A whole new level of "Nope"

It seems that we have a megaphone snooping on my blog. Yes, Isabella, I'm talking about you, and now you're looking around your room with a pleased smile on your face acting like you have no idea what I'm taking about. To the rest, the previously mentioned child did not hesitate to show Miss S my last post, which included my lengthy rant on oxers. Of course, Miss S decided that torturing me during tonight's lesson was imperative. She set up two oxers, TWO OXERS, and one was a triple bar . . . well, it was a tiny triple bar, but it was three poles and they were ascending, therefore it was a triple bar. The second oxer was much large and wider; it had to be 2'0"-2'6", at least somewhere in that range, and although I almost knocked it down three times, I'm still patting myself on the back because I didn't even come close to falling off. My stirrups were longer too, so high five to me.

It was another jumping lesson. We did our trot overs, and Baby was wanting to go. You would never guess she's a western pleasure horse with how she runs through jumps. Despite her forwardness, I just want to note that, in my past few lessons, I have only had one refusal (and was because crazy trainer wanted to set up those gymnastics with the oxers and the bounces and the ajfiebfyfbei . . . .). I lost my balance and would have fallen off if I went over the oxer, so it technically wasn't a refusal, it was a save from my ever so mindful horsey. The gymnastics today were actually really fun, even with the baby triple bar at the end. We changed it up a bunch of times and took it from different directions. If you ever have a friend on the ground while you're riding, have them help you with gymnastics. Do all the different ones that you can, trotting in and out, cantering in and out. It forces you to focus, if you want my honest opinion, but they don't lack the enjoyment factor.

After gymnastics and trotting up to the bigger oxer (it was lower while we were trotting up), Miss S raised the big pxer and had us do a gymnastics course. Big oxer, triple line, outside line, trot fence, then stop by the wall. Sounds easy, right? Wrong! Our indoor arena is about a big as an elf's shoe, so jumping is never very easy. First time, I had to push to the big oxer, and Baby hit her hind feet on the back rail. She slowed down for the triple line, so I had to push her through the whole thing. They were one strides in between the jumps, so letting her go slow with her stride size was not gonna happen. Somehow we made it through the last line and the trot fence, then I made her stop by the wall. Miss Sassy Pants was not wanting to keep her little feet still. We did two more courses, and they were okay. They were far from perfect; the second one was the best, but today was a heels up kind of day, so I was feeling rather unstable, especially over the big oxer.

After all that in the saddle work, we all hopped on bareback, and started messing around. Miss S kept telling Syd to do the triple line; I was just sort of plodding around at the other end of the arena. Miss S and Syd's mom were just telling her to do this line, and poor Syd was just not feeling it. Without really thinking, I just picked up a canter and head towards the triple. That thing is so much easier bareback than in a saddle. At that leather and flocking is overrated. Go the natural way guys, even of it requires your pants to be washed more often! I had to do it again because Izz wanted to get a video, and if you even think about reading this post to Miss S like it's a bedtime story, I'm gonna hide your saddle, sweet cheeks.