Double The Fun!!

I played with America twice today and boy did we have fun! The first session consisted of tossing the "rein" over her head. I think I need to practice without her; from the ground. I'm having trouble tossing it just right to clear her head and too often get it caught on her ears or on her nose. That has to be annoying for her. On the plus side, she won't get upset if it happens when I'm in the saddle!

Played touch it with two frisbees, sending America from one to the other. She remembered this game from the other day and went straight to the frisbee and put her nose on it each time I sent her...I think she was looking for a cookie as that's how I got her interested in finding the frisbee the first time we played the game.

We did some circling game looking for relaxation while increasing the number of laps we can do while still being relaxed. America is up to 3 laps now in both directions; circling to the left is more relaxed than to the right but we're working on it. I decided to add a little interest to the circling game after the 3 relaxed laps and moved to a log obstacle to see if America would maintain gait and direction while jumping an obstacle. She did great but got a little bit impulsive after the jump so I added in a change of direction and that helped her relax a bit. Will play with this a bit more to see how it goes.

Our second session consisted of a little online warm up to help us connect then we went to liberty in the big pasture. Oh what fun that was. The weather is a bit windy and cool so all the horses were a bit frisky and America was no exception. After the online warm up with some touch it and stick to me, I took the halter off and invited America to walk with me. Everything was going well until I upped my energy to trot. America picked up the trot then took off across the pasture. Of course Bert joined her and they cantered around in sync. When America stopped and looked at me I would turn and walk away. If she didn't follow I would send her again. This is where Bert comes in handy...he LOVES to go and America will go with him. It only took three sends and America was looking for me and came to me at a very ENERGETIC walk with Bert right behind her. When I turned and started walking she followed me and placed herself shoulder to shoulder with me. This time when I upped my energy to trot, she trotted but when I slowed and stopped so did she. Of course Bert was participating in all this by following America. We played with go and stop several times and America stuck with me each time. When she stopped slowly and stayed straight when I stopped it was time to quit. Her reward was some scratches and a couple of cookies then hang out time while I played friendly with Bert with the cs and string.