I rode!

For like 5 minutes :) Lucas was extremely good though. I haven't ridden him since the middle of November and he wasn't so good then. I think that I have more problems with him going back to work than he does. I really lost my confidence about 4 years ago. Nothing specific that I can name, but just a general loss of feeling in control when on horseback. Im getting it back bit by bit, but its days like this when I really notice it. Now that Ive had a good ride on him I should be good to go. Its just that first ride back after an extended time off that makes my legs turn to jello.

So I lunged him for about 5 minutes (we kept one of the lesson kids and horses in the ring that Lucas likes to give me a 'comfort' horse as he acts better the more horses that are in the ring) and we didn't want to drive him, so then I got on and he was keeping his head a bit high, but very listening very well. One of the other lady's bought in her two year old to lunge a bit and one of the other kids brought in her horse to do showmanship, so he really relaxed then (well maybe I did!!!) We just walked around doing some small 2 tracking exercises to keep his brain on me while I got my sea legs then we trotted both directions practicing some transactions. Then I got off! The BO was willing to get on him for me for a couple of min before I did, but we've really starting working as a team when we are driving and I wanted to keep that. It felt a lot this summer like we were fighting each other most of the time, but these couple of months that I haven't been able to ride him our trust has increased a whole bunch. Im not just focusing on the under saddle work, but the entire horse.