Sep 2007
Farm Blog | Oct 2007 | Aug 2007

Lovely fall ride

September 28 / 2007 08:56 PM Filed in: Trail Riding
We had a lovely ride today at Caribou Ranch, just north of Nederland. The aspens are turning yellow and the weather was perfect. I rode Ivy, Jane rode Belle, and some friends rode their own horses. We spent nearly all day there. It was so nice! I still have more trails to explore in this area, but so far I think that's my favorite.

Little Ivy out walked (and out trotted) all of the others. She's little but mighty! I just added a photo of us in front of the aspens to Ivy's page.
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Ivy's first canter in the arena

September 14 / 2007 06:45 PM Filed in: Ivy
I took Ivy over to the boarding barn where a friend keeps her horse and we rode in the arena. It's a nice, big arena so I figured I'd try asking Ivy to canter. She doesn't really know any kind of canter cue, so I had to kind of chase her into it, she did great! She even got the correct leads going both directions. And she's so smooth! She was pretty easy to steer at the canter, but now I need to start working on teaching her the cue for the canter depart. She's a quick learner, so I bet she'll pick it up pretty easily.
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My first canter on Ivy!

September 05 / 2007 03:01 PM Filed in: Ivy
I took Ivy to the Niwot Trail today, which has several parts that are wide, flat, and open, with a gentle uphill grade, and that are therefore perfect for cantering on. I'd only cantered on Ivy once before and that was on Monday's trail ride and for only about fifty feet. This time we got some real cantering in, for stretches of a few minutes each. I have to work a little to keep her in the canter, but she's very level-headed about it. And very smooth! I'll need to keep working on teaching her the canter depart cue, but I sure like doing that on the trail when it makes sense to the horse to go. I'm sure horses are confused at first about why we want them to canter in tiny little arenas. Where's the fun in that?!
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Video footage

September 05 / 2007 03:00 PM Filed in: Kelton | Dressage
For the viewing pleasure of the millions of people who visit my web site every day, I've posted little videos of my two rides on Kelton at the dressage show last weekend. Follow the link to her name in the menu and then click on "Dressage Show."
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Four years later...

September 02 / 2007 10:02 PM Filed in: Kelton
I bought Kelton four years ago this October, with plans to be showing her at Training Level the following Spring and perhaps First Level by the following year. But due to a variety of issues, it was not to be. However, my patience has been rewarded and I was able to show Kelton today at my very first "real" dressage show. We rode Training Level Test 1 and Test 2 and she was so good!

Because I've been going easy on her, I didn't ask her to round up as much as maybe I should have, but nevertheless we got the second highest score on Test 1 and the highest score on Test 2, so I can't complain. The judge wrote some encouraging comments, and based on the video I know what we need to work on, so I look forward to continuing to progress. I just hope I don't have to wait another four years to show her again!

I put some stills from the digital video on a photos page for Kelton, and I will add more photos that a friend took later on.
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