We Need More GRIDS too!

Trotting in on awesome uneven ground.

Oh lordy. First, let me start by saying a huge thank you to all of those who participating in my blog hop. My last hop (the music one!) was kind of a failure. I guess failure is a strong word, but it didn't go as far as this one. It is so interesting reading about everyone's scary stories and what moment made them fear the most. Fear can be a strong role in the game of horses and if you can work with it or get passed it, you are incredible.

This is nothin.

You know what makes me nervous? Grids. Just a tad bit. Mostly at my house. Because my arena is the size of a round pen (50'x50') and so everything has to be fairly small. I had to start my grid out of the arena and it ended with one stride before hitting the fence. It was a simple grid. Three trot poles into a small vertical with a one stride into a 2' 9" cross rail. And then the fence!

Her hind end was cracking me up. She looks like a two legged horse here.

She actually did very well through the whole thing. She got excited through the trot poles once though and tried to canter through them, but that was it. But still, she basically canters over everything. And really has to crunch herself up, so I am hoping we can expand our tiny arena a bit more this year.

The xrail looks lower than the front rail, but I promise they were even. 

Next, I changed it up to just a canter pole before a little oxer. And again, horse did not care. She was started to get a bit strong and I think it was her having a hard time turning and then jumping, so we only did it a handful of times. I was so tired from that ride and I don't think that helped either. I also rode in my winter boots and I had never jumped in them before. They are fabric on the top and they made my leg slide everywhere so I was really disappointed when I looked through our pictures. My position was as horrible as I thought it would be. And my horse? Well, her hind end was awesome over the jumps. Her front end? Not so much.

Again, there is a doofus on my horse.

After taking pictures of Aimee and Papa just before (they looked magical) and then looking at mine, I was extra bummed. But, we don't always look like that so I will try not to be discouraged about it. We are just getting back into the groove of things and I know we will improve leaps and bounds this year.

Cortes C crosses his front legs. Bacon crosses the back.