… with my horse and my blog!
It’s been a crazy month here. Family emergency and several days out of town with a grandparent in the hospital, Thanksgiving travels, planning and attending a surprise [50th] birthday party for my mom (she reads this and all of my comments, so feel free to leave your best wishes ), work stuff, and other life stuff, I’ve been out of the loop. Also, with losing Classic last week and Ace having that abscess, I’ve been all out of sorts. He’s finally on the …

I’m a firm believer that the greatest riding instructor you’ll ever have is your horse. Things Ace has taught me over the last week:

he doesn’t like to feel pressured
he doesn’t like it when my upper body gets too forward. He stops if I get in front of the vertical.
I can’t ask him too many different things at once yet. One step, one aid at a time.
he is very forward without any convincing when it’s cold out
an active seat drives him forward more effectively than nagging legs
he likes to walk on …

This has been an interesting week for Ace and me. After two months, I think the honeymoon is finally over.
I still love him to death, and he’s still a great horse. But I am starting to see some recurring issues, which really just means that I am getting to know my horse better and he’s slowly teaching me how to work with him. GreyHorseMatters left this comment yesterday on working with the horse I have:
I can see Ace is teaching you too, how he wants to be trained. It’s good …

I got some great news from Dave about Ace the other day …
Dave said that, other than feeding and cleaning his stall, he hadn’t handled Ace much in a long time. The other day he went to halter him and take him out of his turnout, and Ace was obviously wary of him. He gave him a funny look like, “You’re not my mom. She’s the one who usually does this.” And he moved away. Dave stepped back and gave Ace a chance to check him out, and then he …

Ace has been at Dave and Tracie’s “Crosswinds Ranch” for nearly two months now. Their four horses — Midnight, Louie, Classic, and Marahute — and my boy Ace have had the opportunity to meet each other over the fence, work in the arena together, and get to know each other through the bars of their stalls. Taking our time letting them get to know each other seems to have paid off, because putting them together in the pasture was pretty much uneventful.
Midnight is definitely the herd leader, followed down the …

We all do it, all us horsewomen bloggers have to talk about our horse’s manure habits from time to time. And after reading quite a few poo posts, I can’t believe I’m giving in and doing one of my own. I never thought that would happen on my blog. But here it is …
I’ve gotten up close and personal with Ace’s poop this week, as Dave and Tracie are on vacation and I’m responsible for animal care while they are gone. Sure I’ve cleaned his stall before, but it hasn’t …

I got home late this afternoon, and didn’t get to go see my boy Ace until late this evening after worship team rehearsal at church. I knew he’d be outside, so I just ran out in my flip flops to say hi and give him some cookies.
I walked out of the barn (where I picked up the treats), and there was my boy in his turnout staring with ears pricked and nickering under his breath as I walked up to him. He was obviously excited. He took his cookie and …