I Just Need To Breathe...

I don't even know where to begin. The last couple weeks have been filled with so much craziness. Or should I say busyness? And it is not going to slow down for a couple more weeks. So here is a rundown of all that craziness/busyness. 

My OH and I had our 17 year anniversary. He surprised me that day with tickets to the Gary Allan concert. I have a hard time getting my OH to go to concerts so I was super surprised that he did this. We went out to dinner first and then went to the concert. Boy was that ever fun!! It's been a few years since I went to a concert and that was with my sister to go see Carrie Underwood. My OH and I had a blast.

Gary Allan!

Then my mom came up to visit me for a couple days. The first day we went shopping and the 2nd day we went on a 4 hour trail ride. My mom rode Fritzy. I could tell Fritzy wasn't acting herself on the trail ride. She spooked a couple times, which is not like her. Back at the trailer I noticed she was pointing her left hoof out. I immediately thought abscess. The next morning she was dead lame at the walk. Yep. Abscess. So I wrapped her hoof in an Epsom gel poultice for a few days. The wet/dry weather we had in June and July does not help at all. Fritzy has terrible feet anyways, then add in the mix of wet/dry, means bad news for the Fritzer.

My mom riding Fritzy for the first time!

In between all that I have been trying to get rides on my filly. I turned my round pen back into an arena and Chance is now an arena girl. She has been doing pretty good. She sidepasses, turns on the forehand and haunches, backs, moves off my leg pretty well for the most part, opens gates from her back and we are now working on her slowing down, all in about 15 rides that she has ever had. Last week I started riding her outside of the arena after our lessons in the arena. Quite awhile ago I rode her down to the house for a few minutes, but now we are venturing on the trail back by the arena. This is how she came to open gates. I just walked her up to the arena gate, sidepassed her over to it, unwrapped the chain and flung the gate open. She didn't even flinch. Then I rode her out. Once she realized that I wasn't going to head back to her pasture and turned her to the right to go down a fairly short, steep hill she stopped and said "No way!" It took me 15-20 minutes to get about 50 feet. But she did it. 

Chance's first ride on a trail.

The next day I did the same thing. Once I rode her out of the arena and turned right, she said "No way!". But this time it didn't take me long to get her to where I stopped the day before. She remembered being ridden that far, then when I wanted her to go further, she knew she hadn't gone that far before and didn't want to do it. But I got her to go another 25 feet or so. I am starting to figure her out. When she doesn't want to go anywhere she hasn't been, she will stop and try to turn around. I keep her straight and just stand there and let her relax which doesn't take very long. Once she is relaxed I praise her and urge her forward. She will walk a couple feet and try to spin around. I keep her straight, stand and let her relax. Then we walk forward. Once she is relaxed she is okay with walking forward but if I push her to go forward when she is nervous, she just wants to spin and go the other way. This is all new to her. I have led her on these trails many times, but it is always different once a rider is on their back. She will get better. I will do this everyday after I ride in the arena. I also rode her down to the house and through the front yard. She wasn't too happy with going through the front yard. She gets really nervous and spooky about the bushes blowing in the wind. She will eventually get over that. 

Chance's first ride through front yard.

My Birthday was last Saturday and we had a party here at our house. There were about 25-30 people here and we had a BBQ. It was a lot of fun and the weather turned out nice. Yesterday we had to work up in one of the horse pasture's. That was a day long project. We found a 9" lizard. I did not know we had lizards around here. We get salamanders but I have never seen a lizard. Maybe he's a little lost?

Our new pet Lizard.

Tomorrow I head out west to the Ocean to visit my dad for a couple days. I hope I get to relax a little bit, maybe play on the beach and sit in the sun. I have been an energizer bunny....... going and going and going, that a little relaxation would be really good right now. Because when I get back from visiting my dad, another adventure awaits me for this weekend. And believe me, YOU DO NOT WANT TO MISS THIS ONE!!!