OMG!!! Where was *that* amazing, forward, bouncy pony when I needed it on Saturday???? 😮 Dino was AMAZING tonight. Really forward and keen. Did some work over trot poles and he bounced along very happily. Turned him out and he FLEW across the field at flat out gallop so he was clearly feeling good :wub: I suspect he’s enjoying the cooler weather :nod: (as indeed am I although I got drenched to the skin twice today so I’d like less of that please!)

It’s been an amazing pony filled weekend. Yesterday I sauntered down to lovely Sussex and met the amazingly lovely Beth & Tompony!!! I was curious about the straightness training and whether it would be good for Dino and Beth very kindly offered to show me a bit more about it as the free stuff on the website is a bit confusing and doesn’t make it entirely clear how it works. We had a lovely afternoon! It was a great pleasure to have a bit of a play with Tompony on the ground – even if he was a bit suspicious of a total cack-handed stranger fumbling around with the lead rope and the whip! :wub:

I think it will help Dino a lot. It’s quite subtle but I think it will be useful and I’d love to develop my skill in just seeing the asymmetry as well as actually dealing with it so I’ve invested (I suppose) in the home study course. Lots to learn! A copy of the agility handbook also arrive today so Dino will have many fun things to get on with over the winter, although it’ll be winter dressage all the way if he carries on like today :laugh:

I do wish the little sod would stop rubbing his mane out though. I’ve been putting Kill Itch on daily but this time of year is awful. Midges I suppose. Don’t really want him rugged up all day though so I don’t suppose there’s much more we can do.

Tiber – thanks for the group add on FB.

Yesterday we headed off to Warehill EC (near Dunstable) to do a bit of dressage. Wasn’t the best day – very very hot, even at 09.30 when our test was. Dino isn’t great in heat (despite being half Andalusian? How does that work?? :laugh: ) and he was very unsettled about both the warm up arena and the test one. We got 57.82% which is a bit disappointing, but doubly so when Warehill have their own little championship event for which the qualifying score is 58%. I thought we had a good chance of making that really and was pretty frustrated that we missed it by such a small margin :rant: Not his fault at all and the judging was very fair….just….grrr.

I’m just uploading the video. Not our finest hour. His instinct when he’s unsure is to back right off and so I’m nagging him terribly just to keep him moving. 🙁 But it’s all good experience. We are hoping to take him out there again in September but the friend we went with needs to decided what classes she wants to do and we can see whether us doing the intro again works.

(as I publish this the video is still uploading!!)

As my friend was doing two classes after ours Dino had a lot of practice at standing about in the car park munching hay, which went fine for the first 3 hours or so but then he got bored and started trying to dig up the car park, so I had to untie him and bring him over to the picnic to give him something to think about:

This at least gave me the set up for an unusual head shot!

Good experience for him but way too hot really for either of us. Interesting to see if he’s better when we (hopefully) take him back next month. Once my other friends pony has recovered from having her shoes taken off we’re keen to do some arena hire in different places so he can see coloured poles, fillers and work on different surfaces.

Aww, I’ve just found Shona took a couple of snaps as well as the video. Not the greatest photo ever but I am super pleased with the subtle blingy browband!!

He was a bit freaked out by the photographer on the chair at first. Here we are having a chat.

Been a slightly up and down couple of weeks. On the upside Dino has his new saddle!!! Thanks soooo much to Why for taking the trips down to see us – I’m really happy with it :db: We’ve been out to the gallops in it and today I was jumping and although it’s a dressage saddle it felt great.

Dino has been a bit hot and cold really. He’s been ok out hacking and quite forward and happy to move but very sluggish in the school. I had a follow up with the osteopath yesterday and he can find nothing wrong with him – the hip seems a little stiff but no pain response and David couldn’t seem much wrong with it in the videos I sent across so basically the pony is fine. I think he’s a bit bored in the school and I suspect he’s a bit less fit than he was so, sorry pony, but it’s fitness time! I have a lesson tomorrow so I’ll be having a word with Claudia about a proper fitness plan.

We did have a bit of fun with some jumps in the school today. Just tiny, but there’s some video. He didn’t feel massively forward but he seemed to enjoy popping a few cross poles. :wub: Some video here: https://flic.kr/p/xqiBpd

Damned thing’s been rubbing out his mane again though. Not quite sure how to stop him doing that – been putting Kill Itch on him daily 🙁