Two steps forward, one step back - and meet Uno!

Craziness and uber cuteness have taken over the last couple of weeks. Crazy horse, uber cute Uno the brand new baby son of Rose, crazy weather, uber cute Jellybean the tiny shetland pony...so much to talk about!

Tuxedo and I have hit a new low. I am feeling quite depressed about his lack of progress at the moment, and literally dread getting on him. He's still very unpredictable (though much less dramatic) and I constantly feel like I'm sitting on a very tense leopard about to flip its lid and launch into a very athletic turn. Which he does. He still rears, though not the proper high-ho-Silver's, and he's taken to popping in some decent pig roots when I ask for canter.

It all sounds quite boring when I write it down, but he's a very tense, reactive horse and exhausting to ride. He is making riding not particularly fun and more like work, which is hardly the point. I keep trying to see all the progress we've made - he's so much quieter on the ground, he stands fairly well, he actually eats his dinner (admittedly, I've halved it so he will), he stands well while I mount and will trot rhythmically in general. We've even got some good calmish jumping going.

But he is still prone to becoming very excited, very nervy, and prances and stuffs around, cantering sideways, rearing when he doesn't get his way. It's confidence-sapping to say the least. And I haven't really once felt like I'd come off. Go figure! I've got a lesson with Manu coming up in just over a week, followed directly by the Canberra HT, so I think I'll see how that goes. Then I've got the Intensive Clinic at AEBC in Clonbinane, VIC, a month later and I'll use that as a re-training masterclass. I'll re-evaluate my work with Tux after that to see if I think I can take him on from there.

Moving on to the uber cuteness factor....meet Uno:

He's probably the most unco-cordinated foal you'll meet in a while, on account of the most enormous back legs he was born with:

You may be able to just see the tendon laxity in his hind pasterns which made it very hard for him to balance and walk properly for the first 3 or 4 days. That has resolved with time and exercise, but he still has some issues with those big back legs. The near hind is not tracking through straight, winging out to the side from the stifle. I've got Robyn from Equine Miracle coming out to treat Rose and she'll have a look at Uno too. I'll keep you posted.

Jellybean you'll just have to read about in the next post! I haven't even taken photos of her yet with all the excitement about Uno. But she's probably almost as cute.

Had a great morning judging out at Lynton on the weekend. The atmosphere was a little tense with smoke from the bushfires casting a bit of a weird light over all the quality horses warming up for the stressage. Some riders had fires close to their homes and had to dash home to get other horses just in case. Amazing that they came back, I say! Not the best pic as I had to wait til we'd finished, but the smoke is visible....

A really great event. Can't wait to ride there - maybe next year!