PONY :)

Hey there :)

I'm sorry for the delay in blogging... I have been so busy of late that I don't seem to get the chance to sit down in front of my computer ;)

So what have you missed? Well, I am still on the lookout for a home for Joy. There has been no development of any kind and it is getting to me, and not in a good way (lol). But I will keep on trying :p

Today I finally got the time to work with Joy again. I did work with her on Sunday, but that didn't go well at all. It is my fault though. I wasn't concentrating as much as I should have. I am glad to say that today's session was the best session we have had in a long time :) I played around with the parelli ground games... Joy has a very tricky horsenality. She is VERY dominant and doesn't seem to like being told what to do (at least not when you have her respect). And on top of that she gets offended very quickly, something I haven't come across before. For example, when I want to ask her to do something, like back up, she will walk forwards past me as if she wants to get the heck away. To not offend her I have to gently correct her in the right way which is very tricky. I'm learning how to get this right. This has been my greatest challenge with Joy. I have to learn how to assert myself and still be gentle and forgiving :p

Anyway, so today I thought I would try playing the games more naturally. My goal was to work on Joy's response to my "requests" and still have her enjoy being with me. I sat on the crate, which is always in the arena, and played the Yo-Yo game at first. She is really good at this game now... all I have to do is wiggle my finger!!! We did this a couple of ties and when things felt good I had Joy rest by me (still sitting on the crate). I took my carrot stick and played some friendly game. Joy just stood there all relaxed. She didn't mind me swinging the savvy string (attached to the carrot stick) onto her back.

The next thing I did was take Joy to the big blue plastic sheet (tarp). Joy loves playing with it! Today I thought I would see if I could get it onto her back. At first I had Joy check it out. As usual she just sniffed and pawed it. So I took it, rubbing it against her kegs. She didn't mind at all. I continued up her leg to her shoulder... still nothing. Next thing I know I have the tarp on her back... and NOTHING!!! She didn't care at all :) This got me wondering what else I could do with the sheet... I had Joy stand with the 12ft line on the ground (it wasn't tied or anything, just lying there). I started shaking the sheet while standing at her shoulder. When she looked okay I started walking around her shaking it. Joy just stood there :) I'm so proud of my pony!!!!

I also set up two trotting poles (spaced out for Joy walking over them). I used the squeeze game to get Joy to walk over them. This has been the game we have been working on lately, so using the trotting poles really helped me to stay focused. Joy didn't mind the poles... she just walked over them as if they were twigs :p

Our ground work was really good today and i left on a good note (yipeeee!!!!!!). For me the most important thing about my working sessions themselves is to have a session that ends well. It make both me and the horse feel like we have done ourselves proud.

After doing my groundwork with Joy I put on her bridle. At the moment I have her in a french link snaffle, with no noseband and clip on reins. I try to keep it nice and simple if I can. Anyway, so I put on the bridle with no fuss from Joy :) I hopped on bareback and we headed off to play the pushing passenger game. I haven't done this game in a while with Joy. It really was nice for a change to just follow Joy :) I let joy go where she wanted to, allowing her to stop when she needed to.

Eventually I got round to doing 15 minutes of follow the rail and freestyle riding. I started off just having Joy walk around the arena alongside the rail. She always starts off fighting to go to the centre, but today she was quite happy to follow my suggestion (could this have something to do with us having done the pushing passenger first?). I then started incorporating small circles. They start of quite big, but once Joy knows what I am asking they get smaller. We also walked over the trotting poles. She didn't mind them much, but she was a little bit difficult on the left rein (probably coz that's when we are facing away from home).

After 15 minutes I decided to hop off. Joy really behaved herself beautifully :) I couldn't have asked for more. It made me feel a little more positive about finding her a good home. She will make an awsome pony for kids :)



This photo was taken last week. The little girl and I thought we would make Joy all pretty :)