It's happening

Double dose of good news:

1. The counter canter came back easy peasy and just as nice as before.
2. Hubby guilt tripped himself into driving me to the show in his company truck. Because no, I don't have mine back yet. Or even know where it is right now tbh. 

it's all coming up roses around here.
or dandelions.

I ended up giving Opie Tuesday off after our rodeo on Monday, and in fifteen minutes on Wednesday had run through a solid warm up followed by a steady, relaxed counter canter pattern from 2-2.

I originally planned on doing the cc diagonals again Thursday along with the serpentine with the simple changes, and then the cc serpentine from 2-3 on Friday with Saturday off. That wasn't the best plan, but fortunately things worked themselves out for me.

I went out first thing Thursday morning and he was going so well I hit all of those things in one ride with great success. When I brought him back to the trot out of all that canter, he was like butter in hands so we wrapped up with some sitting trot. Lateral work and the medium trots were A++. He was really feeling like a real deal Second horse which is--let's be honest--something that's always felt just out of reach for my piss poor riding skills and "off-breed" dressage horses. 

puppy watching lessons while waiting for opie's
pemf lady to arrive

Since he was so good, I ended up giving him Friday off which. Riding prooooobabllly wasn't going to happen anyway as I got my second COVID shot Thursday afternoon and I felt like a fucking zombie. I was SO TIRED that moving off the couch was a monumental task. I did manage to go grocery shopping, buy dog food, and stand there for half an hour while Opie got his PEMF done. I drank about twenty gallons of fluids to try to head anything serious off, and after twelve hours (from 8am to 8pm) it was like a switch flipped and my body was like, "Okay done with that nonsense! We're good to go now!"

I'm going to give a good stretch ride this afternoon and make sure the canter is adjustable within the gait as final prep for tomorrow. We don't ride until mid-afternoon to wrap the show up so he'll get several hours of turnout before we have to head out which hopefully does good things for his neurotic brain. You never know which #child is going to appear for the first show of the year with Dopie Horse.