Bit testing

 We rode at home today because I took Lyric to Ashland this morning. And we wanted to do some dressage and all the arena's were closed at Ashland. Luckily my arena was quite nice. There was a tiny bit of water pooling in a section on the long side rail on one side. And Funny kept squirting around it. Silly!

(Funny's not scared either.. but she also didn't attack and behead it like her brother!)

I put the myler ported egg butt on Lyrics snaffle so it would be easier to swap out if Funny didn't like it. And.. she didn't. She was quiet enough in it walking up to the arena but once we picked up the walk, she was a bit chompier. And she felt very squirrely. Like I couldn't keep her straight. She kept wiggling. Maybe it's not the bit.. maybe it's just her, but... So we picked up the trot and she wasn't any better. And she wasn't reaching for the bit very well. Granted, I didn't give it much of a chance, but I felt like neither of us liked it. So I got off and put the other bridle back on. Then I left Funny "Parked" and went and picked up Jean's horses poop, put the fallen gate and jumps back up (it was WINDY last night with Hurricane Isaias) and then took my vest off. She stood there... parked. Good girl! I just tucked her reins under one stirrup because I didn't want her to step through them, but.. she didn't move a muscle. 

So then I got back on and she was a little bit fussy at first, but settled quite quickly. And we got some LOVELY work. Like... she was soft, rocked back, slow, and reaching. It was really nice work!! Walk and trot. We did some spirals in and out. Tracking left she doesn't want to bend as nicely. (I'm sure it's me, because same issue with Lyric). I tried to focus on my body and my position. I feel like she wants to me step into the left stirrup no matter which way we go, but I also had to leg yield her to the right when we were tracking left. 

We cantered and it was okay. Not the best canters, but not bad. Our downwards were better then our upwards, so I focused on fixing that. If I don't ask for the canter with my leg, and instead ask with my hip lifting, it gets a little smoother. I also made sure we had a great trot and then "ANNNNNND.....canter". But it could have also been "ANNNNDDDD Walk!". In theory. Ha ha. We got some nice transitions and even went through the trot poles almost immediately after the downward once. Nicely too! 

But then she was more up and our trot work deteriorated. She was all sorts of crooked tracking left and I had to ride her haunches in to get her to quit blowing out through the right shoulder and overbending to the inside. 

It wasn't as lovely as when we started but we did manage to get some more nice trot work. And then cantered again and did some more transition work and we had some decent canters too. We even got a REALLY nice stretchy trot the hard way. She asked, so I allowed her to stretch and she stayed back on her haunches. Yay! But then we tried to do the trot to walk to trot and that got her fussy again. We eventually settled and got some slightly better than acceptable ones. Then we worked on the halts. She isn't always square and it takes her a long time to settle. She'll stop.. the move one foot... then breathe.. then just about as you are trusting that she's stopped and go to salute, she moves one foot. So we worked on that. Because we can get some points there. In theory!

Good pony! Hopefully we can get that trot we had in the beginning after we canter. Eventually maybe! She got a quick short rinse as she was a little sweaty. 

Then before dinner, I clipped her. She is SOOOO good!! I'm pretty sure that I barely desensitized her to clippers as a small child, but... she was perfect. She let me do a full body clip (well, not head or legs) without hardly flinching. She got a little reactive at her poll, but let me do it. And I did her belly and groin and she only shot me a few dirty looks. She clips so much easier and quicker than Dan. Her unicorn hairs aren't nearly as dense as his butt hairs! Not even close. She clips like his brown clips. Nice and easy. And she's so swirly it's hard to tell if there are lines or missed spots. Hee hee. I tried to clip cupcakes into her bum again, but it's just too many spots to be able to tell anything, so I just clipped them off. But what a good girl! We got her done in about an hour since she was mostly still and just stood there. Yay!

Hopefully she won't get cold tonight. It's only supposed to drop to 62 and not be too windy. I checked her after dark and she was warm, so...  This week is supposed to be record breaking highs.. back up in the upper 80's and low 90's, but then by the weekend it's going to plummet down to the 40s! Doh. But this way she won't melt this week and her clip should be nice for the show. Maybe she'll be shiny again by then. And then hopefully she'll be fully haired back up again by the time I go for surgery. If not.. it might make it easier if she's clipped because then she can just keep her clothes on. But I bet she'll fuzz back up. It's still early enough. She's got so much white now.. but she's also getting some darker liver chestnut spots underneath the chestnut spots and the white spots. She's cool! 

After dinner and my shower, I was checking on the bit I had ordered for Erin to replace the one I was borrowing and had a moment of panic! I could have sworn it said it was legal, but now it looks like it's NOT LEGAL for any federation. What?! No!!!! So I investigated and there are two calm blue baucher bits. One is the "dressage" one and one is just the same name without the dressage. Apparently the non-legal one has a copper roller in the middle of the slightly bigger ball whereaas the dressage one has the copper middle but it doesn't roll independently. And it's more of a noodle middle piece than a round middle piece. Ugh... so which one do I have in her mouth currently? And which one did I order to ship to Erin?? Turns out, I ordered the dressage legal one... phew! BUT... Erin's is not dressage legal. Which.. complicates things because Funny has chewed hers up enough that I didn't want to give it back to her. I wanted to give her the brand new one. But if her bit isn't legal... Plus, maybe her horse won't like the legal one because it is different. And Erin doesn't show, so.. it's not the end of the world if her's isn't legal. But she's so nice. I told her that I could buy her the exact same bit and send it to her. Or I could clean up her current bit and bring it back and pay a "wear and tear" fee. Or she could just keep the legal one and I would buy myself another legal one. She was so nice and said she'd take hers back with a small rental fee. So she should get the legal one by Tuesday night. So I'll try to get over there and swap it out. I'll clean her current bit up as best as I can. If it's too bad I'll just order her a new one.