things sort of accomplished

Colleen, Robert's daughter, took pictures of the wedding and Robert is burning CDs of them. He added a nice touch by including a hard copy photo. Is it of the happy couple? No, of course not! It's Buddy the JRT grinning on the gazebo.

I'd been on Craigslist the night before looking at ponies and tack. I saw one titled "Hector the Hanoverian Gelding," and remembered Cari talking about a horse she used to own named Hector, so I clicked. It was the previous owner who had sold him to Cari, wondering where he was now and if she could get in contact with the current owner. So I got a name from Cari and passed it on, and that was nice.

Rode Keno, in the arena because he was tripping on the hard ground outside. He wasn't too pleased about it. Much more displeased in the same arena was Bella. She'd bucked Jessi off a couple days ago (yay for Jessi wearing the proper shoes that time!), and Jessi was still limping from it. Jessi agreed that maybe ground work was the way to go. So Robert long lined Bella, and Bella was PISSED that her normal backing up/shuffling/rear-spin wasn't working on him. Then she gave up for a bit, thinking about the next step. Keno was completely unphased by Bella. We had a somewhat productive work, I'm trying to get him to give me his head at the canter instead of resisting the bit. If he's above it, that's fine by me, and his walk and trot are getting pretty nice, but I can't stand it when he pulls on my hands. On another note, I have reevaluated wanting to ride Bella. Yeah.

While Robert and Jerry and Imp went out (Jerry is still married, I checked), I went in to play with Honey, since I had brought non-slimy carrots today. The halter is now allowed to go over her nose. Yay! I doubt what I'm doing is Approved Clicker Training, but she is pretty happy to come back to me and work, and we're making progress, so that's good enough for me. She has had a halter on before a few times, and she was pretty good the one time she got her feet done, but I think she's regressed substantially since then. My goal is to have her halterable, leadable, and feetable in two weeks, when John comes back.

Broke for lunch-- I didn't eat breakfast this morning since the kitchen sink is leaking something fierce and we're afraid to run the dishwasher, so no readily available dishes to make food in. Not that there was much to eat anyways. I got bored before Robert came back, fetched baling twine, and fixed the fence where the damn Ay-rabs had mangled it. The damn Ay-rabs were very interested in what I was doing. I had to smack Star once. She was trying to eat the baling twine.

Minis! Mini mini minis! I tacked up Pepper by myself. He was so good for it- normally he dances around, especially for the initial girth and crupper. This time I led him over to the mounting block, put his box o' harness on it, flipped his lead over his neck, and tacked him up without him moving a step. He untacked just as good and I was very pleased. His mom was pretty impressed too. He and Danny drove well after we fixed a minor harness screw up. They trotted and were very happy and tired.

Robert and Sherri the rescue lady went out with Rocky. She says she doesn't think that Alicia is at the A&W anymore. So I went to work with Sadie, who was happy to see me. She haltered and led nicely and gave little more than a suspicious glare at the gazebo. Unlike Star, she is also perfectly willing to step over the crossrail. We also lunged, sort of. I conveyed the idea to her that I wanted her away from me and moving. She walked around once. Then she took off, kicking and bucking. She didn't pull especially hard, and she didn't seem panicked. It was more just letting go of some of her energy. I wonder if she does lunge and all it was used for in her past was running her out. Her pattern seemed to be to slow down when she was going around the half of the circle next to the open side, and speed up on the closed, whether the gaits were canter-gallop, trot-canter, or walk-trot. She was VERY distracted by Rocky and outdoors in general, so she would stop, I would pull her head towards me and ask her to walk on, and she would do so, then stop again to stare. Once she got the idea that I didn't really care what she was staring at, she walked very calmly around and around and around. And around. And ignored my "whooooaaaaa"s. We may work on that in hand. Very happy with her though, she seems to like me or at least what I mean. We'll see what she thinks about ground driving and riding.

I could skip to riding with her, but I'd like to see more of her personality. So far she seems very calm and not mareish at all but she could also be shy. Also, Robert would love to make a driving horse out of her, and for that she'll need to know voice commands as well as someone working behind her. Good stuff.

Additional good Craigslist deed: there are a pair of percheron geldings for $5000 together, broke to drive single or pair. Robert has a couple of clients looking for a pair of drafts to use for weddings, farm events, etc. I forwarded the ad to them; I'm sort of jealous. I want drafty horses. Sigh.