Saddled Up and Ready To Go

So here we are. We're saddled up and ready at the mount and it's time to go for a ride. Oh yeah, but first I have to teach them to stand still so I can get on without them taking off before I get my foot in the stirrup. Gracie caught on to this quite quickly but good ole Dixie gave me problems with that. Oh yeah and lets not forget the day that I'm just sitting on Gracie's back, trying to teach her to stand still and she takes off to the barn with me and no reins to steer her with, only a lead rope. That proved for an interesting little ride as she sidled up to every fence she could bounce me off of saying "GET OFF ALREADY!"  Now, Miss Dixie is the back up expert........unless of course you ask her to. It took a bit of convincing, but we finally got better at it.

So I took some video to send to Julia, to show her what a great rider I was!  Bahaaahaa! I get this comment back from her!

You are a green as grass rider. Dixie is the perfect horse for you. What a good buy you made when you got her. 

The first place we will start is control. 

When you are riding dixie, you should only use the reins when you want her to change something that she's doing. 

The way you are riding her right now, it looks like you are hanging on to the reins for balance. You are always hanging on to her a little bit, just in case she might go faster than you want her to. 

When you tell your horse to go, don't be surprised when she goes. tell her what direction you want, and then let her go there. 

I'd like to see you turn loose of those reins (by that I mean, put some slack in them) for a few strides at a time. Get used to the fact that Dixie will carry you where you want to go even tho you are not micromanaging every step.

And now it is up to Julia to fix this problem! 

Well, I thought that perhaps Julia should meet Miss Dixie Doll in person, cause that horse is not what she appears to be, but man can she act for the camera! Yet of the two of them, yeah, I would trust Dixie on her back before I would trust Gracie, yet I wanted to show Julia that I wasn't totally backward when it came to Gracie, so I saddled her up one cold day and rode her up and down the road to show her that it could be done however sloppy it was. This was Julia's reply:

I am stunned!!!!

Totally blown away!!!

OMGosh, I love you!!! Will you marry me?

Yep, I'm on my way to being a Pro!  Just watch and see!