# Progress Report: Osha, Blue and I



## CinnaDex (Jan 19, 2014)

*September Week 3 Update*

I am still not up to riding this week, which is starting to get to me, but I have started a few small shifts back at work which is exciting! I've been doing a few short sessions of ground work with my horses instead, just easy and simple stuff that they already know like yields, working off pressure, counter doubles, pole work and other little things. It's not exactly groundbreaking but it's good to reinforce some basics every now and again. I've noticed that this week Osha is backing up with alot more energy so that's always handy  

I don't have heaps else to say about this week, my boys are glistening with all the grooming they're getting, they've shed so much fur it's amazing! They've also been enjoying afternoon spring storms  That's all from me so here are a couple of pics










Blues winter coat is all dark  










Not so dark after good grooming however. Nice and sleek though










Oshas winter coat










Annnnd his shiny spring coat


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## CinnaDex (Jan 19, 2014)

*Ride 29.09.15*

I had my first ride back since the accident today! Very exciting. 

I was planning to film it, but long story short as soon as I went to mount up it started bucketing down rain so the camera had to go back in the car so it didn't get water damage, but I'm sure I'll get the chance to film soon

Our warm up was a little bit tense, but I think that that was mostly due to me being so stiff in my lower back, as we got into the ride more I warmed up and so did Osha, and we were able to move alot better together. 

We did just basic stuff, circles, turns, serpentines, loops, plenty of transitions and halts, simple stuff. I didn't really want to be to demanding considering, and I'm so pleased with how Osha went. He was a bit of a giraffe (it's somewhat of a chronic problem I have with him), but about midway into the session he started to relax his neck and use himself from the back alot better, which is always a positive. 

He was so well behaved and focused! He used to be so reactive to everything going on but now he just settles into his work, I'm so happy. It was raining, there was thunder, my other horse was carrying on like a dolt because he was alone in his yard, there were pigs squealing and big machinery doing something on one of the neighbours farms and he just worked through it! I was expecting a little bit of a reaction or a spook just because its been a month since I've been able to ride him and he can be a little silly when fresh, but he was a gentleman! 

We ended the ride on some long and low with a nice wander up the road and back to cool him off. All in all it was a pretty awesome ride and my back actually feels great after working, I didn't realize how stiff it was feeling before.


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## CinnaDex (Jan 19, 2014)

*1.10.2015 quick update,videos to come*

Alrighty, so I have been able to film yesterdays and today's ride, and boy, what a difference being able to review your rides makes! I've just been riding around by myself these last few years (although that's going to be changing before the end of the year ) so having that eye on the ground has been really helpful imo.

I don't have the entirety of both rides on film (my camera films in 20 min blocks for some reason, need to figure that out and see if i can fix it when I have time) but I still have enough to see what I am doing wrong and change it!

I especially noticed with yesterdays ride that I am riding with my legs too straight so today I bent them and had them further back and it felt so much better! I can't believe the difference it made. I felt like my horse was more responsive and had more drive too because my legs were talking to the engine more rather than at the girth muttering to themselves haha. 

I also noticed that I tense my shoulders and that makes my arms rigid when posting to the trot and I wasn't sure why. At first I thought it was my leg postion but it was still happening when I tried that, and I had this kind of light bulb moment trying to figure it out when I realised that _I was rising up and down rather than forwards and back_ I was taught to rise properly when I was much much younger but somewhere between then and now it just got lost in my brain so now I can work on rising properly  

It actually makes me wonder about the two point now, jumping is not something I was taught extensively (yeah I was taught to cling on while the horse jumped over stuff, but things like strides, distance, a proper jump seat, releases, when to go into the two point, ect were not things I learned about while younger). I'm happy to jump up to maybe 70 cm, but now that i realise I was rising wrong I'm thinking that maybe where and how I'm sitting in my two point is wrong too. I will have to film and check. 

Anyway, now to edit 42 mins worth of video and try to cut them into decent lengths for youtube (there are parts where my horse and I are offscreen or can't be seen very well that I'd like to cut, and I'd like to put in some opening/end screens  haha, and I'm not sure i have the data spare to upload so much to youtube so I guess I will find out)


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## CinnaDex (Jan 19, 2014)

*10.11.2015*

Alrighty, so it's been awhile since I've posted and a heap of stuff has happened

First up, I didn't end up having to move, which is awesome because I was stressing about it big time. I actually found a trainer not that far from me - he didn't have heaps of advertisement or anything, just so happens that a friends friend keeps her stud at his place because he has the facilities for him (He is a mini, they have excellent paddocks for him), and we ran into each other, got to chatting and here we are. His place is less than 15 mins from me , on a backroad that I never take and I kinda want to smack my face into a wall for missing it lol

I took my first lesson with him last Wednesday and have my second with him tomorrow, provided the weather holds out. He put me on a horse that he called "dopey and docile". He was a pretty calm gelding that is solid in all three of his gaits - he will plod around unless you know how to tell him to work. I thought the horse was a pretty good choice and I had fun riding him - my trainer is pleased with how I went - but the end of the hour I had the horse working through his back and stretching into contact which I am happy about because I didn't know that I could do that (I had hoped, but hey, yay for validation) 

I didn't end up cantering, I probably will in the next lesson or the one after. I learnt something about the walk cue that I didn't know before - I usually just lightly squeeze with my calves to ask for more energy in the walk, but we ended up working on squeezing one leg at the time - when the ribcage moved outwards I was told to move my leg into it to ask for more energy. It worked and it has been working on my horses as I practise it at home . 

I also have been practising sitting two beats and rising one at the trot, which I think is about testing my balance and seat, I do know that my left side, especially the hip is off at the moment as I am still recovering from my accident. My turns to the left as well are a bit off for the same reason - it's just one of those things that will take time to correct  

It's also no stirrup November! I usually warm up and cool down without stirrups as is, so it's interesting. I do add stirrups to some rides my I make an effort to do at least half an hour per day without. I've also been doing one stirrup work to help me strengthen my legs up again which is honestly worse than no stirrups but I can feel it working. I feel so much better about my hands, I am bending my elbows properly now (as opposed to say six months ago) and riding through my seat alot more. I'm getting that straight line from elbow to bit more consistantly too. 

The videos that I took ended up being in the wrong format, so I couldn't upload them :/ I have them on my computer so at least I can look back on them and see the changes. I think I have figured out what settings to use on the camera, so now I just have to wait for a sunnyish day (weather has been fine to ride in but overcast, I am paranoid, the camera was a gift and hugely expensive, I don't want to get it waterlogged) 

I haven't been riding Blue heaps as he is green and a bit spooky and at the moment I can't afford to re-injure myself - he's being long-lined and I get on him once or twice a week if it is a good long-lining session. He's starting to flex more which is awesome, when I first got him it took awhile to teach him to bend and turn properly, so to have him able to do serpentines, circles and figure 8's even just on the longlines is a pretty good achievement. He's the greenest horse I've owned and progress hasn't been heaps fast but its happening slowly and steadily, which is fine with me. I'm in no rush, and will be able to keep him for a long time, so it suits us. It gives us both plenty of time to learn thing and learn them without taking shortcuts. 

Osha is going awesome! He has always been a notorious stargazer, and he is slowly and steadily loosing that wrongly muscled neck of his :-D. I *think* his topline and hind is also building up slowly, but I am not sure as he lost weight as winter changed into spring. He's putting it back on well after I increased and improved his diet, but it does make it kind of hard to tell what exactly is muscle and what is weight gain. His sway back is becoming less sway however so that at least is a good sign to me. It's only been a few weeks, maybe two months? So I'm not expecting a dramatic change, but I need to take some pictures and look. 

His walk and trot are way more active, and I can feel a change when he goes hollow, so I'm fairly certain he's making an effort to work through the back. I'm not working on the canter just yet as he still tends to hollow out and stick his neck up, so I'll wait til he's stronger through the back and abdomen

I am never going to expect high level dressage or anything like that from him, his conformation will make it hard to be really impulsive and powerful from the rear but he's going nicely which is all I really ask. My vet has told me that he would be sound to do prelim level eventing after our last check up, but honestly I would settle with newcomers, it's probably going to take me awhile to be confident around an xc course and by the time I am ready to compete prelim level Osha will be older than 23 and I don't want to risk it at all, but that is what Blue is for  

Osha is stretching into contact each ride now, even out on the trail. We're also getting a nice long and low in the walk in cool down and sometimes even at the trot. That was one of my goals for this year so i am very happy. He was a broke horse but not finished when I got him, and it hasn't been until recently that I've really figured out how to change that. I've tried, and I've been trying for ages and he's miles away from the horse he used to be (for the better, especially manners wise), but lately things have really just seemed to be clicking into place for us, and I'm loving it. Of course not everything is all sunshine and rainbows, we've had a few little mishaps but nothing major, I just prefer to focus on the positives 

We have a trailer now, Osha is loading on the trailer as well, which is awesome he was horrible to load before - I did post a thread about it. I practised loading again today and he was fine - then loaded out in the open, he thought about going sideways but didn't, so yay! We shut the tailgate and he didn't seem to care, next I'll hang a hay bag and some hay near him and get him used to being in the float for longer than a couple minutes at a time and then work on actually hauling places  

Both the horses were wormed today and Osha's hooves have been trimmed, and I've rambled on long enough, kudos to you if you made it this far and sorry if I don't make sense lol


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## knightrider (Jun 27, 2014)

Love reading about all your progress. Sounds like you are doing great. I hope your back heals.


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## CinnaDex (Jan 19, 2014)

I am glad that you do , and thank you, it is healing pretty well, my physio and I both think that it's the riding that's helping it to strengthen as quickly as it is , I should be back up to speed in a month or two


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## CinnaDex (Jan 19, 2014)

*11.11.2015*

Lesson today! It was pretty awesome, but I went and rode my horses first so I'll talk about that first

I took Blue for a gallop today! I don't often take him for gallops because he can be a little difficult sometimes to pull up and that worries me. Don't get me wrong, he down transitions and whoa's on the flat and in the paddock beautifully every time in all three gaits, it's just when I push him to go fast his mind snaps into "race mode" as I call it - he loves running so much, and he is responsive to slowing, just not as much as I'd like. I know it's a matter of practise and training, I just have to work on my confidence galloping him more. I can gallop on other horses just fine, but Blue has that second gear on him that takes it to the next level, he's an OTTB, I expected it lol. Today's gallop went fine and we had a bit of fun racing around  I am going to try to gallop him once a week and increase from there so we can work on what we need to.

Osha's ride was great! It was a short one, but it was awesome. He was a bit stiff in the warm up just like always, but softened up for me a lot quicker than he usually does and I am very happy! He was reaching into contact and everything about 12 mins in and then doing some nice _rhythmic_ trotting - sometimes getting him into an even pace can be a struggle, so we did some long and low for 10 mins and cooled down  Normally we ride for around an hour but I didn't want to push myself too much before the lesson! We just need to keep working on consistancy at having contact and being connected, once we've aced that it's onto more impulsion if we can. I am going to start looking for some better poles to use to help us with this so I can budget accordingly  

I did have a short ride on him bareback earlier in the day and I can tell his back feels different for sure - when I used to ride him bareback it was like sitting on a barrel - now I can feel muscles and him lifting his spine, which means I am riding him right! Considering I have ridden left to my own devices for a long time I think it's quite an achievement , and learning how to get him there is really improved my riding! I actually think that he'll eventually be able to collect now - before sometimes I thought I was on a bit of a hopeless mission - we just have to stay focused on riding right and building his muscles correctly. I notice small changed in his neck today as well, that muscle built by stargazing is for sure slowly fading!

I *think* that I have figured out the issues with my camera, If I can I will be filming tomorrow! Yay - can't wait to see the difference  

Okay, now onto the lesson! It went really well. Well enough infact that my trainer is moving me onto a new horse next lesson! So that is pretty **** cool, as I'm only two lessons in. 

We worked on a few different things, but I wanted to say the most exciting thing (to me at least) first : I got the horse collected! It wasn't a BAM! instant thing, we worked at it the whole lesson and got it, I am so happy! I am pretty self critical and self aware when it comes to riding, I am always correcting myself and nagging at myself to do better, so to know that I can actually get a horse collected and keep it collected is a big thing to me. 

I've been expecting to get my position critizied or corrected a heck of a lot more, but the the only major things were that I needed to shorten my reins at the trot more and that I need to remember to look where I am going more haha. My trainer made the remark to me that whenever he notices my position slip I self correct before he can say anything XD It's nice to know that I don't have any major bad habits at the moment ( I expected to have several and I know of a few of mine that I have been working on every single ride, so to know that that's paying off is wicked) 

Back to the lesson  We started with the trainer (from now on I will call him R) riding the horse, just to make sure he was behaving, and he was struggling with left flexion. R took some time to talk to me about direct and indirect reins and showed me how to use each one, and then went indepth about how the horse should be flexing through the neck and shoulders ect. R got s degree of left flexion he was happy with and then I rode

At first we worked on the flexion to the left and the right and I learnt a few things about how to achieve it especially when a horse is stiff, ways to flex him and turn him ect. I was familiar with some of it as I had been using it to work with Blue, but I did learn some things too 

Our turns were so much better than last time (I have been working on them so hard at home I am sure that both my horses are sick to death of them, but hey, curves are good for them) I was much more co-ordinated with it . 

We ended up having him flexing very nicely after 15 mins or so then we started on contact and connecting, which imo was the hardest part of the ride - this horse is usually ridden by beginners and intermediates so the horse is used to being allowed to slack off, it took a bit of work (and whoa, I don't remember it being this hard last lesson but each ride is different) - I had to apply more pressure on the reins then I expected to and had to last time but R did say that he has a bit of a hard mouth from being ridden alot by beginners, and that it was going to be hard because of it. We did keep getting contact for a few strides and then losing it, so it was a matter of getting it and maintaining it, which we got eventually  

After that it was connecting the contact to my seat, which came very easily after working so hard on the contact, but I am okay with that XD. It's what i have been working on with Osha recently as well with really helps. Compared to L (the horse I was riding) Osha is very very soft in the mouth, which I love . Not that L pulls or tucks his head, they are just different  

L was already pretty impulsive after I was driving him so much with my seat, so there wasn't much to do there, we did go over some poles and grids just to check and make sure we could keep the impulsion up, and R has L trained to be very straight as is, so we moved up to collection  

It was pretty similar to driving up into contact and we achieved it rather easily compared to the contact issue too. It was really amazing to ride and it felt very powerful, and having that nice swinging back there was so cool, and I was so happy to get there haha. It was a great lesson and I can't wait til next week


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## knightrider (Jun 27, 2014)

I am impressed with how hard you work. I'll your instructor looks forward to teaching you!


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## CinnaDex (Jan 19, 2014)

Thank you! I try really hard, and I hope that he does


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## CinnaDex (Jan 19, 2014)

*12.11.2015*

Good day today! 

Riding Osha was pretty awesome - he is looking for that contact earlier and earlier in the ride, which is nice. Today we mostly focused on maintaining it and keeping that connection, which we did rather well, but I noticed that we tend to lose it for a few strides in our down transitions, so that gives me something to work on. He is picking it up again nicely especially from canter-trot, which I am pleased with because we haven't been doing heaps of canter lately. 

He's staying alot more rhythmic at the walk and trot - sometimes he just wants to go faster and it can be a struggle to keep him moving at the same pace haha.

We did a little bit of canter work - he doesn't brace in the canter as nearly as much as he did, but I want to build his muscles and fitness up more before I really push the issue. We also did a little bit of trot and cantering down a hill - riding down hills is scary lol, it's just something that I'll have to get familiar with doing often so i can balance out on the XC course (eventually).

Worked on some leg and hindquarter yields and flexing, he is starting to bend nicely enough that I feel like we could school a lateral movement or two (I'm thinking shoulders in and sidepass) but again, I'll wait till he is muscled more - I don't want to push two hard.

If the weather is fine tomorrow I will set up some pole and jump grids and have him working on that - he does love jumping so it'll be refreshing and exciting for him 

I am thinking now that he's got some of his stamina back it might be time to start hacking out and introducing some interval sets to really build up that cardio for us


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## CinnaDex (Jan 19, 2014)

*28.01.2016*

I have been so slack updating this! I am kind of mad at myself, but real life has been incredibly intense and stressful and I am dealing with *that* and the many curveballs it's been throwing me. I have still been taking my lessons, but not riding my horses nearly as much as I was :/ more like 1-2 times a week . It's time to change that!!! So I'll just recap on what I've done horse wise in the last 10 or so weeks I guess haha.

Okay so the third lesson - 18.11.15

I got moved up to a less experience horse nicknamed (S)! We started out doing walk-trot transitions, a few different trot pole grids and dictating where the shoulders go as he can run out on the turns sometimes haha. We had a bit of accidental canter. Ended up working nicely into contact and ended stretching down into long and low

Lesson 4 - 25.11.15

We did more trot grids and started really working on those turns, we did a cloverleaf grid and some leg yields and shoulder ins, did some canter work just asking him to be rhythmic and then soft and relaxed. We ended up flexing nicely and collecting towards the last half of the lesson

Lesson 5 - 1.12 15

Rode outside of the arena, doing hillwork and turns, showing me some excercises that help strengthen the horses inside leg and hind end. Finished up in the arena doing raised trot poles and canter work, which was a bit scary cause we managed to find a rare slippery spot and went for a slide. We were both fine  

Lesson 6 - 22.12.15 

Had a two week gap (naughty!) because of horrible weather, picked back up doing some stretches and bending, then worked really hard on poles, we did raised poles and poles shaped in a fan, then raised those too gah! Painful lol. Ended up with a really nice working trot, and when we collected we had some fantastic elevation. We did a heap of lateral stuff and long and low moments too. 

Lesson 7 - 6.01.16

First lesson of the year! Did a few canter grids and had to spend the whole lesson rising two sitting one in trot. Did some spirals with the leg yields, worked hard on refining trot-canter-trot transitions and started to do a bit of counter flexing!

Lesson 8 - 20.01.16
Worked on some travers and renevers (sp?), introduced flying changes. Collecting nicely in the canter now, and did a nice amount of work lengthening and shortening strides in the medium trot through the raised fan poles. Corners are going really nicely, I struggled a little towards the end of the lesson as S was being grumpy and tired and kept trying to lean in the canter to get out of work. 

Lesson 9 - 27.01.16 (yesterday)

I spent most of walk and trot in half seat and now my calves don't exist. I'm going to try and add 10 or so mins of half seat each ride to really help strengthen them and get those heels down. Had some really nice clean flying changes, which R says he has difficulty getting S to do. Our canter has improved so much, it's much more even and balanced! I rode in a close contact saddle for the first time, it's a really strange feeling, my balance felt so off honestly. R said he was really happy with how well I kept S together, round and working nicely while I was in the half seat which is awesome!!!

MY horses: I've just been applying what I've been learning in lessons honestly. Oshas muscles are starting to appear and there is way less sway in his back. He's getting really good at long and low and we've started to work it into the canter. That terrible undermuscle on his neck is slowly shrinking  We've done a heap of raise pole work and had two days of jumping, had a heap of fun over a low (less than 45cm) tyre wall! Blue is starting to feel alot more balanced and is starting to turn nicely. Our sessions are slowly getting longer and harder. He's starting to look for the bit and reach for it more constistantly now too.


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## CinnaDex (Jan 19, 2014)

*28.01.2016 Part 2*

Ride on Osha today. 
Was pretty terrible right from the get go. He just wasn't feeling the forward. He does that sometimes, and has done it to me occasionally over 5 years, despite the legion of vets, saddle fitters, trainers (before we moved out here), chiropracters, dentists, farriers, even equissage. 

I think it's just him having a bad day and not feeling like working. His old mum used to let him get away with it, and he especially likes to rear as a form of evasion. He used to rear for a solid 20 mins at the beginning of most rides for the first two years of me owning him, which has seriously decreased, now its a bit of a rarity honestly but still aggravating. 

So yeah our ride consisted of him rearing from about 3 strides in and not wanting to go forwards and then flinging his head up into the air, like the giraffe he used to be. He got pretty cranky when I put some strong contact on him with that and reared some more, then eventually remembered that if he put his head down he would get a release. He did that for about 2 whole minutes and we managed to do some okay walk-trot-walk transitions and a serpentine or two and some flexing until he decided he was going to try tucking his head and breaking at the 3rd vertebrate so it was on to driving strongly. Phew talk about exhausting. It was about 10 minutes of alternating "Giraffe neck" to "Bad word neck" until he was like okay fine I will do the contact thing. From there the ride was okay, we did some nice stuff but still struggled with that tucked in neck on and off . He's been pretty consistant about working himself nicely now that he's figured out its kinda easier, so it was just a crappy ride honestly. Very annoying!! 

Anyway we mostly worked on flexing and being balanced and rhythym considering that, and when we had that nicely we increased contact with no drama. Did some nice canter circles, which a few months ago were terrible, i think they actually might have been more like canter eggs or canter oblongs haha. Worked on leg yields and shoulder ins. Did some small amounts of counter flexion. Finished with a good long and low session and I got to do a good 10 mins of being in halfseat. 

So that was my day, hopefully Blue gives me something nice to work with tomorrow!


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## CinnaDex (Jan 19, 2014)

*1.02.2016*

No ride on Blue, but two more rides on Osha! 

The first ride was alright, some choppy moments, some good moments. Not really impressed with how it went, but there we go. Did plenty of flexing, transitions, stretching, and lateral work. 

Got into those bends a fair bit more, really working on dictating where the shoulders should be going, and then moving the ribs with my legs rather than messing with the reins as much. I've found that closing the inside rein and opening the outside rein and using the inside leg to push out and close with the outside leg works best to turn him to the left, which is our tension side. To go the other direction I barely even have to change my position haha, so it's interesting seeing the difference. We ended up with nice smooth bends with some decent flexion, so yay!

Our rhythm was a bit crappy, Osha can be really forwards when he wants to be, so we struggled with maintaining that through the whole ride. 

I managed to do a good 15 mins of two point, I'm seriously loving how it makes me sink into my heels and how much more stable my seat is after using it. It hurts, my god it hurts, but so so worth it. I'm glad that my trainer introduced it to me. 

The second ride was probably my favorite of the year so far. It was just.... one of those rides. He was working through the back so nicely! Really nice turns, active swinging walk and trot, down transitions that sometimes stayed off the forehand, it was just awesome. Got some nice sitting trot in, did some hill work, his long and low stretching sessions were fantastic, his contact was brilliant, he actually worked up into contact and felt nice and elevated sometimes. 

Had some nice canter, some of it was a bit flat and not as great but its something we're working on  

Got some awesome shoulder-ins and some decent leg yields too. His rein backs were nice and active, the only thing that I can really say wasn't too great was his one-step hind quarter yields, he tenses up and giraffe his neck when I ask. I dismounted and did a little bit of ground work with him over it, got back on and asked again. It got better and not as tense, but just something we need to work on, again haha. That's okay, I feel like if we did everything perfectly things would just get boring. 

It was a good ride and I think i will just lunge Osha tomorrow, and do some rhythm work and trot pole grids. I have to ride Blue at least 3 times this week too! He's got plenty of potential and I feel like I'm neglecting him


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## CinnaDex (Jan 19, 2014)

*2.02.16, With pictures!*

Lunged Osha today, and got a fair bit of stargazing to begin with, and eventually relaxation and softness. His transitions were awesome. Just got to work on that halt!

I rode Blue today and got a video, I STILL can't figure out how to change the format its in, but I do have some screenshots! We are a bit messy as he is still a bit unbalanced, because every single time we get a nice schedule going something happens and I am not able to ride for weeks or months, and he is one of those horses that needs consistancy. He's not terrible, but not where I want him to be after having him for 2 years. Oh well, guess we start here! Also, please excuse my shirt, it was a hot 39 degrees celsius today, despite the cloud cover, and i didn't really feel like heat stroke lol









Practising the two point, and stretching those calf muscles!








Two point again! When I bought this horse, he was TERRIBLE at bending, scored and underlined. My leg is a little back as I've found that it's the best spot to apply pressure to to ask him to move his ribs out haha, you can actually hear me talking to my sister about it on the video (she was filming) "do you remember when we were riding out at peters that time in his arena and I couldn't even get him to trot through a corner?" 








Flexion through the neck also didn't exist, so we're doing okay! Especially as I haven't ridden him in around 3 weeks. All the long reining we've been doing is paying off!









I just really like this photo, could probably bring my elbows a bit closer to my body, but I will get more fussy when he is balanced more, I don't want to mess with his mouth too much while he is still figuring out his feet!









He is a little btv here, but he was back out of it in the next stride, no stress! I do like how his legs are generally parallel
Fun fact: he started twitching his ears like crazy and then started shaking and tossing his head, for the life of me I couldn't figure out why. Turns out that his forelock was annoying the crap out of him, whoops! I usually tuck it under his browband each ride and forgot to this time, silly me. He's a bit of a Diva








I'm aware that my arms are terrible here, but I really love how he reaches under himself!! I am used to working hard to get Osha to break away from his prancy arab-y trot to do this, so to have a horse that does it naturally it is fantastic, honestly!!

Feel free to give feedback, I'm always interested in improving myself and I'm sure there is things that I am missing


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## CinnaDex (Jan 19, 2014)

*3.02.16 Osha topline progress pics*

I was meant to have 3 rides and a lesson today and ended up with just the 2 rides haha. I feel super lazy, but my trainer had a family emergency pop up, and I was meant to ride a friends mare for her but she ended up being able to ride her herself, so just my two boys today. 

Kinda bummed about the lesson after working crazy hard on my "homework" haha but that gives me more time to practice before the next one.

Osha's ride we really worked on hill work, one of my favorite things to do is to zig-zag him up and down a hill horizontally while doing balanced "hairpin" turns, because it makes him use his inside leg, bend and flex properly, and lift that back of his, alternating trot and walk. We do this just after our warm up. I find it helps to have him moving nicely for the rest of the ride. He gave me an incredibly nice active walk from the word "go" today, and did really well not falling onto the forehand in our down transitions mostly . We started doing some short trot-canter-trot transitions too, eight strides of each. Had a nice cool down and again, I did a good amount of two-point. OH! and I am finding I am gradually able to "open" the outside rein less and less throughout the ride to bend left  

Blue was working on being rhythmic again, we did some hill work, mostly transitions, and some trot poles, he was not head tossy today as I remembered to tuck in his forelock  He started to maintain an even rhythm nicely in the last half of the ride, so I started to introduce the idea of stretching his neck down and forwards, nothing dramatic, just want to start slowly introducing a few little building blocks that will help us get to the next stage.

I am thinking of doing a few trot-poles and cross-rails grids for Osha tomorrow provided the ground isn't bad after the downpour we're having at the moment

I have some pic's of Osha's back, the first one was taken November 1st and the 2nd on February 1st, they're at slightly different angles, but for a somewhat patchy schedule and the fact that he is indeed 21, I think he's loosing that sway nicely. He's slightly ribby in that second pic, the feed store ran out of the senior feed I prefer, so I had to switch to a similar feed in the mean time. I'm not happy with it, I have tracked down another feedstore that sells my feed about an hours drive away, if my local store doesn't get stock in in the next fortnight you can bet I'll be taking a drive!

01.11.2015









01.02.2016









This was taken just after I hosed him off after that "magic ride" I mentioned a couple of posts ago


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## CinnaDex (Jan 19, 2014)

*6.02.16 Day 3 of No Riding*

Ugh, so there has been no riding due to weather, and I'm going a bit batty. If it's like this tomorrow as well I'll try to get out when it's mostly just drizzling and do some in hand work, it's been literal years since I long reined Osha, I'm sure he could brush up on it. I'll also try work on his hindquarter yields and leg yields from the ground. Nothing groundbreaking to report, just a small update


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## CinnaDex (Jan 19, 2014)

Oh wow it's been so long since I posted!! So I stopped riding for awhile as I've had some really intense family stuff happening but here's an update on what happened before and after that no riding stretch. 
Before
- went to several dressage clinics and shows, won a few prep and prelim tests
- went to some nice riding club days!
- started jumping on a friends mare, placed well in the jumping at some small local shows
- had plenty of fun doing hacking and mounted games 
-sold little misty as she kept getting out of the fencing and as her safety is paramount I decided rehoming would be best for her. My biggest issue was that someone living on my agistment property was messing with the gates and electricity unit and that made things dangerous. 
-did an eventing day at a mates place! Super fun and had a blast building jumps!! Osha loved it, it was amazing

My horses had late autumn and winter off as family things were just too intense and I didn't have the time. Things are much better now and I've been bringing them back into work over the last month. Here's some things that have happened recently
- went to a dressage day and got champion for intro level on Sunday
- Went on an overnight "camp" at a friends with a nice hack into the Macca farms nearby
- I brought some shiny new tack today 😈
- I also started the horses on a mineral supplement reccomended by my vet as my pasture is struggling this year 
- I've got the dentist booked in for next month


And that's where I am at at the moment, just an update!


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## jaydee (May 10, 2012)

*This journal has been closed due to prolonged lack of participation by the author. Journals that have no active participation by the author for a period of time greater than 18 months will be considered abandoned and will be closed until the author asks for them to be reopened.*


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