Somehow, some way, my humble little boarding barn managed to get all the ducks in a row to host Dan again for another clinic! I always have lofty aspirations of trying to get on a regular schedule — whether that’s some combination of him traveling to us, or vice versa, or meeting somewhere in the middle…
my feisty critter!!
But ya know. Life is what it is. People have schedules, responsibilities… Obvi there were some winter storms thrown in for good measure… But hey. A lesson every 6 weeks is still better than every 6 years, amirite?? So we make the most of it!!
Tho. Not gonna lie. There was a *LOT* going on throughout my lesson. Doozy obvi had ~~feelings~~ as she so often does. Plus, omg, there was a kubota doing something in the woods outside the ring. And omg OMG, another horse lunging in the ring with us. And, to top it all off, birds. Oooh and also Doozy’s field mate screaming bloody fucking murder right outside the arena windows (audible in the video, natch).
trying to look like we have a lid on it
I’ll be honest and admit that part of me was annoyed. Part of me wanted to just stop the lesson, send someone out to resolve the screaming pony (who had been unintentionally left alone in her field) and ask the lunging horse to go to the other indoor. Bc come on. Can’t I get like *one* dedicated time block in the ring without distractions??
But. Sigh. I did not give in to that temptation. Bc realistically… Well. Those distractions ARE the challenge with Doozy. And they are everywhere. Including when she’s just inventing distractions inside the chaos between her ears. Doozy is straight up the most ADHD horse I’ve ridden, and we *both* need to learn to cope haha.
trotting like i can sorta sit up-ish
And thus commenced our lesson in COPING, MA’AM. Starting naturally with trying to get me to sit correctly on the horse. Perhaps a day will come when that’s not a primary pursuit for me. Like, I keep waiting for these yoga classes to “work” so that I can suddenly sit up tall and straight LOL. Hasn’t happened yet tho…
tense but trying!
Dan had me actually start the ride holding the neck strap as it it was a water skiing handle bar — literally pulling back on it from my upper torso while trying to simultaneously shifting my seat more forward. And also trying to maintain a somewhat normal contact on the reins, obvi, tho mostly it was about the posture. A nifty trick I’ll play around with.
lol why am i like this
He also called me out for moving around way too much — too much side to side with my seat, too much movement with my hands, “meshing” the bit and contact instead of just holding one steady position. He said my approach was sympathetic and ‘nice’ to the horse, but not effective training and not giving Doozy a place to settle.
That to train the horse, I needed to sit up tall, in one place, with legs on and contact firm and steady so that the horse comes to me. So that it’s *clear* to the horse when they’re off the aids. Squeeze and hold, squeeze and hold, forever and ever amen.
one of these days she’s gonna break my face if i keep leaning forward like that!
It was a bit hard to settle into the lesson bc of the constant cacophony of aforementioned distractions… Like, it never really got better in that regard haha. Which was maybe helpful in an odd way bc it forced me to just get into the moment with Doozy.
Dan obvi wasn’t going to let go of his expectations just bc the horse was distracted. So. Ya know. Work through it.
you can jussssst barely see the background lunging horse get silly before doozy reacts…
And a few notable findings came from this approach. First most - “working through it” did NOT mean sacrificing quality of work And it’s always been Dan’s approach that “if what you’re doing isn’t working, slow down.”
So for example, after the above moment (which is also in the video in a more complete format), Dan actually just had us come back to walk to reset bc he felt like we got too shut down, to up-and-down in the canter vs forward and ground covering.
back to remedial transitions (and some internal screaming from doozy) to get back on the aids
From there, we worked on basically a never ending cycle of transitions - mostly walk-trot-walk-trot - focusing on literally nothing else except keeping my aids ON and STEADY, particularly my rein contact, at.all.times. — but *especially* in the upward transition. Which, it turns out, is uh, hard for yours truly!
Tho this was also where the second notable finding about “working through it” came in play. Obvi lots of transitions can make an already tense, worked up horse go nuclear. But the whole point was to do the opposite — help the horse connect to the aids, stay on the aids, find safety and security on the aids.
the jumping was easy after all that!
Liberal application of verbal cues really proved to be a difference maker for Doozy too. Not even necessarily just “good girl” or whatever, but just constantly checking in with her. Using my voice to try to get her to stay with me, focus on me, anchor with me — vs, ya know, again, can’t stress this enough, her field mate who was quite literally in a panic right outside the window.
Fortunately, Dan became satisfied with our progression in being able to hold all the aids steady through various transitions, including another canter - this time slightly more successful than the last (also in the video) - and we got a walk break. Wherein Doozy was finally allowed to release the whinny she’d been holding under her breath (lol poor thing) and I did finally suggest that somebody go rescue that sad fucking pony.
holy crap is emma actually sorta sitting(hovering-ish) on a cantering horse???
At the same time, the lunging horse had finished and was waiting his turn for a training ride with Dan, so peace was restored to the universe, right in time for — omg — jompies, yay!
looking normal!
And ya know. In Dan’s world, the whole point of all that sweat equity with the never ending walk trot transitions on the aids is that… Nothing should ever change. It’s always the same. So when you start jumping, it’s literally just the same exact thing. Just with… Jumps LOL.
grown ass mare just jumpin’ a jump <3
And gooooooo figure. Doozy just… went as she had been, as we had established, and just jumped her jumps. Easy, quiet, on the aids, waiting. No rushing, no drama.
We started with foundational type exercises — landing from the jump and going immediately into a circle, right away reestablishing the aids before doing anything else. And also practiced jumping the above line going away from the camera, and halting straight before the second element. Not on video bc that was when my barn mate went to rescue the pony. But an important piece of the practice puzzle.
patient biscuit!
Bc after we’d practiced stopping straight before* the next jump, you will be SHOCKED to hear that… as if by magic, Doozy had a half halt on the landing side of fences!
(*And Dan was explicitly crystal clear that this would be our ONLY option. No swerving left or right. No twisting, no getting sideways. No pulleying or shimmying. Just. Stop. Straight.)
sitting-ish the canter going the other way too!
And as we practiced a few more little mini courses (all in the video now, yay!!), Doozy suddenly graduated to jumping a fence, landing to turn into the short side (as above), and *immediately* coming back onto the aids such that she could proceed directly to the next jump, and in fact complete the full line now without rushing or changing shape or stride.
and jumping a long straight line on a steady add stride. knock me over with a feather!!
Miracles, y’all. It’s amazing what clear consistent practice can do, even in the space of an hour.
It’s almost hilarious, actually, to watch the jumping in that video. Bc… It’s SO ho-hum haha. She just canters around, steadily and politely. You might even say too steady, as if we should be going more forward. And it honestly felt pretty easy too — the mare was connected, on the aids, ready for whatever came next, whether it was a transition or jump or whatever.
progress slow ’n, uh, ….slow haha
And she honestly finally felt the most secure too. Like, she’s obvi a tense and kinda insecure animal at heart. She likes feeling safe, like she knows what to expect or like she can trust what’s happening to her. Which, fundamentally, is the whole point of this type of practice. Make the connection a safe reliable place for the horse, no matter how spooky or nervous they may be.
Especially with the jumping, where her tendency is to get forward and frantic, being able to stay in front of the leg and connected to the aids makes everything more comfortable, for all of us LOL!
So overall, a really productive session. As is so often the case with Doozy, I didn’t really get the circumstances I wanted … But maybe instead we got what we needed.
An overwhelming proportion of traffic across this modest little blog these days is non-human. Bots, crawlers and scrapers out mining data to power the next generation of LLMs, no doubt.
It’s always interesting to see which posts and pages are getting swarmed, tho. Not that there’s any rhyme or reason to it — but it’s sorta like a random magic 8 ball surfacing an ever changing array of old thoughts, memories, experiences, etc from the archives.
haven’t taken many new pics lol so instead enjoy this festive pony sticker that came in a care package from a friend!
I like to click thru and reread old posts anyway, and the sorta ‘random’ nature to the bot traffic often brings up long forgotten stuff. And sometimes there’s inspiration to be found! Like when a lesson recap from almost exactly 6 years ago popped up, describing the “anti-grid grid” we’d practiced in a jumping session!
pic from back in january, pre-storm, last time we jumped a couple little jumps
It immediately struck me as something we could try even within the confines of the narrow but long indoor! Because real talk, guys, I really have not done a ton of ‘proper’ course work with Doozy, and admit to avoiding a lot of related distances of the 4 to 6 stride variety.
Ymmv, but to me it seems like shorter combos — your typical gymnastics or grids — are more intuitive to the horse, and harder to miss on the striding. Longer lines — think 7-8+ strides — are more forgiving of variations in the horse’s stride length, aka easier to add or leave out a stride. But that middle distance, which is naturally most common in competition, kinda wants more commitment lest you end up on the half stride.
finally set a little mini course this weekend tho. pic not to scale, but was a pleasant little assortment of options! distances: 21’ for the in-an-out one stride bottom right corner; ~55’(ish, I didn’t exactly measure) to the blue oxer
We really haven’t jumped much at all since our last competition in November, either. There have been a couple lessons — notably the two gymnastics clinics with Sally, and also the Loch Moy lesson with Dan that I didn’t really write about but was fine — but otherwise we’ve mostly just dinked around occasionally with whatever was set up in the indoor. Usually singles, and sometimes some bounces.
simple cross rail (illustrated in pink in the sketch) off one diagonal
The weather this weekend was gorgeous, tho. And with Doozy being in a notably placid and serene mood (LO-fucking-L), I was determined to actually set stuff up intentionally and ride it.
Starting with, naturally, the anti-grid grid of a bi-directional 21’ one stride to ~55’ (sliiightly short 4 stride). And a few singles to facilitate cruising flow and easy changes of direction.
bn vertical off the other diagonal (red in the sketch). can also see the bending line to the swedish oxer behind doozy. generous ground lines on both sides since this was our tallest jump.
Nothing crazy, obviously lol. The biggest thing height-wise was a barely-BN vertical with out-to-there ground lines and big bright fluffy flower fill to help give lots of definition to the jump for Doozy. The swedish oxer was maybe a titch larger than you’d expect to see at starter level, esp in base spread, but certainly inviting for BN.
Nbd tho. Indoor course work unsupervised after a relatively quiet season does not have to be balls to the wall, all out, amirite? And also real talk: for the last two competition seasons I’ve kinda gritted my teeth and gotten almost all of our jumping done solo outside of lessons. It was what it was, no regrets or anything, but it’s not reeeally how I’m hoping the year ahead will go for us.
swedish oxers are so versatile and are more inviting to ride off both directions than square oxers. generous ground lines on both sides.
A big priority this coming year will be more jumping lessons, have no fear. But ya know. In the meantime, why not have a little fun, right?? RIGHT lol.
Doozy just loves to jump. I wasn’t sure if she’d be wild or explosive or make bids for the fences after so much gymnastic work in recent months… But honestly she felt SUPER in her connection. She seems to thrive with a steadily closed leg, hip to heel — think: “hugging” the horse — matched with a firm but not dead-weight rein contact — think: feeling the bit move, vs a dull grip.
She has such a natural desire to push forward that the jumps seemed to come up comfortably if I could maintain my end of the connection.
set of 2’3 verticals for the in-and-out, 21’ distance for a more compressed one stride. flowers centered directly under pole for riding in both directions. no extra ground lines bc i was a little lazy, but it was nice test for us to not always have ‘training wheels’!
We did have one moment of getting inverted — our classic ‘face-full of Dooz ears’ move — traveling across the long bending line from the vertical to the swedish the first time, but honestly it was my fault (obvi), I needed to trust that we could wait for the stride **without** shortening or pulling back. Came back around and trusted it and Doozy kept her shape, good girl.
And actually the anti-grid grid was so perfect for this. The 4 strides felt blazing fast, dear god, even tho I set it a little short. But it rode great every time — in both directions, oxer to in-and-out or other way around. So it was good for me to remember that feeling too, esp after months of riding in the indoor where it’s easy to get under powered and off the stride.
the whole line can be ridden both ways, 1 to 4 or 4 to 1; can also catch both ends as bending lines to the earlier diagonal elements: X to in-and-out, or vertical to swedish. i didn’t try to ride the other way — jumping into the line then veering onto a bend — tho you could do that too
All in all a productive session, but also, ya know… Just plain fun LOL. And a good experience of just going out and doing it and not ‘overthinking’ it too much, as Dan would say.
Tho ya know. Now that things are thawing out and temps are climbing again, obvi we’re already starting to get eager for the next fun adventure opportunity! Hopefully soon to come!
Well. Ms Thing would apparently like to correct the record LOL.
Bc this week she’s been feeling…. a certain sort of way, and “resisting temptation” ain’t got *nothing* to do with it haha…
Doozy’s serenely placid expression with all those sheepish geldings lol… ffs mare!
I’ve clearly interrupted a moment here. Just be grateful that the camera didn’t really capture the, erm, yellow tinge to all that snow omg.
Ugh. Mare. Keep your legs out of the fence pls!! Luckily was just a minor little flesh wound… but still!!
One bonus to her, uh, willing mood was that she not only was NOT violent about the acupuncture in her recent appt, but actually seemed to like it for once! Goooo figure haha, that’s the most needles we’ve ever been able to safely place!
Ridiculous critter, I swear to god!
Hope y’all are having as good a Friday as Doozy, LOL — just make good choices pls!
It’s still winter around these parts… But at least the weather is normalizing a bit. It’s only freezing out?? We’ll take it! It hasn’t been quiiiiite warm enough to meaningfully melt any of the snow, tho hopefully that’ll come this week.
somehow only very few new pics, so enjoy this nice shot of Ms Fire Horse Herself, She of Big Emotions, from the last snowstorm
In the meantime… It feels like time to get back on the proverbial — and literal — horse. 2026 has already been a lot of things to a lot of different people… for better, but unfortunately often for worse too.
We’re imminently approaching the Lunar New Year — the Year of theFire Horse — tho, which is apparently a time to embrace our independence, challenge authority, and trust our instincts to strike off down new paths, while not shying away from pivoting or adapting as needs arise.
bc…. the current snowstorm is still with us LOL… gotta love mares tho, look at that tidy little path out to the pasture, clearly demarcated by breadcrumbs manure piles
To me, that leaves a lot of freedom and openness to interpretation. That linked article says,
“It’s a time for big change and big emotions,”
Which… feels somewhat strangely dichotomous considering so many folks are feeling cooped up, restrained and stir crazy, kept inside by a vast array of perilous external forces… Literal, figurative, take your pick. But maybe that’s also the point, the actual sign of the times?
pathway marks a direct line straight to the round bale lol
Anyway. I dunno about you, but “big change” sounds good to me. Well. Ok, let’s back up a sec. I’m actually a bit more of a Wood Ox, personally. More of a ‘dependable planner’ type, admittedly change-averse in my own day to day operations… LOL.
But it’s a sentiment I can get behind if we’re talking about the general times!!
well. **almost** a straight line— clever ladies dogleg over to the heated water trough on their way in and out
Because as it is, there seems to be an increasing feeling of general restlessness and malaise with everything going on. Shifting seasons aren’t likely to fix all (or even any) of that… But maybe the improved conditions can inject some much-needed energy and motivation into the collective psyche, right? Maybe??
speaking of injecting much-needed energy… this gadget continues to be useful in the face of persistent cold!
For my part, I finally dug the trailer out of its snow cave, zapped the truck battery back to life, and hauled Ms Mondeuse over for a dressage lesson with trainer C. Sure sure, we’ve barely ridden at all in recent weeks and the animal is straight up feral. But. Eh. Who cares. We’re following our Fire Horse intuitions, not getting bogged down in the rigid details, amirite?
older pic, lately have had the best success with hooking both positive and neutral cables directly to the corresponding bolt nuts on the battery. ymmv.
all the better for gettin where we wanna go!! (yes, this is the only actual picture from our lesson LOL)
And ok, maybe it wasn’t, like, classically “Good” in terms of getting stuff done, being productive, furthering Doozy’s dressage prowess, etc etc etc. More like small-g “good” — keeping horse between rider and earth despite unplanned dance moves; staying patient with a sense of humor when the mare can bolt on a balanced 15m circle… etc etc, you get the picture!
replaced the pastern wraps we’d been using with new navy DSBs snagged with a recent gift card
It maybe ain’t much lol… But I’m here for it anyway. Getting my fix, focusing my time and energy on the things I love doing.
Spring is coming. The Fire Horse is coming. And if the Chinese lunar zodiac is to be believed, Times of Big Change and Big Feelings are also coming.
flashback pic of my mare and her sweet glare <3 <3 <3
For as tiring and relentlessly oppressive as this winter has felt, it has to end eventually, right?
Not naming any names or anything… But there miiiiiight be a little red mare out there gettin ready to write a strongly worded letter about this whole w*nter situation lol…
the look of a mare who is running out of patience with the whole “sn*w” mess
“wtf is it actually snowing again right now???”
“this is bullshit”
“if i slip and fall and die, i’m taking you with me.”
meanwhile. in baltimore city. nbd, just scoopin’ up some actual literal icebergs in the middle of rush hour traffic!
That weird rodent up in Pennsylvania might have predicted more winter, but we still passed an important milestone this week: a previously-unknown-to-me Gaelic holiday Imbolc!!
#trashhound
February 1st is apparently some sort of ancient pagan festival celebrating the beginning of spring — marking the halfway point between Winter Solstice and Spring Equinox.
trying to hide how excited she is about actually getting to go do something again!
Presumably all these weird winter holiday variations all have shared ancestral roots — or at least, in the case of good ol’ Phil, shared observations of the natural rhythms of seasonal change.
“reading the news”
And while I wouldn’t exactly look out the window and think, “Ah yes! Spring is coming!” there ARE some undeniable signs.
biscuit has been so bored she was literally thrilled to be back in the dusty ring lol
Sunset is noticeably later now — something that makes a HUGE difference for me personally, and probably a lot of you too.
apparently so starved for grass, even dead half rotten grass
The horses are also getting more serious about mid-winter shedding. Doozy started getting a few loose hairs around the solstice, but it’s really picking up steam now. Which, as usual with this sensitive little mare, is a good reminder for me to keep an eye out for under-blanket skin funk.
sunset is later and later every day!
Coat Defense powder is my go-to for trying to stay on top of funk prevention. And actually, one of the barn managers makes a DIY version with tea tree oil that is absolutely luscious!
behold! we aren’t the only crazy ones!
Anyway. Other signs of a shifting season: The horses definitely seem to be hunting for ANYTHING approximating grass. Which I guess could also just be a reflection of having the ground hidden from them for a couple weeks… But still. I like to believe it’s a sign they can smell the earliest signs of growth.
friesian frens are best frens <3
Tho, the downside is Doozy seems more preoccupied sometimes with hunting grass than just chillin at the round bale. It feels inevitable with TBs that they tend to grow a little lean by the end of winter, and Doozy’s definitely on that path.
Nothing crazy - imo she looks fantastic (and was possibly admittedly a *little fat* at the height of summer grass anyway), but ya know. Something to keep an eye on!
so intrigued by this dark mucky substance peeking thru the white
We’ve laid relatively low since the storm anyway. Obviously the new year kicked off with a bunch of exciting lessons, and hopefully we’ll get back to all that soon! But, eh, all in good time — and temperatures, amirite??
Maryland is finally returning to more seasonally appropriate weather, which means this snow might be gone soon-ish too. Here’s hoping!
mmmm maybe more grass!!!
In the meantime, we’re working on embodying yet another little teaching nugget from the recent yoga classes: focusing on ‘wise stewardship of energy.’
In other words, trying to be mindful in how we use our time and energy, rather than operating in mindless autopilot. Recognizing that even tho Doozy has apparently limitless vast reserves of stored energy (lol), it’s up to me to help channel her in productive ways, especially when some of her normal outlets are less available bc of conditions etc. And maybe also especially when my own energy levels are decidedly less than hers… Let’s call it a work in progress LOL!
