Sheesh its hot here!

It was boiling hot already when I got to the yard this morning so I thought we could have a short play in the school before I turned Breeze out for the day.

Breeze is becoming calmer on the circle game and we played with COD today without her blowing up by taking lots of time and slowly asking her and only using the c/s if I really had to. I found a new way to help her not go RB on weave too. I ask her to do her favourite thing and side pass over the last cone at each end! I have noticed whenever she either doesn't want to do something or is feeling unconfident she will either explode or offer sideways, particularly if she doesn't want to circle lol. I usually take what she offers and then try whatever it is she couldn't do.

Bringing my life up and asking her to do something energetic like canter or jump something also makes her explode so I try to ask her immediately to go sideways over something too. Today after almost exploding when I asked for COD, but calming down immediately and doing a lot of COD without more exploding, then almost before jumping a jump I asked her to side pass a pole she went introverted and put her head down. I let her rest and stroked her head while she blinked and waited for her to lick and chew and lift her head up. Then she was ready for something else. I make sure whatever we do, is successful. Sometimes she will be ready for a few different things, sometimes we can play more with one thing. Some days she will not go introverted again, like today. Other days she will keep going in and out so then it's time to end the session. I try to always leave the school on a positive note which can be just lots of friendly if she has been introverted or lots of treats if she did something new or just did what I asked. I always reward the try no matter how small and it gladdens my heart that I remember she is never wrong.

I suddenly realised today how far I have come. I remember in level 1 with Lizzie everything was stunted, awkward and because she was a LBI, hard work. As we progressed the games became more fluid but Lizzie just couldn't physically do it. Now with Breeze, I have a horse that is more than able and our 7 games flow into each other in no particular order. Real play with a capital P and I no longer wonder what to do next. It's as if suddenly I have all those arrows readily available in the quiver to hand.

It used to be such hard work for me to think of things to do. Now my thoughts flow like a river 'what about this, why don't we play this? Breeze offers sideways so we go sideways, then change direction and then we have falling leaf etc etc. Half an hour, an hour goes by without me noticing or caring. All my worries and problems are forgotten. The rest of the world doesn't exist. People and horses have come and gone from the school and although I am aware of them spatially it doesn't really register lol. Jan once came and sat on a jump side in the middle of the school to watch us and I didn't realise for quite a while! Bliss.