Learning to Lunge

So much has happened in the last month and a bit, it's not all going to fit into this post.  In short, I've started riding again, Artemis has been doing awesome in her training (more about that in this post) I started a new job (which I need to be up at 4 am for, which majorly sucks), I went to a horse show for three days to support a friend and that was definitely an interesting experience, and we passed the one year mark of me breaking my arm.  I'll try to stop being lazy and actually write about these in future posts.

Artemis has been great.  She never ceases to amaze me with her willingness to please.  Seriously, this time last year, she was a nightmare.  She didn't want to come in and would put up a fight each and every time we brought her in.  So far (knock on wood) she's been coming in happily. 

We've been working on lunging.  I've never met a horse that picked up on it so quickly, especially considering I've only done it a handful of times myself.  The first time we did it was in the round pen, so she had the sides of the pen to guide her.  The first couple of times I asked she just stood there and stared at me, completely confused.  Then, after a little guidance, she got it.  By the end of it (she only ever gets lunged for ten minutes max because she's young) she was even whoaing just to my voice. 

The next time we went to lunge it was too hot outside so we decided to give it a go into the arena.  Again, it took a couple tries before she understood what I was asking but she got it quickly.  She tries so hard and gets extremely frustrated when she doesn't understand what I'm asking.  As long as I stay patient with her, she gets it though and she's getting to be an old hand at lunging.

I brought my sister with me one day to film her lunging and after we were finished, I left Artemis free in the arena while I cleaned up after her.  She's like my shadow.  Anytime I'm near her, all she does is follow me.

As you can see, I'm not that great at lunging myself but I think considering we're both new to this, she does pretty good.

And here she is following me around.  I think she looks massive compared to me but she's still only 14.3.  You have no idea how much I'm dying for her to grow one more inch.

The second last time I was out, Artemis was not so good.  I hadn't worked with her in two weeks though so while she wasn't horrible, it was obvious she'd had too much time off.  My friend K led her in for me and Artemis took advantage of the fact that it was someone new.  She was trying to lead K instead of the other way around and kept pretending to be afraid of everything.  Unfortunately for her, K doesn't fall for that kind of thing and little Miss Artemis had to pay attention.

Last time I saw her she had two-year-old brain going on.  Focusing was not something she did.  However, two-year-old brain is still so much better than yearling brain and even though she wasn't focused, I was able to get her to do what I wanted. 

That's all about Artemis for now.  I have a few things I'm planning on doing with her so hopefully I'll have more interesting news to report soon.