Heels Down, Kick On

#14   A Whole Lotta History A few months back, I wrote a post about how the initial suggestion I try Flora came about.   If you read that post, you’ll know that I was promised a very lovely, very quiet, ‘Nana’ of a horse, who would be lots of fun and give me no issues at all. I have to say, ‘Nana’ horses are not my style. Nor are complete tornadoes of death, but given the fact I’d had 11 years off, I thought a ‘Nana’ Thoroughbred would give me the ideal compromise. At the time, Flora was 13 years old. Not a youngster; but not an actual ‘Nana’ either. She’s actually the same age as Valegro. A few weeks after meeting her and her owner for the first time, being the complete geekazoid that I am, I wanted the full details of her background and history. Using her Weatherbys passport, which names her only as ‘Bay Filly’ (*sniff*), I set to work Googling the f*ck out of her. I don’t know what I was imagining finding. Pictures of her as a foal maybe. Blowing out the candles on her

Tonight is more of a sedate affair than last night. Last night was spent standing on a chair in my dressing gown, drinking too much Sauvvy B and howling Oasis into a piece of kindling, while my bemused husband looked on. Inevitably, my intention to hack out today turned into a pampering session for Flora instead. Her back legs are a tad puffy on and off, and her scabs are peeling off left, right and centre 😷 but she seems otherwise fit and well, which is a relief. Even minor injuries to our equine friends can lead to infection taking hold, and the previous week or two had been a worry. Tomorrow, we are off hacking with our friends. It will be Oct 1st, so there may well be some pheasants, some gunshots and some stained pants💩, but autumn is coming, it's fresh, it's pretty, there are fewer flies and we love it 🍁🍂❤️ Back to my sedate Malbec now. Happy Saturday Night all xx #horsebloggers

#12 Accident Today was meant to be our dressage lesson at a dressage yard. Unfortunately, it didn't quite go to plan. Flora travelled beautifully but when we arrived, it started to rain torrentially. As we were being shown where I could take Flora to tie her up, she slipped on a shallow concrete ramp with her wet feet and went down, panicking when she couldn't get a purchase to stand back up. 😔 The whole incident lasted a mere few seconds, but it really wasn't nice seeing her on the ground and looking so shocked afterwards. It just goes to show what freakish things can happen in a split second, even with a very calm and happy horse, and the rider on the ground. She calmed down within seconds and was very brave indeed, but she has some nasty cuts and bumps. She was the perfect patient while we sorted out her wounds and travelled home happily for more first aid, some Bute and a feed. Fingers crossed she will be fine - who knows, maybe she planned it all along...

#11  Dressage Stressage So our next little outing will be some DRESSAGE 😱😱😱 We have a lesson tomorrow night, during which we really must practise our test, since I've only just bothered to look and see what it is, never mind learn it, and the competition is on Sunday 😳 We then have another lesson with an actual dressage rider on Friday, which I'm really looking forward to, but am also a teensy bit shatting my pants about. I'm only doing a Prelim test, but here's the thing: I absolutely, totally, completely and utterly HATE flatwork. I am shit at it. My legs aren't strong enough, my hands aren't consistent enough and I cannot keep Flora in an outline. She doesn't help matters with her jaw clenching and general resistance for the first half an hour of work, but I think this is where we are kindred spirits: all she wants to do is go fast and jump things, and all I want to do is point her at fences and fly over them ✈️. It's not called flatW