Dusting off the old carrot stick

Today was the first day of me actually digging out the carrot stick and playing since before Firefly hurt herself. It's been the winter of wound care savvy for me.

I brought Charm to the round pen first. He's my mini gelding who I started driving last summer. He's probably my next best achievement besides Roxie so far, since I raised him from a foal and have done all his training myself. Today, after my slump of avoidance, I knew I'd need to play with him before doing anything with Firefly. Thos darn pneumatic cart tires, I may have not had such a rough winter if I could have still driven him, but they popped before the accidents leaving me with an excuse for avoidaholism. I just invented a new condition, what is my life. :P Anyway, I started with extreme friendly game, which he was always really good at. I could slap the ground from zone 5, but then I remembered (because he backed up into me) that if I move backwards, he backed up to me... Or onto me if I forgot to move lol. Horse remembers things even I've forgotten I had taught him, so that's nice. Then I wanted to see if our yo-yo was any good. He backed pretty fast off of phase 1. Then I tried a circle, and he trotted off in quite nice form. Last summer, his circling game got really good, to where we could do 10 solid laps, bent properly, round back, one ear on me the whole time... off phase 1, no corrections, at liberty. I had started playing with him on the 45' line in open spaces to start doing liberty in open spaces. Today his circles were still that good, so I only asked for three and stopped. It was as if I'd just played with him yesterday, as opposed to October. He is so much fun!!

I put him back, and we jumped a log on the way. He's an amazing jumper, even at 31 inches! I got Firefly out next. She's only been let to run in roundpen so far. She trotted around at the introduction of the stick at first, but in less than a minute she let me throw the string over her back. We did a little refresher course of all 7 games. She was perky, and more dominant after being a bit stir crazy, but overall surprisingly good. She responded just as quickly as she always had. I think many other horses would do more than a head toss when asked to do something if they had been couped up all winter. She remembered just as well as Charm did, and her yo-yo was amazing. It was so funny, I asked her to squeeze between me and the fence, and she didn't want to so she pinned her ears at the stick and squealed at it. I laughed out loud at her and eventually she went. Her personality is hilarious. She is really smart and easy to play with. I called the vet to make an appointment sometime this week to clear Firefly for resuming full work. That was the plan last time I called her too, but we ended up removing more proud flesh and needing more rest. Fingers crossed this time goes better.

In other news, a new boarder came in with a Saddlebred. He's soooo pretty. I have missed seeing the flashy showhorses of the Equestrian Center.

Almost done with school!!! There have sleepless nights and way too much coffee ingested but we're gettin there!