Some Goal Setting

Aspire was really delightful to play with today! Great with the bag and dragging it behind her - I think we're ready to move up to dragging a barrel or something different.  Great with circles - even a few trotting laps on the 22' with her thinking toward me the whole time.  Stellar sideways at about 13', kept a nice, slight arc toward me but was overall very straight for the sideways.  Yo-Yo was excellent!  A light phase 1 to back out 22', let her think/wait out there for a minute then she'd either offer to come into me with two eyes/ears to wait politely for a slight suggestion and then she'd come right in.  Porcupine was good, nothing to write home about yet there.  Squeeze was great - more confidence over the barrels today for sure.  And, big news, I was able to pick up and clean out her hind feet today!!! I should have set my mind to accomplishing this months ago, but it wasn't really a priority in the big scheme of things.  But today I really made that a goal of mine, so I did lots of friendly with her hind legs then picked them up with a rope, when she was soft and wasn't kicking back and forth I changed the rope out for my hand and was able to proceed in cleaning them out!  I've had them up with a rope once or twice before, and briefly have been able to pick up/hold her hinds but not ever long enough to clean them out. :)  Trimmed up her fronts a bit today as well, the backs weren't bad looking so I think I'm going to play with them a bit more before trimming them.  It was really sweet, at the end of playing I put her in her pen and fed her.  I left to go into the barn to get something and when I came out she was standing at the fence looking for me, pacing a little until I got there, then stuck to me like glue around the pen and back over to her hay!  What a sweet girl.  :)

Also ordered some Dynamite vitamins for her and got some minerals as well.  Need to get some apple sauce and a syringe so we can prep for de-worming when the first frost comes.  Wish I had a nice warm arena to play in over the winter!

Some personal goals when playing with Spy - GET OUT AND DO THINGS!  I've always been a person to go play in an arena, round pen, square pen, or if lucky enough on a horse-playground when available.  I have been making a special effort to play with her out of the round pen and in the pastures instead.  Great chance to improve our communication and keep things provocative!  Other goal - USE ALL OF MY 22' LINE!  It's not 22' long so I can hold it at 15' if I don't need to.  I really need to increase the distance on-line so I can bring us closer in our language, leadership, and trust.