Cliff's been good. We did a lot of walk work under saddle yesterday, and today tacked up and did a little trail ride, almost died because the guys were moving a tree with the tractor right when we walked by, so he was moderately feral when we made it to the arena to work. But he worked through it and we got in some good trotting and cantering sets. I put him through an exercise where we cantered on a circle, halted, turned on the haunches, and picked up the opposite lead coming out of the turn. At first he had difficulty picking up the left lead, but by the end of the session he was picking it up easily, so that was nice.

Side note, he continues to amaze me with his creativity involving bellboots. His front left bellboot managed to get wedged UNDERNEATH HIS SHOE so tightly that when I pulled it out the bellboot ripped, so now he has a little rubber piece stuck under his shoe. I think he's due next week or the week after for the farrier, so they can rescue it then, but it's wedged pretty tightly. He's sound, so tallyho and all that, but jeez.

The weather was gross yesterday, so Cliff and I just did a bareback trail ride around the farm. He was moderately feral but behaved himself.

Today we saddled up and went despite the weather continuing to be gross- we did get rained on- but he was really good. His trot is really adjustable. We can go from a huge lengthening to a western-pleasure slow jog, and he remains super calm and relaxed on it, which is great.

Cantering not so much, he's awesome to the left and very controllable, and when we came down to a walk I dropped the reins and he relaxed immediately, but then I picked them up again and he damn near flipped his lid. So we're going to work on that for a bit. Same for the right lead. He very much wants to fall on his inside shoulder and motorcycle around the corners, and panics when I put my leg on to keep him from doing that. So it's something to work on.

I'm actually super happy about this progress though. I'm back to actually training my horse instead of rehabbing him, and loving the process. He looks great and feels great, and I'm hoping we continue on this trend!

Whoot! So glad to hear that he's almost recovered! Also, how in the hell did he do that to a bell boot? Lmao!

He'll never be "recovered" per se, as it's the way his skeleton is shaped and nothing will ever change that (aside from surgery), but he is doing a lot better and I don't think it'll hinder him in any way. :)

Also, I have no clue!

Cliff had Sunday/Monday off as usual and then yesterday the farrier came and he managed to get mixed up with another horse and stuck in a stall (illegal! Bad!) so he ended up getting yesterday off too, not ideal but whatever, so today I wanted to give him a light workout but the weather was wild so I stuck him in the roundpen to get some zooms out and he had MANY zooms. Very stressed because there was ~wind~. Also stressed because I threw a cone at him because he tried to run me over. Also stressed because to desensitize him to the cone, he had to wear it.

Then I got on and we walked around and survived and sometimes that's all you can do.

Onto tomorrow!

Yesterday was pole work. Cliff tried to break his face on the fence afterwards, but he seems okay so today I lunged him up and down the hill by his paddock and then gave him some splash time!

SUCH a good ride today. The second I sat in the saddle it started pouring, but I was like "well we're already wet so. Let's ride." Cliff very strongly disagreed with this at first and walked very quickly and shook his head, trying to outwalk the rain, but then kinda gave into it and we had some really nice trotting and cantering sets. He was really soft and responsive to my leg and hands, so I asked him for a flying lead change for the first time since this all started, and he basically said "oh no thank you", trotted a step, and cantered again on the new lead, which doesn't sound like much, but he used to PANIC if he missed a change or if I asked him to do something difficult, so I'm beyond proud that he kept his cool and figured out his own solution like that.

Clifford and I had an actual lesson on Wednesday. We stayed at the walk the whole time and the main takeaway was that I'm too soft with my hands- Cliff's had the habit of yanking the reins out of my hands for years, and it's not so much yanking so much as the second he asks for more rein I just give it to him. So we worked on just me actually holding his mouth and getting his head down and rounding his back and KEEPING him there. Very pissed off baby dragon by the end of it, so he got yesterday off and today we worked on it again. He was very angry about it, and I'm definitely going to have to break the habit of slipping my reins, but his trot was really nice and powerful and his canter was gorgeously balanced since I kept my hands more steady and wasn't constantly giving and taking with rein length. It's such a simple fix, but one that's going to be really hard for me to get over mentally. And in the meantime- angry dragon.

Sounds like good progress! He's a cutie :)

Water work today! Cliff was a lot more giving to my hand today so we spent less time fighting and more time having a bit of fun. He's worked hard this week so he'll get tomorrow and Monday off, and then back at it Tuesday!