Shove His Nose Up Sonny's Butt!

Yesterday, Tay, Erica and I met at the barn at 2 pm. Taylor saddled up Pete and I saddled up Zan while Erica set up a single jump in the arena.

I rode Zan into the arena and hopped on, starting off by walking around the arena once or twice before setting off into the trot. Again, Zan was good; he was slow, paid attention to my seat, and responded to light touches with my hands. We walked, then Tay asked if we could reverse directions, and I complied. I got Zan to trot over the jump both ways, and he only knocked it down three times (we only went over it three times, XD)! After warming up at the trot, we cantered. Actually, I let Taylor go first. She took Pete over the jump and they were simply beautiful! I love watching them jump; Taylor is such a pretty jumper, and Pete has learned so quickly. It's amazing what a little practice and determination will do! Next, it was my turn to jump. It took a while for me to get Zan to take up the correct lead, but finally I got him to do it; we went over the jump two or three successful times, reversed, and then went over it successfully the other way.

Might I mention that it is actually quite dangerous to try and jump Zan? He likes to randomly stop in front of jumps, then leap over, and he also enjoys flying sky-high over them, as well as barreling through them.

After jumping, Erica ran and got Sonny to ride bareback. We went out to the field back behind the house and tried to get through the gate without other horses getting through. Erica was trying to get me to take Zan right up behind Sonny to get through the gate, so she shouted, "Stick his nose up Sonny's butt!" Which made me laugh, and then Taylor 'shoved Pete's nose up Zan's butt'. It was one of the random laugh moments of ours. ;)

We rode around a bit, cantering a LOT. Pete kept wanting to dart out of the open gate, and it took a while to make Taylor canter around that gate and get Pete to go past it. Eventually, though, she was successful; which makes me very happy for her!

Overall, it was a nice day. April watched us the entire time we were working outside and almost rolled once (I had my phone camera out and ready to capture the awesome moment, but it never came! GRRR!). Now today I get to go and bathe the ponies (just Taylor and I's boys, Madison and Sonny aren't going to the show), wash tack, and work on halter! Oh, the joy! =D