4th Lesson spending the whole lesson in an outline!

The title of this post says it all for me, for those of you that have been following my blog for a while you will know that when I first started riding Gatsby at West Hallam Riding Centre (29th September 2012) I was introduced in to the idea of riding in an outline, ever since then I have been trying to get the feel and some weeks I get it then I could go 2/3 weeks and not get it at all and feel really frustrated. Well the past four lessons that I have had I have been riding Gatsby in an outline the whole time, some of our transitions we loose it a little bit, but the majority of it we are in an outline in walk, trot and we are even starting to get it really well in canter. We have even started to get it in our jump lessons which before we never really bothered to do, we were more focused on getting over the jumps, now not only are we jumping but we are trying to get an outline in-between the jumps.

We started warming up long and low, normally I just stretch him out in the walk then start picking him up in the canter. This time i decided that it was time for a change and we started trotting and getting him to really stretch out while he was trotting. This got him moving from behind and really stretching over his back, it felt amazing, I'm not sure whether I have got a video of this part but I have got lots of videos from todays lesson.

When we started asking to pick him up in the walk initially he was pulling on my right hand and trying to get my right rein out so that he had more control. But by using half halts and lots of transition work, while getting him off my left leg he stopped hanging off my right arm, except when we moved in to canter and were cantering on the left lead. He also tends to want to fall out through his left shoulder.

I then moved on to doing sitting trot and getting him working in an outline, this work was really nice but we needed a little bit more energy. I needed him to really pop off my leg and get him going a bit more forward. But he was working real well.

When we moved in to the canter the left rein was awful, we fell out through his shoulder and he had a tendency of running. We started off doing trot canter transitions, which weren't the best but when I got hold of the right hand side again it worked really well. To the left we were able to do walk canter transitions and these were lovely we had a nice amount of lift and he was forward off my leg, he was also working in an outline in the canter which is something we've been wanting to achieve for a long time so I am really happy with the work that we have done today.

We cooled him down for about 10 minutes because he was really wound up and then we left it at that. It was really good, and of course he got lots of cuddles for being such a good boy during our ride today.

Until Next Time
A Girl With A Dream

CON ARTIST - NICKI WILLIAMS - BEWARE

Okay so this post has taken me a while to post for several reasons but the main one being just how angry this woman has made me. For those of you that have been following my blog for a long while you will know that back around October of 2016, I was introduced to a woman called Nicki Williams, she was a friend of a friend that was supposed to be opening a centre for rehoming and rescuing animals, but also for horses working with soldiers that has PTSD. We hit it off straight away and came what I thought to be good friends. However warning bells should have probably rang sooner. By January or February of last year the horses that I had agreed to look after (that she had got on loan) Bella and Arthur, she was being threatened that she would have them taken off her by the control of horses act, because she hadn't been paying the rent for the field. Although Nicki reassured me that she had done, she even showed my 'payments' that had been made to Angie. I ended up getti...

45. The move

6.45am - I got woke up, I was not happy to be woken up, I'd been dreaming about this move the whole night and I was beyond exhausted. I didn't go to sleep until quite late and then I was up, I'd set out all my clothes the night before for me and Jack so that we could just get up in the morning and go. 7am - Got to the yard, NOBODY was there which was exactly the way that I wanted it to be. I mucked out his stable at the old yard for the last time ever. I made sure that the stable was really clean and that I hadn't left anything in it. I loaded up the last few things in the car and we were ready to go. I received a lovely text from my riding teacher saying good luck today and that she knew that I would be fine, this gave me a real confidence boost as my riding teacher knows me better than anyone (horse wise) and she believed in me. Along with my mum, dad and boyfriend. Do you think we had enough hi-viz on I was taking no chance that magic was going to not be ...

My Dream Barn

So the other day I saw someone who did a post like this and thought why not, I might as well do one, even if I can't afford it I can still day dream, right? My dream barn would be open and spacious, I love the wood look and how natural it appears to be but can also look really fancy/sophisticated. I also like the idea of the stables being in a U shape with doors and windows facing inwards so all the horses can see each other. I love the stable image above, I love how lit up they are the wooden look to them and the way the stable doors are. I'd also like it so that some of the stables had runs going out the back so that the horse could choose whether to be inside or outside. I also really like how the bottom of the stable walls are a stone wall. If the stalls were inside I'd love them to look like this, I again love the wood look but I also really like how open everything is. I like how everyone can see everything and how it has the chance for the horses...

The way to heaven is on horseback

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