Bella & Stormy – May 2023

Weds 3rd

Well, I’ve been away for a weekend teaching up in Aberdeenshire and managed to walk to the horses last night on dog walk to see my 2 beauties. They heard me and came cantering up the big field hill to see me and get some hugs. Think they missed me as much as I missed them. I was teaching horses that hadn’t had much, if anything, done with them, and it always makes my heart sing when I come back to these two well trained, happy equines that understand that we love them and can work with them without them getting spooked. Well trained horses are a joy to be with and they have joy too.

This morning I went and fed them their breakfast, groomed them and then cleaned the field. This afternoon I wanted to reconnect to them with some play and maybe a ride. SO, firstly Bella comes up for some interaction….fab. I groom her, halter her and we had a really lovely play session. It felt like I’d played with her yesterday rather than 2 weeks ago (rain called of play for a bit before I went away).

Here’s our play session:

I then went over to see whether Stormy was up for a wee ride and he said ‘yes’ SO I tacked him up and had a nice, soft, light ride on him with some walk, backup, trot and sidepass over cones 😉

Adore this big old boy, he has a heart of gold 😉

Thurs 4th

Played a bit at liberty in the agility arena today with Bella 😉

Just let her do what she wanted in the area, only asked a few times for draw to
stay connected.

Sidepassed the whole length of this, really light and easy.

Fab draw through the poles too.

Grabbed the opportunity to get a ride in on Bella this morning too

What I was riding for today:

1) Lightness and relaxation (always)

2) Loose rein with precision (S2M)

3) Smooth transitions (backup, walk, walk, trot)

How I did these:

1) Light with cues and relaxed in my own body

2) Keep all my focus on where were going with Point 2 Point game and using the rein ONLY when I needed to and AFTER I used my thought, energy, focus, breathing.

3) Smooth in my requests and thinking in my mind and body the gait I want…she is that tuned in to me that she ‘got it’ perfectly.

Fri 5th

Well, we noticed a few tents going up in a field over the river and opposite our horses field. Then today there were 15 small tents with one huge one! We thought maybe something to do with some coronation celebrations but found out it’s a local wedding. There is going to be noisy music and people and not sure how long it’ll be going on for either SO decided to bring the horses home for some peace. Also worried with a wedding there could be those awful candle lanterns going up in the sky ;( SO just to be on the safe side, being with us at home means I’ll sleep easier. The local coronation celebrations I believe are going on from today until Monday so we can keep out of all that malarky too.

Mark did a great job riding Stormy and leading Bella back home 😉

Sat 6th

You don’t have to go out for long, you don’t have to do a lot but it’s ALWAYS fab when you do something with your best friend

Mon 8th

After the weekend revelry (coronation and local wedding near horses field) Storm & Bella go back to their big field now it’s nice and peaceful again there 😉

I did the first bit of walking, about 3/4 of the way. We were going to ride them back but it’d been
raining a lot so the horses are wet so walking them seemed easier and best today 😉

Mark walked the last bit. S&B were just perfect and happy to be back in their big field
where Storm’s first chore was to roll and get all muddy 😉 lol

Weds 10th

Bought Stormy a beautiful halter like Bella’s one I won from Dee’s Designs. Bella’s is Orange with brown and Stormy’s is Red with black…gorgeous halters and hope to ride in them sometimes too 😉

Managed a lovely ride on Bella this morning. What were we going for???

1) Relaxation: through consistency of basic walk/halt/walk transitions.
2) Impulsion and Flexibility: through turns, circles and straight lines and working between those two for balance.

I asked Bella to just walk straight lines with balanced curves in huge serpentines across the field. It took a while but towards the

end I could loosen the reins and we were still straight together.

Working on all the SMALL THINGS and giving ourselves time to do so in a calm, non-demanding way will bring about changes we
didn’t realise we needed. I’m so glad I get the time to spend on the small things with Bella <3

Thurs 11th

Another fab morning carrying on Bella’s training from yesterday.

1) P2P’s in walk, trot, then canter

2) Large and then medium fig 8’s in walk, trot and then canter

Our straight lines and curves are getting better and I can just touch on her side or tweak the reins and ask for a better curve in her body if it’s not feeling even and this really helps when going in and out of transitions. I also work on feeling if my body is in the curves too….if our bodies are harmonious and ready in the right curve then the transition are smoother and easier

Sat 13th

Dear Bella is so clever, all 4 feet on the pedestal and I’m sure she knows it makes her taller than big Stormy 😉

Great ride on Bella this morning….am enjoying these early morning rides with her. It’s not too hot and is often the best part of the day. Also, having many rides brings the consistency we need to bring about changes in our riding…and it’s paying off. Today, for the first time, we did more canter work than walk or trot 😉 🙂 🙂

Loving the dry warmth too…look…we have fab shadows >>>>>>>>

Sun 14th

Storm & Bella are now on the extended track system we put in place years ago. The main ‘field’ where the round pens are is out of bounds until late Autumn now and slowly the track will be restricted as the grass grows. We keep the track around half of the field and incorporates the hill and two water sources, one at the top with the stream and the other right at the bottom with the trough. This keeps them moving about up and down the hill for exercise and stops them eating too much when the grass is rich.

Wed 17th

A lovely day for a ride with Bella. I rode in the part of the field that is now not used for grazing so lead Stormy there off Bella then let him off for a bit of a graze, it keeps him busy whilst I’m riding,

Only did some large field fig 8’s in walk and trot and as it started to get a bit hot called it a day on a really good note 😉

ALSO…after 4 days of doing bits on this we finally have a horse bridge over a very muddy, wet part of the home paddocks.

The horses could not get from one paddock to the next without getting into the muddy mess on their legs so Mark came up with the plan to make another bridge (we have one at the other end to get them over the stream) 😉

We started off with concrete blocks, then scaffolding boards. On top of the boards we put railway sleepers and then to fix the sleepers we put marine ply. The final bits were some stones jigsaw’ed into the mud at the ends with a good dose of hardcore stones on top to make a good, solid step to the bridge.

The final topping is some rubber matting to make it safe for them to cross over it when wet 😉

This all took a few days of hard graft, hand lifting everything and no machines to help out so we’re really happy it’s done and hopefully on Friday we’ll bring Storm and Bella up to the field to ‘horsey-test’ it out. Fingers crossed it withstands the ponies weight 😉

Found a lot of ‘mole hill’ mud and put that over the hardcore. Hopefully this will help Bella realise it’s safe and she’ll walk on it now 😉

Wed 24th

Yesterday I took time out to put the agility obstacles into the field the horses are not grazing at the moment. It took time but it was so worth it. In the field now there is: a tall narrow gap, a pole lane, a wee jump, a big jump, trotting poles, cones for transitions, 6 x jump wing weave, 4 x flag weave, bunting lane, archway, curtain, 2 x hulahoops, tarp with poles along edges, pole with rope attached for circling and riding one handed, tyre with rope on to pull and a flag on stick to carry.

There are so many things I can do with each of these obstacles so hopefully if we don’t get out hacking we can have some learning fun in the field 😉

Tested some of the obstacles out with Bella yesterday 😉 🙂

She remembered all of them nicely which was fab…lots of trotting, backups and sidepass

This morning both Storm & Bella had a kip, they both ended up laying down quite close to each other and flat out <3

The agility obstacles out in the big part of the field that is unused for grazing until Autumn now 😉

Thurs 25th

Yesterday’s rest day did the horses good, they were up for a bit of field agility fun today. Only did a bit as it started getting quite hot. Stormy & Mark did a fab job working on riding without using the reins, he really is a gem at understanding body weight and focus 😉 They also did a great flag carrying task 😉

Bella was a bit un-straight to start with, it has been 5 days since riding and she tends to do this SO we worked on straightness, even on the curves, all whilst playing with the obstacles. The obstacles made it more fun and we trotted and cantered around the field going from one to the other 😉 Great obstacle was the jump today…she did a great bascule and I looked like I knew what I was doing 🙂

What a lovely day 😉

Fri 26th

Lovely early ride with Bella this morning 😉

Sun 28th

Today was nice and warm with a slight breeze 😉 First ride was on Stormy for a change. He was up and willing to pull the tyre with me in walk and trot, it was a lot of fun to do. He was a little short stepping so didn’t do too much just stretched his legs and had some fun 😉

Bella and I did bits of what we needed (stretching and flexibility to the right) but she wasn’t ‘feeling’ 100%, was a bit stiff going to the right and couldn’t pick up canter on the right ;( SO…again just stretched her legs and took what she could give me. A couple of days off hopefully will have her back to her usual exuberant self

Mon 29th

Did some lovely online play today with Bella and some of the field agility obstacles. Today was a FIRST for Bella…a really lovely, mindful backup through the archway without going through it forwards first…what a clever girl she is, growing in confidence and ability all the time 😉