4th Lesson

Cara came today and we had our 4th lesson. Can't believe how quickly Saffy has come on since we started lessons! She felt quite tired today but she worked nicely. We started off doing a 20m circle around x and then turning off to do a 10m circle on the other rein at various points on the circle. It was very good for getting her to engage both her hind legs. I really need to make sure I'm sitting up straight and not leaning in on turns.

We then went onto cantering more circles and her canter seemed so much more balanced and she was back on her hocks more than before. It felt really nice :) We did some leg yielding in canter and she really took to it easily. We came back to walk and attempted to get her to engage and soften to walk in an outline. Bless her she didn't have a clue what I was asking! It took about 10mins of walking with a consistent contact and random bursts of trot to get her thinking 'forward' and she dropped down! She did it!! It wasn't consistant but she did it for one long side of the arena and got lots and lots of praise. It felt wonderful!! I didn't expect to start working on her outline properly for ages yet, partially because of what the judge said about her neck being upside down, but my little star has shown she can do it!

Tomorrow I'm hoping to go on a hack then she'll have a day off on Thursday. Friday will be schooling and going over what we worked on today and Saturday another hack. She'll probably get a day off on Sunday. If I'm not hungover I'll go and either jump or lunge. In fact, I may as well plan out now what I intend to do leading upto the dressage and show.

Wed 10th Hack
Thur 11th Day off
Fri 12th School
Sat 13th Hack
Sun 14th Day off/jump/lunge
Mon 15th Jump/school
Tue 16th Lesson
Wed 17th Hack
Thur 18th Day off
Fri 19th School
Sat 20th Jump
Sun 21st Hack
Mon 22nd School
Tue 23rd Lesson (and chiropractor)
Wed 24th Day off
Thur 25th Day off
Fri 26th School