Update!! Long over due!!

OK, so clearly I have been a little busy not to update my blog (but how would you know that when I haven't up dated it??) So here I am now, sitting at the computer on what is becoming a chilly autmn afternoon!!

So I will need to fast track you with updates- unfortunately I haven't had heaps of time to work on my natural horsemanship skills; however I've been managing to get the time to watch the savvy club DVD's.

OK, so over the summer I was lucky enough to lease a beautiful mare called Silk. We took her out on heaps of trail rides and got in plenty of riding. (By plenty, I mean I rode 2 or 3 times a week, which is 2 or 3 times more than I get to ride some weeks!!) She turned out to be an amazing horse, but unfortunately I gave her back after 8 weeks, not because of any fault of any ones, but because I'd only taken her out on an 8 week summer lease. I look forwad to getting another of her stud brothers or sisters at some point next summer. (The music is royalty free, but still a bit groovy).

So now I have started up lessons again, my sister is giving them to me and so far I have had 1 lesson, which went real well, but reminded me of how BAD a rider I am (or you can chech the cideo to see for yourself)!! I need to start riding way more often!! So hopefully with these weekly lessons I'll be back to an acceptable standard to ride properly!! So I hope to be able to approach a jump at the canter. It's not something I have really done before, I've always just done flat work. So I've made poles and I am thinking positivly. Dani can jump, she can do 80cms and apparently go higher, although I've never jumped her any higher than knee height. Check out my poles..... As you can see I have tested my dog over them, and she seemed pretty happy with them.

So I shall try to keep things a little more updated!! Raffi is going well, just enjoying his life as a horse.

Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants

Love these books- I am fitting it in between riding and studying!!

My new foster horse Raffi

I started playing with Raffi today. He's a Right Brained Extrovert, 16hh gelding. He's looking a little shocking at the moment but will keep you posted on his looks too!!

So I started playing with him. He's the complete opposite of Dani, and it was quite a challenge today to remember what I'd learnt about RBE. He's huge too and towers over me- I used my 22 foot line (no way I'm letting him near me!!) and my carott stick and had to pretend I was 10 feet tall!!

I started playing the 7 games with him. I only played with him for about 15 mins, but in that 15 mins he did so much licking and chewing!!

He's quite sceptical and a forwad a holic. This will be an interesting learning journey for me!!

Our First Clicker Lesson

The Vet

So we had the vet come out twice for Danis back. Once in May and once in August. We couldn't work out why her back would be sore after not being ridden. She had become really funny about her back leg straps being undone and done up, so after some feeling around the area we found a decent sized lump on her stomach about where her leg straps might touch. We were pretty worried it was going to be somethig serious.
So the vet came out again and gave us the good news that it is a fiberous lump and probably occured when she was playing or rolling. Something had hit her stomach and it had gotten a lupm, kind of like when you kit your head. It would have been very painful when it was first done, so not supprisingly she's been very protective.
It's not sore any more, and her back's all good in the mean time (we believe she may have been carrying her self a bit wrong after it happened so her back kept going out.)
Woo-hoo!! We're back on track now :)

My Jumps!

Last weekend we went to get my poles, wings and cones..... I love them :)

The Vet

I finally decided to get the vet out to have a look at Dani. I'd had a chiro out and the saddle refitted and her teeth done and she still wasn't 'quite right' so I called the vet out to have a look. It turns out she's gotten her self pretty much back into shape with no back pain. She did however have a vertebra 'out of place' in her wither. The vet did some manipulation and a few other bits and pieces then gave me some pain killers for her, which she needs to take for a week. We're pretty much going to see how she goes and then I'll work her in a couple of weeks to see if the problem is all sorted. Fingers crossed it will be :)