Best Finesse Session!

What?! Finesse?! You gotta be joking!
Nope.
Today we had the best, real, finesse session. It was great!

Ok, so first played at liberty in the round pen. He did great! We did the figure eight perfectly and he did it at the trot too. Circling was another story.
Sometimes his round pen circles get out of control. I think I know exactly why. My mom and I always wondered if he was 'round pen trained.' The trainer he went to abused him and he has a big scar to show for it. Anyway, sometimes normals (his owner did this) just ran him around in a paddock without a line and they say they're lunging them. We watched her do this and every now and then I think Eddie's brain reverts back to that. Everything we have done at liberty goes flying out the window! But it was interesting, I called him in, and I tell you, it was like bringing him out of a trance. He had been a bad banana and looking to the outside, not looking at me and generally RB. Once I called him (aka showed him I was there) he came running to me. I felt sorry for him. But he sighed, licked his lips and stood by me with his head down for quite some time. Then I asked him to do another circle, but I asked him to stay by me. Circle around me. He did and his head was low, he was relaxed and generally his normal self! Hmm... How interesting! I think we'll have to do circles close to me from now on!
After that we did some sideways and just some playing around.

Freestyle was next! We had ridden for about 30 minutes yesterday, so we had some things to play with/think about. It's really interesting, I figured out something about myself. If I lower my expectations, and not think about the things we have to do... Wait, first let me say something... I still get a butterfly or too left over from this spring. But I think I know how to manage them. =-) With that said, let me go back to what I was saying. If I focus on one thing at a time, then more gets done! I can't look at the big picture for freestyle. I have to look at the step in front of me. Example:
When I'm getting ready to get one, first I play with the friendly game. I jump on him, jump off. Rub my legs on him. Lay on him. Get off. Lay lengthwise across his back. Get off. Get on. Step one is done! Now I just have to keep in the back of my mind, if I feel any unconfidence, get off. Then we can focus on things we can play with. =-)
So first we played with the weave, point to point, then I thought... "Hey, he is SO smart, I'm probably boring him." He looked bored. So I through the idea out there, let's try finesse!
We've played with finesse on and off, but never a solid session of it. So I picked up the fluid rein and we did the follow the rail by some barrels, cones and buckets. That was our arena! lol! Since we had prepared online and even at liberty, he was ready for it and so was I!
I assumed my new body position - I had watched the latest Savvy Clud DVD, the November one, and my position and balance has increased dramaitcally! And we were off! Here's a short video of us doing it:

His neck was low, and I could feel his back come up into me. It was so cool! He offered it and was really interested by a new thing to do!
After we had done that for a while and he was stretching like crazy, we did some weave with collected reins and minor phases.
I LOVE PARELLI!!!!!!!!!!! I never thought I would be doing finesse so soon. Thanks to parelli, we can do finesse with confidence!

~Lea & Eddie~


Colossians 3:15
And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to which also you were called in one body; and be thankful.