The warm up was nice enough but as soon as I asked her to trot (or really, stopped thinking "sloooooow" for one second) she decided we needed to canter.
Or gallop.
Of course then it all circles and half halts and calming her down, and the second I relaxed just a little she was off again. What a pain! I was thinking to myself, does this horse ever get tired???!
Riding in the outdoor with the wind just wasn't working for us so as my patience was about to expire I took her in the indoor and rode her in there. I didn't allow her to go straight for more than a couple strides. We did circles, zig-zags, figure 8's, loops all around the ring, halt, back up, and had more than a few get-off-my-inside-leg-you-goon reminders.
Towards the end I realized that she was getting tired because I actually had my inside and outside legs firmly on her. Giving her brain lots of things to think about meant it didn't have many spare resources to think about running around like an idiot. It worked fairly well! I am glad I persevered and kept riding. Part of me wanted to be done with it because I was so frustrated in the outdoor but I knew I couldn't leave it like that. We ended on a really nice, soft canter and of course I made a huge deal about what a good girl she was.
I also picked up the finished framed artwork to be auctioned off at the Ride this weekend:
The frame shoppe did a nice job on it. I am really happy with it and I know it's going to look lovely on the highest bidder's wall :)
Well done on the ride and I'm totally drooling over the picture. It's amazing.
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