Rhapsody Is a Superstar!

Annnd if Blogger will cooperate I took pictures! :)

It's spring break and I have gotten permission to ride pretty much whenever I want, so I headed out early this afternoon to ride or work as many ponies as I could find.

Spring is in the air and the trees are flowering even though it was snowing over the weekend. Lol. Today it was nice and warm and partly sunny though--really felt like spring!

The barn cats got all excited when they saw my car, and as soon as I got out they came trotting over and proceeded to get thoroughly jealous of each other despite the fact that I was petting both of them at the same time! Gotta love the felines... :P

 This is Rafik (well I think that's his name). I call him Rocky. He lives in one of the pastures on the way down to Rhapsody's field. Isn't he the cutest thing? He wanted to investigate my camera.  :) I would take him as a project horse in a heartbeat except that he's owned by a boarder who probably doesn't even know I exist!

 This is a rather bad picture of the girls; they never like to put their ears up at the same time! Rhapsody is far left and Surge on the right. Rhapsody got all prick-eared when she saw me coming to the pasture and headed right over to me, along with Cairo and Surge, yay! I was careful to pet her and "ask" before I haltered her, and she was quite easy to catch today. Surge too, though I don't have to ask her opinion on much...I already know it usually. Lol. I also caught Fringe, mostly to clean her up and make sure her rain rot doesn't recur.

 Grooming time was fun! I ended up with dust all over my eyes, in my nose, and a "dust mustache" on my lip! Ahh springtime. You can see in this picture that Rhapsody was still dusty even after a thorough grooming. And they are all starting to shed!

I took Rhapsody out first since I wanted to have time to do groundwork and ride her. This is my new cheapo rope halter. I wanted to get a picture of how nice the green looks on her, but it was a bit hard as she was being "Velcro pony" and wouldn't get far enough away for me to take a picture!

Our groundwork was great and the ride even better! I took a very light contact (usually I keep a fairly firm hold on her mouth) and stuck a couple fingers in the martingale strap for the sake of hanging on, and she walked round like a trooper, not getting worried or startled except when we unexpectedly came upon a tire sitting in the middle of our path. But that startled me a bit too. I hopped off and we worked with it on the ground, and soon she decided it wasn't to be bothered about.

There was also a new mare in the quarantine pasture running round, screaming from time to time, and acting like a nut. This is of course always somewhat worrying, but to Rhapsody in the past it would've been cause for an all-out nervous breakdown. She was still looky and a bit worried, but listened well and paid attention even so. We did a lot of walk, a fair bit of trot, and some big patterns--circles and figure 8's. Patterns seem to help her relax and start thinking. There were several moments where she really seemed to tune in and begin to "read my mind" as I would think about a move and she would begin it before I thought I'd given any cues! I asked for a little canter at the end, and for once she didn't want to canter! She seemed stiff and didn't get into her usual rhythm at canter, so I didn't push it. We ended with some more walk, pets, and I told her what a good girl she was. Very, very pleased with today!

I did some groundwork with Surge--she still seemed a tiny bit sore and, unlike her buddy, was extremely worried about the new mare--and took all the girls back out. So proud of Rhapsody today! She will get a day off tomorrow, groundwork Wednesday, and hopefully another ride on Friday. Surge will get the week off till Friday, and I'll try to ride Brandi and Fringe on Wednesday. We'll see how that goes!