Rolling with it...

Gotta love it when they are happy to see you!

What a gorgeous day today... other than the wind it was pretty much a perfect spring day :) Munchkin and I took the dogs to the dog park for awhile then headed to the barn for some pony time.

My green Paso Fino mare, Sugar, was first up while Seamus continued to enjoy the nice day whilst grazing. Sugar has a new saddle with a crupper so we worked with her on that. After Sugar's workout, Seamus came up for some grooming and his first official saddling since I got him. He stood pretty well on the wall tie, just the occasional racehorse grabbiness at the wall which I'm sure he'll get over soon. He already stands there so much better than when we started. I used my Australian Stock Saddle since it's a saddle that can take a beating and I am more comfortable in it than my old Stubben. I then put the rope halter and lunge line on Seamus and went outside for a little lunge lesson while saddled. As with just about everything Seamus does, it went smoothly, despite it having been about a month since he was last lunged.

As I am wont to do, I rolled with it and threw the bridle on, turned him around and mounted up! He stood perfectly fine, despite him being a bit taller than I have gotten used to- my two mares are in the 14hh range and he's a bit taller than that! It's also been quite some time since I have ridden a Thoroughbred, somewhere in the 6 1/2 year range LOL Again, Seamus could really not have done better for his lack of fitness and lack of training for anything but the racetrack. To be honest, I expected him to have a bit more *umph* under saddle, instead he just plodded along until I gave him leg. At first he didn't want to move off my leg, but he "got it" pretty quickly. I did get him into a bit of a trot, he gave me a couple of canter strides at first, but then settled into a trot. By the third time I did it, he trotted from the get-go.

Munchkin got some (poor) pics:

And a worse video- Munchkin is now being referred to as a "Drunken Monkey" because it looks like the video was shot by one! And please do pardon my horrible equitation, his departures were not smooth and I am not fit to ride a trotting horse anymore LOL

My favorite view of a horse!

And in other news, the colicy mare seems to be fine today... I was relived to see her up and moving about and acting normally :)