Me and Gil cantering

OK, here it is, are you ready for a good laugh? A video of me cantering Gilly and Vicki instructing me. I really don't like posting pictures or videos of me, ugh, but I am doing it anyway. Maybe with all this riding I will lose more weight, some has already come off.......a lot more to go, poor Gilly.

I rode him for two hours yesterday, both of us got a workout and both of us were tired when we got finished.....heck I'm still tired today. Riding him is a lot of work; he is pretty lazy so you really have to work to make him go. It really helps to have a ground person who knows what they are doing. Trying to learn all of this dressage is hard work so someone telling me what to do is a really big help! Wish I had an instructor everyday.

Still in the hay field, wish I could turn this into an arena. Would have to shorten it up so the gas well wasn't in it though. I figure I can ride in it as long as I am not tearing up the grass.....I'll have Gilly tip-toe! LOL I'll just pretend I have an arena and make that work, he doesn't care where we are. He did like the shade along the fence line where we stopped, me too!

Cantering in the field

Here is Gilly doing a medium trot; he can do much better but was really tired from all the work we did today. Lots and lots of cantering, some 20 meter circles at the canter. Me on him, wow! He is a hard horse to ride because of all the suspension he has and trying to ride a trot or canter in a circle has been hard. But today I did pretty well, we need a lot of work. Where we were riding today we in our hay field, Gilly needs a lot of room to move the round pen is not the place to work. Since I don't have an arena we thought we would work in the hay field since we cut hay last week....nice. Haven't told Mike that I was working in there but I don't think we will hurt it.
I have some video of me riding him at the canter but need to edit a lot out before I post it. I am not a big fan of watching myself ride, ugh!!! And I do have some still pictures too.
The field we are in is right by the road to our house and there is no fence. I still can't believe that I am cantering him without a safety net so to speak but he is doing really well. When you set down in the saddle and stop moving he stops too, good boy!!! Oh, how I love this horse!!! :-)
~Jane and Gilly~

Gilly's lesson

Wednesday Gilly and I got our lessons and this is my instructor riding Gilly. The little girl who was riding Gilly in the last post was her granddaughter, who will be in the 5th grade this fall. She rides hunter/jumper ponies and is a very good little rider; her mother is also a riding instructor, teaching jumpers.

Since the rain has made things here pretty sloppy we do a lot of training on the road in front of the house. As I have said before there is hardly any traffic here so this works out well. It would be so nice to have an indoor arena but I don't see this every happening! LOL Unless I happen to win the lottery or something.

Look at the arched neck! Gilly can really look good when he wants to. I need to get some pictures of him when he sees my neighbors pony, talk about strutting your stuff. He can put on a show then!


See behind Gilly the road, I have a long way to ride up and down close to the house, don't have an arena either but I find places to work him. The road is a hard top but soft enough that he can work on it. We are careful when it's wet though, he can still slip if not careful.

Gilly had never had a little person ride him before and he wasn't sure just what to think about it all at first. He did some side stepping but she got on him anyway. After he figured out that she could ride he was OK with that. He liked her but wasn't sure about that small human being on his back! I think it's good for him to have different riders, Mike even got on him once, the only man who has ever been on him.

The second picture on the last post is a BIG favorite of mine, Gilly looks huge and very beautiful! Of course I am a bit bias! I do love my big bay boy!!!!

Priceless Pictures..............

More about these two pictures later, enjoy! (click on picture to make it larger!)

Chimnea, cutting hay, bareback ride.......

I was sitting outside on the patio watching the moon come up over the tree line when I took this picture. Beautiful. This was last Saturday evening, I've been busy doing things all week and just haven't posted any.

My little chimnea has been sitting out on the patio all winter just waiting for me to fire it up. Love to sit outside in the evening and watch the fire, listening to the whippoorwill sing it's night song. The roses and honeysuckle are blooming and their perfume is so intoxicating!

Close up of the fire, it's it pretty? Sometimes Gilly and Pokey will come to the fence close to the patio and stand and watch too, mostly I think they are waiting to see if I will go into the house and get them a slice or two of bread to munch on. Funny boys!

This picture was taken yesterday, Sunday, Mike's friend Rick came down with his big tractor and disc mower/conditioner. This really makes our hay dry fast, we only have a disc mower with no conditioner on it, when the grass isn't crimped it takes longer to dry, about a day longer. Yesterday was beautiful, hot sun and windy excellent for drying hay. Tuesday we will be baling and stacking it in the barn. Yay!!!

Sorry about this picture, Mike took it and since he doesn't know how to operate my 35mm digital he got it out of focus but you get the idea. Yes, that's me on Gilly bareback and with only a rope halter on. We rode up and down the road for a while. I had to climb up on the bucket of the backhoe to get on his back, I can't jump up from the ground like I did years ago. I'm just glad I can ride bareback, it's so much fun; Gilly was a good, good boy last night!

Friday ride

Had a pretty nice ride today about an hour long. It's been so rainy, gloomy and overcast that I almost didn't ride. The weather has been so rainy and stormy that we haven't gotten our first cutting of hay in. It doesn't look good for the coming week either. I thought a nice ride would make me feel better about it.
First we headed back the hollow on our property (all of these pictures were taken last week but I can't take pictures of myself soooo, I cheated a bit!)

Then we headed down the road, Lucy and Gonzo were tagging along also. Pokey couldn't go so he was mad, as usual. We rode past Kim's house and Lacy and Coco came running out to see Gilly. I let him stop to sniff noses and say hi to the girls, when we went on down the road. He is getting better only hesitated a couple of times and wanted to go back. We went quite a way down the road before turning to come back toward home. The ground here is so wet that Gilly's feet are a little tender and he didn't want to walk much on the gravel road. I let him walk on the grassy shoulder.

He needed a drink from the creek on the way back; licking the water off his lips.

Trailer Loading

This is Gilly ready to jump into the trailer; we had been working on it for several days and he was getting better at it. We are playing one of Parelli's games called the sending game. I wonder why I didn't think of using it before. Sheri came over and showed Kim and I this and Gilly remembered it and took right to it.

Hop right in there Gilly!!! You can see that we have the divider over. This just helps the horses not feel so confined and when their confidence is up and they are loading this way well then the divider will be fastened in place and we will start again. Gilly has already been in the trailer with it closed but won't stay in. That's OK though, he will build confidence and stay in. Then we will have to work on him loading on the other side. Gilly won't be in that side for the most part, unless there is a bigger horse riding with him. Gilly is bigger than Lacy so he will always ride on the drivers side. Heaviest horse always rides there; but he needs to learn to ride on either side. This will take longer but when finished he will be good to go in any situation.

Oh, good Gilly!!! He will stand in the trailer like this and doesn't care. I have put the stick behind him to simulate the butt bar and he doen'st mind. When I try this with the divider up he wants to back out but with work he will get used to it. He is backing out really well. This is what he had all the problems with before. He didn't like to back out but wanted to turn around and come out head first. Now he is backing out with no problem. Lacy is having more problems, she isn't as confident as Gilly. She will get herself worked into a tizzy and be dripping with sweat then finally load fine. Someday we will get to take them somewhere??? LOL

Riding Bareback with Pictures

Kim got some pictures of me riding bareback yesterday. However the ride wasn't as good as Saturday's ride, I was tired yesterday, but still it was fun! Love the above picture!
What am I doing with my foot??? I kept trying to press my seat bones into Gilly so I would stick to him, must have been really dropping my heels but my toes are sticking out! LOL But then it could be I was trying to get him to turn around my leg and pressing down with my seat bone on this side.
Yes, I am holding onto his mane, trying to keep from bouncing around. I know I will get better at this the more I do it, more practice. I have ridden every day since last Monday and I can see a big difference in Gilly's attitude, it's much better. He isn't being a stinker anymore. We have crossed the creek everyday and not once has he hesitated to cross now. We went past Kim's horse and pony today and he kept on going where I asked him to go, no stopping.

Whoopee! Here we are trotting, this is just too much fun. I still want to try the canter but better get better at the trot first! I think Gilly likes being ridden without the saddle on, he sure is a fun horse!

Trying to get Gilly to look at Kim so she could take our picture but he wanted to rub his head on me. I didn't ride a long time yesterday but today I rode for an hour; just a leisurely ride down the road and back. It was a beautiful day here today, a really nice breeze hardly any flies to bug Gilly so he was happy about that. This morning we did more trailer loading and he did just wonderful, got right in the trailer each time I asked him to. So far we have had the divider opened up, today I tried it with the divider in place and he went in and stayed for a short time. That's OK though I want him to feel confident in there before we try putting up the butt bar and shutting the door. I want to do it right and he won't have any problems with it that way.

Stealing this idea from Lisa.......The End!!!