New Member of my horse family

Shame on me for not writing about this sooner, but I have a new horse I have gone in on with Wendy. His name is Maverick (registered name: Allergic Reaction), a big gorgeous quarter horse hunk. I really rode him for the first time this last week, and he is as green as grass, but I am not any more, so that is OK. We have started to ride along the rail and ride some circles, walk, trot.  On the ground, he can already do all seven games quite well, we can pick his feet at liberty from both sides (something he really did not want to do at all when we first got him), so we are already playing with Level 2 tasks. He is a left brain extrovert with lots of energy at the ready. Bay with bits of flaxen in his tail and mane. I am in love with him already. When we stop playing so he can think a little, he will lick my hand over and over again. When he gives me a little nip with his teeth, I know it is time to get his feet moving again! He is smart and tries really hard to please. He had a problem with a pretty bad hoof abscess first week we got him, but that is healing. Eddie Drabek is coming to see him tomorrow to start him on a natural trim regimen. For that matter, I want Eddie to evaluate Walker about pulling his shoes off so he can be barefoot again like when I first got him. Walker has been getting better and better under saddle, really bringing a lot of effort. Love that! More later . . .

Clinic update

So now that the holidays are over, it's time for a clinic update. Walker was just fabulous this time around. He was much calmer in the group and yet he still had lots of energy. Kerri pointed out a flaw in my cantering, I was scooping instead of flowing back and up with the canter. Now that my surgery foot has healed adequately, I rode twice this week, and what a difference it made! Walker has had huge energy at the canter, but with exuberance, no craziness. I laughed out loud each time we stopped for a break, fed him cookies as a thank you. And I know I was riding differently, because I had sore muscles. We also worked on our circling game at Liberty, and Walker was able to do a flying lead change at Liberty. What I did find out was that I still needed to play with my draw at Liberty, and we have made excellent strides with that over the last couple of days.
It has been raining quite a bit where we are, and we don't have a large indoor arena. However, we have a large park across the street with big open fields. I go out and mark an arena with cones and it works really well, plus Walker now likes being out in the open. It gives me an "arena" to play in and it helps me focus on the patterns we are playing with. My favorite right now is the clover leaf. I also ride a dressage test to mix it up a little bit so Walker doesn't get bored or stale.
It is wonderful to now be having FUN with my horse. And although I know Walker doesn't think of it as "fun" the way I do, I can tell he feels good about our sessions together. It feels like this is what he was born to do, canter big and beautiful in the middle of a park!
Maverick, the horse Wendy and I own together, is making big strides fast. We play with him in the small indoor arena, where he can now play almost all the seven games online as well as at Liberty. His Liberty stick to me game is really getting good. I love Liberty! It is so much fun, but especially with my extroverted horses.

Back from the wilderness

OK, so it has been for ever since I have visited my own blog! Shame on me!

Quick update:
I now own another horse, well half a horse, with my friend Wendy. He is a hunk of a quarter horse named Maverick (his registered name is Allergic Reaction in case anyone wants to look him up at http://www.allbreedpedigree.com/allergic+reaction . We wanted a project horse, and he is a keeper. 4 years old, LBE, lots of energy at the ready, smart, brave and athletic, but green, so we have a long way to go with him.

Walker is doing very well. At our last clinic, it was obvious that he still had lots of emotional issues, so I have been intentionally pushing his emotional buttons. That way he can get more used to being asked to do more. Lately, he has been giving me the loveliest elevated, collected canter. It feels like he really enjoys it.

I am having a neuroma removed in my right foot on December 22. It has really limited my ability to exercise, so I am looking forward to having it gone. Six weeks, no jogging on it, but I only have to be in a boot for a week or two, so that isn't too bad.

Going to another clinic with Kerri April next weekend, looking forward to it! It will be interesting to see if Walker's emotions are a little more calm this time with all the playtime we have spent shaping how he feels about what I am asking of him.

Reflecting on my Parelli Journey: From Green as Grass to Green String

On the road to New Mexico with Ben and Randy with little to look at out the window but mesquite trees, telephone lines and barbed wire, we are listening to Louis Lamour's Sackett. Gives me time to think about how far I have come since I started with Parelli Natural Horsemanship. I remember Ellie, the horse I leased and then bought seven years ago. She was a flea-bitten grey, a left-brained introvert/extrovert who would go anywhere I asked. She rekindled my passion for horses. She was only with me for less than a year before she died of colic, a terrible day. Would I have felt the need to know more about the soul of the horse if I still had Ellie? Our bond had developed quickly and was very strong. I might not have needed more than that then, so that question I really cannot answer without thinking it has more than one answer. Either way, my path took a turn when I lost Ellie.
I knew I would get another horse, sooner rather than later. Ellie had been such a wonderful horse, I thought another Quarab would suit me. If wasn't long before Walker and I crossed paths. One look at his beautiful face and I was hooked. I had no idea then that anyone who met Walker for the first often would remark that, "He's beautiful!" I would be thinking wryly in contrast, "Pretty is as pretty does." There were many moments when I would have traded pretty for calm and brave. Ellie would climb down any hill, no matter how steep. Walker couldn't walk up an incline without breaking into a trot or even a canter. Ellie had no problems with trailers, even a tiny little two horse divided straight load that was parked at the barn. Walker was so disturbed by trailers that he ran over my friend Nancy when she graciously agreed to help me with his trailer loading skills. I will never forget my heart go in my throat when in a quarter second Walker went from going in her trailer to spinning and jumping right over the top of her. Nancy, unharmed, thank God, got up, and as she dusted herself off, exclaimed, "Well, that didn't work!" Despite my shock over seeing what happened, I was amazed by her equanimity. Perhaps the fact that Nancy had trailer loaded hundreds of horses gave her a calm certainty that one way or another, she would find a way to convince Walker to get in her trailer (now my trailer). After four hours she did. Walker looked like he had run a 100 mile endurance course. It is about time to stop for lunch, so more reflections later.