Less than a month!

My little rock star and his LR:)

Tiki's big Poplar Place debut is coming up in about 3 weeks!  Very excited, can't wait to see Muffin and LR in action "for real".

It felt amazing to ride my boy this week.  It was SO hard to watch and NOT be riding schooling last weekend, but at the same time it is ALMOST as fun watching my boy:)

Monday I just spun him on the longe line both ways to make sure he was all good from his big day on Sunday.  He looked perfect and fresh, with nary a head bobble at all.

Tuesday I walked hills in draw reins.  Carried a dressage whip and made him march up, then halted and backed a few times backwards up the hill as I made my way down.  Did something a little different; After walking up the hill 3 times, I then trotted up and down 3 times.  I've actually never just trotted up and down the hills.  If you've never done it, trotting down a steep hill is HARD!  Lots of leg, lots of balance, and some good hard work.

I got on for a quick 5 minutes to force my student's horse into the water!

Thursday I jumped, whoo hoo!  Set up a super simple outside/inside/outside/inside.  One of the outsides was a tall crossrail bounce, the 2 insides were the coop and the cavaletti oxer, and the other outside was a square 2'6 tall, 3' wide oxer.  I simply lined them up along the center of the ring so that I had a nice long approach to each jump.  Tacked up in the 'wonder bit', and warmed up with a little bit of lengthening and shortening of the trot.  He felt super actually.  Kept my leg on and continuously sent him forward, but I worked on staying super quiet with my body.  Warmed up by trotting the coop back and forth and he was completely perfect.  I consciously softened my left hand and paid attention like crazy to that left shoulder.  I'm satisfied he was dead straight each time.  I began by halting straight then continuing on, just to keep him slow and soft.  I trotted the bounce and fought the urge to DO too much.  I HATE bounces lol!  As he jumped the jumps I concentrated like crazy on my position.  Ended up just going and going and going.  I concentrated on that rhythm, that left shoulder, and MY position.  He was GREAT.  My distances were all acceptable, he popped off a few easy and clean lead changes, and he stayed pretty huntery throughout.

Compare knees here to knees of the big jumps:)

All in all, a successful jump school, it felt great.  He felt very adjustable throughout and he was pretty careful about not touching any poles.  I felt pretty good myself; I think I stayed with him well and didn't interfere at all which is really all you can ask for!

Tomorrow LR is going to do some dressage boot camp.  Next week I plan to jump at least once and do hills in the draw reins at least once.  A dressage school of course.  That's all I'm committing to; anything else will be a bonus!