We have to do this more often...

Today we hired a float and took the ponies to the local indoor arena for a school. They both did really well, however Gracie was the star of the day, self loading (almost) onto the float after a short schooling session on it and then giving Nat her best schooling ride yet!

Normally we have a bit of trouble with impulsion and drive with Gracie, but she focused well and tried really really hard today. Nat said when she first got on that Gracie felt like she would explode and have a tantrum, but as you can see form the videos Nat was able to focus her and keep her calm.

Allie was.. well, Allie. Not bad, not great but she did have more balance on the flat arena surface than at home on the lumpy grass. She did however leg yield really well (In the first Allie video you see a leg yield off the track then back to the track on the long side). She has been fussy with her mouth. I need lessons.

Please feel free to critique these pictures and videos!

Gracie loading

Allie bum

I loved Gracie's work today because she tried so hard. She has a few conformational difficulties when it comes to carrying herself properly (she is still bum-high, short neck, longish loin) so when she does try it is just awesome because I know how hard it is for her.

It is very hard to get a good walk out of Gracie as she can be so LAZY!

I like how far she is stepping underneath herself with her hinds.

Sweetly listening.

Lifting her shoulder - rare for her!

 Gracie vids:

I didn't realise that she has been going so over bent... :(

Please note her cute bonnet. I am addicted to it... I want more for Christmas...

Good timing with the photo there mid post...

Shorter rein here but I'm tipping forward.

She has a looong stride. I like. :)

Allie vids (these are pretty funny!):

You can hear me growling at Allie to "GET UP!" at the end of that one.

Allie couldn't seem to get the right lead at the canter, but in the videos I was happy that she was cantering at all! No wonder she didn't seem able to canter across the short side, being on the wrong lead. We are having trouble with canter because she is a big horse with a BIG canter and my tiny little yard at home is too small to teach her, she gets the shits because she can often lose her balance at home.

Points for me to work on:

• I seem to be riding with my hands very wide and low - this has been because I am trying to encourage her to go in a longer lower frame but it looks ridiculous.
• My toes always turn violently to the outside. I hate it.
• I can't for the life of me put much weight in my outside stirrup. This causes (I think?) mucho trouble bending her on the left rein. She just won't do it. She counter-bends to the right when she is on the left rein. If I use my inside rein to attempt to see just the corner of her eye she just turns in or ignores it. The supporting right rein just makes her bend more right! It is driving me INSANE. Any tips?
• I really really need to get some regular lessons.

Today is another float ride! Where shall we go? Stay tuned!

Gracie's Sarcoids - Day 7

We have finished treating Gracie's sarcoids - now we have to wait for them to fully scab up and fall off.

It does not look pretty.

(Day one, for comparison)

Scabbing up and peeling at the edges.

Ewwie

She is still happy to be ridden with a bit in as it doesn't affect the sarcoids, but she is itchy and scratches it on the ground quite a bit. Natalie called the vet today and apparently this mess means that the treatment is working and they will be gone soon.

More photos in a week or so.

Thank you

Thanks everyone for the lovely comments on my last post. It is amazing how much it helps feeling the love and sympathy coming from what essentially are complete strangers on the other side of the planet. I love the blogging community. We really are a special breed!

I had a very hard first day without Chakra, with a few very hard cries and my heart just ached for her presence. BUT I managed not to cry at all yesterday. Because I know I will miss her always, but it was the right thing to do. There is peace and relief in my heart for the whole situation. Looking at your dog every day thinking 'you are going to die very soon' is depressing and upsetting and not fair on you or the poor dog. I tried very hard not to be sad around her but I think she knew anyway.

It is 'easier' this time loosing a pet I think because knowing she had cancer for the last 3 months was hard at the time but prepared me well for her death. I didn't waste any precious time with her. Plus she had a massive amount of treats those last few months and with food being her favorite thing in the world, this made her very happy.

This weekend we were supposed to take the horses away to the beach but with Chakra's passing I just want to be at home. I don't need the extra stress right now of towing an unfamiliar float for 3 hours to an unfamiliar place and while it would have been very fun, I'm not feeling up to it at all.

We are however still hiring the float and today we are off to the local indoor arena for a school. I'm pretty excited about that and we will be taking our camera!

To finish, here is a picture from when I nearly chopped the end of my finger off while sweeping with a metal broom and it snapped around my finger (yes, really) and when Chakra was supposed to have surgery to remove the cancer lump but they couldn't get the scanner working to see if it had spread yet, so I took her back home overnight and they left her drip in. We were a sorry pair that night!!

When a Light Goes Out

Sad news - yesterday my beautiful Chakra was not doing well. She seemed to have trouble breathing and kept coughing. She got progressively worse and I ended up taking her to the vet at about 9.30 and had her put to sleep.

It was very peaceful - After eating all the vet's liver treats and getting kisses and cuddles from us all, she seemed a little scared but I was on the ground with her and I turned her head so she would look only at me while the vet gave the drugs to her via a drip. The sedative made her slowly lay down and I spoke to her and held her gaze while the green dream was given.

Then her light just went out.

I already miss her like crazy and had a hard night last night. Andrew was amazing - I was crying and couldn't get to sleep and he started asking me questions and telling me stories about Allie (I had ridden her that day, and he had his first proper ride on her cooling her down for me! So cute) and he distracted me enough that I was able to slip into a dreamless sleep.

My cat Evan also snuggled up to me all night long, without trying to hog the bed or claw at me. He felt my sadness I think and was helping me in his little cat way.

I feel like a weight has been lifted from my shoulders and has been replaced by a hole in my heart, a space she used to fill and is now missing her. I have been thinking hard about having her PTS the last week, but it doesn't make it any easier.

You must all go hug your puppies, ponies, kitties, piggies, mousies, birdies, and what-ever-elsies that have your heart and hold them tight to your chest for me, because they won't be there forever and even 1000 years would still be too soon to say goodbye.

Gracie's Sarcoid Treatment - Day One

So as Nat mentioned in the last post, Gracie has had some lumps diagnosed as sarcoids.

Here is an awesome link on sarcoids.

As they are on her nose surgery is not an option (and from what I have read, sarcoids don't respond well to surgery anyway) so the vet prescribed a cream. We are to treat it once a day for 5-7 days and then stop treatment and leave it alone. If this doesn't work, then we need to have the vet re-think treatment.

The normal side (for comparison)

The sarcoids aren't that bad compared to some of the photos I have seen online.
The cream is already applied and has soaked in for 20 minutes in these photos.

Grumpy Gracie

These are crappy pics, sorry.

I took a little video too - it shows the sarcoids better;

The cream

Wish us luck - we really don't want the sarcoids to get any worse.

This grey mare I tell you!

So it seems my horse is causing me issues.

Since Gracie related stories are in less detail on this blog, let me break it down for you.

When we broke Gracie in, she wasn’t much of a challenge at all. She had Lisa off twice, me never (but mostly because I was the one who valued my life more). The first time was because Lisa tried to tighten the girth while she was ON Gracie's back, and the second time was her first attempt at a trot. I think that given the nature of what caused her to buck Lese off in those instances was pretty understandable, and her reaction was quite mild compared to what some unbroken horses can do on their first few rides.

After about a year of Grace being broken in was when we started to get some solid stuff from her. Safe (but a little jumpy) on trail rides, mini road rides and mild schooling (mostly just teaching forwards backwards, walk trot and canter).

So I was thinking to myself "Sweet I've got myself a safe, trustworthy little horse here!"... Well I guess I shouldn’t have been so sure.

When we moved them to Lisa's new property was when she had to start using her brain for everything. She went from a really quiet 5 acre paddock to a 2.5 acre property next to a main road with neighbours that ride their bikes, motorbikes (and I’m talking the whole street pretty much gets their motorbikes out and goes crazy for like 6 hours strait racing up and down the street), kids jumping on trampolines, we even schooled the other day while a neighbour levelled out the gravel on his drive-way with a massive back-ho! For Gracie's brain this is a good thing. She used to be a little spooky and all this stuff that goes on in the street and the main road is great for her bomb proofing. However, she’s a smart horse, and she tries every trick in the book to STILL use these distractions in the street as an excuse for her to go apeshit crazy.

I have had 3 falls off Gracie in the past 4 months. The first was my fault, I was riding bareback and decided to go for a canter, I lost my balance, she lost her balance and lowered her head and I fell off the side. However the other two falls WERE NOT MY FAULT!

The second time, I literally got on, had her take a few step forwards then BOOM, a firecracker went off somewhere in her head and she started bucking like a rodeo horse! I tried to stay on and I managed for about 4 seconds before I half bailed half fell off, after which she had an intense lunging session and Lisa got on and gave her an even more intense schooling session. After this fall Lese and I brainstormed as to what could have set her off. We realised she had been a rotten mole even just to handle the few weeks leading up to the fall (she even bit me so hard I had a bruise for 2 weeks on my back!). I had myself worried that she had some sort of hormonal imbalance that was sending her nutso, so I had the vet out about a week later.

After a $500 vet bill and various tests, it all came down to a behavoiral issue. Let me tell you, its pretty embaressing when the vet calls you and says "so, I have tested for everything and they all came back normal. Im thinking this is probably just a behavoiral problem and I can give you the number of someone who is really good at handling and training problem horses"...Oh he also informed me that she may have had me off because of the saddle and/or girth.

Ok, so I buy a sheepskin girth cover (which I described to the the horse as "like a soft bunny rabbit is cuddling you from underneath") which she seemed to love and went better in it, I nip EVERY behavoiral problem in the bud before it explodes into an episode and I also adjust my own attitude when I'm handling/riding her. And I notice now how in tune this horse is to my emotions and reactions. If I am in a shitty mood, she will be too, If I worry about a loud truck that is about to drive past while Im riding, she will also freak out about it. Basically I now have to ignore most of my survival instincts when riding this horse, or she will simply crumble. She NEEDS me to be the brave one, she looks to me and trusts that I wont put her in a bad situation BUT I need to make her feel like it is HER that is the brave one, like I trust her to look after me too. So I ride on a long rein and I ignore anything that would usually make me worry JUST so she does not worry also. I kind of really like that she is that sensitive to me and my emotions. It makes our bond that much more special. And we were making progress! I am enjoying my rides on her and she is not exploding and being a drama queen. Five steps forward.

Until last Monday, which was my third fall off this horse and probably the most emotional. I was schooling, doing something a little different, being a bit more pushy and she was a little agitated but nothing too bad, just being fussy with her head. Lisa was schooling also and she went for a walk to the back of the paddock as I came around the left corner of our (really shitty) DIY arena. Gracie had a little stare off into the distance at Lisa and Allie and I kicked her on and tried to continue our session. I come to that same corner again and she stops, swings her hind end around, puts in this HUGE rear (I bail/fall at this point) and runs off bucking and being a moron. I completly lost my shit at her so Lisa hopped on and sorted her out. She tried to throw every excuse at Lisa to get out of the job at hand... it didnt work. So this is where we have taken ten steps backwards.

This is Gracie in a nutshell...literallly. And I am boggled as to what the hell her problem is. I think this horse is going to be a constant challenge. I think she will always test me and shes smart enough to think of new tricks to add to her collection of ways to turn into an absolute bi-polar mole of a horse.

Oh, to top off these AWESOME problems. I had the vet out the other day to check out some old warts on Gracie's face and have found out that they are in fact Sarcoids and are VERY difficult to treat... SIGH

Thanks!!

So I have been feeling a bit flat about Chakra (more on that later, this is a happy post!) and I woke up this morning to my very first ever blog award!!

I'm so excited about this, it is totally silly of me but I have been kinda a little bummed that my blog hadn't been mentioned yet and I try so hard to read and keep up with a bunch of blogs and I try to comment on them all and and and I'm happy now. :p

So now I have to pick 15 blogs that I think deserve the award and then tell you 7 things about myself that you might not be aware of.

1. It's a Good Thing You're Cute
2. From Racehorse to Showhorse
3. The Process of Learning
4. 8 Days a Week
5. Nina's Story
6. Pony Express
7. Buckskin and Bay
8. CONTACT
9. G is for Greta
10. Green n' Green = Black n' Blue
11. I Will Jump Sweet Jumps
12. It Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time
13. Letters to Hennessy
14. Princess Diva Diaries
15. Tekes Tally-Ho!

That was hard! I follow that many blogs, it is hard to narrow it down!

Ok, getting to know me....

1. My middle name is Narvelle, after my mother's aunt Narvelle Joyce. I absolutely love it and I am really interested to know everyone's middle name because I have such a cool one. I think it is French and I am yet to be able to find a name meaning on Google, but my mother told me it means beautiful.

2. As you can probably probably tell, I have very sound self esteem, almost to the point of being egotistical. It gives the people I hang out with a lot the shits, but I own it! I know I'm a pretty cool person and worth a lot! All through school, I was severely bullied - spat on, beat up by both girls and boys, paper thrown at me, I have scars on my legs from where I used to have chunks of concrete thrown at me during lunch, the list goes on. I was treated by most of the other kids like I was a piece of scum and they even said my name like "eeew, Lisa Castle" as if I was totally disgusting. DESPITE all this I knew there was nothing wrong with me and it was THEIR problem they didn't like me and it was their loss. I had my few close friends and they were (and still are) beautiful people and I wouldn't have wasted my time on anyone else in school. If it weren't for my healthy self esteem (and my best friends and my first pony) I might not have survived that hell hole.

3. This one is a cheat because you probably already know this, but I would normally want to pick up a horse's foot and trim it then hop on and ride. I am obsessed! I have another blog, The Glorious Hoof, where I write about feet.

4. When I am stressed, I bite the skin around my fingernails, especially in my sleep. I have woken up in the past with a mouthful of blood and when I start picking I know that there is something wrong that I am stressing about.

5. I use an absolute motza of hand cream. I can't stand when my hands feel a little dry and I use easily a bottle a week. I apply it about 50 times a day and I am not even exaggerating.

6. I go to church every Sunday, which is unusual for my demographic.

7. I LOVE to sing. At the top of my lungs, big loud long notes until I am out of breath. And I totally suck at it. I knew Andrew was the husband for me because he doesn't mind. :)