asked, keeping the right pace for the trot was very difficult though. The other big thing I worked on was not letting him slow down to a walk at the turns, which he tends to do.
I started working on taking the reins in one hand, grabbing the end of one with my now free hand and whacking at his flank with it to get him moving. Much easier to do than carrying a crop, and I have a feeling I'll get a lot of practice with Cypress with that maneuver. Butthead.
Near the end of the lesson we worked on... I'm going to screw up the term for this I know it... giving with the leg? No that's not it. Anyway it is basically moving forward and getting the horse to move sideways by crossing his rear foot. There's pressure on both sides at the same time to keep moving forward while going sideways, and very fidgety. Too much and the horse, too little and nothing happens.
Catherine got on him to demonstrate since the first time I tried it I didn't provide any pressure on the side he was moving to, so he just turned. Naturally. She made the analogy of moving a pingpong ball by applying pressure on both sides but a little bit more on one, and that clicked for me.
I got onto him without the stool for the first time then, and despite it being a little difficult due to the lack of flexibility in my legs it was still easier than getting him lined up for the stool, so I may just stop using it from now on.
Once I was on him I gave it another try and it went great. Catherine seemed very pleased and maybe a little surprised that I got it working that well on my first attempt. When we tried the other direction it didn't quite go so smoothly but it was still pretty good. It is tricky for sure but Cypress made me look good.
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