Mara counts to 4 and hops

I'd only ever lunged Mara over 3 raised cavaletti and wanted to try for 4. I put them a little closer together to make it easier, but that was probably a mistake.

She was halfway through when she saw the added pole. She did her best extension and took the last two as one. I was amazed. I laughed at her, "That was wrong actually."

Then she tried cantering through, hoping that would go better. It didn't.

Finally she considered a third option: It's pole #4, so treat it like 1-3. She did it. I was so proud. She really powers over those things. Cavaletti work is great fun with Mara because she hates to touch them so they stay put.

We did our games and she's improving. Yesterday she was totally distracted by people working with their horses and I learned one of the main functions of those games - to get the horse's attention at least partially back to the job/person on the other end of the line. She's a multitasker - apparently even a very distracted horse can do the games. Oh well. I know they want the horse looking at you with two eyes but I don't want to be yanking her in the face constantly, and that seems to be the method for getting both eyes.

Today I brought two rain barrels to the arena to make a little jump by lying them end to end. Yesterday I'd given one to Mara to play with at home, and she licked it, pawed it, bit it, rolled it around, she had a great time with it.

Her first trotting approach to the barrels, she slammed to a stop and looked at me with such a look, "Why, this is impossible! What are you asking me?" As if I'd asked her to walk through a solid wall. She thought I'd push the issue and was quite stressed, but I just laughed and gave her a carrot. No, it wasn't rewarding a refusal, she honestly thought it was impossible. She reached down and pawed at it.

The next time she approached, she also stopped, but this time she pawed at it til it rolled a bit and made a space for her to pass between the two. "There, NOW it's possible" she seemed to say. I laughed again.

I put them together again and demonstrated for her that it's possible to get a body over them, by walking over them myself. She followed, but one leg at a time, like the barrels were ground poles. So funny.  I said, "Mara, just HOP. Like a bunny!"

I stuck a cavaletti pole into one of them to keep them from rolling quite so easily, and I started jogging her over the pole, not the barrels. I knew that she's distractable and eventually she'd forget where she was going, like she does when she sometimes ends up trotting through that massive puddle in the arena. Oops, I wasn't watching, now I'm soaked.

Sure enough, she forgot about it and suddenly the barrels were directly in front and I clucked to her and she jumped! Woo! I praised her and we went away from there for a while as a reward.

Two more times and we were done, she learned she can actually leave the earth for a moment. I had that moment of worry that everyone has the first time they teach a horse to jump: Great, now they know they can...so will they jump their fence and leave?

BTW I'm not interested in jumping - I just want this to be one of the games.

Then I got on her and had one of the best 10 minute rides ever. It had been 1.5 weeks since I'd sat on a horse and I felt that wonderful surge of pleasure you get when they take that first step after you haven't ridden in a while. Oh, it's good to be on a horse!

I paid attention to her leg movements, which leg was moving when, and due to this, I was able to time my leg yield requests so much better (even though I was paying attention before, this time I wasn't just paying attention to her leg movement, but my hip movement that resulted). She was focused on me for the most part, and when I simply thought "one,two,one,two" in my mind, she trotted for me, both directions. I was able to sit her trot easily.

Then some other people showed up and wanted to use the arena so I quit after getting a nice halt and back.

Then she ground tied like an angel while I cleaned up all my toys. I gave her the last of the carrot slices and we went home.

But not before both Nordic and Levisto, the two most beautiful geldings there, flirted with her while being groomed, both of them had their necks arched, ears pointed at her, and eyes shining as if they were competing for her. She squealed and stomped, even though we were not that close to them.

Good girl Mara, let's have more days like today.