Spooky Season

Autumn has arrived in the past few weeks with a drop in temps and the start of rainy season. Cinder loves the colder weather and now that's she feeling much better after her abscess we have a very spicy, spooky mare on our hands. 

Halloween jump decoration is perfectly fine with her

She had an absolute meltdown in the outdoor arena a few weeks ago, when jumps that had been used at the horse show returned home for the winter and were stacked in the corner of the outdoor. She's jumped all these poles and the coop multiple times, but god forbid they hang out on the pole rack in the corner. Cinder is fine going past the spooky corner when we're jumping, but as soon as you're walking and not doing anything, she's trying to spin and rear. She got so bad during one of my lessons that Trainer M got on her and had a little discussion. 

Said scary poles and coop

She has thankfully gained all the weight back that she lost over summer so we cut her grain back and M has been making it a point to work her more outside, weather permitting. I haven't been able to ride outside since her big meltdown because by the time I get off work and get to the barn it's dark or and when I've ridden on the weekend its been raining. 

The mounting block was strategically placed there for a certain red mare

But we've also had our share of spooky things in the indoor. M has been setting a lot of gymnastic exercises with the poles/cavaletti/brush boxes and Cinder took a lot of offense at being asked to trot into the exercise above. She thought it would be much easier to go around the boxes than over them. How dare we ask her to use her body and sit on her hind end over two little bounces. I foresee a winter of skinnies and gymnastics in our future. 

Spooky Season

The temps are still warm during the day here in the PNW, but it's definitely spooky season. The mornings are crisp and foggy, and the ponies have been feeling good. In fact A messaged me last week asking if I had ridden Cinder Sunday and Monday like I normally do (I had lunged her Sunday and had a good ride Monday) because apparently Cinder thought she was a baby OTTB instead of a baby warmblood during her trainer ride on Tuesday and had been quite full of herself. They had to gallop a many laps of the arena before Cinder's brain started working correctly. 

I don't like the sun setting earlier and earlier

 Cinder was pretty well behaved in our lesson on Friday; I was the one having a case of the spooky scaries. We warmed up on the flat pretty well, and then started jumping a few single cross rails, looping around the arena and picking them up as we went along. A started lowering some of the other jumps, and inadvertently spooked another horse who was hacking in the ring with us. He apparently spooks frequently when poles hit the ground and A had taken the back rail of an oxer off. I was taking a walk break and the other horse was directly in front of us when he spooked, then slipped, then bucked and dumped his rider. He started trotting towards us and Cinder grew about three inches wider and taller and I flung myself off just in case she got any stupid ideas. Thankfully she didn't, and A was able to catch the gelding and his rider was ok minus some road rash on her arm. But I was rattled and it followed us the rest of the ride. 

No media from my lesson, but I rode Peebs for the first time in 3 months and he wasn't amused.

We rewarmed up over the cross rails before attempting an outside line. A said it was a short 6 or forward 5 and she didn't care what I did. I tried the short 6 at first, but ended up a 5.5 so I decided the forward 5 was a better choice. We did the five nicely going off the left, but going off the right I had a hard time finding it. Then Cinder spooked a little at one of the barn workers pushing a wheelbarrow and while it wasn't a big spook, I let it get to me. I couldn't push her forward enough down the line and kept finding either a horrible chip to the second fence, or would pull for the 6 and Cinder would break to the trot. Eventually I asked A if I could just trot everything to get my brain back. She was fine with that so I picked up the outside line and the single cross rails until I felt a bit more confident. We ended with trotting in and cantering out of the line in a 6.

She likes smushing her nose on the mirrors

 

I'm annoyed with myself for letting the spooks get to me, but we've been focusing on flat work and haven't jumped for a month and I know I'm always rusty with a long break. I am however really happy with Cinder. She packs me around while I'm having an anxiety attack over finding a distance to a 2' fence like she's a 20yr old school horse, not a green 5yr old. I'm going to try and fit in a second lesson per week for a while because we have our last show of the season at the end of the month, and then hopefully a really cool clinic in December.