Summer is coming

Summer is on it's way here in Denmark now, it is getting much warmer and the mud is drying up. The horses are enjoying it a lot. The horse above is Gallahad, a PRE that Bent has in training.
The days have been as normal here on Lindegården since i last wrote, with only a few happenings: Emma and Tom have gone home, and a new practicant from Germany, Manuela, arrived a week ago.
I was away on a short holiday to Netherland for 4 days meeting up with friends and relaxing and going to conserts.
After that i got a bad cold and was sick with fever for a week. Except from that not much is new.

The riding is going well on Blåi, she is now sure on the aids and the shoulder in both on the circle and along the the wall. The quarter in is getting better and better on the circle.
The trott is also coming along nicely now, and i have started to collect her a bit more.
I trott we are also working on the shoulder in. She is a good girl!!!

Mulle was just about to get back to old form and doing all the sidemovements and collection nicely, but last weekend she started to lame slightly on her left front leg.
It has gotten better through the week, and i rode her a bit yesterday, but 'i'll take it easy with her for a while longer.


Filur is doing well, he likes standing outside sleeping in the warm sun, i have not been riding him so much lately, but always in the weekends.
But he has a new little habbit which i find very cute!!!
In the mornings when i come to brush him he has desided that it is a lot more cosy to get comfy in the straw and be cuddled by me, that to be brushed. So very often he has layd down when i come in to him, sometimes a cat, or Kimo comes in and joins us as well.
I love it, but it does mean that i get a lot of stress getting all my other chores done after we are finished with our morning cuddle session :-)

Another Mulle video

Here is another video from todays lesson. What Bent is saying here is that he finds it very interesting how Mulle has developed. Because when he first saw her she was VERY high in the hind quarter, even for a Quarter horse, and this training has helped her a lot to lift the shoulders and move more freely with the front legs. And that you almost don't notice that the rear end is any higher then the front any more.

So that means i must be doing something right :-)

I am sorry to say that I have not managed to upload the once of Blåi and Filur on Youtube yet. Bot i have not given up.

But i will put one more video from today's lesson in soon, where you get to see a little bit of trott as well.

Oh, and by the way... I get the morning off tomorrow. Now that is luxury, not having to be in the stable at 6 in the morning. YAHOOOOO

Good night and sleep tight!

Uploading videos........

Hello
I am still trying to upload videos....
The once we took of Blåi and me on the lesson yesterday is too long to upload here in the blogg, but I am now trying to upload those on Youtube so that i can link to them from the blogg.
But it has been loading for almost 4 hours now the one that is 9 mins long, and still it is not even half way loaded. So i don't know if this will work :-( I am really not good with computer stuff.....
But I will continue to try.

My lessons today went very well, had one on Mulle and one on Filur. Yvonne filmed me again, but did many short clips instead of one long one. So I am right now trying to upload a video of Mulle and me here in the blogg. Really hope this is gonna work!!!!
If it does i can put in more videos of Mulle and Filur here :-)
Sitting here waiting impatiently now.......
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Still waiting...............................................................................................................................................
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Have made myself some food now. and still this little video has not loaded........
Well, well, i'll keep waitin........................................................................................................................
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Yes!!!! Finally!!!!! Now it worked!!!!

So this is Mulle and me having our lesson today. The format is a bit strange, but i don't know how to edit and stuff, so you just have to live with that we look a bit long and strange...

Will upload some more videos soon!

201 and a video

Good evening!

What a wonderful day!!!!! I have had a super riding day today.

I got 2 lessons today. I rode Blåi on the first one, where we worked on the pliee ( slight shoulder in) and the versade ( shoulder in). Blåi's hind legs have now gotten really good, but her shoulders and front legs still need work. The thing that is happening is that her front legs still push a bit too much backwards, and because the stride from her hind legs is so good now, the hind legs sometimes hit into the front legs. This is a normal situation in the education, and the way to solve it now is to ride her in a slight shoulder in so that the hind leg gets space to be set down in between the front legs. The shoulde in also teaches the horse to start lifting the shoulders and the front legs more and move them more freely. So that this problem of her sometimes stepping on her own front legs will go away when she is stronger and more supple. So this is just part of the prosess. Thanks to a week student who has a digital camera we filmed my lesson on Blåi today so that you can see us in action. Thank you very much Yvonne!!!!

Then, in the afternoon today Bent gave me a lesson on Filur. It was ride # 201, and today it finally went a lot better. Bent helped me a lot and incouraged me and i managed nice shoulder in and quarter in in both hands. In both collection and forward down. He was carrying nicely on his hind legs and was nice in my hand, working propperly over the back. It all felt smoth and soft. I was in the seventh heaven after my lesson. It felt sooooooo nice to manage to ride Filur a bit better again. Yahoooooooo!!!

Then after evening work i had another training session with Blåi. Yvonne, the week student who is here now was so kind to help me. She had Blåi on the longje while i was riding her. In that way she could help me to explain to Blåi exactly what my aids mean and what i want. The shoulder in's were all really really good, and she also got a lot of nice steps in quarter in. I think she understood the quarter in a lot better now when Yvonne could help her a bit as well. Will work her like that a bit more in the weekend. And then i think that she will master the travers in no time as well!

Mulle was the last one to get ridden today. She made very nice versade and travers in forward down and in collection. And we did a bit renvers as well. The trott is also getting better and we worked a bit of shoulder in in the trott. Tomorrow Yvonne is gonna film my lesson with Mulle as well, so then you will be able to see her in action as well. She is very positiv and has a nice energy when we work together. She really does her best all the time!!!

Will upload a video of Mulle video tomorrow ( if i manage to upload the one i am trying to upload here today that is, it takes a loooong time to load....)

Nope, the files were to big to upload here. Working on the problem and will try show it to you soon!

Hugs, good night and stay in the now!

Fencing cats, Blåi's shoulder-inn and a bit of a rough time

Hello
Hope you enjoyed Kimo's little entry the other day!
No wonder he respects the cats now, i got this picture of Madelen and Petrine as they took a break between fencing practice....( The fencing gear is here because we sometimes train it to get better body coordination and balance for the riding)

I have had a bit of a hard time the last few days, bad riding days, feeling tired and aching a lot in my body from the work. Yesterday i rode Filur for the 200th time. It did not go very well, so what was supposed to be a celebration with cake and champaigne ended up making me feel as a useless rider. But hopefully things will get better.
Today has been very busy because we have to get everything ready for tomorrow when it is public evening work. We have cleaned tack, raked the whole yard and set out chairs.
Tomorrow all the horses have to be washed and cleaned til they are spotless ( of course the Knabsrupers get to keep their spots...) and shiny.

But, i do have some good news too:

Blåi has made huge progress the last few days and does now understand the shoulder inn on the circle. The quarter in is coming along a bit slower, but i think she will understand that very soon as well. She is a smart lady and learns very quickly. She is very even at both sides now, and i can't feel a difference in quality between the right and the left side, which is very good!She has a lot of energy and uses it very positiv by trying her best all the time.She did some transitions from walk to trott today, and they were very nice, even though that was not what i asked for. I had to take her back down to walk, and could not reward it because it was not what i had asked of her. BUT: Those transitions showed that she has strenght and balance enough to carry herself nicely in trott as well soon.

Mulle has a lot of energy at the moment and is coming along nicely. This evening i worked on versade-renvers and travers-travers transitions, which went ok. We are still a way from where we used to be, but we are getting there. Will ride her on my lesson tomorrow.

More pictures of her are coming soon!

Hugs m

A dogs life

Bark and hello!
I am Kimo, i think my mom has told you about me before, but now i think it is about time that i write a bit in this blog myself. At the moment i am a practicant dog in Denmark. You would not belive how hard work it is and how much there is to look after.... But i have been on this farm before, so it has been easy to get into the work routines again.
On this farm there are a lot of horses. Here is a picture of me together with old spotty as i call him. He is one of my moms favorits and quite a nice bloke. I actually met a dog once that was as spotty as he is. Strange really.
I think the horses are ok, but i don't like when they make a lot of noice at feeding time.
I like my moms horse a lot, sometimes i even give her a lick on the nose.
But horses can be very boooooooooooring to. When the humans are sitting on them in the riding arena i always have to lie down and keep quiet. Even when i have my ball with me i'm not allowed to play in there. That is not fair! The horses get to run and play....

But outside and everywhere else on the farm i can play as much as i want to. I like playing!!!
A few days ago i found this brilliant little ball outside, and i have had a lot of fun with it.
Sometimes mom plays with me to, but i run much faster then her, so i get to have the ball most of the time. She is a bit silly though, because every time she does get a hold of it she just trows it through the air, and i always get to it before her.
When i am not playing i am working. Here i am looking after that mom is ok while she is getting straw. I like jumping up on the big bales. From there i can see the whole barn and keep an eye on everything.

And then there is the mucking out of course, always mucking out. Those horses poo a lot!!!

But i do like to catch a ride when i can!!!

Whenever we go inside i always feel very tired and try to have as many naps as possible. To begin with i had a few problems though as the cats always seemd to lay down on my bed or in my sleeping cave. But now we have settled our differences. The cats are actually not so bad when you get to know them.

The other day we all had a nap together on the sofa, when Petrine ( the black cat) told jokes to Matilda and me. But we did not quite understand them, so we ended up looking at her in wonder while she was the only on laughing her head off:

Matilde scared me a bit the other day, i seriously thought that she had broken her back and died.

As i came in she was laying like this on our pillow:

But luckily she was only sleeping, i can't understand how that can be comfortable?????

Well, well, now i sometimes lay down beside her to make sure that she stops sleeping in such a silly way!

All in all i guess it is quite good living her. And there are many humans who like me and pet me here. It is actually quite fun being a practicant dog!

Bark and lick from Kimo :-)

A little update

I'm sorry, it has been a while now, hasn't it? Well, here i am, and here is a short update on the happenings the last week.
Mulle has finally started to settel in a bit, and she feels a lot more supple and relaxed than she has done. I am glad that i have 4 month instead of 3 here, so that it does not matter so much that she needed the first month just to settle in. We still have loads of time to learn and get better together. Mulle is such a brilliant horse, so kind and well behaved always.
An though her body is built slightly unfortunate she always works hard and tries her very best.I am so proud of my little horse!!! We are working on the quarter in and the shoulder in on the circle right now, in forward down and in collection. I don't think it will be too long until we are back to were we used to be.

Blåi is doing very well. I had a lesson on her today, and for the first time her right hind leg was acctually better then the left one. This is normal when focusing on excercising the weaker leg for a while, it suddently ends up beeing the better leg.
So now she knows the aids for making the cirkle bigger and smaler on the circle in both hands.

Tomorrow we will start working carefully on the sidemovements on the circle. And soon also try to trott a little bit. She is such a sweet hearted and kind horse, always very polite, but in a playfull and happy way. She seems to enjoy the training a lot.

Both Mulle and Blåi have gotten used to the mirrors as well now, so that is good.

I have not ridden Filur so much this last week. We are still only on time number 197, but hopefully I will get to work him more again now. I already have a little bottle of Champaign in the fridge for the day we will celebrate our 200. ride together :-)
I feel that i still need some time to get into riding him propperly again. I have not been riding regularly for 1,5 years before I came her now, so ot takes time to relax and start feeling through the horse again. But we will get there!

From Thursday til Thuesday I had a visit from my boyfriend. It was great, he helped out with all the chores every day and made great food. On saturday we all went for a ride in the wood together, we were 6 horses all together. It was a great day, and we all enjoyed it very much!

Will put in more pictures of our hack if Tom or Emma have some nice ones.

Now i have only 2 days left being the extra practicant. From the first of next month I will be a normal stable practicant, and i am really looking forward to it.

Until now I have helped out with the normal stable duties on top of doing the other chores that i have been given this month. Yesterday and today I have fixed the stallion padock, and before that i worked a lot on the old barn. Will show you pictures of how nice it all looks now soon!

I'd better get to bed, will write again soon!

Sleep tight and stay in the now!

m x