Motoring along

There hasn't been an awful lot going on, but I still feel like I should keep up on blogging as to not let it lapse like last time. I'm trying to be a good blogger anyway! We took almost 2 weeks off from riding due to the car race over Memorial Day weekend and then it absolutely poured rain for a full week when we got back. Some days we were getting a full inch of rain a day. That's....not helpful for anyone. The road to the barn was blocked by a down tree at one point, the state route washed out, without a horse trial to look forward to, I simply just didn't care.

It didn't help that when we got home from the race, we found one of our 3 yr old cats had died. Very sudden, he was still curled up in his cat bed in our bedroom but had hemorrhaged. And had been that way for a few days. It was a mess to clean up and hell to get rid of the smell. I was very much in grieve mode for almost a week. Poor guy, at least I take comfort that it was quick because he hadn't tried to hide and was sleeping exactly like he normally does when it happened.

Mia has been fairly good! She actually held her fitness while I was gone, I think part of it is the new pasture they are in. There is a huge 6+ acre pasture "over the hill" that was rarely used because no one wanted to walk up and down the big hill to feed and get horses. I had tried for 2 summers to move my horses down there, but was told no because there wasn't adequate shelter. This year, the barn owner I get along with put up temporary fencing and ran a lane from a dry lot down to that pasture. She put her 2 pasture board horses and my 2 in there and it has been the perfect scenario. App is out with 3 mares, they are on/have access to grass 24x7, they have shelter, and App is doing well with going up and down the hill (which isn't as steep as the path we would walk up and down).

Despite better judgement, my first ride after the 2 week hiatus was a XC jump school over the half dozen jumps on the farm. Why? Bc I had capacity and the ground was decent. Mia held it together pretty well, considering, however I think it was maybe a good thing I didn't try that Training level HT? She was...ahem...a little strong LOL! I have zero media since I was alone (well, there was someone AT the barn, but not with me), but I was happy.

From there, we started working on fitness and this week I did our first canter fitness in the fields. She listened well at first, though after the second move up to a gallop, she refused to come back to a canter and I ended up running her into bushes because I refused to yank on her face until she stopped. Bad mare! We ended up doing 2 5-min canter sets, a 10 min trot set and random other canter/trot transitions until would drop into a lower gear when asked via my seat and position. Needless to say, she was a very tired mare when we were done!

We did have a good dressage ride last week, Mia needed reminded that she did have to listen if I wasn't wearing spurs but did try for most of the ride. I'm so happy that even if she has some time off, she is remembering her dressage and isn't falling backwards like she did even last year. Progress indeed!

I am going to England on a short vacation until July 3 so I am missing 3 shows that I had penciled in. The next Horse Trial is tentatively July 14, and I am pretty sure we will enter as a Training HT. Sure, we haven't done any real training level jumps, and sure I probably won't be able to school before that, but if I don't actually go, I may not end up doing it all this year and that is going to be a whole other level of disappointing.