Emily's visit and a few firsts

It was another horsey weekend for me; Emily came to visit! Trail riding on Saturday, horsey shopping, and jumping on Sunday made for a very nice time for both of us. We made a whole course of jumps out of whatever we could find, which was a lot of fun and good practice for Charlie.

Saturday trail ride

Oh!! On the way back from our trail ride we had to ride on the road and not only did a horse and buggy show up behind us, which is typically a really scary thing for the horses to see (a horse being "chased" by a jangling creaky box on wheels tends to freak them out), but it passed us. We had barely any shoulder to work with on the side of the road so we just had to deal with whatever happened and you know what? Neither horse did a thing! I was so proud of both of them :)

Here are some more pictures and video. I didn't have my real camera along but luckily Emily and I both had our phones. A few notable firsts: Colby's first time over a jump ever! Charlie's first 2'6"! Woohooo! And Emily's first time really riding Charlie. The other first time was when he first moved to PA last summer and was still slightly crazy and minus one shoe lol.

 

Colby is the best at kisses

See? xoxo

Game time

Charlie's first 2'6" (video still). Bam!  :D

Colby's first jump!

Braiding fun

The videos:

My goals:
1. Remember that staying out of Charlie's way while jumping does not mean forgetting to steer. Ooops!
2. When in doubt ask for the longer distance, Charlie likes it better, but practice seeing his strides to the base of the jump to get a more consistent good leaving point
3. Work on setting him up in the air to land on the correct lead
4. Practice flying changes, for when he doesn't land on the right lead
5. Start jumping bigger!!!